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Supreme Court Orders Trump’s Administration to Accept New DACA Applications

By
Samuel Nwite
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0

A U.S. District Judge on Friday asked the Trump administration to reopen the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), a first-time applicant program that protects immigrants from deportation and grants work permits to hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants who arrived in the United States as children.

Judge Nicholas Garaufis in Brooklyn ruled the Trump administration’s attempt to end DACA “arbitrary and capricious”, and ordered the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to post a public notice “displayed prominently” on its website by Monday announcing that it is accepting new DACA applications.

“DHS is DIRECTED to post a public notice within 3 calendar days of this Order, to be displayed prominently on its websites of all other relevant agencies, that it is accepting first-time requests for consideration of deferred action under DACA, renewal requests, and advance parole requests, based on the terms of the DACA program prior to September 5, 2017, and in accordance with this court’s Memorandum & Order of November 14, 2020,” Garafius wrote.

The ruling thus puts an end to the controversies that has followed the program since 2017, when Trump moved to end it.

Former President Barack Obama created DACA in 2012 by executive order after congress failed to pass the bill which was known as ‘dreamers’. The bipartisan legislation would have overhauled the U.S. immigration policy.

The Supreme Court had earlier in June blocked Trump’s attempt to end DACA, but his administration continued to turn down new applications. Trump had argued that DACA was not created through Congress and the executive action that created it invalidates the program.

Consequently, the DHS Secretary Chad Wolf issued a new policy memo in July that continued to block new DACA applications while he subjected the program to a “full reconsideration.” The memo also limited employment authorization for DACA recipients to one year and curtailed beneficiaries’ ability to travel outside the United States.

In November, Garaufis discovered that Wolf had been illegally occupying the position of DHS Acting Secretary, and thus has no right to issue the memo that had halted new Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program applications.

Garafius based his Order on his November ruling which found that not even Pete Gaynor, who the Senate confirmed Federal Emergency Management administrator, and who the Department of Homeland Security tried to substitute Wolf with, qualified for the position of the agency’s Secretary.

“Neither Administrator Gaynor nor Mr. Wolf currently possesses, nor have they ever possessed, the powers of the Acting Secretary of Homeland Security,” the Judge wrote in his ruling in November, ordering the suspension of the memo.

In May 2018, Texas and six other U.S. states filed a suit against the Trump administration, over its inability to end the DACA program that has protected nearly 800,000 undocumented immigrants since 2012.

The suit asked the court to exercise its power and immediately rescind and cancel all DACA permits currently in existence because they are unlawful and set a precedent for the executive arm of the government to overstep its authority by bypassing the Congress to create programs that should have legislative backing.

The seven states claimed the litigation had been more about the legality of the program than it is about an attempt to stop undocumented immigrants from using a lifeline program.

“Our lawsuit is about the rule of law, not the wisdom of any particular immigration policy,” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement. “Texas has argued for years that the federal executive branch lacks the power to unilaterally grant unlawfully present aliens lawful presence and work authorization.

“Left intact, DACA sets a dangerous precedent by giving the executive branch sweeping authority to ignore the laws enacted by Congress and change our nation’s immigration laws to suit a president’s own policy preferences.”

It was a season of growing number of suits against and for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Universities filed suits alongside other individuals and entities seeking to stop Trump from killing the dream of the “dreamers”. Before the Friday ruling, five federal courts have found the Trump administration’s decision to end the program “arbitrary and capricious”.

The Supreme Court’s Order now gives thousands of immigrants, including students, whose stay in the United States depends on the program, the opportunity to live their dream.

Abimbola Windapo Emerges South Africa and Nigeria’s first woman professor in Construction Management

By
Rasheed Adebiyi
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0

A Nigerian woman, Abimbola Windapo has emerged as the first woman professor in Construction Management in South Africa and Nigeria. Windapo was announced as professor in the recently concluded Ad Hominem Promotions in the University of Cape Town, South Africa. According to a  release signed by Ridovhona Mbulaheni from the Communication and Marketing Department of the university, the Ad Hominem promotion to professorship, which becomes effective from January, 2021, is in recognition of Windapo’s “research, teaching, social responsiveness and administrative abilities”.

In giving further details of the reasons behind her recent elevation, the release stated that “Windapo has made numerous important contributions, including research into sustainable contractor development and serving as the chairperson of the Faculty of Engineering & the Built Environment’s (EBE) Transformation Committee from 2015 to 2017, a period of student protests across UCT’s campuses.” The release noted that “further contributions and recognition included her graduating five PhD researchers, and receiving the 2020 National Science and Technology Forum-South32 Award in the Engineering Research Capacity Development category.”

Being the first in the room is not strange to Prof. Windapo as she was the first woman to get a degree in Building from University of Ife ( now Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife) in 1987. She then proceeded to the University of Lagos, Nigeria for her Master’s Degree where She graduated with a Distinction in Construction Management in 1990. For her PhD degree, Windapo also attended University of Lagos for a doctorate degree in Building which she obtained in 2005.

Windapo has extensive professional and teaching experience in Nigeria and South Africa. She first joined the teaching faculty of the Lagos State Polytechnic, Isolo in 1994. She was in the Building Department of the polytechnic for four years leaving the institution in 1998. She then moved to the Department of Building of the University of Lagos where she was for nine years (1998-2009) before she joined the teaching faculty at the Department of Construction Economics and Management, University of Cape Town, South Africa. She rose from her Senior Lecturer position to Associate Professorship cadre in 2016 before she was elevated to full professorship in the 2020 Ad Hominem Promotions.

In the course of her career, Windapo has served as visiting lecturer to a number of universities both in Nigeria and South Africa which include Caleb University, Nigeria; Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, South Africa as well as Stellenbosch University, South Africa. She has also served as consultant to many organizations in Nigeria and South Africa.  She is also a member of many professional bodies in her native country and her country of residence. She is a Fellow of the Nigerian Institute of Building; Registered Builder, Council of Registered Builders of Nigeria; a certified Construction Mentor and Professional Construction Project Manager of the South African Council for the Project and Construction Management Profession (SAPCMP).

To Windapo, the recent elevation confirms her as “a role model for women, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds, to give them hope that nothing is impossible”.

What Does It Take to Source and Manage Clients in Nigerian Human Resource Consulting Sector

By
Mutiu Iyanda
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0

Like other economies, the human resource consulting sector is growing in Nigeria. Over the last few years, the growth has been linked to the emergence of new businesses and existing ones’ interest in strengthening their operational performance with qualified talents. From recruitment to payroll management, players in the Nigerian human resource consulting sector are making significant contributions to the growth of other sectors and industries, despite the negative impact of population growth rate on human resource utilization.

From Lagos to Abuja and Port-Harcourt to Kano, there are a number of HR consulting companies with a special bias for outsourcing services. In one of our previous analyses, we noted that players in the sector need to devise new ways of advertising positions for their clients to the public. In this piece, our analyst examines how players can source and manage clients towards sustainable value co-creation and capturing using recent research outcomes.

According to the practitioners in the sector, online and offline are the main strategies being used for sourcing clients. Online strategy largely focuses on the use of professional networking sites such as LinkedIn. While using this strategy, we discovered that representatives of HR consulting companies connect with and engage potential buyers of their services on the platform. Before connecting, systemic profiling of the buyers is usually carried out. This is necessary based on the fact that potential buyer demographics and in some cases, psychographics must fit with their companies’ [representatives] core values, mission and vision statements.

Offline strategy is being employed when the representatives have opportunity of meeting prospective buyers in physical settings such as conferences, trade shows and exhibitions. From our data, we learnt that the use of one of the strategies or both at the same time depends on the proper understanding of the demographics and psychographics of the buyers.

Bidding for Jobs

When clients advertise bid, HR companies, like others in the management consulting industry, compete through technical and commercial proposal presentation.  According to our data, HR companies express interest in bids when it is obvious that they have the required services, and abilities and capabilities to deliver. In the course of making the proposals available to the designated committee of the clients, strategic engagement is a must. The relationship started with the asking of questions for clarification on the grey areas and continue until the two proposals are submitted.

Managing Clients

Having clients through the strategies are not enough, they must be managed effectively towards continuous patronage and interest. To the Nigerian players, relational, strategic, human and structural capital are significant to this. They believe that subsidiaries and other companies, which we called third party outsourced companies, are key to effective management of clients.

Since profiling of the buyers is essential, companies do consider understanding of the clients’ corporate culture and see how it aligns with theirs. Culture alignment is not sufficient. Services must be tailored to their needs with high level of professionalism. This is what we found as strategic capital. Creating and delivering value, according to our experts in the sector, is a matter of having internal employees with the right knowledge and skill-sets. When it is clear that this is lacking, external consultants become handy. This is human capital, according to our analysis. In some cases, both the clients and employees collectively developed tools for recruitment and payroll management. Our analyst considers this as strategic capital and a way of making the created and delivered value sustainable.

 

For IPO, How Much Revenue Should A Nigerian Startup Hit?

By
Ndubuisi Ekekwe
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1

This viewpoint was credited to Jason Njoku, the CEO of iROKOtv: “I think we’re pretty far away from the IPO. For that to happen, we need to be taking in between $8 and $10 million in revenue.” Possibly, he could be referring to a London or New York exchange. In the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), it does not have to be that high. Of course, not many tech companies may be open to IPO in Nigeria when you look at the records of the firms which followed that path.

I think we’re pretty far away from the IPO. For that to happen, we need to be taking in between $8 and $10 million in revenue. Pre-pandemic, we had a clear path to doing that; now, it’s become much more challenging. But with that said, our goal hasn’t changed. This year, we just need to survive. We’ve taken all the costs we can out of the business, and now we need to start building on revenue. My sense is that we’re delaying for a year or so.

Yet, we need these companies to find paths of exit and NSE remains an option. I just think NSE should offer clarity via a document. Yes, it is very possible that these startups are thinking that they need to do more when in a way some of them could be largely ready for a local IPO.

If your startup generates above $4 million annually, consistently over three years in Nigeria, via subscription or multi-payer payments, not just lump-sum contracting, I do think Nigerian Stock Exchange should make space for you, even in a smaller board.

Founder Bags The Most Innovative Agricultural Real Estate Entrepreneur Award

By
Tiamiyu Ismail
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0

The year 2020 most Innovative Real Estate Brands Africa Awards was organized to celebrate innovation, leadership and Growth of the Real Estate and property industry in the continent. The award has a philosophy to connect relevant stakeholders including prominent Real Estate personalities, Government officials, Bankers and Regulators in the industry.

The Award which held on Thursday, 3rd December 2020 at the Banquet Hall, Sheraton Hotel and Tower, Ikeja Lagos, Nigeria, recognized notable players and game changers who have contributed immensely to the development of the sector.

The Founder and CEO of FarmKonnect, Lieutenant Commander (Retd.), Azeez Oluwole Saheed was announced the most Innovative Agricultural Real Estate Entrepreneur.

Agricultural Real Estate (AgRE), which is fast becoming a widely accepted practice in modern smart-farming technology, was initiated by FarmKonnect to attract investments into large-scale collective farming. The idea was spurred out of the need to solve problems, such as lack of access to land, finance, technology and expertise among other challenges of Africa’s food and Agribusiness sector. While Real Estate in the traditional sense of it represents ownership, acquisition and management of landed property for housing or residential purposes, AgRE represents ownership and management of landed property for smart-agricultural practices.

Azeez Oluwole who left the military at a younger age to pursue a career in the Agribusiness sector believes that the greatest form of security to give to the people is food security; hence, the mission to eradicate hunger and alleviate poverty through sustainable agriculture is a noble course indeed. The entrepreneur expressed his excitement over the award and admonished stakeholders to promote collaboration rather than competition.

Meanwhile, the editor-in-chief of the African Brands Magazine, Desmond Esorougwe, had earlier noted that the most innovative Real Estate Brands Africa Awards 2020 Research represents the most comprehensive Real Estate Brands study in Africa as it is a consumer-led survey which establishes the best Real Estate preferences across the whole of Africa.

Ismail Tiamiyu is Research and Development officer at FarmKonnect.

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