President Muhammadu Buhari has approved an amendment to the excise duty rates for alcoholic beverages and tobacco with effect from June 4, 2018. He also granted a grace period of 90 days to all manufacturers before the commencement of the new excise duty regime. The Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, said on Sunday that the new rate on tobacco is a combination of the existing ad-valorem base rate and specific rate while the ad-valorem rate was replaced with a specific rate for alcoholic beverages.

The Minister of Transport, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi on Friday inaugurated the governing board of five agencies under the ministries. The former Governor of Rivers state who performed the inauguration at the Office of the Secretary of the Federation (OSGF) in Abuja charged them to work in line with the policy direction of the Federal Government.

Nigeria’s external reverse grew by about $3.2 billion between February and March 2018, and currently stands at 46 billion dollars, according to figures obtained from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). According to the spokesman of the apex bank, Isaac Okoroafor, said in a statement on Sunday that the reserves grew by about 3.2 billion dollars between February and March 2018.

In line with Federal Government's quest to reduce the challenges that militate against doing business in the country, Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), has concluded plans to complete the registration of companies within two hours. The Acting Registrar-General, CAC, Azuka Azinge, made the disclosure on Thursday during the oversight visit of the Senate Committee on Trade and Investment to the commission’s Lagos office in Alausa, Ikeja.

The Public Relations Officer of Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), Mr. Joseph Attah has said the importer of the military wares which allegedly belong to the government of Kogi State, has been issued a 30-day ultimatum, to produce the End-User Certificate from the Office of the National Security Adviser.

The African Development Bank (AfDB) says it will offer 300 million dollars to financial intermediaries to support the Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa (AFAWA). Mr Ebrima Faal, the Senior Director, Nigeria Country Department, AfDB said this at the 2018 International Women’s Day (IWD) commemorative event organised by the bank on Wednesday in Abuja.

Nigeria’s central bank said it had injected $355.43 million into the interbank foreign exchange market, as part of its efforts to boost liquidity and alleviate dollar shortages. The bank said in a statement that the money was released to “meet requests in the agricultural, airlines, petroleum products and raw materials and machinery sectors”.

The U.S. has announced about 533 million dollars in humanitarian assistance for Nigeria, Ethiopia, Somalia, and South Sudan, as well as countries in the Lake Chad region. U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said millions of people were facing life-threatening food insecurity and malnutrition as a result of ongoing conflict or prolonged drought in the countries.

The African Development Bank (AfDB ) says unless the government of African countries match the continent’s growing population and youth unemployment, the continent could trigger a time bomb. Akinwunmi Adesina, president of the bank, said this in a recent meeting which had government officials from East and North African countries in attendance. He described the continent’s growing young population as a potential growth engine for the world if well harnessed.

The Nigerian Senate on Wednesday lamented that that only 10% of all existing parastatals of the federal government have submitted their audited reports to the Red Chamber for consideration. The disclosure was made in a report of the Committee on Public Accounts on the status of compliance of parastatals in submission of audited accounts to the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation brought to the floor by Senator Matthew Urhoghide.