The Chief Executive of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, Gbenga Komolafe, has disclosed that the country’s average daily production was 1.61 million barrels per day as of July 23.

Komolafe revealed that at the House of Representatives Special Committee’s two-day public/investigative hearing on oil theft/losses.

“As of July 23, 2024, Nigeria’s average daily production stands at 1.61mbpd,” he disclosed.

This is coming barely two weeks after the commission announced that the average daily oil production for June was 1.25mbpd.

According to Komolafe, Nigeria had continued to dominate as Africa’s largest producer of crude oil, boasting proven reserves of 37.50 billion barrels and a production capacity of approximately 2.19mbpd.

On the statutory mandates and regulatory strategies of the NUPRC, he said the Petroleum Industry Act 2021 grants the commission several statutory mandates in the areas of calibration and certification of metering systems and equipment, publication of reports and statistics on upstream operations, regulatory oversight and issuance of quality and quantity certificates for exports, and determination of fiscal prices for crude oil and condensate.

Komolafe added that the strategies of the commission aimed to optimise production, enhance regulatory oversight, and ensure accurate measurement and accounting.

He maintained that the NUPRC had prioritised improving rig availability and reducing non-productive time through unlocking heavy crude oil reserves via industry workshops.

Those initiatives, he noted, also supported new Petroleum Prospecting License awardees to achieve their first oil, among other initiatives.

The NUPRC boss admitted that Nigeria was facing significant challenges regarding crude oil theft and pipeline vandalism, especially affecting terminals at Bonny, Brass, and Forcados.

The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited stated in September 2022 that it lost $700m every month to oil theft.

Also, the Nigerian Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative added that Nigeria lost 619.7 million barrels, valued at N16.3tn, to crude oil theft from 2005 to 2021.

In 2023, the NNPC spent N136 billion on security, repairs, and maintenance of vandalised infrastructure, per Dataphyte.

“This has prompted the commission to employ end-to-end production monitoring and a mass balance methodology to accurately account for losses and differentiate them from operational losses. These interventions have significantly reduced theft, with zero incidents reported in July 2023,” Komolafe stated.

He noted that NUPRC had introduced several innovative measures to enhance transparency and accountability.

He highlighted, “Other innovations include the Advanced Cargo Declaration Regulation that ensures no crude oil is exported without proper accounting and assigns a unique identification number to each cargo, the Upstream Metering Regulation, which mandates reliable metering systems to account for all hydrocarbon production and exports, and real-time cargo tracking and digital documentation to improve visibility and efficiency in cargo operations.”

He, therefore, reaffirmed NUPRC’s commitment to continued engagement with stakeholders to optimise Nigeria’s oil production and maintain its leadership position in Africa’s energy sector.

Our correspondent reports that crude oil thieves and illegal refiners have continued to defy government efforts, impacting the nation’s crude production daily.

 

Punch

At least seven Nigerian soldiers were killed after a mine exploded on a highway in Borno state, the hotbed of a Boko Haram militant insurgency, two vigilante officers said on Friday.

Nigeria faces a raft of security challenges including a long-running Islamist insurgency in the northeast, separatist violence in the southeast, rampant oil theft in the Niger Delta and kidnapping for ransom by criminal gangs.

Shaibu Musa, a local vigilante officer helping to combat the insurgents, said a military vehicle was travelling along the road linking the villages of Monguno and Baga on Thursday when the vehicle detonated an improvised explosive device.

The military did not immediately respond to request for comment on the incident.

Another security official, Isa Bukar, said the explosion occurred on Thursday morning after soldiers on patrol triggered the mine, which killed seven of them.

 

Reuters

Netanyahu meets with Trump at Mar-a-Lago, offering measured optimism on a Gaza cease-fire

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu worked to mend ties with Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Friday and offered measured optimism about progress toward a cease-fire deal for Gaza as he neared the end of a contentious U.S. visit that put on display the growing American divisions over support for the Israeli-Hamas war.

At Trump’s Florida Mar-a-Lago estate, where the two men met face-to-face for the first time in nearly four years, Netanyahu told journalists he wanted to see U.S.-mediated talks succeed for a cease-fire and release of hostages.

“I hope so,” Netanyahu said, when reporters asked if his U.S. trip had made progress. While Netanyahu at home is increasingly accused of resisting a deal to end the 9-month-old war to stave off the potential collapse of his far-right government when it ends, he said Friday he was “certainly eager to have one. And we’re working on it.”

As president, Trump went well beyond his predecessors in fulfilling Netanyahu’s top wishes from the United States. Yet relations soured after Netanyahu became one of the first world leaders to congratulate Joe Biden for his 2020 presidential victory, which Trump continues to deny.

The two men now have a strong interest in restoring their relationship, both for the political support their alliance brings and for the luster it gives each with their conservative supporters.

A beaming Trump was waiting for Netanyahu on the stone steps outside his private club and residence in Palm Beach, Florida. He warmly clasped the hands of the Israeli leader.

“We’ve always had a great relationship,” Trump insisted before journalists. Asked as the two sat down in a muraled room for talks if Netanyahu’s trip to Mar-a-Lago was repairing their bond, Trump responded, “It was never bad.”

For both men, Friday’s meeting was aimed at highlighting for their home audiences their depiction of themselves as strong leaders who have gotten big things done on the world stage, and can again.

Netanyahu’s Florida trip followed a fiery address to a joint meeting of Congress on Wednesday that defended his government’s conduct of the war and condemned American protesters galvanized by the killing of more than 39,000 Palestinians in the conflict.

On Thursday, Netanyahu had met in Washington with Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, who appears on track to becoming the new Democratic presidential nominee after Biden decided to step out of the race. Both pressed the Israeli leader to work quickly to wrap up a deal to bring a cease-fire and release hostages held by Hamas.

Trump’s campaign said he pledged in Friday’s meeting to “make every effort to bring peace to the Middle East” and combat antisemitism on college campuses if American voters elect him to the presidency in November.

Netanyahu handed Trump a framed photo that the Israeli leader said showed a child who has been held hostage by Hamas-led militants since the first hours of the war. “We’ll get it taken care of,” Trump assured him.

In a speech later Friday before a group of young Christian conservatives, Trump said he also asked Netanyahu during their meeting how “a Jewish person, or a person that loves Israel” can vote for Democrats.

He also laced into Harris for missing Netanyahu’s speech and claimed she “doesn’t like Jewish people” and “doesn’t like Israel.” Harris has been married to a Jewish man for a decade.

For Trump, the meeting was a chance to be cast as an ally and statesman, as well as to sharpen efforts by Republicans to portray themselves as the party most loyal to Israel.

Divisions among Americans over U.S. support for Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza have opened cracks in years of strong bipartisan backing for Israel, the biggest recipient of U.S. aid.

For Netanyahu, repairing relations with Trump is imperative given the prospect that Trump may once again become president of the United States, which is Israel’s vital arms supplier and protector.

One gamble for Netanyahu is whether he could get more of the terms he wants in any deal on a Gaza cease-fire and hostage release, and in his much hoped-for closing of a normalization deal with Saudi Arabia, if he waits out the Biden administration in hopes that Trump wins.

“Benjamin Netanyahu has spent much of his career in the last two decades in tethering himself to the Republican Party,” said Aaron David Miller, a former U.S. diplomat for Arab-Israeli negotiations, now a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

For the next six months, that means “mending ties with an irascible, angry president,” Miller said, meaning Trump.

Netanyahu and Trump last met at a September 2020 White House signing ceremony for the signature diplomatic achievement of both men’s political careers. It was an accord brokered by the Trump administration in which the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain agreed to establish normal diplomatic relations with Israel.

For Israel, it amounted to the two countries formally recognizing it for the first time. It was a major step in what Israel hoped would be an easing of tensions and a broadening of economic ties with its Arab neighbors.

In public postings and statements after his break with Netanyahu, Trump portrayed himself as having stuck his neck out for Israel as president, and Netanyahu paying him back with disloyalty.

He also has criticized Netanyahu on other points, faulting him as “not prepared” for the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks that started the war in Gaza, for example.

In his high-profile speech to Congress on Wednesday and again Friday at Mar-a-Lago, Netanyahu poured praise on Trump, calling the regional accords Trump helped broker historic and thanking him “for all the things he did for Israel.”

Netanyahu listed actions by the Trump administration long-sought by Israeli governments — the U.S. officially saying Israel had sovereignty over the Golan Heights, captured from Syria during a 1967 war; a tougher U.S. policy toward Iran; and Trump declaring Jerusalem the capital of Israel, breaking with longstanding U.S. policy that Jerusalem’s status should be decided in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.

“I appreciated that,” Trump told “Fox & Friends” on Thursday, referring to Netanyahu’s praise.

Trump has repeatedly urged that Israel with U.S. support “finish the job” in Gaza and destroy Hamas, but he hasn’t elaborated on how.

 

AP

I am not that old, but one time, I was telling my younger cousins about how Netflix used to be a mailing service, and they were absolutely gobsmacked. I myself was kinda shocked too, because I'd just assumed that was common knowledge. (Wait till I tell them about the mythical world of Blockbuster.) So when redditor u/MrDNLasked the people of r/AskOldPeople to share the common knowledge from their time that younger generations might have a hard time believing, I was all in. Here are some of the responses that will either make you feel totally nostalgic or completely puzzled:

1. "When the internet first came out, you couldn't talk on the phone and be online at the same time."

—u/LosBrad

2. "Going to get gas was more of an experience. When you went, the gas station attendants would put gas in your car, clean your windshield, and check your oil. After that, you just paid them through your car window; you never had to get out of the car."

—u/3D-ironowl

3. "I'm just old enough to remember smoking on planes. It still blows my mind that that was a thing!"

—u/Linzcro

4. "We used to make our Christmas or birthday wishlists from looking in store catalogs, like Sears. You could actually order and pay for things via snail mail, and it was safe to do so."

—u/LeeAnnLongSocks

5. "This wasn't that long ago, but there used to be no security screenings at airports. You could literally walk the person to the boarding area and watch them board the plane."

—u/LCCR_2028

6. "Whenever you wanted to download something online, you'd have to basically threaten everyone in the house with their lives if they picked up the phone during the amount of download time it took. It would take hours to download a game or an image, and if someone used the phone, the download would START OVER from the beginning. Plus, in the mid-'90s, you'd have to pay by the hour."

—u/Shaydie

7. "My 20-year-old son liked hearing this one: When driving in unfamiliar territory, you had to get directions by either stopping at the gas station and asking an attendant, or buying a map/atlas."

—u/littlemissnoname-

8. "Seatbelts weren't taken seriously by most people until the '90s."

—u/Top-Philosophy-5791

9. "There were ashtrays everywhere: homes, businesses, restaurants, hospitals, malls, designated areas in schools, and more. Even if you didn't smoke, it was normal to have ashtrays available for your guests in the house — like on the coffee table or in the kitchen."

—u/oldcatsarecute

10. "My boss blew my young coworker's mind the other day when she explained that there is a special kind of black paper that you can put between two regular pieces of paper, and when you write on the top page, it also shows up on the bottom page."

—u/mr_roborto

11. "Drunk driving wasn't a serious crime until a group of moms got together and advocated (MADD)."

—u/MizzGee

12. "There was a room called the 'coal room' in the basement of our house. We'd shovel coal from that room into a coal furnace whenever we needed to heat our house up. The coal was delivered by a truck that had a coal chute, which was inserted through a basement window in the coal room."

—u/Logybayer

13. "It was normal for an entire household to share a single phone number."

—u/AlexMango44
​

"And you only had to dial seven digits — four, if you were in a small town."
​

—u/notproudortired

14. "The drinking age was 18 back in my day, but you could walk into a bar at 16 and order a drink. Nobody really cared."

—u/jefuchs

15. "People used to actually write letters, put a stamp on them, and mail them to their friends and relatives! As a kid, I would write letters to my school friends over summer break just to tell them how my summer was going, and most would write back telling me how things were with them. I still remember when stamps went from 18 cents to 20 cents, and my grandma complained about how outrageous that was. Today, a first-class stamp is 68 cents, and I only mail Christmas cards and thank-you notes nowadays."

—u/SiroccoDream

16. "If you misbehaved in school, the teacher could — and would — dish out some corporal punishment. I had a couple of teachers who absolutely loved punishing kids with those big wooden paddles."

—u/Felon73

17. "When you watched TV, you had to watch what was on, and if you wanted to watch something in particular, you had to wait for it to come on."

—u/BreakfastBeerz
​

"No pause, fast-forward, or rewind, either. If you missed it, you missed it."
​

—u/Wonderland_4me

18. "Phone numbers were memorized, and there was no speed dial, caller ID, or voicemail. I still remember my home number and my best friend's number from over 50 years ago."

—u/ethottly

19. "Kids could leave home, and people didn't bat an eye about it. My grandfather was 8 when he left home and made his way in the world. He had no education and worked jobs for people, and no one even questioned why an 8-year-old was alone. He signed up for World War II when he was 17 because no one checked for identification."

—u/My_fair_ladies1872

20. "Houses in the same area had to share a telephone 'party line' where you could listen in on everyone else's conversations."

—u/mrxexon

21. "I remember that you couldn't know the sex of your kid until the baby was born. Apparently, there were ways to tell, though. I remember my mom's friends would hold a necklace with a weight over the woman's belly. They thought that you could tell the sex by whether the necklace swung up and down or back and forth."

—u/Shaydie

22. "In the '50s, the milkman would come in through our always unlocked back door and put the milk straight in our refrigerator. Unbelievable."

—u/Building_a_life

23. "On the evening news, every night they would show the 'Doomsday Clock.' It's an analog clock that, when it hits midnight, means we're in a nuclear war. It was usually very close to midnight — like five minutes before. Imagine having the very real threat of nuclear war looming over your head every single day."

—u/pingwing

24. "There were telephones EVERYWHERE: streets, shops, sidewalk corners, etc. And you paid for calls with COINS."

—u/PawzzClawzz

25. "Cigarette machines were pretty much everywhere. As long as you put the money in, you could get a pack of smokes no matter what age you were."

—u/No_Worldliness_6803

26. Lastly: "My adult children and all of their friends didn't believe me when I first told them that married women weren't allowed to have a credit card in their own name until 1974. Before that, women could only have a card through their husband."

—u/jmac94wp

I don't know about you guys, but I'm still stuck on the fact that people were allowed to smoke on planes?! Alright, if you have some fascinating facts or experiences about life back then that younger people would be surprised to hear, drop them in the comments below, or you can submit anonymously using this Google form!

 

Buzzfeed

The Pirangi Cashew Tree in Brazil’s Rio Grande do Norte is considered the world’s largest cashew tree. It has a circumference of around 500 meters and covers an area of 8,400 square meters.

Legend has it that the Pirangi Cashew Tree was planted in 1888 by a local fisherman who later died at the age of 93 under the shade of the humongous tree. However, experts believe that, based on its growth characteristics, “the tree is estimated to be more than a thousand years old”. One thing is for sure, though, this is no ordinary cashew tree. It is the size of 70 normally sized cashew trees and actually has to be seen from a special lookout point high above to be truly appreciated. It produces over 60,000 cashew fruits per year and also attracts hundreds of thousands of tourists from all over Brazil.

But just how did the world’s largest cashew tree get so big? Well, apparently, it has to do with a genetic anomaly that causes its branches to grow sideways rather than upwards. Weight and gravity cause the branches to bend toward the ground, and as they make contact with the soil, new roots begin to form and the tree continues to expand. Nowadays, it is almost impossible to distinguish the initial trunk from the rest of the tree.

Located on Pirangi do Norte beach, in Rio Grande do Norte, the Pirangi Cashew Tree became one of the main local tourist attractions after the tree was recognized by Guinness Records as the world’s largest cashew tree, covering an area of almost 8,500 square meters.

According to the Institute of Sustainable Development and Environment, which manages the famous Pirangi Cashew Tree, around 300,000 tourists visit the tree every year.

Interestingly, the Pirangi Cashew Tree has some home soil competition for the title of the world’s largest cashew tree. According to the state secretary of Tourism of Piauí, a cashew tree on the coast of Piauí is actually the world’s largest, covering an area of around 8,800 meters. However, that claim has yet to be officially verified by Guinness.

 

Oddity Central

Nigerian corporates and SMEs have decried the non-settlement of Foreign Exchange (FX) forwards by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).

The transactions which occurred between 2022 and 2023 are yet to be settled on maturity.

Analysts and stakeholders have expressed fears that the delay could have grave implications for the economy.

Reports indicate that affected companies could lose about N2.4 trillion which will impact Company Income Tax (CIT) for the next two to three years and also threaten federal government’s income.

The development could also exact a huge toll on the fragile FX market which is being rebuilt by the apex bank as it would come under severe pressure, and potentially drive exchange rates to about N3,000/$.

In addition, these losses could also trigger bank losses as confirmation lines used may not be serviced by the SMEs and corporates as well as put over one million jobs at risk.

Analysts further expressed concerns that the unsettled forwards could potentially erode investor confidence in a struggling economy with all the attendant implications. They were unanimous that the apex bank needed to act quickly to resolve the issues.

Earlier in March, the CBN announced that all valid FX backlogs owed to various sectors of the economy had been settled, fulfilling a key pledge of the CBN Governor, Olayemi Cardoso, to process an inherited backlog of $7 billion in outstanding liabilities.

In a recent interview with Arise Television, Cardoso revealed that about $2.4 billion out of the acclaimed $7 billion outstanding foreign exchange liabilities of the federal government were not valid for settlement.

He said while the bank had settled verified FX requests which amounted to $2.3 billion at the time, the total outstanding FX obligations remained at $2.2 billion.

The central bank governor further indicated that part of the headline $7 billion outstanding FX claims were not valid, citing the outcome of a forensic audit by Deloitte Management Consultant which the apex bank commissioned.

He maintained that the CBN would not pay for FX requests that are not validly constituted, adding that the bank had written to authorised dealers to explain the disparities identified.

Furthermore, Cardoso said the bank had contracted the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to investigate suspicious transactions to prosecute individuals and entities with fraudulent entries.

However, the affected companies had expressed worry that the outcome of the investigation was taking forever as most of them have used bank confirmed lines to open Letters of Credit (LCs), paid import duties, and received the goods, while suppliers were mostly settled by their banks’ correspondent banks.

“While CBN says EFCC is investigating, the corporates are bleeding and under intense pressure from their banks and their suppliers,” the stakeholders said.

They called on the central bank to settle the forwards and get EFCC to prosecute companies involved in any act of round-tripping or abuse in the utilisation of the liquidity.

They also warned that the continued delay in settling the outstanding liabilities of companies has far-reaching implications for the companies and the economy in general.

Director General, Nigerian Employers’ Consultative Association (NECA), Adewale-Smatt Oyerinde, explained that forward transaction is an agreement whereby a company credits the CBN through its bank for future supply of FX usually within 90 days.

He expressed dismay that data provided by JP Morgan & Co., had estimated unsettled liabilities at $6.8 billion in 2022, which certainly would be higher afterwards.

Oyerinde, said the development had already truncated the smooth running of production plans and capacity utilisation in industries, particularly that of SMEs that do not have the financial clout to explore other liquidity sources.

He further lamented that supply of raw-materials and production cycle had been broken due to the unsettled indebtedness by the central bank, which had ultimately led to low level of business activities, loss of revenues and low profit margins for corporate firms, including the SMEs.

He therefore urged the CBN to prioritise the settlement of outstanding forwards so that the companies involved could move forward and get on with their businesses.

He maintained that the involvement of EFCC in the matter was unnecessary.

Oyerinde said: “The CBN had informed the public that some of the FX Forward claims are not genuine and that the Economic Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) is investigating the issues.

“But the FX Forward is a transaction that involves the companies, their banks and the CBN with definite documentations and approvals as such. Therefore, due diligence by the CBN should be sufficient in determining the genuine cases.”

He said the CBN should engage “relevant banks on the claimed outstanding forwards to resolve unsettled cases rather than involving EFCC that is not part of the initial agreement”.

 

The Cable