Zainab Ahmed - The African Mirror

Jan

05

2023

Nigeria to spend $7.5 bln on petrol subsidy to mid-2023

BUSINESS

CAMILLUS EBOH NIGERIA will keep its costly but popular petrol subsidy until mid-2023 and has set aside 3.36 trillion nairas ($7.5 bln) to spend on it, Finance Minister Zainab Ahmed said. Africa's biggest economy spent 2.91 trillion nairas ($7 billion) towards a petrol subsidy between January and September 2022, state-owned firm NNPC said, a cost the government has blamed for dwindling public finances. President Muhammadu Buhari signed the 2023 budget of 21.83 trillion nairas ($49 billion) into law on Tuesday after lawmakers increased the size by 6.4% and raised the oil price assumption. "Petrol subsidy will remain up to mid-2023 based on…

Nigeria working procuring vaccines

COVID-19

CHIJIOKE OHUOCHA NIGERIA is working on what type and quantity of COVID-19 vaccines to procure and will make financial provision for them in its 2021 budget, Finance Minister Zainab Ahmed has said. Africa's most populous nation has not been as hard-hit by the pandemic as others on the continent, such as South Africa, but it is in the grip of a second wave of infections. Nigerian authorities have previously said the country is working with the COVAX programme backed by the World Health Organization and expects to receive its first doses in January. Ahmed said the finance and health ministries…

Nigeria ready to reopen its land borders to trade – Finance minister

BUSINESS

NIGERIA is ready to reopen its land borders to trade for the first time in more than a year after closing them to try to stamp out smuggling, the finance minister said on Wednesday. Finance Minister Zainab Ahmed said those involved had learned from the closure and worked together on joint border patrols. "We will be expecting that the borders will be reopened very soon," Ahmed told journalists, explaining that the president would determine the exact date. Nigeria, Africa's largest economy, closed its land borders in late 2019 over concerns about illegal exports of price-controlled gasoline and illegal imports of…