The Supreme Court has struck out an application for review of the judgement which sacked David Lyon and Biobarakuma Degi-Eremienyo as winners of the governorship election held last November in Bayelsa State.
According to the seven-man panel of the court led by Justice Sylvester Ngwuta on Wednesday, the applications filed by the APC and Mr Lyon, were “vexatious, frivolous, and constituted a gross abuse of court process.”
Justice Amina Augie, who read the judgement, said the application lacks merit, and that the court’s decisions were final.
Every citadel of learning derives its claim to greatness from the reputation and accomplishments of its students and staff: the great academics and scholars to whom has been given the enormous task of instructing, guiding and inspiring the minds and talents that are destined to define the future. Your task is possibly the noblest anyone could ask for, yet often without great reward or even gratitude. But we thank you today for your great and priceless service to this and coming generations.
It is most pleasing to learn that the proverbial seed planted less than a decade ago, the Federal University, Dutse, has not only produced four sets of graduates already and tomorrow by the grace of God, a fifth set, but has also grown so bounteously to now have over 7,000 students spread across 6 faculties, including a College of Medicine and Health Sciences.
Yours is the first among the set of Universities set up by the Federal Government in 2011 to establish a College of Medicine and Health Sciences. Congratulations! Equally remarkable are reports of the great exploits being recorded by the University in many fields that amply validate the promise of the fruitful synergy between town and gown.
Let me cite just two such examples, in recognition of your relevant and innovative research efforts. First is the Federal Ministry of Agriculture selected your University to host the Agribusiness Incubation Centres.
The second has been your response to the security challenges besetting our nation today, you elected to express a shared commitment to the national search for solution by being the first among your peers to mount a programme on Criminology and Security Studies, thereby demonstrating your relevance and proving that the university should not just be an incubator of ideas, but also a solution provider.
Congratulations on these sterling achievements. And to the students of this university, and especially the graduating class of 2019, let me just say congratulations and well done! The future is certainly very bright indeed.
Madam Vice Chancellor, my lecture titled “Facing the New Decade”, a topic you graciously allowed me to choose, is really directed at the young men and women here in this arena today. I count myself among those young men and women and I hope that those of us who are here also see ourselves as young men and women.
The reason why this is addressed to the young people here is first, the young men and women, students of this University, are the future of our country. Secondly, that future has already arrived at our doorsteps, perhaps much faster than we expected. For the next few minutes permit me to take you on a brief journey into this imminent future, how it will affect us all and my humble suggestions about what you may need to do to make the best of it.
Let me begin by making a few general statements and perhaps some predictions. First is that the next few decades will present tremendous opportunities for getting well-paying jobs and lucrative entrepreneurship opportunities all over the world. Anyone will be able to access many of those jobs without even having to move from your own country, in some cases even without leaving your home.
There will be a truly international market place of ideas, talents and opportunities, but to access that market place, you need to become, in many senses, a global citizen by your own effort. Self-education and self-development will be important.
Second, technology in its various iterations and applications will be crucial in all and every aspect of human existence. The greater our access to technology, our adaptation and application of the ideas we have, the more successful we are likely to be.
The third is that we are today in the most advanced moment in human history, and on a daily basis, knowledge and its applications grow in leaps and bounds. For the first time in human history, anyone of us can be heard or seen all over the world by live-streaming without owning our own satellite TV station. We can share ideas with millions of people in seconds on Facebook or Instagram.
It was Arthur Clarke, the British Science Fiction writer, who said that “any sufficiently advanced technology is not different anymore from magic.” If you follow some of the trends in technology over the past years in particular, much of his statement appears true, as the coming years look set to be one of the most spectacular magic shows ever.
Last year, DeepMind, which is a learning outfit, announced that one of its healthcare algorithms could detect over 50 eye diseases as accurately as a trained doctor. Only recently, we witnessed the trial run of an Artificial Intelligence, AI, a newsreader on the Chinese Xinhua News station, and the unveiling of a digital assistant that can mimic the voice of humans with uncanny likeness. It is called ‘Google Duplex’. There are provinces in China that are now trying out AI teachers in remote villages where graduates and young people are not likely to stay. In 2018, there was a world-first recording of an Artificial Intelligence system engaged in a two-way debate with a human opponent!
The fourth and perhaps the most important point I wish to make today is that the abundance of natural resources such as we have in Nigeria, oil and several minerals, even talents, mean little or nothing unless we are able to creatively and by using innovation and adding value, add to whatever it is that we have in terms of talent or resources.
Let me put it differently, the difference between poverty and wealth or mediocrity and high achievement is creativity, or the capacity and willingness to add value. This is the reason why Apple, manufacturers of the iPhone and iPad, make more money in four months than Nigeria earns from oil in one year.
Apple sells the product of the ingenuity of the human mind, ideas translated to products, services and solutions that millions are prepared to pay for. And because the capacity of the human mind for creativity, generation of ideas and for innovation and invention is limitless, the source of wealth of innovative companies and individuals is literally limitless. On the other hand, oil drilling and selling, and other extractive activities without adding value by refining and developing a whole petrochemical ecosystem cannot yield optimal profit or create the jobs and wealth.
Similarly, the mere fact that you have large tracts of arable land for agriculture does not mean you will succeed in agriculture or become wealthy, or even as a nation, feed yourself. Anybody can plant a seed and expect a harvest, but the reason why most farmers, our subsistent farmers, remain relatively poor is that they add no value to what they produce by processing, packaging or making other products out of the raw harvest.
And also, because many times they do not have access to cutting-edge innovations and inventions in farm inputs and farming techniques. Those who can add value to the farmers’ harvest become wealthier than the farmer. So the growers of the raw materials are the weakest in the value chain and the poorest.
For example, the man who makes chocolates from cocoa is bound to be richer than the cocoa farmer. He has added value to the raw cocoa by processing and designing and packing the chocolates in appealing wrappers. By adding value, he will create more jobs and more wealth. So, while we will always need the traditional professionals, doctors, lawyers, accountants and bankers, those adding value to their services will make more money than they can. So those developing Artificial Intelligence for giving legal advice or medical diagnoses, or accounting or banking will be more successful than the professionals themselves.
So, the future of banking and financial services doesn’t belong to banks or bankers as we know them today, it may well belong to the FinTechs and other technology-enabled solutions. For example, today we have KiaKia, which uses Artificial Intelligence and algorithms, to process loan requests in minutes and grant credit without the hassles of regular banks. Besides, there is Kuda Bank, for example, a bank without a single physical branch with all its features built into a mobile application. There is also Eyowo, another example of a payment services company which is designed for identifying, enumerating and paying to and collecting repayments from 2.2 million TraderMoni and MarketMoni beneficiaries.
They have revolutionized financial inclusion, making and receiving payments from the farthest parts of Nigeria. There is also another company called Paystack, whose founders are just over (the age of) 30. They have developed applications that make it easier to make payments across the world. There is also InvestBamboo, for example, which was started by two 26-year-olds, and offers new ways for you to save money and invest in stocks, all from a single application.
Others have developed technologies that make it possible for you to invest in a farm without ever seeing the farm. Two Nigerian companies again, ThriveAgric and Farmcrowdy, set up by young Nigerians under the age of 35, are great examples of the service providers that help small-scale farmers scale-up, and access valuable training; and all of these done through crowdfunding.
In the world of medicine and healthcare, there is LifeBank, owned by a young Nigerian lady. This is a health tech startup, which also uses drone technology to facilitate blood delivery to various health centres. We could highlight another called 54gene, a firm that is harnessing genomic data from African DNA to revolutionize the drug industry, and change the future of medicine. Even in the usually conservative legal profession, which I am the chairman, entrepreneurs are disrupting old trends. There is a digital legal research company called Law Pavilion, the company’s digital tools help lawyers to do legal research quickly and efficiently and even answer legal questions. Judges and lawyers subscribe to it and the usage is a very lucrative value addition to legal practice. Yet the founder and CEO of the company is not even a lawyer.
So today there are opportunities for entrepreneurs to build their businesses around traditional professions without being professionals themselves. The most widely read online publications are neither owned nor run by trained journalists. Some of us are familiar with the news aggregation platform called Nairaland which was started by two Obafemi Awolowo University students while still in school. Today it is one of the most successful online platforms we have. Even many of the most successful online advertising or PR companies have no formal training in these disciplines, most are self-thought. My nephew, who is a lawyer, is establishing an organic farm and poultry after taking lessons online. His only knowledge is derived from taking a few classes from somebody in Kano State offering online training for people interested in poultry farming.
But let me direct your minds to the new areas for job opportunities being created today. Data Science is one big area. Currently, we leave vast amounts of personal data online and in the near future, companies will need data scientists to go through it all and generate answers to business questions and make recommendations based on their findings. Many businesses already spend time and money going through people’s data so that they can sell their products. This is a new area of opportunities for jobs.
A big area today is Content Production – 3D/2D animation, Virtual Effects and Special Effects, as well as Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality. The use of animation in education, entertainment and media is growing in leaps and bounds. Those who can create content with animation are being and will be much sought after in the years to come.
According to a recent survey by the US Bureau of Labour Statistics, multimedia artists and animators are among the highest-paid within the US workforce. This has translated to more jobs for animators in emerging economies such as India, Vietnam and now Nigeria. The average pay of a 3D animator in Nigeria who has just started out after learning his trade could be in the region of N300,000 – N500,000 monthly. In our training of N-Power beneficiaries, we set aside a fair amount of money to train animators. We have carried out two sets of training; one in the North and one in the South of Nigeria. In total, we have trained over 25,000 young men and women in animation.
Also, remember that content is becoming more in demand with the streaming wars that have engulfed Netflix, Apple, Disney Plus, HBO and only recently, Airtel, the telecommunications provider, launched its own streaming service in Nigeria.
Then we have the whole range of Cybersecurity, another big area of opportunity. Today, there are new opportunities for cybersecurity specialists. How is that? With each technological advance comes the implied addition of more security risks just to store and keep the information secure. Therefore, cybersecurity will continue to be a growing sector. In this sense, each country will have its own specific regulations just as we have and many other international regulations, which will ensure that professionals with an advanced technological background capable of nullifying new threats posed to both technology and people, will be in demand all the time.
How about 3D Printing? 3D printing is becoming an area of great need. It will become even more relevant and fundamental in the future when compared with Artificial Intelligence and Robotics. Experts in 3D printing must possess creative skills with the ability to improve the profitability and applicability of models. Also, they must have computer skills and knowledge of 3D printing tools. The Federal Government established a humanitarian hub in Adamawa State about two years ago. In that hub, young Nigerians are making artificial limbs with 3D printers for people who lost their limbs in the conflict in the North East. This is a growth area which will continue to grow because 3D printing can be applied in different ways and for many purposes. It doesn’t take a year to learn how to use 3D printers.
The technical revolution from the last few decades have considerably changed the business and cultural world. Currently, we live in an “application economy” as a result of the amount of technology and mobility that surrounds us with our smartphone applications that we depend on for everything, from mobile banking to even health monitoring. As such, it is difficult to find a reason why one shouldn’t try to find a career related to technology, especially when we consider that it is already present in everything we do; from our professions in our companies to our personal lives as consumers. This means computer programming in one shape or form of the other, will continue to be an important skill for those seeking viable employment and a decent pay.
So today, the most successful businesses are those able to add value, even our culture can become a great wealth creator, but only if we add value. So just doing traditional dances is not enough, to put together 8 or 16 barefooted young men and women dancing when foreign guests are visiting cannot make enough money. Organizing dance dramas, on the other hand, can make money. When a whole drama outfit is created with our culture and our songs, where we are able to employ a director, scriptwriter, a composer and an arranger, then it is possible to make money from our cultural dances.
In our future, there is truly something for everyone. We should all take advantage of digital technology, especially social media and the various platforms on offer, to grow a customer base, gain traction and advance businesses. You can write a blog, develop a website to sell your products or even your ideas – whatever it is you know how to do best. People are running fully-fledged commercial businesses on Instagram without a single physical shop, an opportunity only made possible by the internet. We are an entrepreneurial people, a society of multitaskers who, thanks to the virtual economy, can make a real opportunity out of anything we are passionate about.
The question for many of our young people today is: what is your passion? How can you take the skills that you have, and add value to the world around you? The future is going to depend a great deal on what we do with our passions and how we can sell what we are passionate about to millions of people around the world.
I have seen videos tutorials on how to make the best soups or bake the best cakes, getting hundreds of thousands of views on Instagram and YouTube, and people advertising on them. YouTubers like Dimma Umeh are showing us how to do makeup, how to master that highlight and contour, and she told us in one video that she made her first million from YouTube! I have also seen videos of people teaching young women how to keep their husbands, very interesting videos!
Thanks to the social media age, whatever ideas and skills that you have can be leveraged for benefit. Your knowledge is of immense importance and you have to find creative ways to take advantage of it.
While it is easier than ever to sell your knowledge and skills, it has also become easier and cheaper for you to acquire them. “The Mobile Prof” in Lagos, for example, is teaching people how to code from their mobile phones, you don’t even need a laptop anymore!
The future is about self-education, self-development. It is important for us to invest a little in the incredible opportunities for online education. Years ago, it was impossible to do a specialized course in a leading international university without getting an admission, paying a lot of money and then travelling abroad. Today, you can sit in the comfort of your home and get an Ivy League education. Universities such as Harvard University and Dartmouth College, for example, offer full-time online courses on Data Science and Linux Programming through an online learning platform called EdX.
This means you can learn a whole new programming language in a year, for less than it would cost you to even get to America! There are new means of self-education and they are more accessible than you might have thought.
There is no question that an exciting future lies ahead. There are breakthroughs in radical technologies, capable of disrupting whole industries, and perhaps even our very conception of work itself. For higher institutions who are getting graduates ready for the world of work, for the graduates, and new and near graduates who are here today, what does the disruption of the workforce by emerging technologies signify for both livelihoods and employment?
Today, there are several important implications related to the fields of Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technologies that will change the way we work and our economies. So, we have seen for example that much of what is considered analytical work by lawyers, investment bankers, accountants, and other age-old professions will be performed better by machines in a fraction of the time that humans can. There is a need to train these professionals differently, and with these new opportunities and challenges in mind.
With the advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the Internet of Things, the world of work is in a state of flux, changing as never before, driven by inexorable forces that have an impact, not only on professional services but on manufacturing and trade, global supply chains and the digitalization of the global economy to name just a few. So, for example, the supervision work that managers do is changing rapidly and there may be no more need for it. A young lady who owns a clothing store in Abuja and Lagos, who lives in Abuja was showing me how she can remotely see all that is going on in her shop in Lagos on her laptop in real-time. And she can speak to all her employees from her laptop in real-time. In other words, she can supervise her store herself from anywhere in the world. So, the type of manager you will need going forward will be a different type.
Education today must be education for employability, the sort of education that makes us employable and relevant in the technologies and opportunities that present themselves today.
So, our university curricula must be versatile and dynamic. The focus must be on innovation, critical thinking, interdisciplinary thinking, design thinking, synergizing and collaboration with others across the world to solve problems.
The era of cramming the teacher’s notes and regurgitating for high grades is over. The graduate of the future is a problem solver, a thinker, an entrepreneur. Our educators, policymakers, schools, universities must now adapt their curricula, policies and projects to improve the skills that enable the graduate to nimbly and constantly respond to the ever-changing face of the economy and the workplace.
A student of humanities today equipped with the right skills and mindset will be a crucial part of the collaboration required to build an application that will redefine an aspect of business. In other words, a student of History, English, Languages, without any previous scientific training or knowledge, can with the right skills being taught today, with self-teaching, develop applications that will change business and industries, earn a lot of money. Applications are developed through collaborations; there are those that are scientists, there are those who come from the point of view of imagination and others from the point of view of design; all of them collaborating together.
Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, was more of an artist than a computer scientist. Yet he developed some of the most incredible applications that we have ever seen and made the kind of profit that makes people wonder whether they are not in the wrong profession.
A man or woman of ideas, no matter your degree, can become, in collaboration with others, the designers or owners of the next application that will make billions and create jobs for millions. This is the exciting future ahead of us, the opportunities are limitless.
I want to urge all of us, especially the young people who are here, to note that we are in the best times in the history of mankind. Let nobody tell you about the good old days. I said before, and I am quoting someone, I’m not so sure who he is, he said that “those who remind us of the good old days are probably suffering from memory loss.” We must not allow them to keep talking about the good old days. We are in the best times possible today. And the reason why these are the best times is that we are in the most technologically advanced human history.
This is the most technologically advanced moment. This is the most advanced moment in the history of mankind, we have never been advanced as we are today. It was Fareed Zakaria, the CNN journalist, who said and I’m quoting him that, “the smartphones that we have today, have more computing powers than all of the computing power that took men to the moon on the spacecraft, all of the computing powers that were in that spacecraft, we now have a hundred times of that computing power in the Smartphone that we carry about today.”
So, we are living in a time of sheer magic! We must take every advantage of it and I know the young people today, especially those in this Federal University Dutse, are rearing to go. The future is certainly bright!
VICE PRESIDENT, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo delivered the lecture at the 5th Convocation ceremony of the Federal University of Dutse, Jigawa State, on 21st February, 2020
The Bank of Industry has approved a $20 million technology fund for young innovators, even as the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has offered a N90 Billion soft loan facility for small scale agriculture enterprises.
A statement today, February 25, by a presidential spokesman, Laolu Akande said that the idea emanated from a meeting at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, which was presided over by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, to review progress on the Buhari administration’s efforts to support MSMEs. Akande recalled that the National MSMEs clinics driven by the Vice President has reached 26 States, with more Clinics to come in the series. According to him, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) is now poised more than ever to register more Nigerians venturing into the food and drug businesses.More details to follow.
Abel Ozioko, laywer to the convicted former national publicity secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Olisa Metuh has referred to the court verdict which sent his client to seven year jail for N400 Million Dasuki loot as a bad judgment.
Reacting to Justice Okon Abang ruling at the Federal High Court in Abuja today, February 25, Ozioko said that the case was new to the judge and as such, he carried out an experiment on Metuh. The lawyer who vowed to appeal the verdict, stressed that the case was new to the judge and as such, he carried out an experiment on Metuh. “The judge confessed that an issue like this is novel; in other words, he was carrying out an experiment.” Metuh’s counsel alleged that the ruling was a clear example of bad judgement and that this is why it must be contested. “I still have confidence in the law court and we are heading upstairs to the three wise men to know whether he is right or wrong.” The Court had earlier in the day, found Metuh guilty of money laundering, and found Metuh guilty on all the seven charges slammed against him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
The recently appointed Chief Judge of Boko Haram terrorists, Muhammad Shuwa, has been killed in a brutal air raid operation just as the splinter group, Islamic State in West Africa (ISWAP) camp is currently in disarray due to intense infighting.
Series of air raids and the merciless operations from the Nigerian ground troops have recorded massive eliminations of Boko Haram terrorists in the lake Chad region.
This is even as th Islamic State in West Africa (ISWAP) camp is in disarray as infighting has further factionalized the insurgents, especially with the appointment of Amir Abba-Gana as the new factional leader.
Sources confirmed that ISWAP appointed Abba-Gana as the new factional leader for the group following the elimination of Ba’a Idirisa, by the sect group on February 9, 2019. Ba’a Idirisa had replaced Abu-Mossad Albarnawee both biological children of Late Muhammad Yusuf a few months ago after infighting.
Intelligence sources noted that on the spot assessment conducted on the Jihadists group revealed that about 25 high profile Boko Haram Terrorist Commanders were killed within the past two months following intensified military offensives in the North-eastern Lake Chad.
Terrorists and inhabitants have continued to flee the lake chad general area to the neighbouring countries of Chad, Niger and Cameroon.
An intelligence source spoke about massive death from explosions of Undetonated Improvised explosive Devices(UIED’s), used to fortify the camps by the insurgents after aerial attacks.
The source said: “Two foreign terrorist sponsors were killed during the air raid and ground assault by the Nigerian troops in their camps. During the operations, most of the foreign commanders fled leaving behind few local commanders who move around Tumbun Kibiya, Tumbun Alura, Tumbun Kurna and Kayewa where their fighters relocated to after striking Sabon Tumbun and Tudun Wulgo recently.
“The Tumbus are now virtually left in the hands of local inhabitants who were forcefully recruited or abducted into the sect mostly from Mobbar, Abadan, Guzamalla, Kukawa and Marte Local Government Areas (LGAs) of Borno State, North-East Nigeria. “The local terrorists fighters were also said to have been forcibly recruited along with some few Budumas who stayed back to hold ground in anticipation for elevation in status which mostly can not operate some of the supporting weapons left by the feeing commanders.
“There is an anticipation of an imminent and massive protest in the ISWAP camps as some fighters started accusing the leadership of misleading them while on the other hand, mothers of the trained child soldiers are also calling on their children to lay down their arms and surrender.” source: PRNigeria.
The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has barred the 11 Distribution Companies (DisCos) from charging residential customers above an average of N1,800 monthly until they are metered.
In an Order 197 signed by the Chairman, Professor James Momoh and the Commissioner, Legal, Licencing & Compliance, Dafe Akpeneye, NERC said the new order repeals the 2012 estimated billing regulation effective since last Thursday. It said that electricity consumers have grown from five million in 2012 to over 10 million by December 2019, adding that about 52 percent of them are not metered and are placed on estimated billing by the DisCos. It said that the Meter Assets Provider (MAP) was initiated to increase the metering of consumers within three years. “The Estimated Billing Methodology Regulation is hereby repealed and shall cease to have effect as a basis for computing the consumption of unmetered customers in NESI.” NERC said that vall unmetered residential and commercial customers shall not be invoiced for the consumption of energy if they are not metered by April. It said that R2 customers cannot be billed for more than the worth of 78 kilowatt hour (kwh) of energy monthly which is about N1,800. Residents that consume less than 50kwh will be billed at N4 per kwh and a maximum of N200 monthly. All other customers on higher tariff classes must be metered by DisCos by 30 April 2020, failing which these customers are not liable to pay any estimated bill issued by the DisCo. “Any customer that rejects the installation of a meter on their premises by a DisCo shall not be entitled to supply and must be disconnected.” Source: Dailytrust.
Former political Allie of President Muhammadu Buhari, Alhaji Buba Galadima has lost his business premises and assets of Gecko Nigeria Limited as well as his resident to Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) over an alleged N900 million indebtedness.
In a statement in Abuja today, February 25, AMCO said the Federal High Court in Abuja issued an order for it to take over Gladima’s properties, including his private residence and company, over alleged N900 million indebtedness. The statement said that the order followed a ruling in suit No. FHC/ABJ/CS/1136/2019 against Bedko Nigeria Limited and Galadima. The spokesperson of AMCON, Jude Nwauzor, explained that the loan was sourced from Unity Bank Plc in 2011 during the first phase of Eligible Bank Assets acquisition. “Since then, AMCON has offered the obligor a good measure of olive branches and explored all avenues to resolve the matter amicably. But the obligor, and his company, Bedko Nigeria Limited, have remained recalcitrant and unwilling to repay the huge debt to the Corporation.” AMCON confirmed that the order was granted by Justice A.I. Chikere, empowering it to take over some properties belonging to the politician. It listed the properties to include House No. 15, Addis Ababa Crescent, Wuse Zone 4, Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja and House No. 4, Bangui Street, Wuse 2 also in the high-brow area of Abuja. It added that the enforcement of the order on the properties of Bedko Nigeria Limited and Galadima is one of the many it would be undertaking this year since receiving additional powers from the president late last year. An Inter-agency Committee on the recovery of AMCON debts was constituted by the President Buhari last year following the signing into law of the 2019 Amended AMCON Act. The amendment gave AMCON additional powers to go after all obligors of the corporation no matter how highly placed in society. Nwauzor said that AMCON would take all necessary actions, including asset take-over, liquidation, winding-up and garnishee proceedings against Bedko Nigeria Limited and its directors in line with the court judgment and relevant sections of the AMCON Act as amended. Meanwhile, Galadima has denied knowledge of the allegations of indebtedness against him and his company. Source: PREMIUM TIMES.
People trooped out in their thousands today, February 25 in Akure, capital of Ondo State to cheer President Muhammadu Buhari to the state for a day visit to commission some projects executed by Governor Akeredolu.
The Federal High Court in Abuja has found former spokesman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Olisah Metuh and his firm, Destra Investments Limited, guilty of first of the seven counts of fraud and money laundering charges. Justice Okon Abang ruled today, February 25, that former National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki, unlawfully transferred the sum of N400 million to the defendants in November 2014. Justice Abang said that the defendants should have known that it was an illegal transaction as they had no contract with the NSA’s office. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) instituted the charges against them. Details later…
Hosni Mubarak, Egypt’s President for almost 30 years (1981-2011) who stepped down after a popular revolution in 2011, has died. He was 91.
State television reported today, February 25 that he died weeks after undergoing surgery.
Mubarak served as Egypt’s fourth president starting in 1981 until his ouster in what became known as the Arab Spring revolution. He was jailed for years after the uprising, but was freed in 2017 after being acquitted of most charges
He was born in a rural village in the Nile Delta in 1928.
Mubarak left behind a complicated legacy. His rule was partly characterised by corruption, police brutality, political repression, and entrenched economic problems.
He joined the Egyptian air force in 1949, graduating as a pilot the following year. He rose through the ranks to become the commander-in-chief of the Egyptian air force in 1972.
Mubarak became a national hero the following year with reports that the Egyptian air force dealt a substantial blow to Israeli forces in Sinai during the Yom Kippur War.
Hosni Mubarak, who became Egypt’s longest-serving ruler in more than 150 years before being forced from office by a popular uprising, has died. He was 91.
His death was announced Tuesday by state TV. No cause was mentioned, although his family recently said he’d been hospitalized.
Dubbed the “pharaoh” by his detractors, Mubarak had ruled for 30 years and was widely accepted to be preparing his younger son Gamal as successor when the Arab Spring surged into Cairo in January 2011. After 18 days of mass protests, he was gone, his image of an all-powerful ruler shredded.
Mubarak attended his trial for the killing of more than 850 protesters by security forces in the final days of his regime in a hospital bed and faced other serious charges, but was only found guilty of fraud and avoided serving additional time in jail. In photographs, a man famously known for jet-black dyed hair and swagger was seen seated, tired and graying.
Military Career
Mohammed Hosni Said Mubarak was born on May 4, 1928, in Kafr El Meselha in the Nile Delta. Opting for a military career when Egypt was still a monarchy, he entered the Air Force Academy in 1950. Four years later, King Farouk was overthrown in a coup led by Gamal Abdel Nasser.
In 1964, Mubarak was appointed head of the Egyptian military delegation to the Soviet Union, the sole supplier of weapons to Nasser’s regime. From 1967 to 1972, he served as air force chief of staff, became deputy minister for military affairs and was promoted to air marshal after the 1973 Arab-Israel war.
After Nasser’s death, Egypt was led by President Anwar Sadat, who appointed Mubarak as vice president in April 1975, effectively designating him as heir apparent. That succession came earlier than expected, with Sadat gunned down by Muslim fundamentalists on Oct. 6, 1981, during an annual parade marking the 1973 war anniversary. Sadat was killed while Mubarak, seated next to him, escaped with a hand wound.
Mubarak cracked down on violent groups and went on to govern in a low-key, stolid style that contrasted with the glitter of the Sadat years.
“Having Sadat as president was like being married to Miss World,” Layla Takla, an opposition member of parliament, said at the time. “It was great for a while, but then you needed someone to do the cooking and look after the children.”
Suppressed Rivals
While Mubarak provided some room for dissent — within specific red lines that included no criticism of his family — he failed to follow through on pledges to open the country’s political system. Suppression of a wide array of perceived rivals, under an emergency law promulgated in 1981, marked his years in power and helped fuel the discontent that led to his downfall.
In the late 1980s, the country was on the verge of bankruptcy when it stopped paying its foreign debts. It was only when Mubarak agreed to send forces as part of the U.S.-led coalition to expel Iraqi troops from Kuwait in 1990 that creditors agreed to write off debts.
In 2004, Mubarak appointed a government that revived the sale of state assets. By 2009, it attracted more than $40 billion of foreign direct investment in industries such as oil and gas, and telecommunications. Emirates Telecom Corp. and Italian bank Intesa Sanpaolo SpA were drawn to the country.
Out of Touch
But critics saw him as out of touch with the lives of most Egyptians — embracing the elite while the poor were left to grapple with an inflation rate that reached more than 20% in 2008. His supporters blamed explosive population growth and the economic mismanagement of past administrations for the ills of a nation that grew to 85 million people by the time of Mubarak’s ouster.
Egypt’s per-capita gross domestic product in 2009 was $2,160, almost identical to $2,155 a decade earlier, according to International Monetary Fund data.
Mubarak never backtracked on the policy of diplomatic rapprochement with Israel, though his only visit to the Jewish state was for the funeral of assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995. He managed to restore links with fellow Arab rulers who were enraged by Sadat’s decision to sign a peace treaty with Israel.
“There isn’t among us anyone who wants to take the region back to the destruction of war or to the phase of no war and no peace,” he told Arab leaders in 1996. “We are sincerely determined to struggle for peace until the end.”
Key Alliance
He also retained Egypt’s alliance with the U.S., which began with Sadat’s noisy break with the Soviet Union. Egypt receives about $1.3 billion a year in U.S. military aid.
Mubarak presided over several years in which domestic Islamic extremism flared in Egypt. In 1997, violence reached a zenith when 58 foreign tourists in Luxor were gunned down. The massacre, which harmed Egypt’s tourism industry, turned many Egyptians firmly against religious violence.
The Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist movement that had renounced violence in the 1970s, gained in popularity amid dissatisfaction over corruption and economic inequality.
His experiences at home prompted warnings to his allies. In September 2001, he chided the West for failing to take terrorism seriously, warning that serious events were imminent. A few days later, on Sept. 11, al-Qaeda struck the U.S.
‘Gates of Hell’
Mubarak opposed the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, warning that “the gates of hell” would be opened in the Middle East. He argued that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict should be tackled as the first step to regional peace.
He tried to end the rivalry between Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas, an Islamic movement that took over the Gaza Strip in 2007 but faced criticism at home and in several Arab countries for keeping Gaza’s border largely closed as Israel sealed its frontier with the coastal enclave.
It was his ever-tighter grip on domestic freedoms that proved his undoing.
In 2005, Mubarak had opened presidential elections to multiple candidates. Yet the regulations were so restrictive that no strong challengers emerged; the runner-up, lawyer Ayman Nour, won only 7% of the vote to Mubarak’s 88%. After the election, Nour was jailed for four years on fraud charges that human-rights groups say were trumped up.
Muslim Brotherhood
In elections later that year, the Muslim Brotherhood won 88 seats in the 454-member parliament — a surprise result that prompted a crackdown on Islamic activists and on anti-Mubarak secular politicians, judges, newspaper editors, bloggers and street demonstrators. Hundreds of Brotherhood activists were rounded up and some put on trial in closed-door military courts.
His fall came at the hands of an unexpected coalition of opposition parties, the Brotherhood and, most poignantly, a youth movement whose Facebook and Twitter-driven demonstrations mobilized the streets.
Mubarak never officially designated anyone as his likely successor, only appointing intelligence chief Omar Suleiman as vice president in January 2011 in a bid to diffuse mounting protests. The rise of his son, Gamal, up the ranks of the ruling National Democratic Party led Egyptians to conjecture that he’d succeed his father.
Instead that job went, briefly, to Islamist President Mohamed Mursi and then after a 2013 military-backed revolt to former army chief Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, who has dragged Egypt back to the brand of autocracy mastered by Mubarak.
Mubarak is survived by his wife, Suzanne Thabet, and sons Gamal and Alaa.
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The Bank of Industry has approved a $20 million technology fund for young innovators, even as the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has offered a N90 Billion soft loan facility for small scale agriculture enterprises.
The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) has barred the 11 Distribution Companies (DisCos) from charging residential customers above an average of N1,800 monthly until they are metered.
Former political Allie of President Muhammadu Buhari, Alhaji Buba Galadima has lost his business premises and assets of Gecko Nigeria Limited as well as his resident to Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) over an alleged N900 million indebtedness.
Facing The New Decade – A Letter To Young Nigerians, By Prof Yemi Osinbajo
Every citadel of learning derives its claim to greatness from the reputation and accomplishments of its students and staff: the great academics and scholars to whom has been given the enormous task of instructing, guiding and inspiring the minds and talents that are destined to define the future. Your task is possibly the noblest anyone could ask for, yet often without great reward or even gratitude. But we thank you today for your great and priceless service to this and coming generations.
It is most pleasing to learn that the proverbial seed planted less than a decade ago, the Federal University, Dutse, has not only produced four sets of graduates already and tomorrow by the grace of God, a fifth set, but has also grown so bounteously to now have over 7,000 students spread across 6 faculties, including a College of Medicine and Health Sciences.
Yours is the first among the set of Universities set up by the Federal Government in 2011 to establish a College of Medicine and Health Sciences. Congratulations! Equally remarkable are reports of the great exploits being recorded by the University in many fields that amply validate the promise of the fruitful synergy between town and gown.
Let me cite just two such examples, in recognition of your relevant and innovative research efforts. First is the Federal Ministry of Agriculture selected your University to host the Agribusiness Incubation Centres.
The second has been your response to the security challenges besetting our nation today, you elected to express a shared commitment to the national search for solution by being the first among your peers to mount a programme on Criminology and Security Studies, thereby demonstrating your relevance and proving that the university should not just be an incubator of ideas, but also a solution provider.
Congratulations on these sterling achievements. And to the students of this university, and especially the graduating class of 2019, let me just say congratulations and well done! The future is certainly very bright indeed.
Madam Vice Chancellor, my lecture titled “Facing the New Decade”, a topic you graciously allowed me to choose, is really directed at the young men and women here in this arena today. I count myself among those young men and women and I hope that those of us who are here also see ourselves as young men and women.
The reason why this is addressed to the young people here is first, the young men and women, students of this University, are the future of our country. Secondly, that future has already arrived at our doorsteps, perhaps much faster than we expected. For the next few minutes permit me to take you on a brief journey into this imminent future, how it will affect us all and my humble suggestions about what you may need to do to make the best of it.
Let me begin by making a few general statements and perhaps some predictions. First is that the next few decades will present tremendous opportunities for getting well-paying jobs and lucrative entrepreneurship opportunities all over the world. Anyone will be able to access many of those jobs without even having to move from your own country, in some cases even without leaving your home.
There will be a truly international market place of ideas, talents and opportunities, but to access that market place, you need to become, in many senses, a global citizen by your own effort. Self-education and self-development will be important.
Second, technology in its various iterations and applications will be crucial in all and every aspect of human existence. The greater our access to technology, our adaptation and application of the ideas we have, the more successful we are likely to be.
The third is that we are today in the most advanced moment in human history, and on a daily basis, knowledge and its applications grow in leaps and bounds. For the first time in human history, anyone of us can be heard or seen all over the world by live-streaming without owning our own satellite TV station. We can share ideas with millions of people in seconds on Facebook or Instagram.
It was Arthur Clarke, the British Science Fiction writer, who said that “any sufficiently advanced technology is not different anymore from magic.” If you follow some of the trends in technology over the past years in particular, much of his statement appears true, as the coming years look set to be one of the most spectacular magic shows ever.
Last year, DeepMind, which is a learning outfit, announced that one of its healthcare algorithms could detect over 50 eye diseases as accurately as a trained doctor. Only recently, we witnessed the trial run of an Artificial Intelligence, AI, a newsreader on the Chinese Xinhua News station, and the unveiling of a digital assistant that can mimic the voice of humans with uncanny likeness. It is called ‘Google Duplex’. There are provinces in China that are now trying out AI teachers in remote villages where graduates and young people are not likely to stay. In 2018, there was a world-first recording of an Artificial Intelligence system engaged in a two-way debate with a human opponent!
The fourth and perhaps the most important point I wish to make today is that the abundance of natural resources such as we have in Nigeria, oil and several minerals, even talents, mean little or nothing unless we are able to creatively and by using innovation and adding value, add to whatever it is that we have in terms of talent or resources.
Let me put it differently, the difference between poverty and wealth or mediocrity and high achievement is creativity, or the capacity and willingness to add value. This is the reason why Apple, manufacturers of the iPhone and iPad, make more money in four months than Nigeria earns from oil in one year.
Apple sells the product of the ingenuity of the human mind, ideas translated to products, services and solutions that millions are prepared to pay for. And because the capacity of the human mind for creativity, generation of ideas and for innovation and invention is limitless, the source of wealth of innovative companies and individuals is literally limitless. On the other hand, oil drilling and selling, and other extractive activities without adding value by refining and developing a whole petrochemical ecosystem cannot yield optimal profit or create the jobs and wealth.
Similarly, the mere fact that you have large tracts of arable land for agriculture does not mean you will succeed in agriculture or become wealthy, or even as a nation, feed yourself. Anybody can plant a seed and expect a harvest, but the reason why most farmers, our subsistent farmers, remain relatively poor is that they add no value to what they produce by processing, packaging or making other products out of the raw harvest.
And also, because many times they do not have access to cutting-edge innovations and inventions in farm inputs and farming techniques. Those who can add value to the farmers’ harvest become wealthier than the farmer. So the growers of the raw materials are the weakest in the value chain and the poorest.
For example, the man who makes chocolates from cocoa is bound to be richer than the cocoa farmer. He has added value to the raw cocoa by processing and designing and packing the chocolates in appealing wrappers. By adding value, he will create more jobs and more wealth. So, while we will always need the traditional professionals, doctors, lawyers, accountants and bankers, those adding value to their services will make more money than they can. So those developing Artificial Intelligence for giving legal advice or medical diagnoses, or accounting or banking will be more successful than the professionals themselves.
So, the future of banking and financial services doesn’t belong to banks or bankers as we know them today, it may well belong to the FinTechs and other technology-enabled solutions. For example, today we have KiaKia, which uses Artificial Intelligence and algorithms, to process loan requests in minutes and grant credit without the hassles of regular banks. Besides, there is Kuda Bank, for example, a bank without a single physical branch with all its features built into a mobile application. There is also Eyowo, another example of a payment services company which is designed for identifying, enumerating and paying to and collecting repayments from 2.2 million TraderMoni and MarketMoni beneficiaries.
They have revolutionized financial inclusion, making and receiving payments from the farthest parts of Nigeria. There is also another company called Paystack, whose founders are just over (the age of) 30. They have developed applications that make it easier to make payments across the world. There is also InvestBamboo, for example, which was started by two 26-year-olds, and offers new ways for you to save money and invest in stocks, all from a single application.
Others have developed technologies that make it possible for you to invest in a farm without ever seeing the farm. Two Nigerian companies again, ThriveAgric and Farmcrowdy, set up by young Nigerians under the age of 35, are great examples of the service providers that help small-scale farmers scale-up, and access valuable training; and all of these done through crowdfunding.
In the world of medicine and healthcare, there is LifeBank, owned by a young Nigerian lady. This is a health tech startup, which also uses drone technology to facilitate blood delivery to various health centres. We could highlight another called 54gene, a firm that is harnessing genomic data from African DNA to revolutionize the drug industry, and change the future of medicine. Even in the usually conservative legal profession, which I am the chairman, entrepreneurs are disrupting old trends. There is a digital legal research company called Law Pavilion, the company’s digital tools help lawyers to do legal research quickly and efficiently and even answer legal questions. Judges and lawyers subscribe to it and the usage is a very lucrative value addition to legal practice. Yet the founder and CEO of the company is not even a lawyer.
So today there are opportunities for entrepreneurs to build their businesses around traditional professions without being professionals themselves. The most widely read online publications are neither owned nor run by trained journalists. Some of us are familiar with the news aggregation platform called Nairaland which was started by two Obafemi Awolowo University students while still in school. Today it is one of the most successful online platforms we have. Even many of the most successful online advertising or PR companies have no formal training in these disciplines, most are self-thought. My nephew, who is a lawyer, is establishing an organic farm and poultry after taking lessons online. His only knowledge is derived from taking a few classes from somebody in Kano State offering online training for people interested in poultry farming.
But let me direct your minds to the new areas for job opportunities being created today. Data Science is one big area. Currently, we leave vast amounts of personal data online and in the near future, companies will need data scientists to go through it all and generate answers to business questions and make recommendations based on their findings. Many businesses already spend time and money going through people’s data so that they can sell their products. This is a new area of opportunities for jobs.
A big area today is Content Production – 3D/2D animation, Virtual Effects and Special Effects, as well as Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality. The use of animation in education, entertainment and media is growing in leaps and bounds. Those who can create content with animation are being and will be much sought after in the years to come.
According to a recent survey by the US Bureau of Labour Statistics, multimedia artists and animators are among the highest-paid within the US workforce. This has translated to more jobs for animators in emerging economies such as India, Vietnam and now Nigeria. The average pay of a 3D animator in Nigeria who has just started out after learning his trade could be in the region of N300,000 – N500,000 monthly. In our training of N-Power beneficiaries, we set aside a fair amount of money to train animators. We have carried out two sets of training; one in the North and one in the South of Nigeria. In total, we have trained over 25,000 young men and women in animation.
Also, remember that content is becoming more in demand with the streaming wars that have engulfed Netflix, Apple, Disney Plus, HBO and only recently, Airtel, the telecommunications provider, launched its own streaming service in Nigeria.
Then we have the whole range of Cybersecurity, another big area of opportunity. Today, there are new opportunities for cybersecurity specialists. How is that? With each technological advance comes the implied addition of more security risks just to store and keep the information secure. Therefore, cybersecurity will continue to be a growing sector. In this sense, each country will have its own specific regulations just as we have and many other international regulations, which will ensure that professionals with an advanced technological background capable of nullifying new threats posed to both technology and people, will be in demand all the time.
How about 3D Printing? 3D printing is becoming an area of great need. It will become even more relevant and fundamental in the future when compared with Artificial Intelligence and Robotics. Experts in 3D printing must possess creative skills with the ability to improve the profitability and applicability of models. Also, they must have computer skills and knowledge of 3D printing tools. The Federal Government established a humanitarian hub in Adamawa State about two years ago. In that hub, young Nigerians are making artificial limbs with 3D printers for people who lost their limbs in the conflict in the North East. This is a growth area which will continue to grow because 3D printing can be applied in different ways and for many purposes. It doesn’t take a year to learn how to use 3D printers.
The technical revolution from the last few decades have considerably changed the business and cultural world. Currently, we live in an “application economy” as a result of the amount of technology and mobility that surrounds us with our smartphone applications that we depend on for everything, from mobile banking to even health monitoring. As such, it is difficult to find a reason why one shouldn’t try to find a career related to technology, especially when we consider that it is already present in everything we do; from our professions in our companies to our personal lives as consumers. This means computer programming in one shape or form of the other, will continue to be an important skill for those seeking viable employment and a decent pay.
So today, the most successful businesses are those able to add value, even our culture can become a great wealth creator, but only if we add value. So just doing traditional dances is not enough, to put together 8 or 16 barefooted young men and women dancing when foreign guests are visiting cannot make enough money. Organizing dance dramas, on the other hand, can make money. When a whole drama outfit is created with our culture and our songs, where we are able to employ a director, scriptwriter, a composer and an arranger, then it is possible to make money from our cultural dances.
In our future, there is truly something for everyone. We should all take advantage of digital technology, especially social media and the various platforms on offer, to grow a customer base, gain traction and advance businesses. You can write a blog, develop a website to sell your products or even your ideas – whatever it is you know how to do best. People are running fully-fledged commercial businesses on Instagram without a single physical shop, an opportunity only made possible by the internet. We are an entrepreneurial people, a society of multitaskers who, thanks to the virtual economy, can make a real opportunity out of anything we are passionate about.
The question for many of our young people today is: what is your passion? How can you take the skills that you have, and add value to the world around you? The future is going to depend a great deal on what we do with our passions and how we can sell what we are passionate about to millions of people around the world.
I have seen videos tutorials on how to make the best soups or bake the best cakes, getting hundreds of thousands of views on Instagram and YouTube, and people advertising on them. YouTubers like Dimma Umeh are showing us how to do makeup, how to master that highlight and contour, and she told us in one video that she made her first million from YouTube! I have also seen videos of people teaching young women how to keep their husbands, very interesting videos!
Thanks to the social media age, whatever ideas and skills that you have can be leveraged for benefit. Your knowledge is of immense importance and you have to find creative ways to take advantage of it.
While it is easier than ever to sell your knowledge and skills, it has also become easier and cheaper for you to acquire them. “The Mobile Prof” in Lagos, for example, is teaching people how to code from their mobile phones, you don’t even need a laptop anymore!
The future is about self-education, self-development. It is important for us to invest a little in the incredible opportunities for online education. Years ago, it was impossible to do a specialized course in a leading international university without getting an admission, paying a lot of money and then travelling abroad. Today, you can sit in the comfort of your home and get an Ivy League education. Universities such as Harvard University and Dartmouth College, for example, offer full-time online courses on Data Science and Linux Programming through an online learning platform called EdX.
This means you can learn a whole new programming language in a year, for less than it would cost you to even get to America! There are new means of self-education and they are more accessible than you might have thought.
There is no question that an exciting future lies ahead. There are breakthroughs in radical technologies, capable of disrupting whole industries, and perhaps even our very conception of work itself. For higher institutions who are getting graduates ready for the world of work, for the graduates, and new and near graduates who are here today, what does the disruption of the workforce by emerging technologies signify for both livelihoods and employment?
Today, there are several important implications related to the fields of Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technologies that will change the way we work and our economies. So, we have seen for example that much of what is considered analytical work by lawyers, investment bankers, accountants, and other age-old professions will be performed better by machines in a fraction of the time that humans can. There is a need to train these professionals differently, and with these new opportunities and challenges in mind.
With the advent of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the Internet of Things, the world of work is in a state of flux, changing as never before, driven by inexorable forces that have an impact, not only on professional services but on manufacturing and trade, global supply chains and the digitalization of the global economy to name just a few. So, for example, the supervision work that managers do is changing rapidly and there may be no more need for it. A young lady who owns a clothing store in Abuja and Lagos, who lives in Abuja was showing me how she can remotely see all that is going on in her shop in Lagos on her laptop in real-time. And she can speak to all her employees from her laptop in real-time. In other words, she can supervise her store herself from anywhere in the world. So, the type of manager you will need going forward will be a different type.
Education today must be education for employability, the sort of education that makes us employable and relevant in the technologies and opportunities that present themselves today.
So, our university curricula must be versatile and dynamic. The focus must be on innovation, critical thinking, interdisciplinary thinking, design thinking, synergizing and collaboration with others across the world to solve problems.
The era of cramming the teacher’s notes and regurgitating for high grades is over. The graduate of the future is a problem solver, a thinker, an entrepreneur. Our educators, policymakers, schools, universities must now adapt their curricula, policies and projects to improve the skills that enable the graduate to nimbly and constantly respond to the ever-changing face of the economy and the workplace.
A student of humanities today equipped with the right skills and mindset will be a crucial part of the collaboration required to build an application that will redefine an aspect of business. In other words, a student of History, English, Languages, without any previous scientific training or knowledge, can with the right skills being taught today, with self-teaching, develop applications that will change business and industries, earn a lot of money. Applications are developed through collaborations; there are those that are scientists, there are those who come from the point of view of imagination and others from the point of view of design; all of them collaborating together.
Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, was more of an artist than a computer scientist. Yet he developed some of the most incredible applications that we have ever seen and made the kind of profit that makes people wonder whether they are not in the wrong profession.
A man or woman of ideas, no matter your degree, can become, in collaboration with others, the designers or owners of the next application that will make billions and create jobs for millions. This is the exciting future ahead of us, the opportunities are limitless.
I want to urge all of us, especially the young people who are here, to note that we are in the best times in the history of mankind. Let nobody tell you about the good old days. I said before, and I am quoting someone, I’m not so sure who he is, he said that “those who remind us of the good old days are probably suffering from memory loss.” We must not allow them to keep talking about the good old days. We are in the best times possible today. And the reason why these are the best times is that we are in the most technologically advanced human history.
This is the most technologically advanced moment. This is the most advanced moment in the history of mankind, we have never been advanced as we are today. It was Fareed Zakaria, the CNN journalist, who said and I’m quoting him that, “the smartphones that we have today, have more computing powers than all of the computing power that took men to the moon on the spacecraft, all of the computing powers that were in that spacecraft, we now have a hundred times of that computing power in the Smartphone that we carry about today.”
So, we are living in a time of sheer magic! We must take every advantage of it and I know the young people today, especially those in this Federal University Dutse, are rearing to go. The future is certainly bright!