ATTENCAO

The redo edition of The Signature Summit closed in high spirits as participants, speakers and organizers took turns to have brief chats and pictures. The participants had earlier been drilled by experts on Branding and Digital Marketing skills in line with the event’s theme. The program, held at Ajose Lecture Theater, Obafemi Awolowo University- spread across two days, witnessed a conference session on Friday 24th November while a concluding workshop session followed on Saturday 25th November. Keynote speakers at the Friday conference included Author, Business Coach, Business Development Expert and Strategist, Tale Alimi and Digital Marketing Consultant, Deola Kayode while Art Director, Fericool Studios, Tunde Ogunkunle, Digital PR consultant at The Robert Taylor Media, Esther Odia, and CEO of Media Panache, Timilehin Bello oversaw practical sessions Saturday. Delivering ‘Perception is the new reality’, Tale Alimi said being a unique brand required the dualism of one’s big ...

Taking lessons from other parts of the world, Nigerians could make a unique headway of their own to strengthen the country's economy by identifying entrepreneurship as a window to shifting focus from government to the people. Having for the longer period made inputs to the instrument of government without concurrent gains, a strategic point has come to start considering and channeling efforts towards the alternative. The Signature Summit lays fundamental procedural groundwork in that direction - to  which those who attended its first edition on the 24th of February 2017, at the Cooperative Hall, Obafemi Awolowo University will attest. Signature NG, a creative, and multimedia (visual communication) agency, upon inquiry into mystery behind enterprise failure and decline in patronage presents an intervention in the form of The Signature Summit on a score - to turn the tide. Entrepreneurs take their feet off the pedal for reasons they would describe as ranging from limited res...

Question 1 – Let’s say your budget estimated you to earn N4trn from non-oil revenue in 2017 but in reality, you only managed to collect just over N2trn, how much should you budget to collect in 2018? The correct answer is N4.2trn. Question 2 – Let’s say you budget to earn N2.4trn from oil in 2018, how much of that should you spend on servicing your debts? The correct answer is N2trn. If these numbers don’t make sense to you, it’s because you don’t really understand how fiction works. Our existence on earth is in many ways restricted by rules we really have no control over. For example, we humans cannot fly (at least not yet) because the law of gravity truncates our hustle in that regard. But we can create a world on paper (and film) where the law of gravity does not exist, and human beings are thus able to fly. Fiction allows us to escape inconvenient or impossible rules. To be clear, this is not the only function of fiction – it also allows people say things that would be dang...

It has been confirmed that at the 55thOrdinary Session of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) which held in Monrovia, Liberia in December 2016, the Authority of Heads of States and Government of the member states of ECOWAS erroneously gave approval in principle to the request of the Kingdom of Morocco to join the sub-regional grouping. However, in view of the legal implications of the request the Authority has directed the ECOWAS Commission to examine the implications of Morocco’s membership of the ECOWAS within the ambit of the Revised Treaty of ECOWAS and to submit the results at the next session of the ECOWAS scheduled to hold in Lome, Togo in December, 2017 Having critically reviewed the Revised Treaty and other legal texts of the ECOWAS as well as the African Union we are of the firm view that Morocco is not legally qualified to join the sub regional economic union. However, before examining the legality of the request it is germane to expose the false clai...

With 19 months to the end of the term, those who still nurse some optimism about the Buhari government can only hope that it is not too late for the administration to fulfil the promises made to the people in 2015. This is not the first time that this reporter would suggest to Buhari to reboot. During the President’s first anniversary in office, the matter was put like this: ”To be sure, Buhari didn’t promise a magic or an El Dorado. But he told the people that he would tackle insecurity, fix the economy and fight corruption.” That statement still remains valid. A year later, the turn of events has proved the axiom that Buhari does not have eternity to reset the button of his administration to govern in the interest of the people. So what exactly are the prospects of a reboot of the 29-month old government of President Muhammadu Buhari? For the arch political opponents and even some not-so partisan pessimists, of course, the prospects are getting slimmer by the day. And the vie...

While “The Godfather” remains the most successful novel of Mario Puzo, his second mafia epic, published almost three decades later, “The Last Don”, is equally engrossing as he takes the reader into the inner recesses of Hollywood where licentiousness seems to be the order of the day. Even when a lot of things may have changed, especially within the past two decades since the novel was published, that was still the world inhabited by Mr Harvey Weinstein until the bubble burst with the scandal that may also have changed the entire power dynamic in which women are expected to offer sexual gratification to advance their professional career. It all started on 5th October, when two reporters with The New York Times, Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, authored a story detailing how Weinstein, one of the most powerful American film producers, had, for three decades, been exploiting women in the movie business. He was specifically accused of sexual harassment, sexual assault and rape involvin...

Exactly a year ago, the Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria (FRCN), by its Establishment Act, tried to introduce a National Code of Corporate Governance. Had it not been suspended by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment a few months after it had come into effect, the three-in-one code sought to provide a new code of corporate governance for the private and public and sectors and not-for-profit organisations, including religious bodies. The code was all-encompassing and sought to unify, harmonise and would have superseded all the existing sectoral corporate governance codes in Nigeria such as those regulating licensed pension operators, banking, discount houses, telecommunications and insurance. But the minute it came into effect for the private sector and not-for-profit bodies, it hit a speed bump. It was rejected by the private sector for being in conflict with the Companies and Allied Matters Act (CAMA), would have led to the exit of several CEOs who had spent more ...

We are obviously certain that the late Fela Anikulapo Kuti (just like the late Gani Fawehinmi!) if alive today would have rejected any proposed state award given to him. More so that the Nigerian state has progressively degenerated over the years from the bad (he painfully lived) to the worse (he foresaw) in most important critical success and nation-building factors. Certainly not with the perennial crisis of governance since independence manifesting in serial revelations of Authority Stealing and shortages of “water, light and food” Fela bemoaned with his legendary saxophone. As a matter of fact, Fela once banned his music being played on federal radio stations (what many artists would see as a badge of honour) in protests against the non-payment of copyrights fees, sheer brutality and oppression of the “military sergeant majors” in the military regimes who ruled (sorry ruined!) the Federal Republic! Very few could be so singularly audacious in damning a perceived oppressive a...

Iron-clad integrity was the chief credential General Muhammadu Buhari flaunted to win power in 2015. Today, that golden badge appears under grave erosion in view of rising tide of sleaze and tales of apparent presidential indifference. Last week's leaked memo by scorned junior oil minister, Ibe Kachikwu, provides what potentially may now be the tipping point. In a rather rambling response yesterday, the NNPC boss, Maikanti Baru, could not but admit that approval was still needed from a superior for any big transaction he entered. The big question, then: was President Buhari granting such behind Kachikwu's back? In any case, that a man supposedly saddled with overseeing the nation's fattest "cash cow" (as a presidency official recently classified the NNPC) could not access the principal for more than seven harrowing weeks until the confidential letter leaked cannot be a compliment. It perhaps best describes the squalor of the prevailing governance process ...

•President and VP's Budgets not fully reviewed. • We acted with probity, accountability,  and in the best interest of Great Ife students- Hon. Wale Oladebo. Ayoola Omole The Budgetary and Finance committee, Obafemi Awolowo University Students’ Union, is expected to Thursday 12th October, approach the Students’ Representative Council (SRC) with a 26-page document containing harmonized budget items for union officers, with Budget Sitting to follow on Saturday. This was revealed in an extensive interview with the committee’s chairman, Honorable Wale Oladebo. The claim is further backed by a Parliamentary Session notification released by the Clerk of the House, in which ‘Submission of Budget’ is listed the 8th agendum. Other matters on agenda which are up for consideration on Thursday include: ‘Ratification of Security Committee’ and ‘Report of All Committees’. Honorable Oladebo envisaged that a Budget Sitting would be subsequently convened on Saturday, in the event that Thur...