Opinion – Shipping World News Magazine

Apr282022 by Asu Beks1 Comment

PETER OKOCHA TO TONY IJU: RESIGN NOW AND SAVE ANLCA FROM DISINTEGRATION ….says ANLCA died the day Shittu left office

Following allegations that the President of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents , Tony Iju Nwabunike, may have gone on AWOL, Shipping World Magazine engaged a former President of ANLCA, Chief Peter Okocha, in an interview on the State of Affairs of the once very vocal Association . Here are excerpts from the interview: S/W: You were once President of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents, ANLCA. What was the vision of ANLCA under your leadership? OKOCHA: Well ,under my leadership then, I was with Otunba Fashawe who was my Vice President.Our vision was to reposition ANLCA and help the sector to reposition itself as the second largest revenue earner ,which it actually is. But our tenure was short lived because our frien...

Jan192022 by Asu BeksNo Comments

IYC slams CNPP, CSOs call for Wabote resignation over corruption allegations

News Feature, Opinion

THE Ijaw Youth Council IYC, Worldwide, has slammed the the Conference of Nigeria Political Parties, CNPP, and the coalition of Civil Society Organisations, CSOs, over calls for the resignation of the Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board, NCDMB, Mr. Simbi Wabote over corruption allegations. IYC described the call for Wabote resignation as mischievous and aimed at tarnishing the image of NCDMB Executive and distracting him from the laudable job he is doing at the NCDMB. President of IYC, Comrade Peter Igbifa, who was reacting to a statement by the CNPP National Chairman Chief Willy Ezugwu and the Secretary of the CSO coalition, Alhaji Ali Abacha, said it was subjudice for the duo to comment on an issue that is before a court of law. Igbifa sai...

Nov112019 by Asu BeksNo Comments

Obeisance to Customs, the new power house

Breaking News, News Feature, Opinion, Travel

By Owei Lakemfa A MAN who identified himself as a traditional ruler, strolled with a swag through Immigration at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja. He then walked towards Customs and was stopped. An officer pointed out he was carrying a pack that suggested he bought a pair of shoes abroad. He confirmed he did. He was asked to produce the shoes. He pointed at his feet: those were what he was wearing. The Customs said it was an item he has to pay duty on. The man explained he bought the shoe on his journey and had been using it abroad. He was handed a hefty amount and given the option to either pay or forfeit his shoes. He paid under protest. It seemed strange that the Customs now calculate what a Nigerian is wearing and decides to impose duty. That means a lady p...

Nov112019 by Asu BeksNo Comments

HAMEED ALI: A MONUMENTAL FAILURE AS CUSTOM CG___ Taiwo Mustapha.

Breaking News, News Feature, Opinion

ALHAJI TAIWO MUSTAPHA is the CEO /Executive Chairman of the Pyramid Quicka, a leading freight forwarding company based in Port Harcourt, Rivers State. Taiwo who sits atop a very thriving conglomerate with Interests in Oil and Gas as well as Agriculture is a consummate businessman and Chairs the elite Board of Trustees of the Association of Nigeria Licensed Customs Agents. Taiwo spoke with the doyen Maritime Journalism, Asu Beks, in his Trans Amadi Corporate Head office recently. The interview centred on the performance of Hameed Ali’s tenure as Comptroller General of Nigeria Customs Service, the closure of Nigeria's borders and his expectations in the maritime sector in 2020. Excerpts HIS ASSESSMENT OF HAMEED ALI’s 4 YEARS IN OFFICE. The hope of every Nigerian Civil Servant,...

Sep152019 by Asu BeksNo Comments

Why Buhari is ‘Man of The Decade’.- MARTINS OLOJA

Breaking News, Opinion, Politics

Inside Stuff With MARTINS OLOJA. I want to plead again for understanding about the many inconclusive issues here. The issue of ‘questions to our governors’ and ‘the launch of free and compulsory basic and secondary education in Kano state’ at this moment deserves to be rounded off. But again, there is a more current and weightier matter of governance and leadership we should reflect on before the momentum fizzles out. It is the credit I think most of us deny President Muhammadu Buhari. I mean that the taciturn, lanky General and President of the most populous black nation on earth at this time deserves some respect even as some of us wailers keep saying he didn’t go to school. Buhari just like Winston Churchill, who was to be later recognised as an incomparable, world-class orator, ...

Aug182019 by Asu BeksNo Comments

Digging Up Wealth In The South Burying Them In The North

Breaking News, Opinion

By Dele Sobowale That was how Hamilton, one of the founding fathers of America and a former Treasury Secretary (equivalent to our Minister of Finance) described some of the nations of Europe when they were going through social, political and economic upheavals similar to what we are now experiencing in Nigeria. Invariably, the tensions were heightened by poor leadership and prolonged by lack of compromise on the part of the contending forces for supremacy. When a leader announces that he is by nature combative, he has simply forgotten that nobody has a monopoly on that attribute. One person’s perpetual aggression invited a similar response from others. Both the thirty years and hundred years wars in Europe started in one day and outlasted most of those who got them starte...

Aug182019 by Asu BeksNo Comments

No End To Zoning Until South/North East Produce President in 2023 – Orji Kalu

Breaking News, Opinion, Politics

The Chief Whip of the Senate, Orji Uzor Kalu, has cautioned the northern political elite against canvassing an end to rotational presidency as from 2023. Kalu, a two-term governor of Abia State, stated this in an interview with our correspondent in Abuja following the call by the Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir el-Rufai, for an end to power shift in the country. He maintained that nobody should canvass an end to power shift until the South-East and the North-East geopolitical zones had produced the President of Nigeria. The principal officer of the senate noted that the agreement at the end of the 1978 national conference was that all the major ethnic groups in Nigeria must produce the President on a rotational basis. He said, “Calling for an end to the zoning arra...

Aug102019 by Asu BeksNo Comments

An Open Letter to the Incoming Minister of Transportation.

Breaking News, Maritime, Opinion

By Elder Asu Beks (President Maritime Media Ltd) Dear Sir, Congratulations on your nomination by President Muhammadu Buhari as a Minister and the subsequent ratification by the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. There is no doubt that your choice as the Minister of Transportation at this critical time of our nationhood is an attestation to the confidence Mr President reposes in you to reposition this sector. As a critical stakeholder in the maritime subsector and given the myriad of problems facing the Maritime Industry, I expect you to hit the ground running as soon as you take your Oath of Office. Your predecessor left no one in doubt about his preparedness to rewrite the history of the Transport sector. He engaged all critical stakeholders to acquaint himself ...

Aug42019 by Asu BeksNo Comments

Sowore’s Arrest: Buhari’s govt behaving like Abacha’s – Soyinka

Breaking News, Opinion, Politics, Press Release

The Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka, has condemned the arrest of activist Omoyele Sowore. Mr Sowore, a presidential candidate in the last election, was arrested on Saturday for calling for a revolution against poor governance. “Beyond the word ‘revolution, another much mis-used and misunderstood word, nothing that Sowore has uttered, written, or advocated suggests that he is embarking on, or urging the public to engage in a forceful overthrow of government,” Mr Soyinka said. He compared the actions of the security agencies that arrested Mr Sowore to what happended during the tenure of the late dictator, Sani Abacha. “We underwent identical cynical contrivances under the late, unlamented Sani Abacha, when he sent storm-troopers to disrupt a planning session for a similar ac...

Jul282019 by Asu BeksNo Comments

BUSINESS-AS-USUAL CABINET WITHOUT ABUJA INDIGENE’

Breaking News, News Feature, Opinion, Politics

Inside Stuff With MARTINS OLOJA It is his privilege to nominate anyone he likes. It is our right to examine the nominees and have our say. But as chief executive of the federation, he will have his way. In the same vein, it is still our responsibility as citizens to return our verdict on the quality of the cabinet this brand new senate will certainly clear tomorrow. The President of the Senate as a candidate, pledged that the senate he would preside over, would not be a ‘rubber-stamp’. Indeed, he has set the tone for the kind of senate he will lead with the just-take-a-bow-and-go’ standard that has just been set. I understand the president’s men are smiling (not to the bank please) that Senator Bukola is not even in the senate to ask why portfolios were not attache...