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Makinde, who declared an asset of N48 billion before becoming governor, says poor remuneration encourages corruption.

Governor Seyi Makinde has disclosed that he earns only N650,000 as monthly salary.

The governor who lamented the poor remuneration in the state’s civil service pledged the commitment of his administration towards addressing the issue.

Makinde had declared an asset of N48 billionupon assumption of office.

Addressing the newly sworn-in commissioners in the state, Makinde noted that that poor remuneration encourages corruption.

The governor stated that under his leadership, it would be business unusual, as he would do everything possible to ensure that workers in the state were not exposed to the temptations of corruption.

“We do have challenges and I can give you an example of the kind of issues that we are faced with. When I was on the podium being sworn-in, I announced that I was donating my salary to the pension board,” Makinde began.

“I actually thought my salary was going to be like three or four million naira monthly. But, when I came in here, I discovered that my salary is only six hundred and fifty naira (N 650,000) monthly, which is less than two thousand dollars ($2,000). And then, I have a budget of over five hundred million dollars. 

“How can somebody earning $24,000 a year preside over a five hundred million dollar budget? The temptation is just too high. 

“When I was growing up, anytime I saw permanent secretaries and top civil servants, all around with their entourage, jeeps, Land cruisers, I thought they were making it big because I was driving Peugeot or Toyota Camry.

“But when I came in here, the salary of Permanent Secretaries is under N500,000 per month; in such an environment where you have contractors coming with big temptations. The expectation is just too great and high. But the good news is, we will find a solution to this. It’s going to business unusual in Oyo State,” the Governor said.

He charged all the commissioners to key into his vision and manifesto of accelerated development of Oyo State, adding that the administration would conduct business in an unusual manner that would change the narrative about governance in the state.

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The Oyo State Governor, Mr Seyi Makinde, on Friday unveiled the e-registration programme of the Nigeria Immigration Service for all migrants (non-Nigerians) in the 33 local government areas of the state.

Makinde said the exercise was coming at the period the country was facing security challenges.

He said no meaningful development could take place where there was insecurity because no investor would invest where there was insecurity.

The governor said one of his cardinal objectives was to address security threat in the state, adding that the e-registration for migrants would help tackle insecurity, plan and know the total number of people to be budgeted for in the state.

Makinde said, “The state appreciates the NIS for the exercise because it will assist the state to leave up to its responsibilities. Those concerned should comply adequately without wasting time to avoid going to jail or being reprimanded.”

In his speech, the state Comptroller of NIS, Saleh Abdullahi, said the registration would help to identify and determine the migration status of resident migrants in the state and Nigeria in general.

Abdullahi said that the registration would also enhance the internal security of Nigeria.

Punch

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The Former Kano State Governor and Senator Representing Kano Central Senatorial District, Mallam Ibrahim Shekarau has slammed Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike for allegedly demolishing a mosque in Port Harcourt.

He described the action as barbaric and totally condemnable.

Shekarau, said in a statement he personally signed on Friday that “all rationale and conscious citizens of this great country, Nigeria should join in condemning the Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike for recklessly demolishing the Rainbow Town Central Mosque located at the Trans-Amadi Area of Port Harcourt and for irresponsibly declaring Rivers State a “Christian State,” and claiming to owe no apology to anyone.”

He added: “Muslims and other right-thinking and peace-loving citizens of this country should come together to condemn, in strongest terms, this irresponsible, reckless, rabble-rousing Governor whose apparent aim is to ignite a religious conflagration, the kind of which has never been seen in recent times.

“If a Muslim Governor were to come out openly and declare his state a “Muslim State” and proceed to demolish a church for any reason, all hell would have since broken loose in Nigeria, and sections of the Christian community would have since rushed to the “international community” and even the United Nations seeking protection against Muslims.”

The former Minister went on: “The action of Governor Wike is a pointer to his being induced by other than rationale brain waves, as no leader in his right senses would contemplate stoking these embers of discord in a country so religiously, ethnically and regionally charged as Nigeria.”

“We must repeat that were a Muslim Governor to be reckless to utter even half of what Governor Wike uttered, the fragile peace holding in this country would have since been jeopardized because of the intolerant nature of a section of the citizenry.

“Yet here we are, with the added tragedy of a cohort Christian clergy lining up to bless and endorse Governor Wike’s action.”

According to him: “Nigeria belongs to all, and no state in Nigeria could claim to be mono religious.

“It only takes a responsible leadership to carry everybody along. When I held sway as governor of Kano State between 2003 and 2011, we encouraged and guided the people to lead their lives according to the tenets of Islamic Law (Shari’ah).

”But we neither became power-drunk to demolish Churches nor disregarded the provisions of section 10 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to declare Kano an Islamic State.

“Our fair dealings with every section of the community earned us commendation, even from Kano State Chapter and National Body of Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) at different occasions.”

Shekarau further noted that, “these Christian leaders are a still alive today to attest to my claim.

“It may interest Wike to learn that Mr. Tala Ilo from Bayelsa State and Mr. Chris Chibuzor Azuka from Anambra State, (both, born-again Christians) were special advisers in my administration.

“Wike’s claim that Rivers is a Christian State is pathological lies. It suggests that not only are the people of Rivers State 100% Christians but Muslims and adherents of other religions from other parts of Nigeria cannot make Rivers State their home.

” It also insinuates that Rivers State operates a government, a constitution of its own, different from the Nigerian Nation.

“It means Rivers State does not recognize or protect the interests of people like Alabo Mujahid Dokubo Asari, Alhaji Isa Boaima, Alhaji Sani Okiri, Alhaji Ahmed Sani Pe, Alhaji Abdul’aziz Pepple, Alhaji Sulaiman Akani, Alhaji Ibrahim Orlu, Alhaji Musa Brown, Chief Hassan Douglas and Alhaji Mustapha Wakama who are all Muslims and productive citizens of Rivers.

TheNation

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TOYOTA and Suzuki will take small equity stakes in each other, the Japanese carmakers said, as they seek to develop newer technologies and meet sweeping changes upending the global auto industry.

The tie-up is the latest example of automakers chasing scale to manage costs and boost development. Automakers – especially smaller ones like Suzuki – are struggling to meet the breakneck growth of an industry transformed by the rise of electric vehicles (EVs), ride-hailing and autonomous driving.

Toyota will pay around 96 billion yen ($908 million) for a 4.94 per cent stake in Suzuki, while Suzuki will acquire in the market around 48 billion yen ($454 million) worth of shares in Toyota.

That is equivalent to 0.2 per cent of Toyota’s shares as of Wednesday’s closing price, before the announcement.

The companies said in a joint statement they intended to overcome challenges facing the industry by “building and deepening cooperative relationships in new fields while continuing to be competitors”. They said they would strengthen technologies and products in which each of them specialize in.

The firms had said in 2016 they were exploring a partnership, citing technological challenges and the need to keep up with industry consolidation.

Earlier this year they said they would produce EVs and compact cars for each other.

Automakers around the globe have been joining forces to slash development and manufacturing costs of new technology. Ford and Volkswagen have said they will spend billions of dollars to jointly develop electric and self-driving vehicles. Also read: EdoJobs to graduate 400 youths from Data Science, EdoBits, other training programmes Shares of Toyota and Suzuki closed little changed before the announcement.

The deal brings Suzuki firmly into Toyota’ orbit, alongside Daihatsu, Hino Motors, Subaru, Mazda and Yamaha. Rival Nissan has an alliance with France’s Renault, although that has been shaken following the ouster of former Chairman Carlos Ghosn, and with Mitsubishi Motors.

Honda has a tie-up with General Motors. Toyota has been looking to expand scale in next-generation technology and said this year it would offer free access to patents for EV motors and power control units.

It believes that move would help it cut by as much as half the outlays for expanded electric and hybrid vehicle components in the United States, China and Japan. Supplying rivals would greatly expand the scale of production for hardware. Suzuki, which specializes in affordable compact cars, had been struggling to keep pace with the huge costs of investing in research and development for automated driving functions.

Toyota said in June it aims to get half of its global sales from electrified vehicles by 2025, five years ahead of schedule, and will tap Chinese battery makers to meet the accelerated shift to electricity-powered cars.

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The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, has said half of the challenges confronting Nigeria will be over if youths are properly engaged in the administration of the country.

Gbajabiamila, who was represented by the Deputy Speaker, Idris Wase, said this at the National Christian and Muslim Youths Summit in Abuja on Thursday.

According to a statement by the Deputy Speaker’s Chief Press Secretary, Umar Puma, Gbajabiamila urged the youth to resist being used by politicians to cause trouble along religious lines.

The Speaker, who lamented that some politicians had continued to use religion to cause mayhem in the country, stated that, “This should not be the case because we are all human beings and were created by God.”

He said, “I believe if we get it right with the youth, we will have solved at least 50 per cent of the nation’s problems.

“In a secular state such as ours, religious tolerance should be the watchword. We must appreciate the fact that we are all created by one God and must resist the temptation of engaging in inter religious crisis and continuous killing of innocent people in the name of religion.

“If the youth, who are often engaged by unscrupulous persons to perpetrate violence, get to understand and apply what both faiths teach, sponsors of crimes will not see anyone to enlist for evil.”

According to the Speaker, both Islam and Christianity are religions of peace and adherents of both faiths believe in resurrection, judgment and paradise.

Punch

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The Lagos State House Assembly has launched a probe into the purchase of 820 buses during the administration of former Governor, Akinwunmi Ambode.

According to the lawmakers, they decided to investigate the purchase of the 820 of the 5,000 buses since Ambode proposed an estimated N45b for the state’s mass transit project, in spite of the lawmakers’ objection.

In a motion titled: Lagos State House of Assembly Motion Number 2, Gbolahan Yishawu (Eti Osa 2), during the 2017 Executive/ Legislative parley that Ambode informed the lawmakers that the state government would buy 5,000 buses.

Ambode was said to have proposed to spend N17b to purchase the buses in the 2017 budget, which the House did not approve.

“In the 2018 and 2019 budgets, the state government proposed N24b and N7b respectively, which were not also approved, but the state government went ahead to import 820 buses at N7b and out of them 520 are still awaiting clearance at the ports,” he said.

He added that the House was concerned that the 520 buses, which were purchased by Ambode with taxpayers’ money without approval, were awaiting clearance at the bonded warehouse and the Port.

Responding, Speaker of the House, Mudashiru Obasa stressed the need to prevent future occurrence because the money had been spent.

“The vehicles are in the ports and they have been there for almost a year. The state will continue to suffer if we allow the buses to stay at the ports. We should get the buses to the roads and prevent the state from further waste,” he said.

Consequently, the House set up a committee headed by Fatal Mojeed (Ibeju Lekki 1) to look into the matter and report to the House in due course.

Obasa directed the committee to invite Accountant General of the state, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Transport, the Commissioner for Finance, Managing Director of LAMATA and others involved in the purchase.

Other lawmakers, including Makinde and Rotimi Olowo (Shomolu 1) argued that purchase of the buses flouted section 120 of the 1999 Constitution.

Olajide Omotayo (pictured above) gave an inkling of what he has in stock again at the 12th African Games as the Nigerian defeated one of the continent’s most celebrated stars – Egypt’s Ahmed Saleh 4-3 in the quarterfinal of men’s singles to berth in the semifinal of table tennis.

Omotayo was all over the Egyptian in the encounter which had the fans glued to their seat throughout the match.

The Nigerian combined his backhand with forehand smoothly and this confused the Egyptian who had to surrender to the youthful Nigerian star.

Aruna Quadri

Aside Omotayo, Aruna Quadri also walloped Congo Brazzaville’s Saheed Idowu 4-0 to berth in the last four and set up a rematch of the ITTF Africa Cup against Egypt’s Omar Assar on Thursday August 29.

Seven-time Olympian Segun Toriola was at his very best when he also beat Egypt’s Khalid Assar 4-3 to set up a semifinal clash against Omotayo.

Segun Toriola

In the women’s event, Olufunke Oshonaike played her last game after going down 3-4 to Egypt’s Farah Abdel-Aziz. Dina Meshref also beat Algeria’s Lynda Logrhaibi 4-0, while Edem Offiong humbled Egypt’s Reem El-Eraky.

Cameroun’s Sarah Hanffou berthed in the last four after beating Egypt’s Yousra Helmy.

Offiong will battle Hanffou while Meshref will face her compatriot – Abdel-Aziz in the second semifinal on Thursday August 29.

An elated Omotayo said: ” I am so excited that in my first African Games I made it to the semifinal. I knew that it was going to be a tough game against one of the most experienced African players and I just ensured that I did not get angry on table because he did everything to upset me but I was determined. I was calm and I am happy that this is a good outing for me in the singles.”

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Apple on Wednesday, August 28, apologised for its digital assistant Siri sharing some of what it heard with quality control workers as it unveiled new rules for handling data from conversations.

Under the changes, Apple will allow its employees to review conversations only from customers who opt into the “Siri grading” program to improve the voice recognition technology. Apple will also delete by default any recordings used for the program.

“We realize we haven’t been fully living up to our high ideals, and for that we apologize,” Apple said in a post.

“We’ve decided to make some changes to Siri” as a result of concerns expressed about the grading program, the company added. “Our goal with Siri, the pioneering intelligent assistant, is to provide the best experience for our customers while vigilantly protecting their privacy.”

Computer-generated transcripts will still be used to hone the ability of the software to understand what people say and mean, the company said.

Apple suspended the program after news broke that contractors were hearing confidential medical information, criminal dealings and even sexual encounters.

The California tech giant was among several firms scrutinized on using contractors to “listen” to conversations with digital assistants to improve the artificial intelligence software.

If customers opt in, only Apple employees will be allowed to listen to audio samples of Siri interactions and they will “work to delete any recording which is determined to be an inadvertent trigger” of the voice-commanded digital assistant, according to the company.

“We hope that many people will choose to help Siri get better, knowing that Apple respects their data and has strong privacy controls in place,” Apple said.

Google and Amazon have also announced changes to their programs in response to privacy concerns.

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The Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Sanwo-Olu has restated its commitment toward providing an enabling environment through the provision of friendly policies and putting in place appropriate regulatory framework that will attract the needed investment in the real sector.

Sanwo-olu made this known at the African Real Estate Conference and Awards with the theme “Bridging Investment Gaps in Africa’s Real Estate Markets for Sustainable Growth” Wednesday at Landmark Conference, Victoria Island, Lagos organised by PropertyPro.ng.

He said that shelters remains one the very important needs of man and a critical factor that determines quality of living.

He noted that in all major cities of the world, especially those with challenges of rising population, provision of affordable shelter and bridging the deficits in the housing sector is both a social and economic issue.

He stressed that bridging the hounding deficit as we have it today is not a responsibility for government to shoulder alone. The investment required is huge and can only be provided by the private sector.

Sanwo-Olu said “we are willing to partner with the private sector to meet the housing needs of our growing population which is excess of 22 million people. Our focus is the development of sustainable urban settlement with adequate infrastructure for decent living”.

He further said that the challenges become more pronounced with growing urbanization as a result of migration of people from rural areas seeking economic opportunities.

“A number of steps have been taken in the past to develop appropriate and sustainable solutions in partnership with the private sector. What is clear is however, considering the increasing needs of affordable and decent shelter is that the desired objectives are yet to be met”.

“The situation at hand therefore calls for a review of existing policies and strategies with a view to aligning them with current realities and policy objectives”, he said.

Sanwo-olu added that part of the issues which he believes are germane to achieving sustainable growth in the housing sector include the development and sustenance of a modern mortgage system, development of appropriate technology in building construction as well as use of local materials.

In his words, the Chief Executive officer, PropertyPro.ng, Fikayo Ogundipe said that the conference is designed to proffer solution to real estate issues, acknowledge, encourage and celebrate excellence among Africa real estate stakeholders by given them the opportunity to gain valuable exposure and well-deserved recognition for their national and global achievement in the real estate sector.

“AFREECA 2019 is a platform for deliberations on concrete solutions regarding formation and implementation of effective investment ideas, and policies that will serve as motivation to interest individuals who have help reshape the development and growth of the African real estate market”, he said.

The Nation

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President Muhammadu Buhari has commiserated with the General Overseer of the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries Worldwide, Dr. Daniel Kolawole Olukoya, over the death of his mother, Mama Janet Olukoya, aged 95.

A statement by President’s spokesman, Mr. Femi Adesina, said Buhari joined the General Overseer, his family members and all worshipers at the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries in mourning with the devout Christian and prayer warrior.

The President believed that Mama Janet, who would be interred on Thursday, August 29, loved God and lived according to His precepts which was clearly reflected in the way she raised her children.

He urged all family members to find solace in her devoutness and service to humanity.

The President prayed that Mama Janet’s soul would find rest in the Lord.