Category: West Africa

Although the Central Bank of Nigeria left the repo rate unchanged at 14% per annum last month in a bid to control inflation and support the naira after abandoning the currency peg to the dollar in June, the economy continues to experience challenges. The fall in commodity prices that started at the end of 2014…

Amid slowing economic growth, forex shortages and currency depreciation, retail rentals have doubled in naira terms since December 2014. To retain tenants, retail landlords have had to offer significant rental concessions which include rent free periods, fit out allowances, pegged exchange rates, concessions on rents for limited periods and step-up lease agreements stipulating that the…

South Africa’s MTN has appointed a new regulatory affairs chief, a spokesman said on Monday, after a large fine in Nigeria dragged Africa’s biggest mobile operator by users to its first-ever half-yearly loss. The firm, which had been fined $1 billion by Nigeria for missing a deadline to disconnect inactive SIM cards, was last month…

Managing Director of Volkswagen Nigeria, Tokunbo Aromolaran, has said that Nigeria spends about N1.4trillion yearly on importation of used vehicles from different countries of the world. Speaking in Abuja, at a two-day workshop for heads of mass transit companies in Nigeria, Aromolaran, who delivered a paper titled; ‘Local Demand for Bus and Assembly Plants as…

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday sent a draft budget framework for 2017, outlining spending plans for Africa’s biggest economy, to the upper house of parliament for approval. The figures contained in the document, referred to as the medium-term expenditure framework, must be approved by the Senate before the final budget is submitted. Overall spending…

Sierra Leone will cut the cost of running its government by 30 percent to try to tackle an economic crisis triggered by falls in commodity prices and the aftermath of an Ebola epidemic, President Ernest Bai Koroma said in a statement. The measures will come into effect immediately and continue for the rest of the…

The governor of Zamfara state, Abdulaziz Yari Abubakar has raised the alarm that the state experiences an annual loss of over five hundred million US Dollars ($500m) to improper mining business. Speaking during a special paper presentation by scholars held at the JB Yakubu Secretariat, Gusau to mark the 20th anniversary of the state, the…