Hillingwell Consulting

   Dangote and his Dangote Refinery are again in the headlines as they have often been of recent. This time around, Africa's richest man has come out to disclose the true picture of NNPCL'S stake in his refinery. The disclosure by Dangote that NNPCL has only paid for 7% stake in his refinery as against the 20% many Nigerians believe seems to confirm the belief in many quarters about the frustration he is facing with getting his refinery fully operational. You can recall that Dangote Refinery earlier alleged that some highly placed international oil companies and foreign media are out to frustrate it. NNPCL has since come out to explain that it decided to cap it's acquisition in Dangote's refinery at 7.2% after a review. This looks more like a face-saving explanation after Dangote's revelation. Let's explore the reasons and implications of this development. The most obvious reason is NNPCL'S financial incapability. The finances of NNPCL has been strained of r...

The news went round yesterday that the supreme court has granted autonomy to the 774 local governments  areas in Nigeria. Expectedly mixed reactions have trailed the news with different people making their views and opinions known. How do we make meaning of the news and   understand the implications in the midst of the noises trailing it? Let's understand the background first. The 1999 constitution  recognizes the Federal, government, the state governments and the local governments as the three tiers of government in the country. The federal government has it account while the constitution made provision for each state and it's local governments to have a joint account. Over years this joint account owned by each state and it's local governments has become more or less that of the state government with the state governor spending the money that belongs to the local governments leaving the local governments with little or nothing to meet their financial obligations. T...