Nigeria’s Golden Jubilee Business Summit and Cultural Gala Dinner organized by BusinessinAfrica Events in London last week brought together Nigerians and friends of Nigeria (individuals and corportates) from far and wide. It was a great opportunity to celebrate Nigeria at 50 from a business perspective. Ray Echebiri who participated in the summit reports that the consensus was that Nigeria has the potential to be a great nation, but has definitely not become great yet.

THE illegality of toll collection was made manifest in a tripartite memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed by three parties in Ifo Local Government Area of Ogun State without the backing of the law and without input of lawyers representing the three parties. The parties are the representatives of the people of Matogun-Olambe, the contractor for a road construction and Mr. Olawale Sikiru Ogundele, chairman of Ifo Local Government Council Area.

LOVERS of the media as channel of communication and mass mobilization have in the last few weeks been appalled by allegations of torture, assault, human degradation and abuse of human rights leveled against the governor of Imo State, His Excellency Chief Ikedi Ohakim by one Mr. Samuelson Iwuoha, a petition writer based in Owerri, the state capital.

Militants in Niger Delta, Nigeria

Many believe that it was not the letters of the law of the land that were applied to achieve the relative peace we are now witnessing in the Niger Delta. Rather, it was political brinksmanship and diplomacy of amnesty offer. In other words, we see the flight of law or rather the failure of law as an instrument of restorative justice, social order, stability, change, development and deterrence to evil doers in the Niger Delta. This has its social implications in the sense that people can now gang up to brush aside the law in their quest for “social justice”/ “resource control” as witnessed in the Niger Delta. These also have their philosophical implications on the polity viz: the actual purpose of law in society. Is the amnesty grant to the militant insurgents sufficient enough to dissuade them from further taking up  arms against the state sometime in the future? ALEXANDER EKEMENAH writes.

THE purpose of budgeting is to provide a forecast of revenues and expenditures, construct a model of how government or a business might perform financially speaking if certain strategies, events and plans are carried out. It enables the actual financial operation to be measured against the forecast.
Budgeting is a veritable instrument for ensuring the judicious allocation of the nation’s scarce resource for development. Unfortunately, in spite of its overarching role as a tool for economic development, Nigerians have regrettably, yet to feel the positive impact of budget.

Many firms have run into trouble due to risk management failures. However, where risk management failures are accompanied by corporate governance failures, the lethal combination has caused swift demise. A good example was Enron, an AAA rated institution.

A New Document in the Battle against HIV/AIDS

A new book has just been added to the growing corpus of materials focusing on the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Written by Florence Uchendu, HIV, All You Must Know, documents a wide sweep of information that touches on all aspects of the subject in one breath. STEPHEN UBIMAGO engages with the thoughts of the author in this piece.

Okon Edem (real names withheld) is from Akwa Ibom State. Only the previous day, his girl friend of nine months, who, for some time, had been down with a strange ailment, broke the mind searing news of her having tested positive to the dreaded Human Immuno deficiency Virus (HIV) that causes AIDS.

Hardly did he imagine a day would come when he would have to subject himself to Voluntary Counseling and Testing (VCT) were it not that doctors had advised his girl friend to quickly bring forward the man in her life for the test. Swiftly, though in dooms-day garb, he had headed for the Nigerian Institute of Medical Research, Yaba, were he underwent the test.