There is a short video flying over Twitter that shows where a person, believed to be Gov. Rotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State, was spraying money from his SUV. The sender of this video captioned it, “Gov. Akeredolu sharing 200 naira notes in Akura”. Of course some of the governor’s diehard fans claimed he was not the one. But then, sirens were blaring in the background and the black SUV looked like what is being used for election campaigns. However, the man that threw the money up wore facemask and the car’s plate number was covered, so you can’t really tell who committed this public offence.

But that is by the way. The thing that actually caught people’s attention in the video is the way people scrambled for this money. Let’s forget about the CBN financial act that forbade the spray of naira notes, because our politicians don’t observe it, and focus our attention on why adults will fall over one another on a highway because of just two hundred naira.

People that don’t go to market these days won’t understand why I said “just two hundred naira”. Some may go as far as accusing me of not understanding the sufferings people are passing through. But those are actually the reasons behind calling two hundred naira a “just”.

Now I ask, what can two hundred naira do for a person in Nigeria today? I mean, a cup of local badly processed stone-filled rice today is even more than that amount. If you take fifty naira out of that money, you will buy a bag of pure water with the balance. If you decide to buy kerosene with that money, you will have to go back home, find another seventy naira or more, add it to the two hundred naira and then buy a litre of kerosene. But here we see men and women diving into the road to pick two hundred naira.

Please, don’t laugh at these people or get angry with them; they are victims of circumstances. We all are victims of circumstances. Trust me, I cannot honestly tell you that I won’t dive for my own two hundred naira if I happened to be at the scene of this drama. Maybe I will recollect myself later but the reflex of rushing for the money will definitely be there at that particular time. Now why would I or anyone else do that? It is simple – poverty.

Poverty isn’t just about not having money in your bank account or being afraid you might not be able to eat your next meal. Poverty also involves the desire to collect and store because you don’t know tomorrow. It is possible that those people that rushed for the sprayed two hundred naira notes obviously had something doing they needed more. They are unsure of their tomorrow. If not, they wouldn’t fall into gutters to pick money.

But then, what about the politician that sprayed that money? What was his intention? Of course we all should agree that he knows that the money will do nothing for the people there. If he really wanted to help them, he knows what to do. So why did he spray that money on the road? Was it to entertain himself as he watched men and women fall on each other as they reached for the money? Or did he want to see if people are still hungry? Or was he hoping to win more votes from that?

Some people assumed that what he did was diabolically motivated but I wouldn’t stand for that. If you ask me, I will say that whoever devised that strategy wanted to test waters. He obviously wanted to see if poverty can still be used as an asset towards securing or manipulating votes in the upcoming election. The person knows that our politicians have been deliberately starving us and that we should be ripe for harvest. He wanted to know if we can dance to whatever music politicians beat so long as they promise us a slice of dry crusted weevil-infested bread. And did he get the answer he wanted? Oh yeah. His experiment rang positive.

It is a pity. Poverty is both an asset and a weapon constructed by our politicians to utilize whenever they need to. But it is left for Nigerians to beat their chests and say, “Enough is enough.” We don’t need politicians’ money to feed, clothe or find shelters. We shouldn’t let poverty turn us into morons.

5G networks represent the next generation cellular networks posed to replace 4G networks. The network represents a shift from consumer technologies to industrial technologies and promises to usher in an era of exponential connectivity, low latency, ultra high reliability, seamless connection of high dense machines or sensors spread over geographic locations.

In order to meet the exponential demand, it is anticipated that 5G networks would rely on a combination of technologies from Wi-Fi, LTE (Long Term Evolution), small cells, satellites, relays, various access technologies etc. For this to work, the 5G core has been virtualized and softwarised to allow these technologies work interoperably and seamlessly.

Here, I will look at one of the techniques introduced by the 3gpp (third generation partnership project) , in one of their releases, aimed at facilitating interoperability of these technologies.

In the 4G network, when a user attempts to make a voice call or connect to the internet, both voice or data connections typically pass through the cellular network. Alternatively, the user could attempt to make the same voice call or connect to the internet using Wi-Fi, from a hot spot, for example, and thereby avoid incurring charges from the mobile operator. Both cases are depicted below in figure 1.

However, in a 5G network, the network could carefully combine the resources of the both cellular network (2G, 3G, 4G, 5G etc.) and Wi-Fi to offer a superior service to the user. As shown below, the voice and data traffic are split and passed over all networks, see figure 2.

The 5G network can perform any of the functions listed below

1. Steer and select the best network: the 5G network is able to steer the traffic over either the cellular network or Wi-Fi, based on the best network for the user.
2. Switch traffic: when a user is already using the resources of the cellular network, the 5G network is able to hand over the traffic to a wiFi network and vice-versa.
3. Split traffic: the 5G network is also able to split the user’s traffic over all available networks e.g. it could direct voice traffic over a gsm network whereas it directs the data traffic over a Wi-Fi network.

These functions would be performed based on certain rules embedded within the network. The steering, Switching and splitting traffic over various access networks may sound trivial until one considers some of the anticipated use-cases of 5G. For instance, consider an autonomous car driving and it encounters a child crossing the road and it needs to make a quick decision on how to avoid the child, then one would appreciate the need for the network to be able to quickly switch network resources, when one access network suddenly becomes unavailable. The same applies to a robot performing surgical procedures, in the wake of a surge in the use of tele-medical applications, due to social distancing directives.

The Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) suspended the nationwide strike action scheduled to take place on September 28, 2020. The NLC’s decision came after the Federal Government of Nigeria halted the implementation of increased electricity tariff and petrol pump price for two weeks.

Organized labor and Trade Union Congress had mobilized stakeholders in the past weeks to embark on indefinite strike that will force Nigerian government to rescind its decision to increase tariff and pump price. Consequently, the federal government engaged the stakeholders to avert the strike which would deal fresh blow on the already fragile economy.

The meeting was aimed at addressing the issues raised by the NLC and TUC, which includes the minimum wage, building refineries and metering electricity consumers.

The Minister of Labor and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige said the meeting was fruitful, as the parties reached agreement on the key issues.

Dr. Ngige said the committee agreed to set up a Technical Committee comprising Ministries, Departments, Agencies, NLC and TUC, which will work for a duration of two weeks effective from Monday, Sept. 28.

“The committee is to examine the justifications for new policy in view of the need for the validation of the basis for the new cost reflective tariff.

“The technical committee membership included Mr. Festus Keyamo, Minister of State for Labor and Employment, as chairman, Mr. Godwin Jedy-Agba, Minister of State Power, Mr. James Momoh, Chairman National Electricity Regulatory Commission.

“Others were Mr. Ahmad Rufai Zakari, SA to Mr. President on infrastructure, Dr Onoho’Omhen Ebhohimen, Member, NLC, Mr. Joe Ajaero NLC, Mr. Chris Okonkwo, TUC and a representative of DISCOs,” he said.

Part of the committee’s assignment is to examine the different electricity tariff rates of the DISCOs, and see if they are in compliance with the order of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), and also see if the commission is upholding its mandate.

In the aspect of deregulation, Dr. Ngige said all parties agreed that Nigerian refineries must function in bigger capacities to ameliorate the impact of petroleum importation.

He explained that based on the agreement, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), has been given marching orders to expedite the rehabilitation of Nigeria’s four refineries located in Warri, Port Harcourt and Kaduna and to achieve 50 percent completion for Port Harcourt by December 2021, while timeline and delivery for Warri and Kaduna will be established by the inclusive Steering Committee.

Dr. Ngige further explained that the national leadership of the Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) and Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association (PENGASSAN) will be integrated into the Steering Committee already established by the Corporation.

“The Federal Government and its agencies are to ensure delivery of one million CNG/LPG AutoGas conversion kits, storage skids, and dispensing units under the Nigeria Gas Expansion Programme by December 2021 to enable delivery of cheaper transportation and powerful fuel.

“A Governance Structure that will include representatives of organized Labour shall be established for timely delivery,” he explained.

On the issue of minimum wage and general intervention, Dr. Ngige said the federal government will facilitate the removal of tax on minimum wage to cushion the effects of deregulation and the pump price and electricity tariff increase. He added that the federal government will provide 133 CNG/LPG driven mass transit buses immediately for labor unions. The buses will get to all states and Local Governments before December 2021.

He said 10 percent of the Ministry of Housing and Finance housing scheme will be allocated to Nigerian workers under the NLC and TUC.

“A specific amount is to be unveiled by the Federal Government in two weeks’ time, which will be isolated from the Economic Sustainability Programme Intervention Fund that can be accessed by Nigerian Workers with subsequent provision for 240,000 under the auspices of NLC and TUC,” he said

Based on these agreements, the strike was called off for weeks. The federal government is expected to live up to its side of the bargain by implementing many aspects of the agreement in two weeks. But Nigerians said that the NLC and TUC have betrayed their mandate by reaching an agreement with the federal government and calling off the planned strike.

This perception stems from the concern that the government always reaches an agreement with striking unions only to avert the strike, and moves on after without implementing any of the things agreed upon. Moreover, none of the demands of the NLC was met in the agreements. People believe that the federal government will renege on the agreements as soon the NLC and TUC sheath their swords. And they have a good reason to believe so.

The Nigerian government is notorious for breaching agreements with civil society groups and unions in the country. The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) is still on strike instigated by the government’s failure to fulfill its agreement with the academic union.

The trajectory this sets emboldens the notion that the Nigerian government cannot be trusted, and thus, should not be negotiated with on matters affecting the wellbeing of the citizenry.

Thus, it is believed that the NLC has betrayed the people by going into agreement with the government, as the agreements represent the interest of a few. “Are you representing your pocket or the people of Nigeria?” Seun Kuti, Musician and rights activist asked the NLC.

Dr. Ngige said there will be subsequent meetings between Labour and the federal government, to discuss other matters, including the participation in agricultural ventures through the CBN and the Ministry of Agriculture.

Nigerians will have to wait for two weeks to see if the government will keep its promises. While the people feel betrayed by the NLC and TUC, the federal government has succeeded in saving the economy from another shutdown.