Daniel Ruiz, head of the office of the UN mission for stability in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO/Goma), has announced last week-end that the International Criminal Court (ICC) will initiate an investigation on illegal acquisition of lands in Northern Kivu. This was reported by l’Agence de Presse congolaise. “Given the situation of illegal acquisition of various land plots in...

French dairy group Danone plans to become the majority stakeholder in the Tanzanian subsidiary of the Kenyan dairy firm Brookside Dairy. Without disclosing the terms of the acquisition, Danone informed the Tanzanian Fair Competition Commission (FCC) of its plans. The move which is still to be approved by the FCC should see the French company acquire all the shares of the Kenyatta family in the...

The Nigerian Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL), has announced plans to provide about N60 billion ($191.6million) of loans to farmers this year. The agency will also execute the $300 million African Development Bank, (AfDB)’s Youth Enable Programme, and the $500 million Mechanization Partnership with the Brazilian Government, amongst...

Aiteo Group, an integrated global-focused Nigerian energy company, has paid all outstanding debts amounting to $202.3 million owed to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)’s downstream units for under-deliveries of petroleum products under the crude swap deal between 2012 and 2014. “Following extensive reconciliation between both parties across their business transactions...

The prices of Cocoa in Nigeria are decreasing due to the poor quality of the beans from intermediate harvest, according to the Cocoa Association of Nigeria (CAN). “The quality of the cocoa is poor, the weight of the beans (intermediate crop) is very bad due to late and insufficient rainfall,” said Vincent Ohwojakpor, Vice president of CAN. He said in Ekiti and Edo, cocoa is currently sold at...

Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi (photo), has revealed that the Federal Government has finalized plans to take a loan of $6.1billion from China’s Exim Bank to complete all rail projects across the country by 2019. Amaechi, who disclosed this during the Ministry’s 2017 budget proposal defense at the National Assembly in Abuja, said that the President Muhammadu Buhari had...

A sum of $6billion has been invested in the Lekki Free Trade Zone by Dangote Group and other companies in the last one year, according to Lagos State Governor, Akinwunmi Ambode (photo). “We are all aware of the investments Dangote Group and China Africa Lekki Investment Limited (CALIL) have injected into the zone. Dangote Group has the lion's share of about $4 billion,” he...

During a field visit last Sunday with the Prime Minister, Youssef Chahed, Tunisia’s State secretary to public domains and land affairs, Mabrouk Korchid, announced that some of the people living on public properties will now be granted ownership of these lands. This stands only for those who have been occupying these lands for the past 30 to 40 years. “It is the right of citizens who have...

Less than 1.5 million people (0.9%) out of the over 180 million citizens in Nigeria have insurance policy, according to the Minister of Communications, Adebayo Shittu (photo). Speaking at an e-Insurance conference themed: “Driving Insurance Penetration with ICT” in Lagos last week, Shittu revealed that the gross income of the insurance sector stood at N500 billion ($1.6 billion) in 2016....

Telecommunications networks (GSM) in Nigeria lost a total of 1,275,573 internet users in February, according to the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC). NCC in its internet subscribers’ data for February disclosed that, over the period, MTN alone lost 714,700 internet users from 31,015,405 in January to 30,300,705 in February (as compared to 35, 604, 370 in February 2016), making it the...