An interview with Greg Davis about investment and economic conditions, investor expectations, and technology’s effects on the financial markets.
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The Advocacy for Integrity and Economic Development has urged the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control to stop wasting “limited testing kits” on political office holders and government officials.
In a statement on Thursday by its Director of Media and Publicity, Comrade O’Seun John, the organisation said the unchecked usage of the scarce testing kits for COVID-19 on government officials and politicians is appalling and a disservice to ordinary Nigerian, who deserve to be truly tested.
The statement reads, “We have noticed with utmost dismay the unending wastage of scarce testing kits for COVID-19 on politicians and political office holders at the detriment of the masses.
“We find this endeavour as a disservice to the people of Nigeria who should be the primary focus of the Nigerian Centre for Disease Control and Ministry of Health.
“From several reports, the NCDC conducts an average of two tests on governors, senators, House of Representatives and Assembly members, Chief of Staff to the President amongst other influential figures in the country.
“These individuals have been solely responsible for the decades of decay and backwardness our health care system is facing. They stood aloof and budgeted billions of naira for frivolous expenses while the citizens suffer in penury, they do not deserve to enjoy the benefits from magnanimous philanthropists who have inconvenient themselves to help Nigerians.
“It is also on record that most, if not all, of the cases recorded or perceived in the corridors of power have been caused by the sheer refusal to submit to simple emergency protocols and checks at the airports. Nigerians should not then be the ones suffering for the ego and pride of these few ones.
“While we acknowledge that not every Nigerian will get tested for COVID-19, it is extremely important that these testing kits are kept safely for the primary use of the average Nigerian.
“The present statistics of less than 200 individuals who have received testing from the NCDC is disgraceful for a population of almost 200 million people. NCDC must channel its resources on improving the testing rates for Nigerians.
“The NCDC should leave the politicians alone and focus on Nigerians who are more in number and at a greater risk. If any politician feels the need to get tested, such politician can charter a flight to Europe, Asia or America where they get their routine medical check-up.”
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Olabisi Deji-Folutile
Olabisi Deji-Folutile
The world is facing its most trying and unprecedented times as the last few weeks have been most challenging for almost everybody. What started in Wuhan, China, as an epidemic, has put the entire world in disarray. Major streets across the globes have become empty. Both the rich and the poor are being ravaged by the plague of COVID-19, which the World Health Organisation has rightly described as a pandemic. Work places have been shut; religious and social gatherings banned and many countries are on total lockdown, in a bid to curb the spread of this viral disease. Expectedly, schools are also affected across board. Every day people are being told to embrace social distancing and suddenly things like human contacts, hitherto considered as free gifts of life, are becoming very expensive.
No one knows when this whole chaos will end, so people are making different kinds of adjustments to cope with the situation while it lasts. Many companies have shifted their operations online. Likewise, many schools have opted for e-learning, making use of available technology for teaching and learning.
Universities around the world are making use of communication technology to ease the effects of the global pandemic on their academic calendars. In China, universities are going for online teaching instead of in-class teaching; the ones in Australia have moved their classes online just as UK universities have suspended face-to-face teaching. Turkey started its remote university classes on March 23. In Kenya, universities have activated communication between lecturers and students via social media platforms and emails while classes have gone totally online in the Philippines and Kyrgyzstan. Teachers in France have been working with their students on Zoom.
Just a few days ago, Ghana’s President Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, directed the ministry of education to collaborate with the ministry of communications in rolling out open learning programmes in response to the closure of all educational institutions in the country. In the same vein, Mount Kenya University’s Vice-Chancellor Peter Wanderi, has announced the extension of online teaching platforms for regular students to facilitate the learning process. And to take care of the over six million students that have experienced disruption to their studies, ten North African and 12 Arab countries have begun work on an e-learning initiative to facilitate open and online education.
These are some of the steps being taken across the globe to bridge the gap created by school closure in the wake of COVID-19. Unfortunately, while all these activities are going on in other parts of the world, Nigerian government has not said anything about steps being taken to take care of its students’ community. Rather, the only message from the Federal Government was a total closure of all tertiary institutions and FG-owned unity schools till further notice. A statement issued by the National Universities Commission simply said universities would remain shut for one month while the Education Minister, Adamu Adamu, said tertiary institutions would remain shut indefinitely.
Assuming government has been overwhelmed by the burden of controlling the spread of COVID- 19, hence its silence on options for learning for its teeming student population, one would have expected the higher institutions themselves to at least say something, but as it is, they too are not helping matters. The silence in our universities has been deafening. To worsen the situation, the Academic Staff Union of Universities, decided to choose this time, of all times, to embark on an indefinite strike. One wonders how the academic body manages to feel comfortable being on a strike at a time when researchers across the globe are busy looking for solution to a pandemic that is ravaging the entire world. This kind of action makes one query the essence of having Research and Development as a core component of tertiary education in Nigeria when researchers can be nowhere to be found at a critical time of societal needs.
By now, our researchers should be adding their voices to the various efforts being made towards developing a vaccine or cure for COVID-19. After all, universities are expected to proffer solutions to societal problems. This is a wrong time for ASUU to embark on an indefinite strike. This should be a time of strategising and proffering solutions. This is really the time for everyone to get involved. Besides, I think Nigerian universities should also be more forthcoming on their responses to the challenges posed to their students by COVID-19.
As it is, religious organisations are doing far better in terms of their responses to the effects of this pandemic on their primary constituencies. Many of them have devised other means of getting the attention of their members following several government directives prohibiting either gatherings or limiting the number of people allowed to congregate at a time. Almost all the churches have switched to online platforms for their services. How come religious organisations are working hard to keep their flocks and both government and higher institutions in Nigeria are just moving on as if all is well? No word on how to keep the students busy or keep them engaged using available online technology! Should teaching and learning be restricted to the classrooms alone in this 21st century?
Nigeria has always been described as a religious society. Corona Virus has further exposed the smartness of our religious bodies and the dullness of those in charge of our public educational institutions. This is not an attempt to blame any religious organisation for having the foresight to deploy technology in reaching their audiences. Instead, it is a wakeup call to managers of our educational institutions to adopt and use available technology to help their students at a time like this.
Apart from the National Open University of Nigeria, which basically runs online, I doubt if there is any other public university in the country that has capacity for online teaching. This is in spite of the launch of the Nigerian Communication Satellite known as NIGCOMSAT by the Nigerian Government first in 2007 and then NIGCOMSAT-IR in December 2011, to provide critical ICT backbone infrastructure to support e-learning, among others in the country.
What is the essence of investing so much money in a communication satellite if it cannot be deployed at a time of need? Those in charge of NIGCOMSAT, the commercial arm of Nigeria’s space centre, have consistently claimed that the technology has the capacity to cover the entire Africa. If that is the case, why is the country still struggling to deploy internet connectivity facilities to its schools to aide e-learning? If we are truly a serious country, by now, all the schools in urban and rural areas should have been connected to the e-learning services.
No doubt, COVID-19 has exposed Nigeria’s unpreparedness for e-learning. But, we can’t afford to remain where we are. That is why it is important for every institution to start thinking of how to deploy available technology in the world for the good of their students at this critical period. Universities should as a matter of urgency migrate online. This shouldn’t be another season of waiting and probably wasting for the Nigerian student. There is no reason why any higher institution worth its name should suspend all academic activities until the end of Corona Virus with all the available resources and technology in the world today. The minimum expected of them is to upload teaching resources online for students to have access to them. At least this will give the students the opportunity to learn on their own.
This is also an opportunity for telecommunications companies like Glo, MTN and the rest of them to make a difference in Nigeria’s educational institutions. They can as part of their corporate social responsibility decide to boost internet facilities in universities and other educational institutions; or provide data at cheaper rates to help poor students have access to the internet for online learning.
I know there are obvious stumbling blocks to digital learning in Nigeria. Many students don’t even have access to devices while the cost of buying data is still high. These challenges and others have provided telecommunications companies a huge opportunity of making a difference in Nigerian higher institutions by providing e-learning solutions and broadband connectivity to universities and other higher institutions.
They can as part of their corporate social responsibility decide to boost internet facilities in universities and other higher institutions; or help poor students who have limited or poor internet access to enhance online learning.
Olabisi Deji-Folutile is the Editor-in-Chief of Franktalknow.com and member of the Nigerian Guild of Editors. Email: bisideji@yahoo.co.uk
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What investors need to know about Vanguard money market funds.
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The infection is being eliminated as a public health threat by countries that introduce widespread testing and treatment for those at risk
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Telecommunication providers are taking positive steps to meet consumers’ demands in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. As a result, the National Broadband Network (NBN Co) is being urged to reduce its wholesale broadband charges for these providers.
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Segmentation and targeting are key elements of marketing and almost 91 percent of marketers agree that high quality data is of prime importance for all marketing efforts. As per the results of BluKai survey conducted among 133 marketing executives, 36 percent of respondents said that they were trying to utilize at least 20 percent of their overall budget for data driven practices. According to them, this has earlier shown positive results such as an impressive hike in the conversion rates as well as sales.
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Rates of death and disability after a stroke have fallen by a quarter in south London in the past 16 years, perhaps due to specialist stroke centres
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When interest rates rise, bond prices fall.
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The 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action remains the world’s most progressive blueprint for advancing gender equality worldwide. Twenty-five years after it was affirmed by 189 countries, what progress has been made in raising this blueprint
off the page?
On International Women’s Day the World Health Organization, United Nations University – International Institute for Global Health and the British Medical Journal have launched a special series marking ‘Beijing+25’.
It shines a spotlight on health, education, environment, work and other critical foundations of life as they empower or restrict the rights and well-being of girls and women.
Every person’s right to control their sexuality and sexual and reproductive health is linked to their human rights. This makes sexual and reproductive health and rights a cornerstone of the Beijing strategy: both as a driver towards gender equality,
and a fundamental part of it.
The first article in the series, ‘25 years after the Beijing Declaration we need to reaffirm that women’s rights are human rights,’ highlights recent advances in gender equality and celebrates
the rise of a new and determined generation of activists, working together to empower girls and women.
It also expresses concern that progress has been superficial and not fast enough. Some critical areas of work have slowed or even been pushed back, such as comprehensive sexual and reproductive health information, services and rights.
The authors ask for increased and direct investment in women and girls, to meet their specific health needs and accelerate equal rights for all.
The Beijing Declaration affirms that the human rights of women cannot be separated from the universal human rights of every person – but that without concrete actions to strengthen them, they will remain rights in name only.
Some advances in this area since 1995 can be measured by health outcomes, including a reduction in both maternal mortality and rates of female genital mutilation. Positive change is also reflected in public awareness: concepts of period poverty and sexual
harassment, once taboo, are being taken up in day-to-day language.
And yet today, sexual and reproductive health conditions remain one of the leading causes of mortality and morbidity for women and girls. Violence against women and girls is the most frequent human rights abuse worldwide.
Twenty-five years on, the Beijing agenda is still relevant and still unfinished.
Although The Platform for Action is repeatedly affirmed in international and governmental forums, women and girls still face social, political and cultural barriers to controlling their sexuality, sexual and reproductive health.
Their decisions cannot be free from coercion, discrimination and violence if they are made in the context of power imbalances, harmful gender norms and inequalities.
The authors from HRP, the Institute on Inequalities in Global Health, the Supreme Court of Nepal, the WHO and Women Deliver call for a system of protection for women’s human rights defenders everywhere.
They celebrate new communities of frontline defenders, civil society movements holding governments to account, and vibrant coalitions such as Generation Equality as drivers of achievements in girls and women’s rights over the last twenty-five years.
Governments are preparing for the 64th Commission on the Status of Women in late March, where they will review implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and challenges affecting full realization of the 2030 Agenda for
Sustainable Development.
They will recognize that no country has fully achieved equality, and that women and girls who experience multiple forms of discrimination throughout their lives are still the most held back.
If this collective reflection can be shifted into action, 2020 will become a new anniversary: a pivotal year for the accelerated realization of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls, everywhere.
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