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TRENDING STATEMENT OF A MAN PURPORTING TO BE ADDRESSING THE HONOURABLE MINISTER OF WORKS MISGUIDED, SELF SERVING AND VICIOUS PROPAGANDA TYPICAL OF A PROXY SPEAKING FOR NONCONFORMING CONTRACTORS.
The attention of the Honourable Minister of Works, *His Excellency, Sen. Engr. Nweze David Umahi, CON* has been drawn to a trending statement of a man purporting to be addressing the Honourable Minister of Works over the state of roads in Nigeria and which was credited to the Chairman, House Committee on FERMA, Hon. Engr. Aderemi Abasi Oseni. The Honourable Minister views this unprovoked attack as an inconceivable embarrassment demeaning to his person and the Federal Ministry of Works as neither he nor his Permanent Secretary was in such a meeting where the said Chairman of House Committee on FERMA was said to be addressing the Honourable Minister of Works.
2. In a news conference dated 28th October 2024, the Honourable Minister stated that it was no doubt akin to darkening counsel without knowledge for the Honourable Chairman, House Committee on FERMA to vilify him over the bad state of Federal roads inherited from previous administrations numbering over 2,604 without deferring to the records of various interventions made by the Renewed Hope administration which have made a great difference in the public transport trajectory of Nigeria. The Honourable Minister has however chosen to refrain from joining issues with the said House Committee Chairman on FERMA because of the respect he has for the hallowed institution of the National Assembly, the Senate President and the Speaker of the Federal House of Representatives. He said, “For the respect of Mr. Speaker, and of course the Senate President and the National Assembly that I belong to, I will refrain myself from joining issues with him. He said, I have failed, and if a blind man is to assess you, your guess is as good as mine because if he has no knowledge of anything, then his knowledge becomes his god so I will not join issues with him.”
3. He views the action of addressing him as if he was before the House Committee on FERMA as deliberate, ill-motivated, misguided, self-serving and nothing but a vicious propaganda typical of a proxy representing the interest of nonconforming contractors who have constituted themselves into adversaries against the Federal Ministry of Works for insisting on best practices in project pricing, variation on price and foreign exchange differentials. There is no doubt that the vituperations of the House Committee Chairman on FERMA were from the abundance of his heart, but to say that all the roads across the country have failed for the failure of the Honourable Minister of Works to address the existing road with the resources approved or for his failure to deploy the N300 billon supplementary fund approved for him or that he is concentrating his energy on the less priority issues shows that the House Committee Chairman on FERMA either has little knowledge of the volume of road infrastructure deficits inherited from successive administrations and cost requirements for road construction or that he deliberately refused, ignored and neglected to appreciate the Renewed Hope administration’s intervention milestones or he is playing to the gallery on the prompting of the nonconforming contractors. He said,” And let me say to him that the projects Mr. President inherited were a total of 2,604 projects. As of May 29, 2023, the total cost was N13 trillion. That’s what the President inherited and a debt to contractors of N1.6 trillion. And when you look at the variation by the reason of the subsidy removal, by the reason of the floating of the dollar, you’ll find out that if you review all these projects, you will see that you will get over N19 trillion for the total ongoing projects. Mr. President did what no other President has done. He manifested all the projects in the 2024 budget with the hope to give him time to look for resources, including loans, to do these projects. I wasn’t in that meeting where the Honourable House member was said to be addressing me, and there is no way I was going to complain of resources to fix our roads because Mr. President has given very special attention to the Federal Ministry of Works. He has paid so much attention to the sufferings of Nigerians vis-a-vis the road situation, and the ministry is not the only ministry in Nigeria. Mr. President has a lot of other challenging situations and competing demands, yet he has given priority attention to the Ministry of Works”
4. He noted that the utterances of the Chairman, House Committee on FERMA were no doubt aimed at inciting the public against the government that brought him on board as it is a common sense that a person of his level and profession ought to know the method statement required of road construction. He said, “There is no way you expect some projects that have lasted 20 years, 18 years, 17 years to be done in one year. And if he says he’s an engineer, he should try and understand the processes that are involved in the Ministry of Works. It’s different from his procurement of fertilizer with his constituency project. They are two different things. You have to go to the field, you have to measure the project, you have to design it, and you have to do in-house procurement to look at it.” He further said, “The method deployed in the construction will require you to do earthwork, to compact etc and if you don’t give it one month and you start to put stone base and asphalt, it will fail. So, those times that you are preparing the sub-grade, the sub-base, the base course before the pavement,what do you call it? It is not valued by people like him as progress made”
5. Furthermore, the Honourable Minister views it as a gross violation of parliamentary procedure for the Chairman of the House Committee on FERMA to invade the legislative powers of the Senate and House Committees on Works which have been carrying out oversight functions on the Ministry and are conversant with the achievements and challenges of the Ministry. He carpeted the Chairman of House Committee on FERMA for acting outside the legislative competence of his committee. Highlighting the modest achievements of the ministry across the six Geo-Political zones, the Honourable Minister thanked the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,*His Excellency, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu GCFR* for the unprecedented attention he has given in bridging the funding gap on the inherited projects. He said, “What we did is that we used over 90% of these funds to keep all the inherited projects alive as directed by Mr. President because a project has to be alive and in the budget before you can look for funds to assist it to be completed. That’s what we’ve done, and so for those who are bitter that we have no projects to award to them, this is the reality.” He further said, “ Over 2,600 projects plus 330 supplementary projects plus the new projects in 2024 is not a tea party. It requires commitment, and it requires dedication, which we are doing. We work on Saturday, Sundays, and Public Holidays, and somebody will say we are giving attention to less priority issues without mentioning those less priority issues that we are giving attention to.”
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The Department of State Services (DSS) and Police have arrested a suspected People’s Democratic Party (PDP) agent, Shehu Fantagi, with about N30 million allegedly earmarked for vote-buying ahead of today’s by-elections in Kaduna State.
Fatangi was picked up on Friday evening at a hotel in the Kaduna metropolis, where he was said to be coordinating the distribution of the funds meant to influence voters in the Chikun/Kajuru Federal Constituency election.
Reliable security sources confirmed that the suspect was caught in possession of cash running into tens of millions, allegedly intended to compromise the integrity of the polls.
The Kaduna State Police Command also confirmed the arrest.
Its spokesman DSP Mansir Hassan, in a statement on Saturday said: “In a sustained and collaborative effort by security agencies to ensure that the forthcoming by-elections in Kaduna State are conducted peacefully and without interference from criminal elements, operatives of the Nigeria Police Force in conjunction with the Department of State Services (DSS) have successfully apprehended vote buyer in Kaduna.”
According to him: “At about 0330hrs of today, arrested one Shehu Aliyu Patangi at a popular hotel located along Turunku Road in Kaduna metropolis and recovered a total cash sum of Twenty-Five Million, Nine Hundred and Sixty-Three Thousand Naira (₦25,963,000) from the suspects, believed to be earmarked for the purpose of inducing voters to compromise the electoral process.
“Preliminary investigations revealed that the suspect had planned to use the said amount to bribe eligible voters. On interrogation the suspect confessed to the crime and pleaded for leniency.
“The Commissioner of Police, CP RABIU MUHAMMAD psc, mni, expresses appreciation to the other sister agencies for the synergy and swift collaborative action. He warns, in the strongest terms, that anyone, regardless of status, found attempting to undermine the electoral process will face the full wrath of the law.
“The Kaduna State Police Command reassures residents of its commitment to providing maximum security before, during and after the elections, and calls on the good people of Kaduna State to go out and exercise their franchise peacefully and lawfully without fear or intimidation.”
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Bye-Election: Crisis Rocks Labour Party as Obi Directs Members to Vote for Other Party , Abure Says ‘Ignore Him’
The attention of the leadership of the Labour Party has been drawn to a statement by the party’s former presidential candidate, Mr. Peter Obi, directing party members to cast their votes for another party in the August 16, 2025 bye-election. The party said that Obi’s directive is misleading, mischievous and delusional.
The party is however calling on all our faithful party members to ignore this malicious directive and go ahead with casting of their votes for the Labour Party and their candidates.
It is unfortunate that Obi has turned himself to an irony and a paradox in the Nigeria political space. He is now reputed to have elevated subterfuge in the game of politics and has of late been crying wolf where there is none. He has turned himself into “Uber” politician, not willing to take a position and stand by his decision. He has now booked a place for himself in the Guinness book of records as a person affiliated to many political parties pari pasu, all in his desperation to preside over Nigeria.
Nigerians should not forget in a hurry that it was Peter Obi that created the crisis in the Labour Party which he is now citing as a reason why people should not vote for the party. Peter Obi and Alex Otti the Governor of Abia State hosted the ill-fated and illegal expanded stakeholders meeting in Umuahia, September 4, 2024. He has also co-funded the crisis all these while and went as far as leading a protest match to INEC headquarters against his own party.
His desperation to control the soul of the party has made him go haywire.
A man that received so much goodwill from the party leadership but turned around to pay them with evil. This is why we have maintained that Peter Obi lacks the competence, character and capacity to actualise the vision of a new Nigeria.
What Obi does not know is that Labour Party is on the ballot and our candidates are contesting the election in spite of all his efforts to strangulate the Labour Party. The party unknown to him has done everything within the law to ensure that our candidates participate in the bye-election and of course in all other future election.
We are therefore encouraging our candidates, members and supporters across all the states where bye-election is holding to be focused and ensure that we carry out our civic duties by returning Labour Party and the candidates elected. Nigerians have come to know who Peter Obi is.
President Bola Tinubu on Wednesday directed a review of deductions and revenue retention practices by Nigeria’s major revenue-generating agencies, in a bid to boost public savings, improve spending efficiency, and unlock resources for growth.
The agencies include the Federal Inland Revenue Service, the Nigeria Customs Service, the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency, and the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited.
Tinubu gave the directive during the Federal Executive Council meeting on Wednesday in Abuja. The President’s directive was disclosed to journalists by the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun.
According to Edun, President Tinubu specifically called for a reassessment of NNPC’s 30 per cent management fee and 30 per cent frontier exploration deduction under the Petroleum Industry Act. He tasked the Economic Management Team, chaired by Edun, to present actionable recommendations to FEC on the optimal way forward.
The President said the directive was part of efforts to sustain reforms that have dismantled economic distortions, restored policy credibility, enhanced resilience, and bolstered investor confidence.
According to him, these reforms have created a transparent, competitive business environment attractive to local and foreign investors in critical sectors such as infrastructure, oil and gas, health, and manufacturing.
Reaffirming the Renewed Hope Agenda, Tinubu said Nigeria’s goal of a $1tn economy by 2030 requires growth of at least seven per cent annually from 2027 — a target he described as “not just economic, but a moral imperative,” as higher growth is the surest path to tackling poverty.
He cited the July 2025 International Monetary Fund Article IV report, which he said endorsed Nigeria’s economic trajectory and the need for investment-led growth.
On grassroots empowerment, the President pointed to the Renewed Hope Ward Development Programme — a ward-based initiative covering all 8,809 wards across the country — designed to lift economically active citizens through micro-level poverty reduction strategies in collaboration with states, local governments, and private partners.
Tinubu noted that public investment accounts for just five per cent of Gross Domestic Product due to low savings, stressing that optimising “every available naira” is vital, especially under current global liquidity constraints.
Edun said macroeconomic indicators were improving, with a more stable exchange rate, easing inflation, rising revenues, and debt-to-GDP ratios now within range. He described savings as the foundation of investment and said the President’s directive aims to quickly raise public sector savings by reviewing deductions and retention practices.
Meanwhile, Edun said he presented two memoranda to Council — a $125m Islamic Development Bank financing for infrastructure in Abia State, covering 35 kilometres of roads in Umuahia and 126 kilometres in Aba; and a plan to refinance N4tn in outstanding electricity sector obligations.
The electricity debt resolution will be executed in phases, with the first phase expected within three to four weeks under the coordination of the Debt Management Office and other agencies.
According to the talking points by President Bola Tinubu obtained by our correspondent, he commended members of the Federal Executive Council for implementing bold reforms “that have dismantled longstanding distortions in our economy and restored policy credibility.”
Tinubu said the reforms have enhanced economic resilience, restored macroeconomic stability, created a transparent and competitive business environment, and bolstered investor confidence.
“As a result, our economy is now better positioned to attract both domestic and foreign private investment-investment that is critical to stimulating sustained growth, creating decent jobs, and lifting millions of Nigerians out of poverty.
“Our Renewed Hope Agenda remains focused on achieving a $1tn economy by the year 2030. To realise this vision, we must now accelerate our efforts to achieve a minimum growth rate of 7.0 per cent by 2027,” Tinubu said.
According to him, stimulating higher growth is the only sustainable path to solving the poverty challenge in Nigeria. “The recent IMF Article IV Report, published in July 2025, also affirms this trajectory and underscores the importance of investment-led growth.
“In line with our commitment to inclusive development, I recently launched the Renewed Hope Ward Development Programme-a ward-based initiative covering all 8,809 wards across the 774 Local Government Areas in Nigeria.
“This programme is close to my heart. It is designed to empower active grassroots economic players, using a micro-level approach to tackle poverty. We aim to bring sub-national governments and private sector partners on board to ensure efficient and impactful implementation,” he stated.
He urged governors to accelerate growth by prioritising productivity-enhancing investments, strengthening food security, and deepening collaboration with local governments to address the poverty challenge and ensuring that no Nigerian is left behind.
Speaking on savings and investment as catalysts for growth, the President emphasized the critical role of savings in catalyzing investment and growth. “Currently, public investment as a share of GDP stands at a low 5.0 per cent, largely due to insufficient public savings.
“We must urgently review and optimize our savings. This includes enhancing spending efficiency and reviewing deductions from the Federation Account, such as the cost of collection by revenue agencies, such as FIRS, Customs, NUPRC, and NIMASA, etc.
“There is also the need to reassess the 30 per cent management fee and the 30 per cent frontier exploration deduction by NNPC based on the Petroleum Industry Act. We must optimise every available Naira to sustain our momentum and finance our growth trajectory-especially in a time of global liquidity constraints.
“Accordingly, I am directing the Economic Management Team, chaired by the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, to conduct a comprehensive review of all deductions and revenue retention practices, and present actionable recommendations to this Council for an optimal way forward.”
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