Ndigbo: We're not trying to dominate you ... but living as wired - ITREALMS

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How do a people who have never picked arms to fight their host community home and abroad or people living in their own enclave always accused of dominating or colonising? How?

We are not dominating you, we only travelled to your village, fill a need you probably did not see, render services you could not, sometimes start by sleeping in overpriced shops in the same village, few years down the line, buy small land, build one small hut, tried to just run our business and feed our kids while struggling with the evil policies of those who have hijacked governance since we were brushed aside decades ago....tell me, How are we trying to dominate you?

Nigerians dominate gender parity in 100 Most Influential Africans - ITREALMS

ITREALMS:

Nigerians have once again dominated this year’s list in terms of entries, followed by Kenyans in the New African 100 most influential Africans, reports ITREALMS.

The list, ITREALMS gathered is for the first time having gender balanced, just as quadruplet covers featured Mo Salah, Bogolo Joy Kenewendo, Denis Mukwege and Ahmed Abiy.

“For the first time since publishing the list, there is an equal amount of men and women featuring in this year’s one hundred. Although this year’s listing is dominated by entries from Nigeria and Kenya, outstanding personalities from several other African countries are also featured,” a press statement from the publishers read.

The December issue is published with four different covers featuring: Ethiopia’s Prime Minister, Ahmed Abiy, arguably Africa’s person of the year; the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize co-winner DR Congo’s Dr Denis Mukwege; Botswana’s 32-year old Minister of Trade  Investment  Bogolo Joy Kenewendo; and Egypt’s soccer superstar, Mo Salah whose influence goes well beyond football.

The annual list has become an industry and readers’ much-awaited collation – revealing Africans who contributed in shaping the African narrative in the concluding year and envisaged to play a big role in the coming year, both on the continent and in the Diaspora.

Collated by and from its global network of correspondents and industry insiders, this year’s listing consists of some regular names, and some of them returning for the second, even third year such as businessman Aliko Dangote.  The final 2018 tally sees a drop in the number of entries for politicians, but an increase in the arts and culture section at 16 and 22 entries respectively.

In terms of countries, entries are led by Nigeria with 18 names followed by Kenya (11) South Africa (10) Egypt (8) and Ethiopia (7).

“One yardstick which we often employ when coming up with the final list is to emphasise that influence is not about popularity and popularity is not always influential. The influencer’s impact on public, social and political discourse, however, is what largely helps us determine their influence. Most importantly we focus mainly on people who have been influential for Africa’s good,” says reGina Jane Jere – editor of the magazine’s sister publication – New African Woman, who leads and oversees the 100 Most Influential Africans project.

With many reports indicating how gender parity improves the quality of governance and accelerates development, and in a year that has seen the emboldening of gender issues, with countries such Ethiopia even taking a lead in achieving gender parity in Cabinet, and appointing its first ever female President under its new reformist Prime Minister Ahmed Abiy, the magazine felt it apt to produced a 50/50 ratio in this year’s list. According to the editor of the magazine, Anver Versi, this happened as much by chance as it did by design. “When whittling down the nominees and choosing our hundred, we ended with an equal number of women and men. That was the premise of this year’s ranking but it happened naturally!”

One other outstanding feature of this year’s list is the increased inclusion of people of African descent making their mark at a global level in the African Diaspora. “This is a clear indication of the wealth of talent that our continent possesses and shows that given the slightest opportunity, our men and women can eclipse their peers worldwide in their chosen fields of endeavour,” explains Versi.

Also of note is the inclusion of men and women in the seemingly unglamorous fields such as conservation and climate change, whose work is often overlooked by the media.

Uj. N. Dominic/GEE

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Nigeria, Senegal, Cape Verde dominate West African hotel industry

ITREALMS:

Nigeria, Senegal and Cape Verde have described as the top three dominating the West African hospitality industry, with over 114 hotels and 20,790 rooms, reports ITRealms.

According to the W Hospitality Group’s 2017 Hotel Chains Pipeline report, the West Africa region is at the heart of the continent’s growth and economic transformation in recent years.

ITRealms reports that notwithstanding the sharp slowdown experienced in 2016 and 2017, the region’s economy is expected to rebound in 2017 onwards.

The commodity-based economies, like Nigeria, ITRealms gathered, are slowly recovering from the fall in oil prices and oil production, while countries like Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, and Senegal have shown economic resilience and sustained growth.

The report also noted that as many of the countries continue to stabilize politically and economically, the region will be better integrated from a local and international context. This increased integration raises the need for quality travel and accommodation infrastructure.

Experts equally see the growth of the hotel sector as an important indicator of how well the market is developing its travel infrastructure, and the indicators for West Africa are mixed.

ITRealms pointed out that the 114 hotels and 20,790 rooms, accounted for 42 per cent of the sub-Saharan African hotel pipeline.

However, of these hotel deals signed and planned, only approximately 9,875 rooms, or 48% have moved to construction. In addition, projects in the region have longer than average development periods at approximately six years, compared to the two- to three-year development program that is usually planned. Some of the reasons for these delays are high capital investment required, lack of access to adequate financing options, limited access to raw materials, high construction and material costs, a heavy reliance on importation, inadequate technical capacity to manage the development program, and other barriers to entry.

Within the West Africa region, Nigeria, the report showed, contributes 49.6 per cent or over 10,000 hotel rooms in 61 hotels.

“Nigeria is also the top market in Africa for planned rooms,” part of the report read.

The other substantial markets in West Africa include Cape Verde with 11 hotels and 3,478 rooms, and Senegal with 14 hotels and 2,164 rooms. These three markets contribute a total of 15,955 hotel rooms, or 77 per cent of the West African hotel pipeline.

Approximately 57 per cent of the pipeline in these countries have moved to site, however some of these projects have been stalled for some time. In a country, like Nigeria, this can be significant. For instance, 40 per cent of Nigeria's pipeline was signed between 2009 and 2014, and as the chart above illustrates, a large portion of these projects is still in the "planning" phase. In Senegal only approximately 44 per cent of the deals signed have moved to site.

The pipeline of hotels to the sub-region, therefore, is encouraging and indicative of strong investor interest, the low completion rate of projects could be troubling for the development of the hotel sector. It is also difficult for the hotel chains whose expansion plans in these markets rely on partnerships with local and foreign investors to develop these hotels. All the major global hotel chains have strong expansion plans to increase their operating presence on the continent, and in West Africa.

Ogochukwu Nebenanya/GEE

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Orosanye’s ripples: Uncertainty dominates affected govt agencies

ITRealms:

 … CPN, NACETEM, others listed

The ripples of the White Paper emanating from the Stephen Oronsaye-led Presidential Committee on the Restructuring and Rationalisation of Parastatals, Commissions and Agencies, has left uncertainty to dominate the fate of public servants with the exposure of the latest circular on its implementation, reports ITRealms.

This is coming as the Federal Government may have stopped the payment of salaries of over 13 agencies affected including the Computer Professional Registration Council of Nigeria (CPN), National Centre for Technology Management (NACETEM), Nigerian Financial Reporting Council (NFRC) and Industrial Training Fund (ITF) among others.

ITRealms also reports that this uncertainty was heightened on realization by the affected agencies that their January salaries have been stopped through official circular by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, to the Accountant-General of the Federation (AGF) via the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS).

At the weekend, workers of the affected agencies were seen in clusters discussing the development with lamentations.

ITRealms recalls that IPPIS is an integral part of President Jonathan transformation agenda to centralised database system for public service in the country, to facilitate unhindered payment of salaries directly to employee’s account after relevant deductions and remittances, such as tax,  cooperatives, pension, union dues among others.

But the letter dated November 13, 2014 titled “Agencies, Parastatals and Commissions that should not be provided for in the 2015 budget” with reference No: SGF.12/S.11/C.9/T/3, Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, directed the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy to stop funding the affected agencies from the 2015 budget. 

ITRealms reports that similar directive was issued to the AGF on December 1, 2014.

Additionally, The Guardian reported that the letter had read in part: “Recall that as part of the decisions of Government in the White Paper on the Report of the Presidential Committee on the Restructuring and Rationalisation of Federal Government Parastatals, Commissions and Agencies, Government accepted the recommendation that it should cease funding the attached list of Agencies, Parastatals and Commissions with effect from the 2015 Appropriation.

“Accordingly, I wish to request that you take adequate steps to implement these decisions by ensuring that these Agencies, Parastatals and Commissions cease receiving Government funding with effect from the 2015 Appropriation. Attached herewith is a list of the Agencies, Parastatals and Commissions Affected.”

ITRealms notes that the White Paper rejected most of the recommendations of the Presidential Committee on the Restructuring and Rationalisation of Federal Government Parastatals, Commissions and Agencies. Government, just as it accepted some of the provisions of the report, including the scrapping of CPN and reposition of NACETEM from being funded centre to self-generating revenue entity.

Even as FG rejected the merger proposal of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB) to name a few. Whereas the Nigerian Financial Reporting Council ceases to received government patronage through budget provision, the Industrial Training Fund (ITF) has since 2014 been declared self-funded initiative.

+Remmy Nweke (ITRealms) +The Guardian 
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Pix: Senator Anyim Pius Anyim