ASUU likely to extend strike after crucial meeting
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) may extend its 12-week old strike after members of its National Executive Council held a crucial meeting in Abuja to deliberate over the strike.
A member of ASUU NEC who spoke anonymously complained about the insincerity of government delegation to meet up to its part of the agreement.
He stated that the strike may continue until the federal government shows genuine desire to end the strike.
The lecturers have been on strike since February 14.
What the lecturers asked the government to do is to “implement the Memorandum of Action (MoA) signed in December 2020 on funding for the revitalisation of public universities”.
The other agreed demands in their MoA are renegotiation of the 2009 agreement Earned Academic Allowances, and the deployment of the University Transparency and Accountability Solution to replace the Integrated Personnel Payroll Information System, poor funding of state universities among others.
Chris Ngige, the Minister of Labour and Employment, had on Friday informed the public that the federal government was willing to put an end to the 12-week old strike.
The minister, pleaded with the striking unions to take advantage of the FG open door policy as embraced by the hospital workers union. He believed that if his open-door policy approach is accepted by the striking universities union that the strike would be called off.
The FG meeting with ASUU is scheduled to take place this week.
First Quantum approves $1.25 billion Zambia copper expansion
Zambia’s new government and First Quantum Minerals Ltd have entered into an agreement to allow First Quantum Minerals Ltd to expand its Kansanshi copper mine with an investment of $1.25 billion.
The investment which is an avenue to improve the relationship between the government and the company will increase copper and gold production by 25 percent, and extend the lifespan of biggest copper mine by almost 30 years according to the company. Added to this agreement, a $100 million fund was approved for the development of a new nickel project.
President Hakainde Hichima who took over from former President Edgar Lungu pledged to not only repair the damaged relationship between the country and the mining companies but promised to push for more investment to explore the potentials in the mining industry in the country.
One of the major areas of dispute that destroyed the relationship between foreign owned mining companies and the former president was “whether a new mineral royalty would be deductible from other corporate taxes, a change which became effective in January this year.
Added to the earlier resolve, all other contentious areas have been resolve especially “an agreement on an outstanding value-added tax receivable sum and a plan for repayment based on offsets against future against future mining taxes and royalties,” the company said.
“The government’s commitment to improve the predictability of the mining fiscal regime also provides the certainty needed to support large capital investments in Zambia,” First Quantum concluded.
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EU’s push to ban Russian oil stalled by Hungarian demands
European Union’s proposal to ban Russian oil imports is being stalled by Hungary’s fear of economic disaster if outright ban should be implemented.
A source told Bloomberg that the meeting of EU’s 27 ambassadors on the matter ended without any agreement. Further talks to arrive at a workable agreement should happen in the coming days.
However, an agreement is more likely after the Group of Seven countries commit to banning shipment of Russian oil to third countries.
According to Bloomberg, “the EU’s proposal seeks to ban crude oil over the next six months and refined fuels by early January”. The EU fearing that adjustment to its sanction on Russian crude may be hard for some of its European countries it gave Hungary and Slovakia until the end of 2024 to comply with the sanctions and the Czech Republic until June of the same year.
Understandably, Hungary has continued to block any plan by the EU to ban Russian crude because alternative plans to transition away from Russian energy hasn’t been convincing enough.
“We have voted for all the sanctions packages so far, but this latest one would destroy the security of the Hungarian energy supply,” Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said in a statement on Sunday. “As long as there is no solution to the problem caused by the Brussels’ proposal, we will not vote for this package.”
Information made available says that the EU had been pushing to make this all important statement with this ban concluded today (May 9) as Russia’s marks its historic victory over Nazi Germany in World War II.
More than 60 feared dead in bombing of Ukrainian school
In apparent desperation to capture the city of Mariupol to mark Russian Victory Day, Russian forces launched a bomb which flattened a school that sheltered innocent civilians killing 60 people in the process.
According to Reuters, Antonio Guterres, U.N. Secretary-General expressed his disappointment over the school bombing which took place on Saturday in the eastern village of Bilohorivka and called it another reminder that “it is civilians that pay the highest price” in war.
Serhiy Haidai, governor of Luhansk province, through a message he wrote on his Telegram messaging app, said that emergency crew were able to rescue 30 people from the rubble out of the 90 people that were in the school building while the other 60 people trapped under the rubble are believed to be dead.
Unfortunately, two other boys in the nearby town of Pryvillia, aged 11 and 14 were also caught in the cross fire, the governor said. Luhansk is part of the Donbas, the industrial heartland in the east that Russia’s forces are working to capture.
Oil prices fall narrowly as investors eye EU vote on Russian oil ban
Oil prices reacted negatively in early Asian trade today as investors await what would be the likely resolution from the European Union ban on Russian oil this week. A ban they believe will limit global supplies on crude oil.
According to data gathered from Reuters, “Brent crude dropped 67 cents, or 0.6 percent, to $111.72 a barrel by 0002 GMT while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude was at $109.02 a barrel, down 75 cents, or 0.7 percent.”
Reuters reported that crude oil futures prices rose last week following concerns over the plan embargo on Russian oil as part of its toughest yet package over the country’s invasion in Ukraine.
Bulgaria has agreed to veto EU oil sanction on Russia if it doesn’t get a definite decision on the proposed embargo, Bulgaria’s Deputy Prime Minister said on Sunday.
According to Vassilev who spoke to BNT television said that “the European Commission on Friday proposed changes to its planned embargo on Russian oil to give Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic more time to shift their energy supplies”.
“The talks will continue tomorrow, on Tuesday too, a meeting of the leaders may be needed to conclude them. Our position is very clear. If there be a derogation for some of the countries, we want to get a derogation too,” Vassilev told national BNT television.
