Business

More Microfinance Banks May Collapse – Operator

Published

11 years ago

February 4, 2015

Managing Director of
Asha Microfinance Bank, in Lagos Mr Aminul Bhuiya, has said more microfinance banks in the country might collapse due to high cost of operation.
Bhuiya told newsmen that over 860 out of over 890 microfinance banks in the country were struggling to survive because they were competing with commercial banks.
He said most of them collapsed because they operated on a mini commercial bank model, adding that no microfinance bank would succeed under such model.
According to the expert, microfinance banks need not to rent a gigantic or exotic building to offer their services.
“Some of us operators even amass vehicles, this is not supposed to be so,” he said
According to Bhuiya, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has designed a model and rules for microfinance banks in Nigeria but most operators have deviated from the rules.
“For example, if we follow real microfinance practice as laid down by Asa Microfinance banking model in Bangdalesh, the sector will thrive.
“So I therefore urge my colleagues to make efforts at reducing unnecessary cost to prevent more collapse.
“Our business should be for the active poor; I mean for people into small businesses of selling pepper, tomatoes and other petty traders.’’
He also urged the operators to always adhere strictly to the laid rules by the CBN.
“According to the CBN rules, loans to an individual should not go beyond N500,000 and that those who borrow money should always be monitored.
“We must ensure that the loan is used strictly for the purpose for which it is borrowed and attempt to divert such loan requires the lender’s advice,” he said.
He urged operators to stop giving huge loans to individuals because such loans could affect their shareholders’ funds and lead to bad debt.
Bhuiya, who is from Bangladesh, said that such bank was bound to fail in the long run.
He said that it might also be difficult for many microfinance banks to access the N220 billion intervention funds for the sector by the Federal Government because of their mode of operations.
He said it was wrong to blame the government for their inability to access the fund.
“The rules are not stringent only that most of them will prefer not to access the loan than exposing their weaknesses,” he said.
To access the fund, a microfinance bank must submit its latest CBN/NDIC examination report and audited and management reports for two years.

Business

NUPRC Declares ‘Drill-or-Drop’ Era, Moves Against Dormant Oil Licences

Published

3 seconds ago

March 16, 2026

The Tide

The Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), has commenced the strict enforcement of the ‘drill- or-drop” provision contained in the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA), compelling operators to either commence exploration activities or relinquish idle oil blocks.

The Chief Executive, (NUPRC), Oritsemeyiwa Eyesan, who disclosed this while receiving a delegation from the Petroleum Directorate of Sierra Leone, at the commission’s headquarters in Abuja, at the weekend, declared the era of oil companies holding on to prospecting licences without developing the assets over.

Eyesan said the enforcement of Section 94 of the PIA has fundamentally changed the landscape of Nigeria’s upstream sector by eliminating the long-standing practice where operators held licences for decades without developing the assets.

She explained that the new regime has begun to attract more serious investors into Nigeria’s upstream sector, particularly in the ongoing 2025 licensing round, which is expected to boost the country’s petroleum reserves and unlock new exploration opportunities.

“The PIA has opened opportunities for both small and big players because there is now a drill-or-drop provision in the Act. In the past, we had operators who held licences for as long as 20 years and sat on those assets without doing anything. That era is now over,” Eyesan said.

She noted that the enforcement of the provision has expanded the pool of available assets and strengthened the commission’s capacity to organise more frequent bid rounds, with the possibility of conducting annual licensing rounds going forward.

Eyesan also expressed satisfaction with the level of interest shown by investors in the 2025 licensing round, describing the number of applicants that participated in the pre-qualification stage as impressive.

She explained that the licensing round offers 50 oil blocks, but the guidelines restrict each company—whether bidding independently or as part of a consortium—to a maximum of two blocks, a measure designed to encourage wider participation and promote fairness in the allocation process.

The NUPRC boss further disclosed that the commission has introduced additional safeguards to ensure transparency in the bid process by engaging an independent audit firm to scrutinise and validate the digital system used for the licensing exercise.

According to her, the outcome of the audit will be made public in order to strengthen investor confidence and reinforce the credibility of the process.

Earlier, the Director-General of the Petroleum Directorate of Sierra Leone, Foday Mansaray, said the delegation visited Nigeria to understudy the country’s petroleum regulatory framework and draw lessons that could help strengthen Sierra Leone’s hydrocarbon sector.

Mansaray stressed the need for deeper energy cooperation between Sierra Leone and Nigeria, describing Nigeria as a leading player in Africa’s oil and gas industry.

He further sought the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding to formalise cooperation between both countries in the energy sector.

He said “We are here to collaborate with the NUPRC at a bilateral level and learn from Nigeria, our big brothers in the industry. We are a small country of about eight million people, but we are very ambitious”.

Business

Experts Warn of Catastrophic Environmental Fallout From Iran War

Published

7 seconds ago

March 16, 2026

The Tide

The war in Iran is sending shockwaves through global energy markets that will be felt for years to come. The conflict is causing the single biggest oil supply disruption in history, as the closure of the Strait of Hormuz has caused a nine-day disruption of 20 percent of the world’s oil transports, more-than doubling the previous record set during the Suez crisis of 1956. But the war and its energy market impacts represent much more than just economic chaos – they are also the harbingers of serious and lasting human and environmental impact across the region and the world.

The United States and Israel have been targeting Iran’s energy infrastructure in their ongoing attacks, with disastrous results for local lands and people. Monitors have admitted that they are so overwhelmed by the scale and breadth of environmental impacts from the war that they are “struggling to keep track of the environmental disasters arising from the widening war” according to The Guardian. Explosions at oil storage facilities have left fires burning for days as a black rain has fallen over the capital city of Tehran as it chokes on noxious smoke.

“To me, this black rain indicates toxic pollutants such as hydrocarbons, ultrafine particles known as PM2.5, and carcinogenic compounds called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) have made their way into the rain,” Gabriel da Silva, Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering at The University of Melbourne, recently wrote for The Conversation. He added that this rain would also include heavy metals and inorganic compounds from all of the buildings and other materials set ablaze by the strikes. The resulting acid rain could be catastrophic for human, animal, and environmental health, experts warn.

While this rain alone is cause for massive concern for Iranians, it’s likely just the tip of the iceberg. “Oil raining down on Tehran is likely only the first tell of the environmental damage – and the impact that that has on people’s health – that the US and Israel’s war will cause,” Global Witness cautioned in a recent report.

Environmental incidents are already widespread across the country. The Conflict and Environment Observatory has assessed 232 incidents for their level of environmental risk, and has flagged three types of emerging environmental harm: pollution from the destruction of military sites, marine pollution from the destruction of oil infrastructure along the Gulf coast, and the destruction of inland fossil fuel infrastructure.

There is also cause for concern about potential damage to Iran’s nuclear power infrastructure, and all of the associated environmental and health risks that would come along with such damage. In last year’s 12 days of war between Iran and Israel, there was considerable concern about lasting impacts of irradiation on the lands and soils near attacked nuclear power plants and nuclear enrichment sites.

“I want to make it absolutely and completely clear, [in] case of an attack on [a nuclear power plant], a direct hit could result in a very high release of radioactivity to the environment,” Rafael Mariono Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), warned in a June 23 statement about the war between Iran and Israel.

But even the missiles that didn’t hit nuclear sites carry serious environmental and public health hazards, as aerial attacks and the fires they create release huge amounts of toxic pollutants that end up in soil and groundwater. “This has been an issue that is concerning in the Middle East, and some of these impacts are even transboundary and trans generational,” Kaveh Madani, director of the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health, told the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists last year. “So, the war might be over, but these impacts would remain there.”

The Conflict and Environment Observatory also warns that there will be new forms of environmental fallout as the war drags on. In addition to the threat of nuclear irradiation, the watchdog warns that Israel and the United States may also target desalination plants, gravely impacting the availability of freshwater and potentially unleashing sodium hypochlorite, ferric chloride and sulfuric acid into the environment. The organization also warns that Iranian environmental governance, already weak, will all but collapse under this new stress.

In addition to the risks imposed by direct attacks on energy infrastructure, the war also poses a major threat to the climate. Wars are huge contributors to climate change. The greenhouse gas emissions associated with Russia’s war in Ukraine, for example, reached levels comparable with the entire annual emissions of France in just the first two years, according to a report from a Ukrainian watchdog organization.

By Haley Zaremba

Business

FG Establishes Petroleum Sector Reform Taskforce, Appoints Adeola As Leader

Published

30 seconds ago

March 16, 2026

The Tide

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has established a Presidential Petroleum Reform and Value Optimisation Taskforce to design and sequence the next phase of structural reforms in Nigeria’s petroleum sector.

The President appointed the co-founder of Guaranty Trust Bank(GTB) and founder/chairman of the Fate Foundation, Fola Adeola, as chairman of the task force.

A statement issued by the Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, at the weekend, disclosed that the task force would operate as a time-bound, high-level executive working group tasked with producing execution-ready reform blueprints.

According to the statement, the task force would consolidate ongoing reforms, unlock capital within the petroleum sector, and strengthen Nigeria’s position as a leading global energy investment destination.

“The initiative reflects the President’s commitment to transforming Nigeria’s petroleum industry into a more competitive, transparent, and value-maximising sector capable of driving long-term economic growth, macroeconomic resilience, and industrial development,” the statement said.

The taskforce would operate as a technical reform body rather than a representative committee, engaging industry operators, regulators, investors, and civil society as consultees while focusing on actionable policy design and implementation strategies.

It would report directly to the President and provide monthly progress memoranda, with an interim report expected after three months and final outputs within six months of inauguration.

It stated “President Tinubu has directed the task force to deliver three major reform blueprints.

“The first deliverable is the Implementation Toolkit for Immediate Structural Fixes, including draft legislative amendments, executive instruments, and institutional restructuring proposals.

“The second deliverable is the Capital & Liquidity Acceleration Blueprint, aimed at unlocking $5bn to $10bn in sectoral liquidity while safeguarding Nigeria’s sovereign interests.

“The third blueprint will focus on the National Energy Transformation Strategy, a 10-year roadmap with measurable targets for production, foreign exchange earnings, GDP contribution, and cost competitiveness”.

Tinubu has directed all ministries, departments, agencies, regulators, and relevant institutions to provide full technical support to the task force and to submit inventories of ongoing initiatives to ensure alignment with the emerging reform framework.

The President also directed all existing committees, teams, and working groups established under various reform initiatives within the sector to align their activities, reporting structures, and work programmes with the new taskforce.

“The streamlining will ensure coordination, avoid duplication of mandates, and provide institutional clarity, thereby ensuring coherence in the petroleum sector reform architecture,” the statement noted.

The President further directed that all relevant documentation, institutional knowledge, and ongoing workstreams should be made available to the task force to support the development and implementation of its comprehensive reform framework.

Onanuga described the creation of the taskforce as “a strategic presidential instrument to accelerate petroleum sector reforms, strengthen governance architecture, optimise national energy assets, and position Nigeria’s petroleum resources as a foundation for sustainable economic transformation.”

The task force would automatically dissolve upon submission and acceptance of its final report.

Other members of the taskforce are Ademola Adeyemi-Bero, Osagie Okunbor, Abubakar Suleiman, Adaeze Aguele, Farouk Gumel, Phillipa Osakwe-Okoye, and Seyi Bella, with Mofoluwasho Fadayomi serving as secretary.