The Election Petitions Tribunal sitting in Calabar has sacked a
member of the Cross River House of Assembly for Abi State
Constituency, Dr. David Etta, of the Peoples Democratic Party and
ordered a rerun.
Chairman of Panel Two of the tribunal, Justice A. A. Babawale,
declared the election of Etta null and void while ruling on a
petition by the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, Iwara
Inah, in the election.
Inah had, in his petition, alleged electoral malpractices, and
non compliance with the 2010 electoral guidelines by the
Independent National Electoral Commission in the conduct of the
election on March 9, 2019.
According to her, votes in 15 polling units numbering 10,400
votes which were cancelled could decide if victory could go one way
or the other among the candidates.
Justice Babawale ordered “a rerun to be conducted in the 15
polling units within 90 days,” and called for the withdrawal of
Certificate of Return given to the PDP candidate.
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imported
rice
Boosting Rice Production, Tackling
Smuggling
The battle to end the importation of rice into the country
through the illicit activities of smuggling may be far from been
totally won. Yet, the determination on the part of the Federal
Government to boost its production through massive local
cultivation has since been unassailable.
It would be recalled that the Federal Government (FG), sometimes
in November 2018, approved the sum of N60 billion to support rice
production in the country and crash its market price ahead of the
last festive period. Equally, as part of efforts to boost rice
production and ban importation into the country, FG expressed
readiness to partner with OLAM farm, in Nasarawa State.
Speaking after inspecting facilities at the farm during a visit
in 2016, Kebbi State Governor, Atiku Bagudu, who is the Chairman of
the National Initiative for Stable Crop Production in Nigeria,
congratulated Olam farm for its doggedness and self-determination
in consolidating on FG’s policy of fighting importation of foreign
rice into the country by encouraging local food production. The aim
of the partnership, according to Gov. Bagudu then, was to support
domestic food production and food security through scaling up rice
cultivation.
While responding, Vice president of the farm, Mr. Regi George,
who stated that they had already developed a 10,000 hectare fully
irrigated paddy farm on green field sites in Rukubi, Nasarawa
State, expressed belief that the country would soon achieve
self-sufficiency in rice production. He further disclosed that over
4,450 hectares were already under cultivation, with a further 3,000
hectares on target for 2017 and 2018 raining season.
In February this year, the immediate past Agriculture Minister,
Chief Audu Ogbeh, while declaring open a two-day ‘Farmers Forum and
Exhibition’ workshop, jointly organised by the Kebbi Ministry of
Agriculture and DailyTrust Newspapers, asserted that FG will train
100 rice farmers in Kebbi, as part of efforts to boost rice
production in the country.
Ogbeh added that the training of the 100 Kebbi farmers in
commercial rice production was in recognition of the success which
the state government had recorded in rice production under the
Anchor Borrowers’ Programme of the Central Bank of Nigeria
(CBN).
Likewise, a one-time Minister of Women Affairs and Social
Development, Hajia Aisha Al-Hassan, in March last year, during the
62nd Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW),
disclosed that FG had released about N43.92 billion (122 million
dollars) to 300,000 rice farmers to increase Nigeria’s rice
production by additional two million tonnes in 2018.
But amidst the courageous steps and inspiring commitments shown
by both the Federal Government and State Government to boost local
rice production, activity of the smuggling of the staple crop seems
to be burgeoning. As a matter of fact, the protracted smuggling of
the commodity appears to have grown to the extent of dominating the
market, even as it sucks away the foreign exchange by way of
capital flight. Almost 70 percent of rice in the local market are
foreign parboiled rice, while the locally-made rice have been
overwhelmed and barely has little or no place in the market.
Already, the Rice Processors Association of Nigeria (RIPAN) has
said Nigeria lost over $400 million after about one million metric
tonnes of the commodity was smuggled into the country from Benin
Republic between January 2019 and August.
The National Chairman of RIPAN, Alhaji Mohammed Abubakar
Maifata, disclosed this to journalists on Thursday in Abuja, after
an intensive border and port survey by the association.
The RIPAN boss explained that about half a million metric tonnes
of the commodity have already been booked in Thailand for onward
journey to Nigeria, preparatory to the forthcoming Christmas
celebration and Yuletide season.
This, according to the chairman, would no doubt have a ripple
effect on rice processors in the country as their activities would
be hampered if this impending illegal importation is not checked
with the attendant colossal loss of over $400 million.
He noted that the closure of the Nigerian Benin Republic border
would go a long way to curb the menace of rice smuggling so that
local producers would have a breather, adding that the association
supports the current border closure by the government.
RIPAN and other stakeholders had in a three-week survey on the
rice market across the six geopolitical zones in the country
observed that foreign rice such as Mama Gold, Royal Stallion, Rice
Master, Caprice, Falcon Rice and Basmati are sold alongside
Nigerian rice.
“We at RIPAN join other stakeholders in the rice subsector,
namely, Rice Farmers Association of Nigeria (RIFAN), in commending
CBN for the timely intervention and banning of rice since 2015, a
development that has seen growth in local production of rice and
serious saving of foreign exchange,” Alhaji Maifata said.
He applauded the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) for its current
and rigorous fight against smuggling of the commodity and enjoined
the various security agencies who are mandated by the current
directive to raise the bar of the fight to check the various porous
borders.
There is no gainsaying that the activity of rice smuggling will
automatically be curbed if locally-produced rice can compete evenly
in terms of pricing and quality with its foreign counterpart.
However, that will only happen, if the private sector is supported,
and commercial rice farmers encouraged to invest in mechanized
farming. They should be advised to adopt cost-effective means of
processing locally-produced rice to ensure optimality in quality,
as well as price competitiveness.
They also need to be supported with special intervention funds
that are of single-digit interest rate and allow long term
repayment tenure, together with providing easy access to land and
infrastructure support for mechanized farming.
But to permanently tackle the menace of illegal importation of
rice, FG must ensure that its anti-smuggling efforts are
strengthened, while security officials caught aiding and abetting
these economic saboteurs should be severely punished to serve as a
deterrent to others.