Zimbabwe fed up with stubborn Nigerian illegal immigrants

The Immigration Department has expressed concern over Nigerian nationals who attempt to frustrate deportation processes by making frivolous applications to the Supreme Court after being arrested for staying in the country illegally.

This comes after a Nigerian was recently arrested in the city after being found without the required documents to stay in the country. Cletus Chukwuka Anueyiangu had his case dismissed on Wednesday last week at the Supreme Court after he challenged both his arrest and conviction.

He is still in custody and awaiting deportation. Assistant Regional Immigration Officer Mr Francis Mabika said Anueyiangu, who was residing in Braeside, entered into the country sometime in 2004 on a holiday before he went back to his country.

"He then attempted to enter into the country on 7 May, 2005, but was equivocally denied entry," he said.

It is believed that Anueyiangu then sneaked into the country, but was arrested and deported on June 15, 2005.

He sneaked into the country again using fake names and another Nigerian passport.

In 2006, Anueyiangu and two other Nigerians applied for and were issued with a Zimbabwe Investment Licence and they formed a company called Ideal Clothing Manufacturing based at the Gulf Complex.

Immigration officers found out about the company and launched investigations.

Anueyiangu then joined the Pentecostal Assemblies of Zimbabwe where he was a student pastor. On February 6 this year, further investigations carried out revealed that he was once deported.

"On 12 February, 2012, he made an urgent chamber application which was dismissed with costs by Justice Mavhingira on February 29, 2012," said Mr Mabika.

"In the course of the court proceeding, as a way to cover his tracks and as an afterthought, his counterparts went on to renew the Zimbabwe Investment Licence which had since expired on 15 December 2011 and presented the renewed licence in his supplementary affidavits without justifying the action."

Anueyiangu's wife was also ordered to leave the country, but she went into hiding before making an urgent chamber application to interdict the Immigration Department from arresting her knowing fully she had no legal right to stay in the country.

Anueyiangu also made the Supreme Court application against the High Court ruling, but it was dismissed with costs.

"Clearly, Nigerian nationals have shown an inclination towards frustrating due processes of law," said Mr Mabika.

"The dismissal of the application is a clear testament of the supremacy of law in Zimbabwe. Aliens do have a corresponding obligation to observe the laws of Zimbabwe."

Last year, more than 100 foreigners were arrested and deported for illegally operating businesses like grocery shops and restaurants in violation of Zimbabwe's immigration and investment laws.

The Department of Immigration said most of the culprits were Nigerians and Chinese.

The Herald

Nigeria still ranks very high in infant and maternal mortality index

Nigeria still ranks high the list of countries with high maternal and infant mortality rates with a ratio of 545 per 100,000 live births on the maternal mortality index and 75 per 1000 live births on the infant mortality index; these figures are from the UN World Population Prospects and the Institute for Health Metric Reports (2010).

Chairman of the National Population Commission (NPC), Chief Festus Odimegwu, who disclosed this while speaking at a press conference to commemorate this year's World Population Day (WPD), added that the Federal Government had budgeted $3m annually to provide free family planning facilities for Nigerians.

Although some progress had been made since the release of the report, he said a lot more still needed to be done to prevent the avoidable deaths; stressing that only 58 per cent women had access to ante-natal care.

Odimegwu, who represented by the NPC Commissioner in the FCT, Mr. Sani Suleiman, outlined grim statistics of the health status of reproductive women aged between 15 and 49 in Nigeria.

"Fifty-two thousand, nine hundred women and girls die every year from pregnancy-related causes. For every woman that dies, at least 20 others suffer morbidities such as obstetric fistula, infections and disabilities.

Twenty-three percent of women between 15 and 19 are already mothers or are pregnant with their first child, 20 per 1000 children die before the age of one month while 35 per 1000 die before their first birthday," he lamented.

The NPC chairman added that interventions are being carried out in partnership with the UN Fund for Population Activity (UNFPA) to promote family planning, maternal health, sexuality education and HIV/AIDS prevention services.

Earlier, UNFPA's National Program Officer for Reproductive Health Commodity Security, Mrs. Nike Adedeji, said the organisation was currently working to manoeuvre the cultural and religious impediments to the promotion family planning usage in Nigeria.

This, she said, was carried out with the aim of educating leaders of religious and traditional institutions on the need to allow child spacing to preserve the health of mothers and children.

She further added that Nigeria had no excuse on its 10 per cent use of contraceptives, noting that even countries that may be regarded as stables of the major faiths (Italy and Saudi Arabia) already record about 80 per cent use of family planning methods which has helped them to reduce infant and maternal death rates.

This Day

Ex-militants give president Goodluck Jonathan ultimatum

Niger Delta Ex militants Phase 3 has given President Goodluck Jonathan two weeks ultimatum to give its members their entitlements or they will return to the creeks and blow pipelines.

The national chairman of the group, which parades about 10,000 members in the nine oil producing states, Julius Joseph, said the Federal Government was yet to keep to its terms of agreement after they surrendered their arms two years ago.

He said members of his group had endured for so long. "If the government is not ready to give us our entitlements then they should return our arms. We are hungry; we want to go back to the creeks", Joseph stated.

"We have tried to reach the president through the Minister of Niger Delta, but the minister has refused to attend to us. We have tried different means of dialogue but nobody is listening to us. We even wrote a petition to the Senate President but there was no response.

"We are open to dialogue. But government doesn't want to dialogue with us. They want to dialogue with Boko Haram that is faceless. We are not faceless yet they don't to dialogue with us".

The group's vice chairman, Henry Gomerome, said the Federal Government was supposed to pay them a monthly salary of N65, 000.00, for over two years, saying nothing had been paid. He added: "It is for that reason that we blocked Lokoja road in December last year. We were actually heading for Abuja but we were stopped at Lokoja. We are going to block another major road if our demands are not met.

Vanguard

Video - The young and the jobless in Nigeria

Al Jazeera program examines the causes and possible solutions to increasing unemployment in one of Africa's richest nations.


Al Jazeera

Nigerian banks make it in top 1000 global banks

Nigeria's top nine banks that featured in the Banker's top global 1000 banks 2012 have a combined tier one capital of $11.699 billion as against the $11.332 billion they had in last year's top 1000 banks. This showed a slight improvement in the tier one capital of the Nigerian banks.

However, the combined tier one capital of the nine banks is this time around slightly above the $9.842 billion of Standard Group of South Africa, the biggest bank in Africa and the 112th in the world. Standard Group's tier one capital dropped from last year's figure of $12.6 billion to this year's $9.8 billion. This fact is contained in the 2012 edition of The Banker magazine top 1000 global banks, a publication of Financial Times of London.

Bank of America which occupies the first position in the global ranking has a capital base of $163.626 billion. It is followed closely by JPMorgan Chase with a capital of $142.450 billion. The third position is occupied by HSBC, a British bank with a capital base of $133.179 billion. China has three banks in the top ten positions while Japan has just one.

The Banker magazine's endorsement has become an instrument that central banks and bankers seek after as a marketing tool. The low level of capitalization of Nigerian banks when compared to international standard is a challenge to regulators who are at the moment busy fragmenting the industry.

The Banker in its benchmarking of the top 1000 global bank said that Zenith Bank PLC had, as at 2011 financial year, a total tier one capital of $2.398 billion as against the $2.405 billion of last year. This makes Zenith Bank the biggest bank in Nigeria, the 7th in Africa and the 322nd in the world. It is followed by the first generation bank, First Bank, with a total of $2.262 billion in 2011 as against its last year's figure of $2.221 billion shareholders' stake in the bank known as tier one capital. First Bank occupies the 2nd position in the Nigerian banking sector, 8th in Africa and 338th in the globe.

The third highly capitalised bank in Nigeria by the standard of Bank of International Settlement (BIS) is GTBank with a tier one capital of $1.478 billion as against the $1.362 billion of 2010 financial year. By tier one capital ranking, it is Nigeria's 3rd biggest, 11th in Africa and 455th in the world. Access Bank followed closely with a capital of $1.054 billion as against the $1.149 billion it had last year making it the 4th largest bank in Nigeria, 15th in Africa and 541st universally.

United Bank for Africa (UBA), one of the oldest banks in the country, as at the 2011 financial year end had $1.003 billion compared to the $1.037 billion capital in 2010 making it one of the internationally recognised strong banks in the country. It is by this classification, the 5th largest bank in Nigeria, 16th in Africa and 563rd in the world. Fidelity is next with $867 million as against the $904 million tier one capital the previous year, making it the 6th biggest bank in Nigeria, 17th in Africa and 618th in the world. First City Monument Bank followed closely with $683 million compared to the $854 million capital base it had a year before. It thus becomes the 7th largest bank, 22nd in Africa and 710th in the world. Skye Bank has $665 million compared to $695 million it had previously to feature as the 721st top banks in the world, 24th in Africa and 8th in Nigeria.

However, the Nigerian banks did not rank among the top five in Africa. Zenith which is the most capitalised bank in the country ranks 7th as against its last year's 6th position in the continent. The top three banks in Africa are all from South Africa. Standard Bank Group topped the Africa chart with a capital base of $9.842 billion and is in the 112th position globally. The second is the FirstRand Bank Holdings, South Africa with a capital base of $8.471 billion. The Needbank Group Limited, also of South Africa, came third in the top 25 banks in Africa with a capital of $5.123 billion.

Attjariwafabank of Morocco, an Islamic Bank, is fourth with a capital base of $2.786 billion. Investec of South Africa came 5th in The Banker ranking of the top 25 banks in Africa with a capital base of $2.519 billion. According to The Banker, two Nigerian banks featured in the capital adequacy ratio measurement. Fidelity Bank, The Banker said, has a capital to asset ratio of 28.8 per cent, making it the soundest bank in the country. The report also said that First City Monument Bank with capital to asset ratio of 23.89 made it to the 1000 soundest capital to asset ratio banks in the world.

According to The Banker, going by the Bank of International Settlement measure, Zenith was the only Nigerian bank that attained the 1000 soundest BIS ratio of 36.

The Banker in the 2012 review of Africa Banking landscape said: "African banks suffered in this year's Top 1000 ranking from the weakness of their currencies, many of which fell sharply against the US dollar in the second half of 2011. South African banks were among the hardest hit, with the rand sliding almost 19 per cent versus the US currency last year, though Standard Bank retained its position as the largest bank on the continent by tier one capital and assets.

"Yet, while the latter rose 12 per cent in local currency during 2011, assets fell from $201billion to $183 billion in dollar terms. This was also largely the reason why Standard Bank's tier one capital decreased from $12billion to $9.8 billion in 2011, causing it to drop from 94th to 112th in the ranking - leaving Africa without any bank in the Top 100.

"In last year's Top 1000, Standard Bank had doubled the tier one capital of its nearest rival, FirstRand, which had $6 billion. FirstRand has closed the gap substantially and has $8.4 billion of such capital in this year's ranking. It was helped, however, by its financial year ending on June 30, 2011. In the 12 months prior to that date, the rand actually strengthened against the dollar, Standard Bank's year ended on December 31.

"Last year, 30 African banks made it to the Top 1000, whereas this time, 31 did. The continent's banks still account for a small proportion of global tier one capital, collectively making up 0.98 per cent of the total in the Top 1000, down slightly from last year. Mauritian banks, assisted by the rupee being one of the few African currencies to hold its own against the dollar in 2011, were some of the fastest risers in this year's ranking. Two of them, Mauritius Commercial Bank and State Bank of Mauritius, were among the four African banks that increased their tier one capital the most.

"Angola's banks also had a good year. Banco de Poupança e Crédito is a new entrant to the Top 1000, after its tier one capital rose 31 per cent to $705m. Banco Angolano de Investimentos, Angola's biggest lender, saw its tier one capital increase by 11 per cent to $708m and assets expanded by a hefty 42 per cent to $12billion. This caused it to climb the global assets ranking from 674th to 596th.

"While Nigerian lenders did not move up the tier one ranking significantly, Access Bank's assets increased 93 per cent to $10.3 billion, thanks to its takeover of local rival, Intercontinental Bank. This led it to move from 805th to 635th in the assets ranking. Togo-based Ecobank moved from 609th to 498th in terms of assets, thanks mainly to its acquisition of Nigeria's Oceanic Bank.

While European banks count the cost of the Eurozone sovereign debt crisis, China is leading the emerging markets into a new era of banking dominance. But the established markets of the US and Japan should not be forgotten.

It will come as no surprise that 2011 was the year when the Eurozone crisis dragged the global banking sector backwards. Assets and tier one capital in The Banker's Top 1000 World Banks ranking continue to grow, although at a much reduced rate to last year's ranking. But aggregate profits, which had staged two years of recovery since the financial crisis, reversed by one per cent, to stay only just above the $700 billion mark.

Vanguard