Business News
Nigeria must embrace technology to remain relevant – Zinox boss
Technology innovation represents a way for developing nations to foster economic development, improve levels of education, training and way of life.
Technology innovation represents a way for developing nations to foster economic development, improve levels of education, training and way of life.
These and more were the points made by Chairman, Zinox Group, Leo Stan Ekeh, as he prepared the minds of Nigerians on how technology would disrupt several spheres of the Nigerian economy by 2029.
Speaking at the 2019 Annual Lecture Series of foremost advisory and corporate commercial entity, Alliance Law Firm, the Techpreneur said that no one has the capacity to stop the coming wave of positive technological disruption.
Leo Stan Ekeh
He tasked Nigerians, especially the youths to take advantage of the positive digital disruption and add impetus to the brand Nigeria on the global map.
The Zinox boss, who was the Lead speaker at the event, said, “It is now between our competence, our commitment and God to lead other nations of the world. This is a century of quality wealth driven with knowledge and conscience and powered by technology. We have no reason not to scale with over 200million ambitious people from birth.”
[READ MORE: Start-up owners must believe in Nigeria to scale, says Ekeh, Zinox Boss]
Meanwhile, the event was attended by the Chairman, MTN Nigeria, Ernest Ndukwe, who chaired the occasion; Media entrepreneur, Linda Ikeji; Managing Director, Ecobank Nigeria, Patrick Akinwutan, and former Director, NOTAP, Umar Bindir.
Others are Group Managing Director, Mojec International Holdings, Chantelle Abdul; and Deputy Chief Executive Officer, Payment Tokens, Interswitch, Mike Ogbalu, among others.
Ekeh described the event as one of the best ever organised in Nigeria in recent times because of the quality and content of the event.
According to him, every sector of the Nigerian economy is experiencing the impact of technology, be it the electoral system, health care delivery, agriculture, banking, transport, education, hospitality, governance, entertainment, housing and including the way businesses are run in Nigeria.
“Today, Nigeria is moving closer to e-voting. Also, you will observe that post-election litigations have dropped considerably. In fact, we are down by about 41% today.
“Once we migrate to e-voting fully, anyone who loses an election will have no need to go and contest it in court. This is the power of technology. Technology does not lie. This is why I chose to go into it as a profession,” he added.
He urged the Federal and State Governments to take that decision now to invest about $10 billion to provide quality digital infrastructure in Nigerian schools at all levels and finance school fees for indigent students nationwide.
Ernest Ndukwe
“When I returned to this country over 30 years ago, I was worth less than $10,000. Within three months of returning to Nigeria, I was privileged to have met people like General Theophilus Danjuma, the Awolowo family and others who patronised me and in the first six months, I hit over $4.5m balance sheet size.
“I wouldn’t have achieved this if I had decided to remain in the UK, as I was being advised then by those who saw no future for Nigeria in technology. It is important to note that though my customers did not really understand what they were buying, I did not betray them. This century is a century of trust and those that can not be trusted have no financial capacity to scale.
“A very good example of this is Konga which is run by my son and his colleagues. A few months after we acquired Konga, Naspers – the previous owners – which invested $32m in TenCent sold off two per cent of its stake for $9.8bn. Today, Naspers’ remaining 28 per cent stake in TenCent is worth $133bn. If the whizkids at Konga choose to put Konga up for sale today, we have an idea how much it will attract. Nigeria with our growing quality population is headed for greatness,” Ekeh added.
[READ ALSO: Ekeh, Zinox boss, intervenes in Imo State with N1 billion]
The event also witnessed the launch of the Doing Business in Nigeria manual. Chief Host of the event and Managing Partner, Alliance Law Firm, Uche Val Obi (SAN) affirmed that the publication drew on the firm’s vast advisory experience and their status as notable contributors in the IMF/World Bank Doing Business publications.
Hospitality & Travel
FG to open Kano, new MM International Airports for use in March
The new MAKIA terminal, new Murtala Muhammed international Airport (MMIA) will be ready before the end of March 2021.
Coronavirus
COVID-19 Update in Nigeria
On the 5th of March 2021, 371 new confirmed cases and 3 deaths were recorded in Nigeria
The spread of novel Corona Virus Disease (COVID-19) in Nigeria continues to record significant increases as the latest statistics provided by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control reveal Nigeria now has 158,042 confirmed cases.
On the 5th of March 2021, 371 new confirmed cases and 3 deaths were recorded in Nigeria.
To date, 158,042 cases have been confirmed, 137,025 cases have been discharged and 1,954 deaths have been recorded in 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory.
A total of 1.54 million tests have been carried out as of March 5th, 2021 compared to 1.49 million tests a day earlier.
COVID-19 Case Updates- 5th March 2021,
- Total Number of Cases – 158,042
- Total Number Discharged – 137,025
- Total Deaths – 1,954
- Total Tests Carried out – 1,544,008
According to the NCDC, the 371 new cases are reported from 20 states- Lagos (101), Rivers (54), Anambra (31), Ebonyi (23), Imo (23), Kwara (22), Kano (20), Taraba (17), Akwa Ibom (16), FCT (15), Abia (13), Kaduna (13), Osun (5), Edo (4), Oyo (4), Kebbi (3), Ogun (3), Ekiti (2), Nasarawa (1), and Zamfara (1).
Meanwhile, the latest numbers bring Lagos state total confirmed cases to 56,374, followed by Abuja (19,328), Plateau (8,939), Kaduna (8,623), Oyo (6,761), Rivers (6,651), Edo (4,645), Ogun (4,419), Kano (3,830), Ondo (3,066), Kwara (2,953), Delta (2,582), Osun (2,449), Nasarawa (2,248), Enugu (2,078), Katsina (2,060), Gombe (2,010), Ebonyi (1,951), Anambra (1,811), Akwa Ibom (1,588), and Abia (1,568).
Imo State has recorded 1,551 cases, Borno (1,297), Bauchi (1,232), Benue (1,188), Adamawa (942), Niger (917), Taraba (863), Ekiti (825), Bayelsa (779), Sokoto (769), Jigawa (496), Kebbi (401), Cross River (334), Yobe (288), Zamfara (221), while Kogi state has recorded 5 cases only.
READ ALSO: COVID-19: Western diplomats warn of disease explosion, poor handling by government
Lock Down and Curfew
In a move to combat the spread of the pandemic disease, President Muhammadu Buhari directed the cessation of all movements in Lagos and the FCT for an initial period of 14 days, which took effect from 11 pm on Monday, 30th March 2020.
The movement restriction, which was extended by another two weeks period, has been partially put on hold with some businesses commencing operations from May 4. On April 27th, 2020, Nigeria’s President, Muhammadu Buhari declared an overnight curfew from 8 pm to 6 am across the country, as part of new measures to contain the spread of the COVID-19. This comes along with the phased and gradual easing of lockdown measures in FCT, Lagos, and Ogun States, which took effect from Saturday, 2nd May 2020, at 9 am.
On Monday, 29th June 2020 the federal government extended the second phase of the eased lockdown by 4 weeks and approved interstate movement outside curfew hours with effect from July 1, 2020. Also, on Monday 27th July 2020, the federal government extended the second phase of eased lockdown by an additional one week.
On Thursday, 6th August 2020 the federal government through the secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) and Chairman of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19 announced the extension of the second phase of eased lockdown by another four (4) weeks.
Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State announced the closed down of the Eti-Osa Isolation Centre, with effect from Friday, 31st July 2020. He also mentioned that the Agidingbi Isolation Centre would also be closed and the patients relocated to a large capacity centre.
Due to the increased number of covid-19 cases in Nigeria, the Nigerian government ordered the reopening of Isolation and treatment centres in the country on Thursday, 10th December 2020.
On 26th January 2021, the Federal Government announced the extension of the guidelines of phase 3 of the eased lockdown by one month following the rising cases of the coronavirus disease in the country and the expiration of phase 3 of the eased lockdown.
On 28th February 2021, the federal government confirmed that the first tranche of Covid-19 vaccines will arrive in Nigeria on Tuesday, March 2nd, 2021.
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