Eurozone unemployment at record high as inflation drops

Unemployment in the euro zone has surged to a fresh record high, while inflation has fallen to a three-year low, boosting expectations that the European Central Bank will cut interest rates.

Unemployment in the 17 countries using the euro hit 12.1% in March, up from February's 12%, according to official figures from Euro stat.

In total, 19.2m people are now out of work in the region.

Separate Euro stat data showed that inflation slowed to 1.2% in April.

Greece and Spain recorded the highest unemployment rates in the euro zone, at 27.2% and 26.7% respectively, while Austria, at 4.7%, and Germany, at 5.4%, had the lowest rates.

Youth employment, defined as those under 25, hit 3.6 million in the euro zone. In Greece, 59.1% of under-25s were unemployed as of the end of January, while in Spain, 55.9% were unemployed.

Minister raises alarm over theft of rail components

 

Minister of Transport, Senator Idris Umar, has raised alarm over the frequent theft of rail components on  the Port Harcourt – Enugu rail line.

The minister, who frowned at the situation, charged the Managing Director of Nigerian Railway Corporation, NRC, Adeseyi Sijuwade, to deploy the railway police to theft-prone areas in order not to jeopardise the completion of the project.

Umar, in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, after he was briefed on the level of work done so far on Lot 1 of the rehabilitation of the Eastern line rail service from Port Harcourt to Makurdi, said that regardless of the challenges, the 2013 completion date for the project remain realizable.

Speaking earlier, Sijuwade lamented the inability of the contractor handling the project, ESER Contracting and Industry Company Incorporated, to access the main quarry for the project located at Ishiagu in Ebonyi State.

He said that the denial of access was seriously affecting the progress of work on the project and implored the minister to assist in resolving same.

NCC orders MTN to collapse rates

Telecommunications regulator, the Nigerian Communications Commission, has ordered MTN Nigeria to collapse the rates for its on-net and off-net voice services, which it said has a 300 per cent differential with effect from tomorrow, May 1.

The NCC, in a report titled, ‘Determination of dominance in selected communications markets in Nigeria,” signed by Eugene Juwah, Executive Vice Chairman, NCC, said it plans to make a determination of pricing principle to address the rates charged for on-net and off-net voice calls for all other operators, to manage dominance in the market.

The NCC also disclosed that competition in the Nigerian mobile voice market is not highly competitive, and using what it called the HHI, said MTN with 44 percent of the market share has emerged the dominant operator in the mobile voice segment.

According to Juwah, an industry review showed phone calls between MTN customers cost three times lower than calls to other networks, indicative of the likely establishment of a calling club for MTN subscribers.

Continuing, in the wholesale Leased Lines and Transmission Capacity market, which are in the upstream segment of the telecoms market, the NCC said the dominant operators, MTN and Glo jointly control 62 per cent of the market, and they shall be required to adhere to the following obligations as the Commission will come up with a price cap for wholesale services and price floor for retail services, and subject to periodic review.

NCC said there are about 113 million mobile phone subscribers at the end of 2012, with MTN Nigeria leading with 47 million lines.

Globacom followed with 24 million users, Bharti Airtel had 23 million customers while Etisalat, had 14 million.

PIB: Experts call for upward review of host communities’ fund

Senators were, that passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, into law might lead to repeal of laws that established 10 agencies, including Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, and preservation of five others.

Senators were also cautioned to x-ray the aspect of the PIB which gave the President Powers of discretion and section that made the Minister of Petroleum an institution.

The experts have also stressed the need for an upward review of the 10 percent petroleum host community development fund which was designed for the development of the economic and social infrastructure of the communities.

These were some of the issues that came to the front burner, yesterday, at a one-day workshop by the Senate Joint Committee on Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, held at Bolingo Hotel, Abuja.

In his presentation, Professor Dagogo Fubara of Kariala Konsult Nigeria Limited said the 10 percent of oil companies’ net profit to be set aside for host communities was not easily realizable.

Fubara, who described the figure as inconsequential and capable of defeating the purpose for which it was established, called for full royalties from oil and gas companies to oil producing communities.

In his presentation, a member of PIB drafting Committee and Director, Multi Oil and Gas Company Limited, Francis Adigwe, noted that the oil and gas sector formed the bedrock of the nation’s economy, contributing 80 percent to government’s revenue, 95 percent to the nation’s foreign earnings and 30 percent of Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product, GDP.

He said passage of PIB into law would bring about the repeal of 10 acts, adding that not all laws relating to oil and gas would be repealed.

Adigwe, however, explained that the existence of PIB law would bring about the creation of 10 new government agencies that would be coordinated by the Minister of Petroleum who is to be treated as an institution and not as a person in the bill.

NPDC daily crude production now 138,000 barrels

Nigerian Petroleum Development Company Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, has increased its daily oil production to 138,000 barrels from 60,000bpd.

This was contained in a rejoinder signed by NPDC management in response to a story published in a national newspaper alleging that the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke, was involved in a N59tn oil deal.

To expand its opportunities in the upstream oil and gas sector, NPDC said it had adopted funding mechanisms to secure production capacity of 250,000 barrels per day by 2015.

The support of the Federal Government in ensuring NPDC’s expanded operations by seeking additional asset base and funding outside the normal government funded Joint Venture cash call is, therefore, an imperative, according to the company.

Five oil communities in Delta State led by Chief Emami Ayiri were said to have made allegations against Alison-Madueke.

Specifically, the minister was alleged to have deliberately excluded indigenous rights to pre-emption and/or first refusal on four oil blocks: OMLs 26, 30, 34 and 42.

She was also alleged to have illegally assigned 55 per cent of the Federal Government’s interest to Atlantic Energy Drilling Concepts without any recourse to due process in the transactions.

The minister was also alleged to have had pecuniary interest in Atlantic Energy Drilling Concepts, hence her approval of the deal that would make Nigeria lose four trillion cubic feet of gas asset worth $15.72tn.

Meanwhile, the minister has said gas supply to the country’s domestic market has been growing at 20 per cent per annul and is currently at a peak of 1.5 million cubic feet of gas per day.