 Very good morning to you. You're welcome to the breakfast on plus TV Africa. My name is Romare Paulson And my name is Nyamgul Agadje. It's another Monday morning and we're glad to know that you were able to join us We survived to this moment and we're going to make it to the end of the year and say Eureka We found the solution to all our problems. We will be rejoicing when it gets to the end of the year Yeah, hopefully We have some topics we'll be discussing this morning. Our first one is labeled the cries federal governments refusal to set up minimum wage panel and Lagos ban's usage of styrofoam other single-use plastics. We'll also be looking at what the national dailies are saying this morning in off-the-press as well as some top trending issues. But first, let's take our course of the day. Don't be pushed by the fears in your mind. Be led by the dreams in your heart and this is from Roy T Bennett. Like I say everything you desire is on the other side of fear so if you embrace that fear it's not that you see the lion and go and face him. That's not the kind of fear but you know embrace that fear because if you say I might fail I might fail you kind of attract what you think of all the time. So if what is in your mind your dream is big enough pursue it and I think it's a very very beautiful thing to say. Interestingly I was on social media a few days ago and a popular Hollywood actress had posted a video it was the fish in a litu pond and then there was like this you know sea as well and the fish was trying to wiggle its way out of the litu pond and then it finally made it into the ocean and I think the the caption was everyone should actually put their best you know quote for that and the the ones I saw that resonated the most was the fact that you know you're only in your comfort zone because you're afraid of what might be on the other side but as long as you can push through you might just have that sea of opportunities the sea of possibilities and that's what happened to that little fish imagine it just being in that litu pond it could probably just die it wouldn't know that there's you know even more to his life than what he was seeing like the current circumstances but then being able to move over to have that sea of possibilities that just opens you up to what could become of you and you you know fulfilling your destiny and your purpose so that's what Roy T. Bennett is saying this morning don't be pushed around by the fears in your mind be led by the dreams in your heart so as long as you have a dream believe that you can achieve it and that's just what we're telling people this morning if you have a dream just know that you can achieve it push yourself don't be afraid you can make it through improvement never comes without discomfort there is no way you can find improvement in your life in your business in everything that you're doing everything about you that you will not find some kind of discomfort some kind of failure some kind of disappointment but it leads to the ultimate goal yeah so it's like a picture that i think maybe you have seen it once whatever you want to do you you are the sculptor of your life you know you want to get a perfect body you want to be whatever you want to be you have the chisel and the hammer you chisel out the kind of person that you want to be but if you say i don't want to hurt myself no matter what then you will never improve you will not go to school you will not learn it straight you will not do anything you'll just be there even personal development as well because you're setting habits that we have and you start to realize i don't think this you know when you see yourself in a different space when your mind already creates a version of you that is amazing you start to see yourself like i need to take out certain things so that i can get there the person who's going to be there in a few years we should not have this trait so i have to start sculpting out you know the things that are not necessary and start to put the things that would require me to become that better person so personal development in fact in every area of your life if you just as you said even your body at the end of the day you're saying i want to be healthy i need to go to the gym i need to have a better diet my nutrition matters so all of those things you just have to start to um put the things that are necessary for you and take out the things that are not so it's a mindset Monday we're hoping that you will change your mindset about a lot of things it's a it's a very fresh year we're starting it's only 22nd day into the year 2024 we still have more than 300 days so there's a lot of time to make that positive change in your life no it's not everything that is sweet that is good for you so you should know that so move out move out of your comfort zone and see what you can do when you conquer your fears all right let's take our top trending stories this one and the first one is police army rescue Najiba's sister other Abuja kidnapped victims following the relentless rage of the federal capital territory by the police command anti-kidnapping squad in conjunction with troops of the Nigerian army the joint security team on saturday night rescued several kidnapped persons abducted at the zuma one area of warrior area local council on january 2nd the fct police command in a statement signed by s speed jesofine adis said the operative successfully rescued the victims around kadru forest in kadruni estate at about 11 30 p.m on saturday the 20th of january 2024 suspected bandits on january 2nd and 3rd attacked zuma community in warri area council of the fct in the early hours enduring two policemen and kidnapping about 10 persons including a father manso kadira and his six children all girls during the attack the victims quickly alerted a middle-aged man identified as alaji who mobilized policemen to try and follow the kidnapping of the seven family members and others but he was shot by the bandits alaji abdu fatah kadira was later discovered to be a brother of manso kadira during the exchange of gunfire two of the policemen were injured before the bandits made a way with the victims subsequently the bandits demanded a ransom of 60 million and naira and killed the eldest daughter nebiha owing to the delay of the of impaying the ransom and later increased the ransom to 100 million naira another three persons had earlier been kidnapped by bandits in the early hours of ads rather bangori area in warri area local council after inflicting gunshot injury on a vigilante during the incident according to the statement cp haruna garba appreciated the inspector general of police i gp o lu kairi ebetoko for the deployment of the newly commissioned special intervention squad which has given an uplift to the existing security architecture of the fcd noting that it has brewed public confidence cp garba reiterated the command's commitment to sustaining the robust security development deployment made in the area and other parts of the territory for the utmost maintenance of peace for all and sundry encourage residents of the fcd to note following the following emergency lines and promptly report suspicious activities at zero eight zero three two zero zero three nine one three zero eight zero six one five eight one nine three eight zero seven zero five seven three three seven six five three and zero eight zero two eight nine four zero eight eight three so these are the numbers to call if you say if you see any suspected activities i'll take the numbers again zero eight zero three two zero zero three nine one three zero eight zero six one five eight one nine three eight zero seven zero five seven three three seven six five three and zero eight zero two eight nine four zero eight three three i was going to say when the numbers not called too fast and then i remembered when i was working on radio you just say a number and the next thing is someone's calling yeah i don't know how the people have the ears to hear all that to catch it but yeah but this uh this kidnapping or kidnappers are getting boulder and boulder and now they incursion into the federal capital it seems to be like it's more lucrative anybody that they abduct in the federal capital territory the ransom demanded for is so high uh outrageously high yes they killed someone the ransom was supposed to be yes the ransom was supposed to be 16 million then you killed someone and increased it to 100 million because they know they know the kind of know that uh they are going to get away with it now we've been told that they have been rescued by the special intervention squad when they rescued them did they where they where the kidnappers just sleeping at the time that they rescued these people where are they they should have rescued these people and captured a lot of other people who were the kidnappers themselves at this point no matter the atrocities that abacari committed i just i miss him yes abacari of the the sauce i miss him because i know a lot of people will just roll eyebrows and say hey that man was a criminal and all that but while he was holding sway he did not let a lot of these things happen he will he will hunt them down maybe because he was in bed with them i don't know but i do know that he did a wonderful job up to the extent that the national assembly at some point gave him a standing ovation it's unfortunate that we discovered later on that he like i said was in bed with some of these criminals but um whatever it is he did a good job so wherever he is right now for the good ones that he did we thank him for the bad ones well maybe he's already paying for them but special intervention squad is another name for himself for sas so whether we like it or not we just want that squad if this squad we just want that squad to do yeah to do the right like the job they're supposed to be doing not harassing people on the road yeah um i mean this kidnapping thing like you said is becoming rampant and they're so bold and we have to start to carve out these things because guess what it starts with two people that would say oh you know what i'll go kidnap this person get money when people see that they are being successful and nothing is being done there's going to be an uprising you're going to see more people that would do it and think you know i'm not nothing is going to be done to me i'm not going to you know be arrested i'm not going to be captured nothing and that's not what we want we want a situation whereby the lives and properties of nigerians are secured because you how can i be in nigeria and i'm even scared i mean i mean when they came out let's talk about the fact that abuja is the federal capital territory where you see all of these politicians you see people there like people that supposed to be that you think they even have more protection than you somewhere like in a rural community and these people are there going there to kidnap them you know still from them no it's one chance and all that yeah we'll have to capture it but now my greatest annoyance or one of my greatest annoyance was when they came up with the issue of NIN they told us that it will curb all the stings would they can track bandits and all that these bandits are still kidnapping people even with the NIN and then phone calls the the person that was in charge uh the pantamig that was in charge of this NIN and gave us all the promises now is organizing people to pay ransom for a friend who was kidnapped it was on their news the other day and he was saying somebody has decided to pay with a 50 million or so for kidnapped victims somewhere pantamig that should have had all this information and should have used it for for good and he's now telling us that he is involved in collecting ransom what are they doing with the data that's that's that's a very it makes no sense what are they doing with the data first you start with bvn then you come with NIN then you come with KYC then you you every single in fact i'm sure in another six months there's something else that they'll ask us to to go and register for so if you're not going to use that so to the advantage of Nigeria then why are you collecting that data what are you using it for okay well we move to the next one follow no demands and to scandalous pension for ex-governors human rights lawyer Fermi Fallano has called for an end to what he described as scandalous pension for some ex-governors in Nigeria Fallano in a statement lamented that while many state governors voted themselves among us pension payments and allowances some of them chose not to pay the pensions and gratuities of their former workers whilst they were in office he noted that not less than 20 of the former governors are in the senate where they also receive jumbo salaries and allowances and according to him who is also the chairman of alliance on surviving covid-19 and beyond ask up the pension laws for leaguers aqua bomb and river states are the most scandalous he pointed out that in the socio economic rights and accountability project sarah versus attorney general of the federation and al-haji garba umar versus tarah bah state government the federal high court and the national industrial court declared as null and void the payment of pensions and gratuities the former governors and deputy governors he added that in 2022 the leger state government announced the 50 percent reduction in the pension while senators daniel and dank wambu have directed the governments of ushun ogun state and gombe to stop paying them the pension since they are receiving salaries and allowances in the national assembly he gave further examples of the government of quara imo and zanfarah states abolishing the payment of the pensions he called on other state governments to abolish the pension as soon as possible and explained that nigeria can no longer afford to pay scandalous pensions to ex governors while workers are owed areas of mega pension according to him the pension laws applicable to other public officers should also apply to all ex governors i agree 100 percent yeah a few days ago uh the former governor of leaguess came out and said that legoes pays him only about 500 000 naira as pension per month okay well uh it's it's tolerable amount to pay an ex governor but is that really what happens everywhere else and the fact that pensioners who are waiting for 30 000 every month or 50 000 every month as a case may be they don't get paid why is someone who is working for four years getting a pension uh a steady pension a humongous pension and steady and then the people who worked for 30 35 years are not getting theirs some of these people are very mega some of these people worked all their lives they did not even have the money to save enough to build houses when they go home uh understood the way waiting for gratuity and pension and said okay at least i'll get a lump sum at the end of the day i'll build my house go and rest and all that and then you don't find it then you find verification every month every every month you come from wherever you are on your sick bed and some of them collapse they and die and then you're still giving people annoyingly the people who are still in the national assembly right now as you speak collecting salary from the national assembly and collecting as governors yeah it's outrageous yeah it's just and and i think because so if you hold a public office you're there to serve i don't see it as you're there to make money i mean it's nice that you get wages because your time you know your efforts those are valuable but how do you go for like four years that's why i said i completely agree how do you go for four years and you're getting so much meanwhile me that i have labeled that's the word i've labeled and i don't even get enough i'm not i'm not okay but guess what you are fine because the money that you have taken over the years in fact the pension because if the former governor of lego state comes to say he's only getting 500 000 i'm like is that what he survives on that is a good question maybe he has businesses maybe he has other things but some of these people they were not able to you know build a business sometimes you give your entire life how how convenient is it for you to you know have a full-time job they still have another business that is budding do you understand most of the time that's what he used to even finance this business you don't have loans from banks because they're not even the the times are not even favorable even if they're available they give you a profit margin that you cannot even fulfill and you're asking yourself what am i taking the loan for if i'm going to end up the whole of my life paying back the loan that may not make sense to me and all that and so there are a lot of things this world is not just engineered or let's say nigeria it's not just engineered to favor the poor man you know the ordinary man not actually poor but the ordinary man everything is just geared towards that you are rich you become richer it floats it floats it's like this like the money doesn't come this way it's like this it is like it's been circled around the one percent so we're just exchanging it but it coming downstream not really the chances are very slim i'm not even asking for humongous amount just give me my due you know if i'm supposed to if i'm paying taxes and i need a good education for my children give it to me yeah give me health give me everything that i'm supposed to give me a good road give me a favorable environment it's it's my right as a taxpayer in this country i'm not asking you to give me extra just give me what is due me and then yeah and then i'll survive so if you're paying me 50 000 per month but i know that my child will go to school with that 50 000 i don't have a problem i know that whenever anybody in my household is sick you go to the hospital you get your health care it's good then all the the the basic things i have okay if i'm going home to my state maybe there's a an available train the roads are safe and the transportation is cheap i will not be complaining i will not be asking for minimum wage of 200 000 because 50 000 is just for to have fun to just it's extra you're chilling because everything else it's available there is accommodation you know but right now i saw somebody somebody just joked and said okay this is 2024 another time to work and pay the landlord i swear because that's that's that's what it is you're just leaving your landlord so anyways let's move over to our final top training story it says court finds police xigp son over 50 million naira of a violation or 50 million naira over violation of abbyola's right justice modukwa osho adibi of a federal high court sitting in abuja has slammed a 50 million naira fine against the nigerian police force over violation of the fundamental human rights of professor zaynab duke abbyola also affected by the fine is one ibrahim who said to be the son of a former inspector general of police igp husman akali baba according to an enrollment order dated december 19 2023 and obtained by one of the newspapers yesterday the defendants were also ordered to tender a public apology to the applicant in two national newspapers according to the matter the respondents had paraded abbyola the applicant in a nightgown which the judge held was a flagrant violation of her rights abbyola filed an application pursuant to order one rule three of the fundamental human rights enforcement procedure rules 2008 praying the court to declare that the arrest and torture and detention by the officers and men of the first and second respondents acting on behalf of inspector teju moses and one ibrahim who without any suspicion that had said she had committed any criminal offense constituted a flagrant infringement or or for fundamental rights she had asserted that the breaking and entering to our house on september 2022 without a valid court order constituted an infringement of a rights and a threat to her family life in her judgment the judge held that it was not unlawful to arrest detain or charge anyone suspected to have committed an offense to court but it must be within the limits stipulated by the law according to the judge the applicant ought to have been charged to court within 24 hours but this was not the case as she was detained for about 72 hours however the george declined to award the 500 million an hour damages requested by the applicant but awarded 50 million naira as fair and unappropriate fine yeah well uh no time to even talk too much about it whoever is at fault pay pay for it yeah that's as simple as that nobody should be above the law even the police that should be the law enforcers are doing somehow within punitive so if they are found wanting they should pay they're fine they should they should go in for it just that you cannot take the whole police people to to court to court you can take them but you can't take them to prison like the whole police force go to prison they can't go to prison but whenever something like this happens let them pay the fine they the problem is that when they do it to people who may not be able to have good lawyers and to institute a case against them and all that this they go squat free so the law should be so good that even the poor man can also fight them if his rights or their rights are being trampled upon yeah because it happens atm matters that is a waiting trial matters are so many in the prisons now police will just go and catch you on suspicion of something dump you there nobody talks for you and you are there for years yeah it doesn't make sense there's so many people there even innocence in this in this place a lot of innocence i can tell you that but as long as they don't have a lawyer or anyone who can plead their case they're just forgotten and that's quite sad and you know talking about fundamental human right i don't know how you would move into someone's house and parade them in their ninth way like why would you even do such a thing because like the georgia said you know you have to you have to you know move with the law so even anything that you're going to do you can't go outside of the law move with the law and that way you know when when a case comes like this the judge has nothing to say like oh yes you're well within the right he doesn't open the books and say okay this is what the law states okay they were doing the right thing but this is not this is impunity and well let's just take that all right we'll go on a quick break we'll look at what the weather is this morning and when we come back we'll be having all the press please stay with us so this is a very good call uh given the fact that what i what i what we are using now is not biodegradable uh usually you see it is a health hazard because it blocks drainage and it is an iso and this cause a lot of problem you know that is why if this thing is not taken care of our fight like against malaria and other diseases will be in vain because of the dangerous hazard that they constitute you see it all depends on the consequence you have to weigh each policy has its own uh negative consequence yes it will interest or the interest of uh you know the producers so i think to me even though this is a draconian measure is so sweet um i think that is the way to go about it uh the government of course being a democratic government should have uh you know alerted the people and give them time space to to do it but uh to me i think that is the best way to do it because if we allow people to keep on doing it we don't know what is going to happen uh maybe uh yes the government can give them a little time space uh to adjust but uh given our attitude the Nigerian attitude i think even if we give them two years from now they will not be able to adjust unless they see that uh something is coming so by doing that uh at least we can put them on the all the government will put them on their toe and they will address the issue uh seriously and uh rapidly you see in most of our cities virtually every look and crying of the city uh turn into markets we have to be organized we have to uh know where the market is where public residential areas are where businesses are uh where you know companies and so on so i think this is a good thing also even though the people will think it is too harsh but we have to be organized we cannot be so chaotic everywhere you go you you you find markets here and there and so i think the the government should make arrangement in such a way that those who are banned should be relocated to other places so that whoever has a need he knows where to go and get his own needs there instead of this haphazard nature of market all over the place yeah i think this is a very bad thing a very sad uh after in our own history because one uh the the phenomena is widespread initially it was uh north east then north west uh then north central now it is going all over the country that is one thing the second alarming thing is that uh they have so they have become so audacious that now they give bank account that are supposed to be people are supposed to pay in there so i think this is where the problem is the government has to do something on such banks uh especially given the fact that uh two banks they seem to be very prominent in that so i think unless unless we take action i let the government take action on those in this phenomenon will i keep on going you know it will rise more than the way we are seeing it so i believe and i think the best way is for the government to head up these things uh not to allow people to continue with it especially the the banking sector that um you know we are told we have to have bvn we have to have name attached account what happened to them so that we cannot address or trace those who on the account i think this is a very serious problem you see taxation is is one way to generate revenue but it has negative consequence if you put the higher the taxes the more you make companies you know to wind up and the more you now make them to apply to leave the country look at what is happening in developed countries like america most of its businesses most of the industry are outside uh in other places where the cost of labor is cheap where taxation is low so i think the government has to weigh in on that issue not to overflog the issue of taxation especially the concern that many the investors are having there is high taxation there is multiple taxation there is corruption so i think all these things are one thing that the government should look into and see that we have a realistic tax policy that will encourage rather than discourage investors to invest in Nigeria i will grade him very low because one the inflation is rising and two the naira is one of the three worst performing currency in the world now it is i think after the the lebanese pound and the argentina peso then there is the nigeria this is so i think it's a good thing it's a very bad situation and then there's also the issue of uh you know insecurity which even the economics of today you know come out with very damning report on the insecurity and there is also rising inflation like i said there is rising poverty uh all which are contrary to the renew hope agenda if the things if things keep on going this way i think the renewed hope will end up being a dash hop for nigerians instead of a renewed hope you see there it is a very good thing that we should have uh major political parties the way we are having you know mushroom parties all over the country i think it's not a good thing even though in terms of democracy we allow people to form their own political parties or to join any party of their own but some of them are just mere briefcase political parties they don't exist on ground so the idea of having major parties will give nigerians the chance to choose look at what happened in 2015 when the political environment was dominated by pdp when some people joined and formed a pc it was able to discharge the the pdp from power so i think what we need major past parties so that at least we have three or four major parties which will allow nigerians the choice to choose now the way we are having it now if we allow it to continue this way we may end up having impact not in the law we will end up becoming a one-party state because and that is too dangerous for democracy it will have an accountability we have you know impunity and so many things that uh accompanied one party system no i doubt it very much as you said leadership is one of the problem you see what an able apc to be able to come out in a very short time was that they have a rally in person they're all rally around buhari and that was what make them what make the alliance possible but in terms of these three major parties that you have mentioned i think the issue of personality is there everyone will want himself to be the leader unless they have a person uh that they will rally around that will be a pipe dream so what i'm suggesting is that even if the three of them could not give up let them find a neutral person that both all of them will rally around secondly they need to have a program and ideology or at least a principle that they will rally around not just the idea of any party but apc in power so if the only thing i mean aim is to disclose the party without any program that's in that one also will be a very herculean tax for them to have and the third thing is they need to go able to look and cranny of the country in terms of selling their own programs unless they have all these measures i think it will be a pipe dream for them always thinking that they will come to form a mega party after all the ruling party will also will not sit down to allow that to happen it will rule some of them like what is happening now even the nmp here in kano uh they are underground moves that uh they are going to be ruled back into apc so i think these are some of the things that they have to look into uh which are realistic challenges for them to become a mega party i quite agree with him i think even the court has said it is immorally it is an immoral issue that of a pension and uh i after having the pension they will also join the national assembly and will be getting a new salary so there will be any salary and there will be an impension which according to our all laws of the land there is nobody who will retire and this unimpensioned and then he gets a pressure appointment so i think the law is clear about that i think it is wrong and they are like what the court said it is morally wrong for them to have that one and secondly it is a wastage of our resources it is a grain on public resources given the humongous pension that they give to themselves all right we're going to quick break this thing with us thank you very much uh good morning uh nigerians good morning negligence uh morning this uh issue has taken uh you would collectively was properly negotiated uh it's a timeline given for all these agreements uh in particular the one you are you mentioned now which is referenced to the widow world and the minimum minimum wage minimum wage statutorily is due for this year which is around april and prior to this uh time the labor and the government agree that uh because of the adverse effect of the subsidiary mover on the life of an average engineer and the workers there is need to design a pallet use which is called wage award to workers so that they will be able to at least sustain uh painting women which will be reviewed and as at that time they have already requested for nomination of committees both from the union side and the government side from the union side both nlc the two labor center nlc niger labor congress and the trade union congress have since the review of minimum wage but up to this moment the government have not demit fit to inaugurate the committee for action but we as a union we are now waiting to that uh we are not relating we have been doing our background uh assignment in terms of research into what you call not only minimum wage this time around it must be a living wage for all workers across both so this prompted the leadership of the nlc congress to immediately put up a technical committee to research on the rates the standard rates of an average negligence in each of the 36 states and fc we know there are peculiarities across it some states cost of commodities a minimal standard of living is above the means of an average worker so we are going to negotiate this time around in line with all these socioeconomic indices across states put together which will form the background of what labor is going to propose to government whenever they are ready for the negotiation but what we know for sure is that it we should not it can never exceed deeply because by every the minimum wage will have been lapsed and it will not be of effect so before the call us to a table we are preparing our our notes we are doing our background research across states so that whatever we are putting across to government we be in line with the current reality and it will be a living wage for all not just a take home which cannot take people's we will not be able to preempt the intention of government we are labor movement we are always back already we are focused and we are determined and and we are and for sure you know we are partner in progress so maybe two three weeks ago the current acting minister of labor and employment uh issue a statement that federal government is ready to clear the backlog of the areas of wage award because they've only paid two out of four September and October as I speak November December wage award is still pending and generally is counting down so she made some issues some official statements in this regard that they are very mindful of paying all this backlog because it's affecting the level of an average worker seriously as I speak most of our colleagues in the public sector find it difficult to celebrate Christmas and New Year with with their with their entitlements but be that as it may they are we are ready and we are hoping that they will pay this backlog and we focus their attention to the negotiation table which they have already established so that they can institute and inaugurate this uh committee formally so that work and commerce in the next before a pre deadline with this minimum wage will have a lapse so we are very very optimistic we don't want to be pessimistic we don't know the intention of a government but they are working as we heard that they are going to inaugurate this committee soon as but they know it's a statute it's a statute it's a constitutional it's a constitutional matter you understand and uh government uh is the should be the number one respecter of law so they know for sure that the law of the land says for sure you know that we have our instruments and we have our uh mode of operation so we'll give them some automation approaching this uh deadline to let them know the reason and the the urgency of this uh committee to commence work in the next so we'll give them the necessary timeline to know that this if they have not refused to commit it can't inaugurate this committee within soon as soon as soon as time it will create a kind of vacuum which means