SNG gives Presidency 74-hr ultimatum to disclose Buhari’s health status

ABUJA – The Save Nigeria Group, SNG, Tuesday, issued a 74 hours ultimatum within to the the presidency to furnish it with full information on the health situation of President Muhammadu Buhari, who is currently believe to be receiving medical attention in London. 

The SNG, which made the request via a letter, entitled “Request for information on President Muhammadu Buhari’s health status” and addressed to the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, urged to be availed information urgently in order to reduce tension on state of Mr. President’s health. According to the letter containing the request which was acknowledged to have been received on February 7, 2017 by the office of the Attorney General and Minister of Justice and made available to Vanguard in Abuja, the group warned that it will take all other necessary legitimate and legal steps should the authorities ignore the request.

According to the letter signed by Barrister Benedict Ezeagu, the National Coordinator, SNG, “This ugly development, including denial, conditional admission and restriction of access to President Buhari and the true information on his health status is reminiscence of the late President Yar’Adua’s incident which our revered organisation was at the forefront of its peaceful resolution and this is not good for Nigeria at this critical period of economic downturn , nationwide insecurity, and political strife. “As you may know, the lack of clearness in handling the ‘vacation’ turned ‘medical trip’ of Mr. President has heightened the rumours and speculations about his health, the most frightening of which is that President Muhammadu Buhari had passed on or he has been in coma or on life-supporting machine, and thus increasing the political tension in the country. 

“Since Mr. President is not a private citizen but a public servant whose health bills are currently being paid from the country’s treasury, Nigerians deserves the right to know the true state of his health as obtainable in enlightened republics. “In the light of the foregoing Sir, while we join other Nigerians to pray for Mr. President in line with the request of the Presidency, we herby demand for full information on the health status of President Muhammadu Buhari in exercise of the rights granted us by section 39 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as amended, the freedom of information Act and Article 9 of African charter on Human and people’s rights, as this will help dispel these rumours and speculations and reduce the current political tension in the country. “Please sir, take notice that if we are not availed of the requested information within 74 hours of your receipt of this letter, we will have no alternative than to take all other necessary legitimate and legal steps, including approaching the National Assembly to activate relevant sections of the Constitution with regard to the health of a Nigerian president as well as institute court actions and organise peaceful protests among others, to ensure that we are availed of these rights guaranteed Nigerians by the laws. 

Senators clash over Trump attorney general pick

Tensions over confirming President Donald Trump’s cabinet nominees erupted late Tuesday in the US Senate, where a lawmaker’s criticism of attorney general pick Jeff Sessions led to the very rare reprimand of a senator.

Senate Democrat Elizabeth Warren was told to sit down for reading a 1986 letter critical of Sessions written by Coretta Scott King, widow of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

The chamber’s Republican leader Mitch McConnell interrupted Warren to accuse her of having “impugned” Sessions, a fellow senator.

“The senator has impugned the motives and conduct of our colleague from Alabama, as warned by the chair,” McConnell said, taking the extraordinary step of invoking Senate Rule 19 that prohibits highly critical remarks against a fellow senator.

“The senator will take her seat,” said the presiding officer, Senator Steven Daines. When Warren challenged the ruling, the Senate voted along party lines to uphold it.

It was a rare and powerful rebuke in the body where decorum is a cherished tradition.

But tensions have soared in the few weeks since Trump took office, particularly over the process of confirming his cabinet nominees.

During debate over education secretary nominee Betsy DeVos, Democrats held the Senate floor Monday through the night as a protest against her nomination.

She was eventually confirmed Tuesday, but only when Vice President Mike Pence was brought in to break a 50-50 tie.

Pressure built during debate about Sessions, whose record on civil rights ultimately doomed his nomination to a federal judgeship in the 1980s.

At the time King wrote the Senate Judiciary Committee warning that Sessions used to “intimidate and chill” voters, and that confirming him as a judge would have “a devastating effect” on the US justice system.

“Mr. Sessions has used the awesome powers of his office in a shabby attempt to intimidate and frighten elderly black voters,” she wrote.

Warren, a potential 2020 presidential candidate, was reading the King letter when she was blocked from continuing, a move that astonished Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse.

With the ruling decided, “I don’t know how we go about doing our duties,” he said. “Are we supposed to simply blind ourselves to derogatory information?”

An exasperated Senator Orrin Hatch, the longest-serving Republican currently in the Senate, called for a more dignified debate of Trump’s nominees.

Senators must treat one another with respect, “or this place is going to devolve into nothing but a jungle,” he said.

A confirmation vote for Sessions as attorney general was expected for Wednesday.

Buhari didn’t give us date of his return —Senate

The Senate on Tuesday confirmed the receipt of a letter from President Muhammadu Buhari, informing the legislature of his intention to extend his medical vacation in the United Kingdom.

The upper chamber of the National Assembly however failed to provide details of the letter.

Earlier on Sunday, the Presidency had announced that Buhari’s 10-day vacation to the UK had been extended.

The extension was contained in a three-paragraph statement made available to journalists by the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina.

 Adesina said the extension was necessary to allow the President complete a series of tests recommended by his doctors and get the results before he could return to Nigeria.

Although he said Buhari had already dispatched a letter to the National Assembly on the extension, he did not specify the duration of the extension.

The Chairman, Senate Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Sabi Abdullahi, while briefing journalists on the letter,  said, “ …You will recall that we received, before we suspended plenary, a letter from Mr. President which was dated 18th January, 2017, where he informed the distinguished senators that he was proceeding on his vacation for 10 days and this is to meet the constitutional provisions…

“In this second letter, he is informing the Senate that he is extending his vacation because in the cause of that routine medical check-up, there were still some tests his doctors still want to run further and so, because of that, he is extending his stay.  This is a constitutional provision and let me say it is within his prerogative to do so and we are in receipt of that letter accordingly.”

The spokesman said the Senate was waiting for the safe return of the President.

When asked if the date of Buhari’s return was stated in the letter or it was indefinite, Abdullahi stated that the letter did not say indefinite “because indefinite is taking the matter out of context.”

He added, “But, then, he said he’s extending (his vacation); that is, beyond the 10 days he had asked for and because the tests that are going to be run are not in his hands (to be determined by him) – it is in the hands of the doctors – he is not giving us a date. But, definitely, he’s extending (his vacation) and I think that is what is important.”

When asked for how many days the legislature would permit the President to remain on vacation, the Senate’s spokesperson said he was not sure if the constitution had a specific duration for a President’s absence from duty.

We’ll no longer import fuel by 2019 – Kachikwu

ABUJA—THE Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Mr Ibe Kachikwu, yesterday, in Abuja said Nigeria would no longer import fuel by 2019. Kachikwu said this at a public hearing on the review of petroleum pricing template for Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) organised by the House of Representatives. 

The minister said that within two years, the Federal Government revived refineries that were non-functional to contribute about eight million out of over 20 million litres of petrol consumed in the country daily.
 He explained that the Federal Government initiated a model which attracted foreign investors to partner with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, to repair the country’s refineries within the two-year period. He said: “This has consistently served as a target for this government so that by December 2018, NNPC must be able to deliver on some of the terms given them, one of which is to reduce petroleum importation by 60 per cent.

 “By 2019 we should be able to exit completely the importation of petroleum products in this country. “Cognisant of the fact that Dangote is building one refinery, we expect to have an excess situation then,” he added. He further explained that Nigeria must also have the capacity to stop exporting crude oil. According to him, selling crude is not different from selling agricultural produce in an unprocessed manner. “The world is leaving that, every member of OPEC is leaving that because of the prizing, volume and market challenges, now shifting from selling crude to selling refined petroleum products.

 “That is what this country must do and there is a template we are working on, noting that the ministry intends to create an enabling environment that will promote local refining of crude oil. On the possibility of reducing the fuel pump price, Kachikwu said there was no padding in the petroleum pricing template for Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) currently sold at N145 per litre.

 According to him, 71 per cent of the cost is for the production and freight, 18 per cent balance is covered by depot charges and retailers margin. He said: “In other words, the storage tanks, the amount you get by verge of operating a filling station takes another 18 per cent, the output of those is already taking you to roughly about 90 per cent. “The transportation is less than 10 per cent; we probably can do better with some of those because the effect of that to the templating is an insignificant one or two per cent but that is not where the problem is. “The problem is with foreign exchange rate of conversion. There are two key elements in the template, how much you buy it is internationally fixed, it is not a Nigerian issue, the cost of foreign exchange is a monetary policy issue. “So at the time we did the template the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, monetary policy was N245, that was the basis upon which we calculated the pricing, today N305 is the exchange rate.