Daily Watch – MTN lists on stock exchange, Emefiele confirmed

Nigeria’s Senate has confirmed the re-appointment of Gowin Emefiele as the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria. The confirmation of Emefiele was announced at a Senate plenary session. President Muhammadu Buhari had last week written to the Senate requesting that Emefiele be confirmed as CBN Governor for a second term of five years. The CBN governor had been screened by the Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance and Other Financial Institutions, on Wednesday during which he was grilled in issues affecting Nigeria’s economy. The screening exercise came after the mandate given by President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki, to the committee at the plenary on Tuesday. The committee was given one week to carry out the screening and report back to the Senate. Emefiele, who was appointed as CBN Governor on 2 June, 2014, is due to end his first term on 2 June, this year.

The Ekiti state government has moved to terminate more than 2,000 workers alleged to have been illegally employed during the administration of Ayodele Fayose in the state. The affected workers include up to 2,000 people employed after the 14 July, 2018 governorship election won by Kayode Fayemi. Commissioner for Information, Muyiwa Olumilua, said that the decision to sack those he described as illegal staff was arrived at after the report of a panel set up to review employments into the state civil service in the last four years. Governor Fayemi has ordered the Head of Service, Ayodeji Ajayi, to collate all available vacancies in the civil service, with the overhead implications, to enable the state government prepare to recruit suitable and qualified Ekiti citizens into the public service, irrespective of the party affiliations. Ajayi said that officers reinstated into the Local Government Service Commission between 16 October, 2014, and 15 October, 2018, are to be reabsorbed by the relevant personnel boards and migrated to biometric payroll with immediate effect while all 272 officers employed by the Fayose administration, who are still on manual payroll, shall be considered for absorption into the civil service but on case-by-case basis. Absorption will be conditional on the availability of vacancies.

The FEC has approved a new loan of $1 billion from the Chinese EXIM Bank for the Gurara II Hydropower project. The Council also approved ₦5.7 billion for the revised estimated cost for the completion of Nkari dam in Akwa Ibom State. Suleiman Adamu, minister of water resources, said the Gurara II project is aimed at generating 360 megawatts of electricity. In 2017, the FG made plans to secure a loan of $550 million from the China Export Import Bank for the acquisition of two new communications satellites for the Nigeria Communications Limited. In 2018, the government had also negotiated a loan of about $6 billion with the Chinese bank for the construction of the Ibadan-Kano rail line. Rotimi Amaechi, minister of transportation had on Monday, speaking in Nairobi, Kenya, allayed fears over reports that assets built with Chinese loans in some African countries would be taken over by the Asian giant if the countries default. The minister said the loan agreement between Nigeria and China does not involve forfeiture of some Nigerian infrastructure if the country failed to pay back.

MTN Nigeria has listed 20.35 billion ordinary shares at ₦90 per unit on the Premium Board of the Nigerian Stock Exchange. The company, a part of the MTN Group, is the first telecommunications network provider to be listed on the NSE Premium Board, a listing segment for the elite group of issuers that meet the Exchange’s most stringent corporate governance and listing standards. The Group with the price values at ₦1.84 trillion decided to list its local company in the country on the NSE in 2016 after agreeing to pay a $1.7 billion fine to settle a sim card dispute with the Federal Government. The CEO, NSE, Oscar Onyema, said they are delighted to welcome MTN Nigeria to the Exchange as the listing is a promising development in the country’s telecommunications sector. It is expected that the listing will add to the NSE bouquet of diverse investment offerings to the public. Nigeria accounts for a third of MTN’s annual core profit while indigenous investors own 19.4 percent of the company. Apart from MTN, the NSE Premium Board features other companies like Dangote Cement, FBN Holdings, Zenith International Bank, Access Bank, Lafarge Africa, Seplat Petroleum Development Company and United Bank for Africa.