Business
Union Bank To Reduce Operating Cost By N1bn
The management of Union Bank Plc is planning to reduce operating costs by N1 billion over to next one year, Mrs Funke Osibodu, the managing director of the bank said.
Osibodu noted that the cost management strategy embarked upon by the new management of the bank recently is expected to culminate in the saving of N300 million on purchase of diesel for the head office of the bank over the next one year. Already, about N30 million has been saved on diesel for the head office alone in two months and by the time the cost management strategy is extended to other branches of the bank, over N300 million would be saved over the next one year, Mrs Osibodu and two of her executive directors made these known during an interactive session with the media.
Mr Adebisi Shonubi, executive director operations, technology and services, said rather than toe the line of the old order by buying diesel from distributors, Union Bank has since the new management came on board, been purchasing diesel directly from the importers, thereby reducing costs.
Besides, he noted that about N145 million was also saved by the bank for purchase of new computers. Instead of buying new ones as had always been the case, Shonubi, said the bank had to approach the manufacturers and asked them to refurbish existing ones at N5 million and still achieve same results. “On the average, we use about two tankers of diesel in this building in a week. We were buying diesel from distributors. Meanwhile, all the people who import diesel into this country have account with us. It meant we were paying more for the diesel than we could have gotten taking to our existing customers who are directly importers.
“We would have turned the business over in our customer’s account to make them happier with us but we were not doing that. Immediately we started doing that since August, we have saved over N20 million just on item and that is on this building.
We expect that by the time we roll it out to other branches, and the other cost cutting things that we want to do on the energy alone, we should be looking at about N200 million,” he said. Shonubi said the institution had a mandate by its Group Managing Director to cut operating expenses by about 30 per cent. Executive Director, commercial and Retail Banking/Consumer Banking, Mr Adekunle Adeosun, said a e-mial culture has been instituted to improve on turn around time.
Previously, a customer’s request could take two to three weeks to complete, he said. With the e-mail system however, he said that could be achieved within 24 hours. “What we have done is improve turn around time. Our system is very old-fashioned. A request for customer stakes two to three weeks to complete the process. We are instituting an e-mail culture. Every staff has an e-mail address, so why we couldn’t use it is just an attitude and leadership thing. We have reinstituted it and the staff are embracing and using it. We are not only cutting costs in terms of cartridge, we are also helping the environment by cutting the use of paper, he said.
He, however, admitted the fact that only 45 to 50 per cent of its Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) were working properly. He said there is an ongoing process to revamp the machines and enhance their uptime, in view of their relevance in modern banking business. He said there are plans to outsource the distribution of its cheque books, stressing that the online order system has now been put in place.
Giving an update on the loan recovery efforts of the bank, Mrs Osibodu said the bank has recovered N31 billion and that the bank came from Transcorp, she explained, N600 million was in cash from government, while the remaining was in promissory notes, earning interest of 8.6 per cent per annum for the bank.
The GMD also revealed that the bank’s liquidity ratio had at different intervals reached a peak of 42 per cent. The stipulated liquidity ratio for all banks in the country is 25 per cent. On the alleged face-off between the bank and some labour unions over issues bothering on retirement and retrenchment benefits, the President, Union Bank Association of Senior Staff (UBASS), Mr Fred Ojeh, who was also in attendance, said the relationship between the union and new management has been cordial.
“The relationship here has been so cordial, I must confess, and if there are grey areas we sit down and talk it over. We support in totality all the actions of the new management to bring the bank back to Eldorado and we hope more will be done?”
“Nobody will picket Union Bank without our consent. The other faction of Association of Senior Staff of Bank, Insurance and Finance Institution (ASSBIFI) are not representing our interest,” he said. Head, Human Resources, Union Bank, Mr Mike Iyella, pointed out that the bank is committed to engage the union in positive dialogue over any issue that may arise.
Two universities in the Niger Delta zone (University of Port Harcourt and University of Benin) have emerged winners of the South-South region in the Nigerian Engineering Olympiad (NEO) competition.
The NEO competition which took place at the Nigerian Content Tower(NCT), headquarters of the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board(NCDMB) in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State is a nationwide engineering, innovation and entrepreneurship competition launched in 2025 by a non-profit organization, ‘Enactus Nigeria’, in partnership with NCDMB, Renaissance Africa Energy Company Limited, First Exploration & Petroleum Development Company and the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE).
The two Universities teams represented differently by ‘Inovation team PROTRONICS’ and ‘Innovation team VHORDE’, won their counterparts from the Igbinedion University, Okada, Edo State, Federal University of Petroleum Resources (FUPRE), Effurun, Delta State, and the University of Uyo, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, in the competition showcasing hardware and software prototypes developed to serve as innovative solutions to real-world challenges with specific reference to Nigeria and Africa.
From UNIPORT’s ‘team PROTRONICS’ was an innovation called ‘KEYTRIC’ which the competitors presented as a ‘SMART POWER CONTROL’ that makes electricity usage effortless and automating with the use of an intelligent locking systems.
Team PROTRONICS highlighted high electricity bills, electricity fire risk and expensive smart home and gaps in existing solutions, including costly installation, lack of integration between security and energy, and dependence on the Internet as the reason for their innovative invention.
“Our innovative solution is a smart energy door lock that switches off a user’s electricity supply when they lock to leave the house.
“Our solution saves money on electricity bill, reduces the risk of electric fire accident, and is affordable to everyone”, the Uniport’s team said.
On the other hand, Team VHORDE of the University of Benin presented what it terms Intelligent Real-time Interface(IRIS) which enables visually impaired individuals to gain sight.
They pointed out that there are 4.5 million visually impaired Nigerians who are in some way incapacitated and unable to live life to the fullest.
The students displayed an IRIS pack, consisting sensors, wearable glasses, microphone, camera and Haptic feedback.
On how the IRIS works, the UNIBEN students said the smart glasses, which consist, a camera, depth sensor, and edge Artificial Intelligence(AI) processor, enables a visually impaired person to see and understand the world in real time.
“There’s an AI Compute Unit to be worn at the waist, which runs Convolutional neutral network (CNN) object detection, face recognition, and voice processing on-device”, the team said.
In a section on Business Model and Revenue Streams, the University of Benin competitors indicated production-scale pricing for IRIS Standard as N699,000 one-time purchase.
According to the team, the IRIS standard has the following functions, real-time object and scene identification, familiar face recognition, obstacle and hazard detection (haptic wristbands), natural voice interaction, Edge AI – fully offline core functions, and OTA software updates via Wi-Fi.
In an assessment of the prototypes and demonstrations made, one of the key judges of the competition, Engr. Dokubo Obongo, Manager, Institutional Strengthening, at the NCDMB, described all the presentations as “top-notch”.
He noted that there are solutions that are viable marketwise, relevant to the society and the challenges humans face, explaining that the Engineering Olympiad is a competition targeted at developing home-grown solutions from research and development from Nigerian universities.
“The idea is to see how we can proffer solutions to our own problems which means creating business opportunities”, he said.
Speaking for Enactus Nigeria, the group’s Country Director, Mr. Michael Ajayi, said the two top finalists from the six geopolitical zones would move to a boot camp for further preparation towards the main national championship, and that the best three teams would share N100 million.
He also disclosed that each of the 30 teams that displayed prototype technology in the regional competition would receive N3 million.
Team PROTRONICS of the University of Port Harcourt had as Team Lead Dr. Victor Jinn (Faculty Adviser), while the contestants were Chukwuma Sunday-Odu, Fubara David Otokini, and Ekemini Godwin Akpan, while Team VHORDE of the University of Benin had Anoint Oritsetimeyin Igorki, Oghosa Derick Osarobo, Uti Henry Eworitsewarami, Jada O. Godfrey-Ariavie, Richard O.Enegbuna, Momodu O. Olayemi, and Asemota G. Ayevbosa.
By: Ariwera Ibibo-Howells, Yenagoa
The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has officially unveiled the Simplified Customs Advanced Declaration System (SCADS) at the international wing of the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja.
The move is aimed at improving passenger clearance, compliance and customs operations.
This was contained in a statement by the NCS spokesperson, Abdullahi Maiwada, and made available to Newsmen in Abuja.
Maiwada explained that the platform, designed to simplify baggage declaration for inbound international passengers, aims to reduce manual bottlenecks, improve transparency in revenue assessment and enhance operational efficiency at Nigeria’s international airports.
Speaking at the inauguration ceremony, Deputy Comptroller-General of Customs in charge of ICT/Modernisation, Oluyomi Adebakin, said the deployment of SCADS marked another major step in the service’s digital transformation agenda.
Adebakin said the initiative became necessary to address operational challenges encountered on the service’s previous passenger declaration platform earlier this year.
She explained that rather than allowing the setbacks to slow operations, the service chose to develop a stronger and more efficient alternative.
“When the earlier platform experienced operational challenges, we chose not to see it as a setback.
“We saw it as an opportunity to build something better, stronger and more efficient,” she said.
According to her, the newly introduced SCADS platform allows passengers to declare items before arrival, thereby reducing clearance time while improving compliance and operational integrity.
“For passengers, this system creates the opportunity for advance declaration before arrival. It means faster clearance, easier compliance and smoother movement through our airports,” she added.
Adebakin said that the system would eliminate subjective revenue assessment by ensuring that duties were being automatically generated based on declared items, their quantities and actual values.
“When we talk about revenue collection, it is not about collecting more or less. It is about collecting the right revenue. With this system, assessment will now be more objective, accurate and driven by data,” she said.
Earlier Comptroller Customs Area Controller, FCT Area Command, Victoria Alibo,described the selection of the command for the pilot phase as a vote of confidence in its operational capacity.
Alibo said the new platform integrates passenger baggage and e-commerce declarations into a single digital framework designed to support global Customs best practices.
“SCADS is designed to simplify declarations, reduce clearance time, eliminate manual bottlenecks and align our operations with international standards,” Alibo said.
She said that the pilot phase would run for five days, from May 18 to May 22, during which officers would evaluate the system in a live environment ahead of nationwide deployment.
The event was attended by senior Customs officers, officials of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria, partner government agencies, technical teams, and other key stakeholders in Nigeria’s aviation and border management ecosystem.
By: CHINEDU WOSU
Olubiyo, said this in an interview with Newsmen to Monday in Abuja.
He said energy theft occurs at both the consumer and institutional levels across the electricity value chain from generation to transmission and distribution.
According to Olubiyo, at the consumer level electricity theft includes metre bypass, illegal connections and unauthorised access to power without proper billing.
According to him, some customers would dig underground cables directly to their homes or businesses without being metered, while others exploit estimated billing systems to consume electricity without payment.
“Whether through metre bypass or illegal connection, many customers are using electricity for free. That is energy theft,” he said.
He also alleged that institutional energy theft exists within the power sector, particularly through defective, obsolete, or wrongly installed metres used in monitoring electricity generation and distribution.
He said that wholesale metres installed at critical interfaces among generation companies (GenCos), transmission companies, and distribution companies (DisCos) were often out-dated or improperly configured.
He said those could lead to inaccurate readings and inflated subsidy claims.
“If 4,000 megawatts is generated and 7,000 megawatts is recorded, that is energy theft because the excess energy does not get to consumers,” he stated.
The expert further said some operators in the sector allegedly exploit maintenance and repair contracts through inflated contract sums and possible collaboration with vandals.
He also cited the deployment of secure pole-mounted metres in military barracks as an example of how technology can curb metre tampering and unauthorised access.
He, therefore said the sector had to urgently address infrastructure decay, weak regulation, poor investment, and corruption within the value chain.
Otherwise, according to him, Nigeria’s electricity industry will continue to face liquidity challenges, revenue losses and unstable power supply.
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