The National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) says Nigerians will have to pay for the new multipurpose national identity card due to limited government revenue.

Peter Iwegbu, head of card management services at NIMC, spoke on Thursday at a two-day press conference in Lagos.

Iwegbu said paying for the identity card would ensure it is produced for only those who needed it.

He said the decision was made to avoid repeating the mistake of past efforts to issue physical cards to Nigerians for free, which many did not collect.

The NIMC official said over two million cards were produced in a previous attempt to issue free national ID cards by the commission

He said many of them have not been collected till date.

“Before we stopped due to funding, we produced more than two million cards but a lot of them are still in our office, people didn’t pick them up because they didn’t need it,” Iwegbu said.

Aside from low collection, Iwegbu said the government could not fund the production of ID cards due to limited revenue.

“The government’s limited revenue is also a major factor in the decision to make Nigerians pay for the new ID card,” he added.

He said  NIMC is also working with banks across the country, which will make it possible for people to walk into any bank closest to them and request the card.

‘GOVERNMENT HAS MADE PLANS FOR LESS PRIVILEGED PERSONS WHO CAN’T AFFORD IT’

Also speaking, Lanre Yusuf, director of information technology at NIMC, said the idea of a free national ID card did not turn out well in the past.

Yusuf described the new ID card as a post-paid identity card, which means that individuals must need the card before initiating a request for it.

“To get the new national ID card, Nigerians will need to make a payment, select a pickup location, and then collect their card from the chosen location,” the director said.

“The government has implemented programmes to make the card accessible to the less privileged Nigerians who cannot afford it but require it to access government support.

“This initiative demonstrates the government’s commitment to inclusivity and equality.” 

Yusuf also said the multipurpose ID cards are expected to launch soon, with sample test cards already received.

“The new national ID card is a multipurpose card that can serve the purpose of identity verification, payments, and even government services,” he said.

In April, the federal government unveiled plans to launch a multipurpose national identity card.

The card, powered by AfriGO, is in partnership with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Nigeria Inter-bank Settlement System.

The card is enabled for all government intervention and services across multiple ministries, departments, and agencies (MDAs).

The Cable

The federal government's plan to sell crude priced in the local currency is faltering, with refiners, including the giant Dangote Oil Refinery, saying they are still unable to secure adequate supplies.

To address challenges in accessing foreign currency, the government in July said it would sell crude priced in naira to local refineries for an initial six months starting in October.

"We need 650,000 barrels per day, (state oil firm NNPC Ltd) agreed to give a minimum of 385,000 bpd but they are not even delivering that," said Edwin Devakumar, head of the Dangote refinery.

The refinery built by Nigerian billionaire Aliko Dangote in Lagos aims to compete with European refiners when operating at full capacity but it has struggled to secure sufficient crude supplies to run optimally.

While Devakumar declined to give specific figures, he described deliveries from NNPC under the scheme as "peanuts".

Still, Dangote is the only one of 8 operational refineries in Nigeria to have benefited from the naira-denominated crude sale arrangement, said Mathins Obaze, an acting executive director of the Crude Oil Refinery-owners Association of Nigeria (CORAN), a trade group of refiners.

"Members are still unable to access crude in naira and are currently engaging the government for a resolution," Obaze said.

The reason for the shortfall was not immediately clear. NNPC did not respond to a request for comment.

The Dangote refinery in August urged the oil regulator, the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) to enforce a rule that compels oil producers to supply local refineries.

NUPRC did not respond to a request for comment on the matter.

Dangote, with a current capacity of 425,000 bpd and a year-end target of 85% operational capacity, has turned to international markets for supplies.

It purchased two million barrels of U.S. WTI Midland crude on Wednesday, its first U.S. crude purchase since August, according to trade sources and shipping data.

Meanwhile NNPC is pursuing new markets for its crude oil. The company was in London on Wednesday seeking term customers for its new Utapate crude oil grade.

Reuters

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Putin announces mass production of Oreshnik missiles

Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed on Friday the decision to begin serial production of the new Oreshnik ballistic missile system.

The announcement came after the system was used in combat for the first time earlier this week in Ukraine.

Speaking during a meeting at the Kremlin with the leadership of the Defense Ministry and defense industry representatives, Putin outlined that the Oreshnik missile system, one of Russia’s latest military advancements, is not a modernization of an old Soviet weapon. 

Instead, it is a new development based on cutting-edge hypersonic technology and modern materials. “It is the result of work done in the conditions of New Russia,” Putin said, highlighting that the system was created to meet contemporary defense needs.

Putin confirmed that several Oreshnik systems are currently undergoing testing in Russia, and that the decision to embark on mass production had already been articulated. “You can assume that the decision on production has been made. In fact, it is organized,” he added. More of the missile systems are expected to be delivered to Russia’s Strategic Missile Forces in the coming months.

The first combat use of the Oreshnik missile took place on Thursday, when it was used to strike a Ukrainian defense facility in Dnepropetrovsk. The target was Yuzhmash, one of Ukraine’s largest defense-industrial facilities inherited from the USSR that produces missile equipment and other weapons.

Putin said the use of the missile was in response to Kiev’s attacks inside Russia with Western-supplied long-range weapons such as American ATACMS and British Storm Shadow missiles.

The Oreshnik is described as a medium-range, hypersonic weapon designed for high precision strikes. According to the Defense Ministry, “all warheads” of the missile “reached the target”during this week's deployment. 

The president praised the missile’s successful test and combat deployment, expressing admiration for the speed at which the system had been developed.

Putin also emphasized the importance of continuing testing and increasing production rates. “I congratulate the military on the successful tests and support the adoption of the system,” he said.

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Russia says hypersonic missile strike on Ukraine was a warning to 'reckless' West

The Kremlin said on Friday that a strike on Ukraine using a newly developed hypersonic ballistic missile was a message to the West that Moscow will respond harshly to any "reckless" Western actions in support of Ukraine.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov was speaking a day after President Vladimir Putin said Moscow had fired the new missile - the Oreshnik or Hazel Tree - at a Ukrainian military facility in response to Kyiv striking Russia with U.S.-made and British-made missiles this week for the first time after the U.S. granted its approval.

"The main message is that the reckless decisions and actions of Western countries that produce missiles, supply them to Ukraine, and subsequently participate in strikes on Russian territory cannot remain without a reaction from the Russian side," Peskov told reporters.

"The Russian side has clearly demonstrated its capabilities, and the contours of further retaliatory actions in the event that our concerns are not taken into account have been quite clearly outlined," he said.

Moscow has said it regards Ukraine's firing of ATACMS and Storm Shadow missiles into Russia as proof of direct U.S. and British involvement in the war. It says satellite targeting data and the actual programming of the missiles' flight paths must be done by NATO military personnel because Kyiv does not have the capabilities itself.

Putin said Moscow had struck a missile and defence enterprise in the Ukrainian city of Dnipro, where missile and space rocket company Pivdenmash, known as Yuzhmash by Russians, is based.

Russia's Defence Ministry said on Friday that all of the missile's warheads had hit their targets and hailed what it said was its first successful use of an intermediate-range hypersonic ballistic missile with conventional warheads in combat.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said Russia's use of the new missile amounts to "a clear and severe escalation" and has called for strong worldwide condemnation.

Peskov said Russia had not been technically obliged to warn the United States about the strike because the missile used had been intermediate-range rather than intercontinental, but he said Moscow had informed the U.S. 30 minutes before the launch anyway.

He said Putin remained open to dialogue, but that the outgoing administration of U.S. President Joe Biden "prefers to continue down the path of escalation" and urged it to heed a warning Putin issued in September.

Putin said at the time that the West would be directly fighting with Russia if it allowed Ukraine to strike Russian territory with Western-made long-range missiles, a move he said would alter the nature and scope of the conflict and force Moscow to take "appropriate decisions" based on the new threats.

In his televised remarks on Thursday, Putin said that Russia had fired its new missile after Ukraine, with approval from the Biden administration, had struck Russia with six U.S.-made ATACMS missiles on Tuesday and with British Storm Shadow cruise missiles and U.S.-made HIMARS on Thursday.

Peskov said he hoped that the U.S. had received and understood Moscow's message.

"As for openness to dialogue, even in yesterday's statement the president stressed his readiness for any contacts - both with a view to de-escalation, to avoiding further escalation, and to reaching a peaceful trajectory," said Peskov.

"Yesterday's statement (from Putin) was very comprehensive, clear, and logical. We have no doubt that the current administration in Washington had the opportunity to familiarise itself with this statement and understand it."

The UK Conservative Party was created in the mid 1800s during Queen Victoria's reign 'to Conserve the White sociocultural, economic and political sphere', following the 1830s abolition of African slavery. This  Conservative mantra, to institutionally restrict freed Blacks from competing with Whites, spread across Western Europe as Christian Democratic Parties and to the US Republican Party. Therefore it is oxymoronic for an African to be a Conservative of the Western or any other civilization. A Black White Supremacist. This was why Kemi Badenoch has to publicly deride Nigeria, the world's most populous Black nation, the origin of humanity and source of the indigneous African civilization.

Nee Kemi Adegoke belongs to the Yoruba ethnicity, the oldest full sized humans genetically dated to 89,000 years, and the most populous Indigenous African group. Unfortunately, the Yoruba were the most enslaved African group in the Americas, and the British were the largest slave traders. By virtue of being the source of indigenous African civilization, Yorubas should lead the Black Race to global economic and sociocultural racial parity. As fate would have it, Yorubas are currently being employed by White Supremacists to act as counterrevolutionaries, both home and abroad. In Nigeria as president and in UK as White Conservative leader.

Some simpletons might argue that slavery and colonization are long gone, as Kemi would like to portray, but as Yorubas say, 'a lie never goes amiss, if the liar doesn't know, the person lied to knows. It is true that Africans are traditionally Social Conservatives that reject LGTBQ, therefore recently shunning left wing parties to join US Republican and UK Conservative Parties. However, the racial conservative roots of Conservative Party remain very much alive, due to the fear of genetic annihilation of unfretted miscegenation. Some claim Kemi is just being used to Whitewash their racist foundations to fool Black voters, and will be dropped before the next election, knowing their supporters who are majority racists will not vote for her.

A similar political game and optics were played with Rishi Sunak, the Indian made a party leader and prime minister by Conservative Party handlers. It has been alleged that Rishi was never intended to go for elections, but before he was replaced with Boris Johnson, he rushed to elections and sunk the party with its greatest election defeat since its creation.

Kemi might not only be used for racial optics but racial capture in what is termed Empire 2.0. The Conservatives pushed for Britain's exit of the European Union, the Common Market created in the 1950s to augment the loss of African markets due to decolonization. Like Trump's 'Make America Great Again' mantra, the UK Conservatives that had spearheaded the 1800s African colonization believed they can make Britannia Great Again by recolonizing the Black Race of Africa and Caribbean islands.

Frighteningly, Kemi is Bad Enough to accomplish Empire 2.0, like Helen of Troy bearing gifts to Nigeria and other Black nations. Unlike the initial British Empire built with war, Empire 2.0 was to be accomplished with soft power by offering to strike economic partnerships with their neocolonies. After social engineering neocolonial guards to destroy African economies with IMF and World Bank Neo-Conservative economic policies, the British will offer to site their factories here, like sweatshops, to exploit Africa’s natural and human resources, while shipping away the profits. Elevated neocolonies like India and Japan.

Like the iron axe with a wooden handle kept cutting trees, Kemi Greek gifts will be hard to resist as Yorubas will relate to her father, family and church. Kemi is everything that Coloniality of Being has conditioned the average Nigerian to want to be, Whiter than White. Racial inferiority complex that breeds self hatred as Kemi continues to portray to integrate herself into the White civilization. Her comments on slavery and colonization are based on ignorance inspired by coloniality of knowledge that denigrates her indigenous African civilizational knowledge for Western civilizational values.

Some will argue that she is doing what is necessary for her personal advancement. The same logic that inspired Yoruba Baloguns and Iyalodes at the center of indigenous political system, to engage in slave trade to get European guns, to prevent European inspired and armed bandit coast kingdoms with European guns from overrunning them. With the evolution of slavery to colonization came coloniality of the economy whereby to make it professionally and financially, you had to submit to the European racist economic caste system. Those who could not gain access to sellout their human and natural resources migrated to the Western countries as economic migrants.

The worst scenario is that if the civilizationally conscious and protective Northern Nigeria Afroasiatic civilization resists the British civilizational imperialism, Yoruba and Igbo separatists might be armed to break up Nigeria, and the resultant smaller uneconomic tribal nations will have no choice but to sign as neocolonial satellites of the British Empire 2.0

 ** Justice Faloye,

President ASHE Foundation

Prioritizing your joy can feel like an abstract assignment that, frankly, many of us don't have time for. When work and family obligations are crowding an already stressed schedule, adding one more to-do to your list can feel overwhelming — even if that to-do is supposed to increase your own happiness.

But what about something that takes no more than 10 minutes? There are plenty of quick, therapist-approved tasks that even the busiest person could execute.

Here are three science-backed ways you can boost your mood today. And, they all take less than 10 minutes.

1. Text or call a friend

Texting or calling a friend to let them know you're thinking about them is an easy way to nurture the positive relationships in your life, says Vienna Pharaon, a therapist and author of "The Origins of You."

"It makes us feel really good to do for others, and the bonus is that it also creates much needed connection," she says

It can feel awkward sending an out-of-the-blue message, but, according to a 2022 study, people consistently underestimate how much their friends want to hear from them. An unexpected phone call or text is actually very appreciated. And the research shows that the more surprising call, the better it's received.

2. Do something hard that you've been avoiding

We tend to remember undone or interrupted tasks better than completed ones, a psychological phenomenon known as the Zeigarnik effect. This creates cognitive dissonance which can actually distract us from tackling other projects.

Crossing even the smallest to-do off your list can relieve some of this tension and cause your brain to release dopamine.

"Addressing something you've been ignoring lightens the load and allows you to accomplish something that's been weighing you down," Pharaon says.

There are so many tasks we dread that only take a few minutes. Scheduling a dentist appointment or vacuuming your rug might not seem like it will bring you joy, but science shows it probably will.

3. Give someone a compliment

We can make ourselves feel better by complimenting another person, says Laurie Santo a psychology professor at Yale Univeristy and host of The Happiness Lab podcast.

Even if the prospect of complimenting someone gives you anxiety, you're likely to feel better after the act, according to a 2020 study

"Tell a stranger that you like their shoes or their bag," Santos says. "Reveal to a colleague that you thought they did a nice job at a work meeting, remind a friend how much you appreciate them, or compliment a colleague on something you've long admired."

The effects, Santos says, will last well beyond the interaction: "That quick compliment may boost your mood for longer than you think."

CNBC

Two-thirds of Nigerian households cannot afford nutritious food, according to a new National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) survey comparing data from 2018/19 to 2023/24.

The study reveals a sharp decline in food security, with 62.4% of households worried about having enough food to eat—a significant jump from 36.9% five years ago. Nearly 64% of families reported limiting their diet variety due to financial constraints, while 60.5% reduced their portions.

The survey also highlighted infrastructure challenges. While 82.2% of urban households have electricity access, only 40.4% of rural homes are connected to the power grid. Those with electricity face an average of 6.7 blackouts weekly.

Traditional cooking methods dominate, with 65% of households using three-stone stoves and 70.2% relying on wood fuel, though LPG usage is increasing. Basic amenities remain scarce, with many homes lacking proper toilets and depending on boreholes for water. Nearly half of households dispose of waste in bushes or streets.

While overall asset ownership has decreased since 2018/19, mobile phone penetration remains high at two-thirds of households, with 21.3% having internet access. Home ownership stands at 70.4% nationally, showing a notable urban-rural divide (49.1% urban vs. 80.1% rural).​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has criticized the President Bola Tinubu-led administration for the increasing pressure that loans are placing on Nigeria’s economy, describing the situation as “insufferable.” Atiku, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate in the 2023 elections, accused both the president and the National Assembly of pushing Nigeria deeper into debt.

In a statement reacting to the government’s recent borrowing proposal, Atiku expressed concern over the World Bank’s report that named Nigeria as the third most indebted country to the International Development Association (IDA). He pointed to the government’s latest move to borrow an additional N1.7 trillion through Euro bonds to cover a shortfall in the 2024 budget, questioning the economic strategy behind the move.

“At a time when the country is already reeling under significant debt, this new borrowing proposal, which is based on an exchange rate of N800 to the dollar, is alarming—especially considering the Central Bank’s rate of over N1,600 to the dollar,” Atiku said. He further criticized the National Assembly for approving such loans, calling it an “accomplice” in driving the country deeper into financial crisis.

Atiku also questioned the rationale behind the government’s borrowing, despite claims by President Bola Tinubu’s administration that the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) and the Nigeria Customs Service had achieved record revenue collections to finance the 2024 budget. “If the revenue is at an all-time high, why continue borrowing?” Atiku asked. He suggested that the government’s handling of the country’s finances was not transparent, and warned that Nigerians were being burdened by “failed policies and loan rackets.”

The PDP leader went on to criticize the government’s “voracious appetite” for loans, suggesting that the funds were not being used for vital infrastructure or development but were instead fueling corruption. He referenced a report by budget watchdog Budgit, which raised concerns over the excessive perks included in the 2024 budget, calling it a “mess.”

Reflecting on Nigeria’s past, Atiku lamented that just a few years after the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo had successfully exited foreign debt burden, the country was once again facing a serious debt crisis. He called for a more cautious and strategic approach to borrowing, urging the government to apply “arithmetic” to its loan policies to prevent further economic strain.