Nigerian Newspapers: Updates you need to know Thursday morning

Here is today’s summary from Nigerian Newspapers:

1. The process for nationwide deployment of Compressed Natural Gas, CNG, vehicles has commenced. Not less than 530 buses are to be deployed by the end of the month in six pioneering states. These are Oyo, Lagos, Kwara, Kogi, Kaduna, Nasarawa, and the Federal Capital Territory, FCT Abuja.

2. The Nigeria Labour Congress and the Trade Union Congress on Wednesday dumped the minimum wage negotiation after the Federal Government offered to pay N48,000, a figure far below the N615,00 the unions were demanding as the new national minimum wage.

3. The average price of imported food commodities to Nigeria rose to its highest level, reaching 34 per cent in one year between April 2023 and April 2024. This represents an increase of 200 basis points from 32 per cent recorded in March 2024, according to an analysis of the Consumer Price Index report released by the National Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday.

4. The Federal Government is set to tackle the power challenges in Nigeria with an additional 500 million standard cubic feet of gas in the domestic market. The government said it would also enhance industrialisation and create more jobs with more gas supply into the nation’s economy.

5. The result of the autopsy conducted on the body of the late singer, Ilerioluwa Aloba, aka Mohbad, is said to have been unable to ascertain the cause of his death. A Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Wahab Shittu, disclosed this while addressing the press at the coroner’s inquest held in Lagos State on Wednesday.

6. An official of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, Uduo Achu, on Wednesday, narrated to the Federal High Court in Lagos how a convicted drug baron, Steve Adigwe, also known as Isioma Obobo, received huge sums of money from the illicit trade and laundered the same. Achu said that the convict attempted to disguise the origin of the said money which is over N400m.

7. A family dispute over the sharing of inheritance has led to grief and death in the quiet community of Larabar-Albasawa on the outskirts of Gezawa, headquarters of Gezawa Local Government Area of Kano State. Eight people were confirmed dead and more than 20 are now at the Murtala Muhammad Specialist Hospital, Kano, after 38-year-old Shafiu Abubakar set a mosque on fire while worshippers were observing the early morning prayer.

8. Seven loyalists of Nyesom Wike, Minister of Federal Capital Territory, FCT, have resigned from the cabinet of Governor Siminalayi Fubara. They were among those who rejoined the cabinet after President Bola Tinubu brokered a peace deal that eventually collapsed.

9. The FCT Department of Development Control has commenced the demolition of over 500 illegal structures at the popular Karmo market in the territory. The assistant director of sector monitor in the Department of Development Control, Tpl Garba Jibrin, said the administration decided to demolish the market because the area has been encountering lots of bottlenecks because of the market since inception of Abuja.

10. The Federal Government is working to reconstitute the governing councils of its universities across the country, the Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), Chris Maiyaki, has said. He said the Minister of Education, Prof. Tahir Mamman, had constituted a panel to work on the list of the people who would be on the councils.