 Fuel subsidy is gone, but what is the economic impact of its removal on wages? That will be one of the things we'll be looking at on the show. As a growing need to secure ourselves and properties become an issue, we will be looking at securing our home with technology. We also will be looking at what the headlines are on the press. Very good morning to you and thanks for joining us on the breakfast. My name is Nyam Gul Agadir. It's always so pleasant having you around and knowing that you are there for us as we are here for you. It's Plus TV Africa and it's a wonderful Tuesday morning. And every Tuesday we look a little bit at technology also. Our theme for the day is innovation. It's our biggest asset in the fight against subsidy. We always are concerned about how you get to work every day when we get to the studio ourselves and we're wondering how the traffic situation is for you. A lot of people were hoping or were thinking, rather not hoping, were thinking that with the situation on the ground, a lot of other people will stay back home. The cars on the road will be less and the traffic will not be that much. But if you know you're in Lagos, you have to think again because that nothing ever stops Legosians from going to the road and going about their normal businesses. And so sometimes you go and find out that the roads are clogged even with the fuel situation. You ask yourself, where have they been getting the fuel to be on the road all the time? But well, be that as it may, if you go to the last marked page, which is the body that monitors the traffic in Lagos state, you will find out that some places are really good to move. Now getting through on the mile 12 bridge inward, a gelo go in and out is good. Ascending and descending mile 12 bridge inward, Kosofe, down to Yano school is good. And return journey from Yano school inward, Kosofe, down to mile 12 is good. You also find out that ascending and descending mile 12 bridge inward or would be led down to Odeogung is good. On the way here this morning, I found out that from Bega, or you do Bega to down to a co-hotels, it was very, very free. And if you're traveling, if you moved at the same time that I moved, I'm sure that you had a one very, very beautiful ride. There was no traffic on the road, very unusual. Some people would say that it is expected. But yesterday the situation we find today was the same. And the traffic was not as good as today. Some people have said that because of this situation, when people get to the office on Monday, they choose not to go home until it's Friday and then they enter the road to go back as weekend. So maybe every other office should also think seriously about making it comfortable for the people who work there to sleep over if they cannot be going to and fro every day to work. So that when they close the work from duty as it were every day, they can always find a place to lay their head and wake up in the morning. So there should be a place to bathe. There should be a place to lie down. Maybe you provide some mattresses and all that. You provide some sprays so that the mosquitoes do not give them malaria while they're trying to run away from transportation, they begin to treat malaria. And every other thing that they might need to stay back at the office and work till Friday because the economy is really biting and anything that employers can do to make sure that employees are a little bit comfortable to do their work, please should be done by the employers of labour. It's not enough to just show that you're a boss and that anybody who comes late to work, you fire the person. Anybody who does not show up for work, you fire the person no matter what it is. And you have not even increased what do they call it, salaries. And you're firing and hiring because you can't do that and a lot of people are looking for work. I've heard a lot of employers say that if you leave, there are a thousand others looking for your job. And these are jobs that you're paying maybe 30,000 or 40,000 an hour and you're beating your chest and saying that you are doing poverty allegation or something like that. It's not very good. You are an employer. You have your challenges. You have an employee. He has his challenges. Whatever you can do, let it not be said. It is because of what you did wrongly that the person and his family are suffering. Well, if you go to the social media, you will see a lot of things today. One of the things that you will see is the fact that, or you go to the pages, it's not of the press yet, but it's good to know that some things are happening that may not be one of the topics that we're talking about today. We do know that we've seen on the national dailies that the NLC may have called off their strike. But the Nigerian Maritime Workers Union just began their own strike. They have shot down seaports nationwide because of that. So if the seaports have been shot down, it also means that the economy will be affected in a very, very negative way. Whatever their grievances may be, I hope that the relevant authorities are doing something. I've seen Joheshu and the other unions calling off their strike after meeting with the president. A lot of groups that have threatened to go on strike are meeting with the president and coming up with solutions that are making them to call off their strikes. I do hope that the Nigerian Maritime Workers Union will also call off their strike because they have had the opportunity to meet with the president. If the president doesn't do anything else, at least being proactive enough, to meet with the unions who are aggrieved is a very, very good sign of a listening ear. We do hope that this listening ear will translate to very, very positive actions on the part of the federal government. So Nigerian Maritime Workers Union begins strike, shuts down seaports nationwide, as we've already said. Then there is also very gladdening news. We do hope that whatever should be done to give legal backing to this next thing I'm going to say will be done as fast as possible. We have a Nigerian man who builds vehicles that are fearless. So right now, vehicles could be kekeh, could be bike, but whatever it is, vehicles that do not need to use fuel. Please, let's just see this trending video right now. This guy is the Elon Musk of Nigeria and he's about to become a billionaire. He's turning vehicles that is his fuel into vehicles that now operates only on electricity. Hi, my name is Tugia Makayze and I turn vehicles that use fuel into vehicles that use only electricity. And I believe this is the future. Believe you can make more than 20 billion around from this? Yes. And this is your idea? Yes. Tell me, how did this all begin? Well, it started from when I was still in the university as an undergraduate. I was studying the works of Tesla and the vast transition into electric mobility globally. And then in my final year in the university, we had this project where a group of, a team of engineering students, we came together under the tutelage of Professor Zeminani and then we built an electric vehicle from scratch then. So the... Which university? The University of Nigeria and so on. So the kind of attention we got then kind of exposed me more into the potentials that lie ahead. And then I started seeing opportunities where young people who drive vehicles commercially can actually save costs in operation by using electric vehicles because they cost much, much less to operate and then much, much less to maintain. So how far have you come with this project? So far we have successfully completed our kit. A kit that we can use to convert one vehicle that is powered by a fuel gasoline engine to one that is powered by a full battery electricity. How many of these vehicles do you have running in Enugustin at the moment? We currently have about five and we are working on our mini bus model already. Okay, do you have investors at the moment? Yes, we have a number of investors, people who believe in us from the very beginning. And with the way you are going, do you think you will be able to achieve the vision you have for this? Yes, very much. I work with a team of very visionary people who see the future of... But not just the renewable energy industry in the world, but the energy industry in Nigeria particularly and in the whole of Africa. We believe that this is a beginning of the transmission of Africa into a global economy. Well, this is really impressive. Can you show us how this works? This is one of our vehicles and then what you have here is the battery. The whole thing here is the battery and then underneath it is the engine. So then this is a test model. We could have our batteries under the seats of this vehicle. Can you put it on? Yes, one of the most obvious advantages of this is it has absolutely no noise and absolutely no emissions. It doesn't have any combustion system. Okay, well that debunks all the notions that Nigerian universities are not training people to be self-reliant. They're just going there to do theoretical parts of it. Whoever wants to succeed, whoever wants to progress, will progress in the Nigerian university system or education system. You take what you get from the university and you translate that into a workable model for you. This guy has done that. But my fear and the fear of a lot of Nigerians is whether he will be encouraged by our government and other investors or he will be shot down. Will he thrive or will fall into strife or rife? I'm talking about this because at one point, once upon a time, the National Assembly said nothing should be said in Nigeria about electric cars because we are people who produce fuel. Someone said that in the National Assembly, I don't want to call names, but if you were listening to the news about a year ago, you may have heard someone in the National Assembly rising up to give a notion that people should not even, the National Assembly should not even consider discussing electric cars because we as a country produce crude oil so we should not be thinking about electric cars. I don't know how that went for him. And right now we're in this jam because of fuel subsidy removal. Our economy depends so much on fuel. Now we have an opportunity. We heard this kind of a story before now how someone was converting mini buses in the North to buses that can run on electricity and all that. And we didn't hear anything about him anymore for a long time now. I think it's in Medugri that happened. Now we've seen this one in Enugu state. And he was asked whether there were investors that are coming in. I wonder the kind of investors that were coming in. Maybe there were small scale and all that. I'm looking forward to a time maybe they would partner with big brands like you know some Motors and any other car manufacturing brand that might spring up in Nigeria to produce this kind of things. So if it's in Enugu state you know some Motors is very close to him. So why can't there be some kind of collaboration so that we start producing our own electric cars here in Nigeria. The government should be proactive. So the new government that has come talked a lot about technology being a very integral part of our nationhood as it is. So I do hope that whoever is supposed to listen is listening now. Whoever is supposed to get this information has gotten it from the internet or from plus TV today that we played it. To look for this guy encourage talents like this so that technology will thrive in Nigeria. A lot of things that we depend on to get our livelihood we may not need them in the nearest future which should not be left behind. This is someone who has come up with something. So let's encourage him the best we can as a nation and as individuals. So congratulations to you my guy. University of Nigeria and Suka has produced something and someone really really lovable. So it's still the breakfast on plus TV Africa. We're going to take a very short break and when we return we'll continue to talk about some of these things and then also go to the newspapers to find out what is going on. Stay with us.