Breaking News! Breaking News!!
The mood of the nation has changed and there is jubilation everywhere because President Muhammadu Buhari has just announced the immediate replacement of Professor Mahmood Yakubu with Professor Is-haq Oloyede. Professor Oloyede until his new appointment was the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board, JAMB Registrar. He is generally believed to be a very honest, prudent and incorruptible administrator taking a cue from his huge credential in public office so far. He was unanimously endorsed by the Federal Executive Council with the sole aim of reviewing the just concluded general elections in response to both the local and international outcry that greeted the outcome of the poll. It is believed that he will do justice to the humongous allegations of bias, sellout and favoritism on the part of the last umpire. He is expected to begin his work immediately so as to meet up with the May 29 handover date. Thank God for witnessing a brand new month. It’s April Fooooool. If you don’t like it, please go to court!
On a more serious note, we welcome network members to the month of April, the first month of the second quarter of the year. From our end, we have been able to put a few things in shape and in consonance with our new global status. A quick view shows that there has been considerable improvement on the aesthetics of the entire website. We now have the annual calendar at the bottom of each page. We have also made it much easier to navigate the website. Our stories on the Blog are becoming more and more juicy and relevant to the needs and aspirations of our business community. There are now useful links at the bottom of every page that takes you straight to the story of your choice, to the Blog or to our social media forums.
As you may probably know already, the chaotic circumstances that followed in the wake of the controversial 2023 elections in Nigeria coupled with the problems that attended the change of the naira, cash scarcity in the banks and the subsequent increase in the cost of virtually everything made ROLU Ltd Board of Directors to reconsider its initial stand that any network members who were unwilling or unable to afford the N12, 000 a year subscription should have their businesses de-listed from our website and from all our social media forums. They therefore extended the period of payment to the end of June, when it is hoped that a new government would have been put in place and with that, a level of stability in the banks and easier access to the naira.
Between now and the end of June, we will endeavour to get in touch with all network members with the information on our planned delisting exercise. Every business that is listed on our website should be able to pay an annual subscription of only N12, 000 to be able to advertise in any of our social media forums.
It is indeed challenging that out of the approximately 1,100 businesses we have on the website, only a few businesses have paid their 2023 subscriptions because they appreciate what we are doing and want to be a part of us. Among those we have approached, some promised they would pay but have not yet paid; others made excuses with the economic condition in the country. More importantly is the fact that we have not even spoken to nearly 95% of our network members about these developments, which is what we are doing now, since Ms Gift Okoro came on board as the Acting Editor of ROLU Ltd magazine. She holds a Bachelors degree in English Language from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka.
We had actually started delisting by the start of January after we communicated to network members about new developments and the new direction we were taking since conditions had made it necessary for us to go global. It meant that all listed business transactions would no longer only circulate within Imo State. They would now be known about within the 36 states of Nigeria, the Federal Capital Territory and in every country of the world where Nigerians reside to do business or render service.
A cursory look at the website before now showed that the input heavily slanted towards the Eastern Nigeria States. Now, we have to get businesses from many other Nigerian states into the system. These are some of the challenges we face. But we can assure members it will be done as expeditiously as we feel free to do so by your cooperation because if we hire people to work on that, we must pay them.
I would advise all our network members to read through some of our features like our editorials, from the publisher, relationships and the more engaging ones in business, education and health news. ROLU Ltd is an innovation in journalism in this part of the world, and indeed around the world. There is just no other magazine like it. I remember those days that both Lagos and Nasarawa states tried to come up with their own brand of state business link magazine but they soon fizzled out because they were ill equipped to manage a massive project like that.
To achieve our target means we have to work really hard and evolve strategies to collect all the debts we are owed and to upgrade the quality of service we offer our clients such as instituting monthly zoom lectures by distinguished business experts from the UK, Australia, USA, Taiwan and Africa which will broaden the business horizon of network members and place them on the path to internationally accepted best practices. I am counting on your cooperation. Thank you for your understanding.
- Chief Sir Emeka Asinugo, KSC
