• National Assembly asked to legalize presidential, governorship debates
• Peter Obi doing comedy skits – Deji Adeyanju
• NBC fines Arise TV over report on Tinubu
• Appeal Court removes Akpabio as APC senatorial candidate
• Remove subsidy immediately – El-Rufai tells FG

Across Nigeria’s 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, these are the five top Nigerian news stories you shouldn’t miss:

National Assembly asked to legalize presidential, governorship debates

The Conference of Nigerian Political Parties (CNPP) has tasked the National Assembly with mandating participation in presidential and governorship debates.

Secretary-General Willy Ezugwu said in a statement that such a law will boost Nigeria’s electoral process.

The CNPP questioned why some candidates declined to attend debates or were excluded by the organizers.

The coalition believes that legalizing conversations with candidates present will assist citizens in making informed judgments.

In mature democracies such as the United States, according to CNPP, debates are an integral aspect of the electoral process.

Ezugwu stated that no credible presidential candidate in the United States could afford to be absent.

“There is a need to make governorship and presidential debates in Nigeria mandatory for all candidates and their parties.

“Debates should be a veritable platform for the public to screen persons seeking to represent them in government.”

The statement urged the National Assembly to establish measures quickly to make its demand the norm.

The CNPP proposed a bill mandating the establishment of a National Commission on Election Debates (CED) charged with coordinating political discourses.

In addition, the panel should have the authority to censure candidates who do not participate and impose penalties.

Peter Obi doing comedy skits – Deji Adeyanju

A social media influencer, Deji Adeyanju, has likened the Labour Party presidential candidate Peter Obi’s ambition to comedy skits.

Adeyanju, in a post on his verified Facebook page on Monday, said the only way to stop Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) is for Obi and Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to step down for each other.

“The only way to stop APC is either for Obi to step down for Atiku or Atiku steps down for Obi,” Adeyanju said.

However, he admitted that “it is politically unreasonable to ask Atiku to step down for Obi because PDP is too strong politically with so many governors.”

He said that as of today, “Obi is only doing comedy skits,” saying the Labour Party has no structure across the nation.

“I will personally prefer for Atiku to step down for Obi, but it can never happen in politics. PDP structures across Nigeria are in every PU; not even about the Govs they have.

“Politics is very deep but both Atiku & Obi should continue their dance of shame, APC will show them pepper,” he asserted.

NBC fines Arise TV over report on Tinubu

Arise Television was fined N2 million by the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) for airing a false broadcast regarding Bola Tinubu, the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

The television station had aired a report stating that the Independent National Broadcasting Commission (INEC) was investigating Tinubu for alleged drug-related crimes.

A statement reportedly published by the INEC had gone viral on social media, but the electoral authority disputed the allegation on Saturday, saying it was the product of miscreants.

Arise TV apologized to Tinubu and INEC on Sunday for misinforming the public.

It was reported that the television station was fined N2 million for violating the broadcasting code.

Appeal Court removes Akpabio as APC senatorial candidate

Godswill Akpabio’s candidacy as the All Progressives Congress, APC, senatorial candidate for Akwa-Ibom North/West District in the 2023 General Elections has been declared null and void by the Court of Appeal.

The verdict was rendered in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory, on Monday evening.

Recall that the Federal High Court had directed the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to recognize Akpabio as the APC’s candidate for senator.

Justice Emeka Nwite, the chief judge at the time, ruled that INEC acted illegally by refusing to accept and publish Akpabio’s name after it was submitted by the APC. As a result, the court ordered INEC to accept and publish Akpabio’s name as the APC candidate for the Akwa Ibom North/West senatorial district in 2023.

However, the appellate court overturned the verdict.

A three-member panel of judges led by Justice Danlami Senchi found that Akpabio did not produce proof of arguments within the deadline specified by court rules.

As an APC presidential aspirant, the tribunal ruled that Akpabio was unable to participate in the party’s legitimate primary held on May 27 and monitored by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), which produced Udom Ekpoudom as its candidate.

Remove subsidy immediately – El-Rufai tells FG

Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, the governor of Kaduna State, has called for the immediate removal of petrol subsidies.

Yesterday, he made the request during the “State of the Nation” session at the ongoing NESG in Abuja.

When asked what the government’s top priority should be, the governor on the panel responded, “immediately abolish fuel subsidies.”

El -Rufai announced that governors of the 36 states and federal government officials had decided in the National Economic Council to remove petrol subsidies in September 2021.

He was surprised that President Muhammadu Buhari had failed to implement the decision, despite the enormous fiscal strain the subsidy had placed on government resources and the corruption it had spawned.

According to him, the management of the subsidy remains opaque, which should have prompted the federal government to discontinue the program sooner.

The governor added that the National Economic Council, NEC, anticipated that the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, NNPCL, would report that the nation’s entire monthly oil earnings had been spent on subsidies if the subsidy was not eliminated.

He said, “I think if NEC decisions were faithfully implemented by the national government, some of the current economic issues will not arise – because NGF provided technical support to study this subsidy issue when it started looming and at N800 billion.”

“We projected that if left unchecked, it would lead to trillions of leakage. As pointed out earlier, we are not even sure if these figures are real or just manufactured on paper to take out money.

‘We envisaged at that point that a time would come when the NNPC would come to FAAC and say guys, we need a cheque from you to cover for subsidy- not to contribute but to say we are spending more than we are receiving from crude oil. That time has come.

“We took a decision to remove the subsidy in September 2021. The Minister of Finance also agreed. We agreed that the money from there should be channeled into health, education, and infrastructure.

“Even this ASUU problem, we agreed to provide funding for ASUU. The NEC took that decision but the national government failed to implement that decision. Till today, we do not know why this decision taken in 2021 has not been implemented.”