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Despite Huge Reserve: Nigerians Groan As Cooking Gas Price Keeps Soaring

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Firewood and charcoal mongers are now smiling to the banks with the attendant rise in deforestation……

Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) or cooking gas is now beyond the reach of average Nigerians as many have turned to charcoal or firewood.

A kilogramme of cooking gas is now N625 or more, depending on the location, forcing many households and eateries, especially in urban centres to seek alternative means of cooking.

Firewood and charcoal mongers are now smiling to the banks with the attendant rise in deforestation.

Experts have warned relevant stakeholders on the consequences of the shortage on the health of residents and the environment at a time global warming is taking a toll on different parts of the world.

Multiple increases in months

Despite a proven estimate of 206.53 trillion standard cubic feet of natural gas deposits in Nigeria as of June 2021, the price of cooking gas has surged higher beyond the reach of Nigerians, with five increases recorded in three months, Daily Trust reports.

Our reporters in a survey on Tuesday observed that the prices of various kilogrammes of LPG have surged more than 50 per cent, with a 12.5kg content selling for N7, 800 or more, rising from N6, 500 in less than a month.

Some of the gas users who spoke to our reporters during the market survey in Lagos, Abuja, Kano, Kaduna and Nasarawa states, among others, said the situation had forced scores of poor Nigerians to resort to using charcoal-fuelled stoves to cook.

Records of gas price tags indicated that the marketers began to hike the product price from April this year, rising from around N3, 600/12.5kg cylinder to N4, 200. By May, gas filling plants sold 12.5kg for N4, 700 while it reached N5, 000 in June and N5, 700 in early July.

It was learnt that those buying in lower volumes like 3kg, 5kg, 8kg and 10kg, paid over 50 per cent more than they did in March.

The Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) recently reported that the volume of LPG supplied in August fell by 20.5% to 85,264.803 metric tons (MT) compared to 107,224.584MT supplied in July and 102,787.234MT in June.

This sharp decline, according to dealers, might lead to further upward pressure on the retail prices of the product.

The Executive Secretary of PPPRA, Abdulkadir Saidu, also in a recent statement said of the 85,264MT volume, 38,040.457MT was sourced locally by Ever Oil, Stockgap, NIPCO, 11 Plc., Greenville Natural Gas, PNG Gas Ltd, NPDC and Ashtavinayak Hydrocarbon Ltd. in August.

However, the larger part of 47,224.346MT was imported by NIPCO, Matrix, Algasco, Techno Oil, Prudent, A. A Rano, and Stockgap. The imports were more from the USA; Algeria and Equatorial Guinea in Africa.

Gas price increasing since April – NBS report

Confirming the rise in the gas price is the recent report of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), which said that the average price for refilling a 5kg cylinder of cooking gas increased by 0.56 per cent from N2,057.71 in March 2021 to N2,069.21 in April 2021.

As of Tuesday, a 5kg cylinder volume of cooking gas was sold for N3, 250 in Abuja.

According to the NBS latest report, the average price of a 5kg cylinder of cooking gas in August rose by 3.44% from N2,141.59 in July to N2,215.33. The product sold higher in Akwa Ibom at N3, 025.45; Benue at N2, 825.00 and Jigawa at N2, 521.43. The prices were lowest in Abuja at N1, 806.66, Ondo at N1, 840.81 and Lagos at N1, 847.70.

The average price for refilling a 12.5kg cylinder also saw an increase of 2.09% at N4,514.82 in August from N4,422.32 in July 2021 and was more expensive in Abuja (N5,837), Kogi (N5,237) and Ogun (N5,170) but the cheapest in Niger (N4,021), Kebbi (N4,042) and Jigawa (N4,079).

Users groan

Some gas users blamed the federal government for its inability to control the price in the open market.

In many parts of Lagos, one kg of cooking gas sells for N600, which is N7, 500 for 12.5kg cylinder and N3, 560 for 6kg cylinder.

Mrs Vivian Kogi, a resident of Lagos described as worrisome, the rising cost of cooking gas, which she said had made many go back to use of coal and firewood because kerosene was also expensive.

“With the way things are going, the cost of gas may rise to N1, 000 per kilogram by end of the year,” she predicted.

Mrs Kate Okpalefe, who lives in Ketu Ijanikin, said many of her neighbours had resorted to the use of charcoal pots because they could no longer afford gas.

Aina Babatunde, a taxi driver, said he abandoned his gas cooker for a charcoal stove.  “Many of us can’t buy cooking gas anymore; government should do something about it. The price keeps increasing every day.’’

A restaurateur in Abuja, Hajia Muinah Fagbohun, decried the increase, saying her daily revenue had dropped.

“The government should please prevail on gas marketers to bring down the prices of gas,” she said.

Mrs Salamatu Bello, a housewife said she bought a 3kg volume at N2, 750 at a refilling plant, instead of the N2, 200 she paid in August.

“That little gas has increased by N550 yesterday when I bought it at Karu. It is now difficult for us to use gas and the cost of kerosene is not helping matters,” she said.

John Abu said he bought a 12.5kg gas content on Saturday for N7,800 in Nyanya, the highest record in that part of Abuja.

“It has never been so high like this before; I think we have to find a cheaper alternative, which may be the charcoal stove,” he said.

In Kaduna, the price per kilogramme had risen from N320 to N600 within the time under review.

Musa Mando, a bookseller, called for price control, saying cooking gas was now beyond the reach of the masses.

Abba Ibrahim of Hotoro Quarters, in Kano, said he had switched to using the kerosene stove.

“I just can’t afford cooking gas these days…It is N600 per kg as against the N300 or N320, we paid last month.  I have no option but to get a stove,” he said.

Marketers blame forex, VAT

Daily Trust reports that marketers had resorted to various explanations for the hike as they blamed the foreign exchange (forex) crisis.

Some of them said low supply and a rise in Value Added Tax (VAT) on gas import were to blame.

Malam Sagir Bello Baba, a cooking gas seller in the Tarauni area of Kano said they never experienced such a rapid hike in prices of cooking gas before.

“Our business, our source of livelihood is crumbling. Government should do something,” he said.

Aminu Isiaka, a major dealer at Kurnan Asabe, Kano, said the implications are many.

“Many people have been pushed out of business. There is also serious pressure on forests because firewood mongers are raiding forested areas cutting down trees.

“And most importantly, the development is a serious setback to the green initiative of the federal government. People have been sensitised in the last few years to stop felling trees and after resistance, many started using gas but it is now beyond their rich.

“We know there was no subsidy on gas and I wonder where the problem lies,” he said.

Reversal of tax regime fingered

Mr Sylvanus Ogbonna, who sells cooking gas in the Ikeja area of Lagos, attributed the hike in the price of cooking gas to the implementation of a 7.5 per cent tax on imported LPG.

“There is no constant price from the last two weeks… The price is changing because of the nature of our supplies and the VAT increase,” he said.

The Secretary, Liquefied Petroleum Gas Retailers of Nigeria (LIPGAR) in Kano, Alhaji Muhammad Omede, who blamed the forex crisis, said the government should always consider the public when making policies.

A management source with one of the four major importers said: “There are many issues involved. For the imported liquefied natural gas, the price is dominated by the dollar. So the more the naira is devalued, the higher the prices will continue to rise.

“The federal government re-introduced value-added tax (VAT) that was suspended about three years ago in a bid to reduce the price of LPG. The government is looking everywhere for revenue and they were forced to reintroduce VAT.

“But the worst of the government action was that they backdated these VAT to 2020, which has now left the four major importers with huge debt amounting to over N1 billion.”

The source also said due to the backdated VAT, most companies were not importing, as everyone depends on supply by NLNG).

On his part, the Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Association of Liquefied Petroleum Gas Marketers (NALPGAM), Mr Bassey Essien, said Nigeria consumed about one million MT of cooking gas annually and that 65 per cent of this was sourced abroad.

Essien said the CBN had no dedicated window for foreign exchange for cooking gas importers; hence the sourcing of foreign exchange at a high price ultimately dictated the price.

“We, as marketers, are also saying that the NLNG and other gas producers should domesticate the production chain for cooking gas by dedicating sufficient quantity for domestic consumption,” he said.

Commenting on the gas price hike, a Lagos-based petroleum industry analyst, Suraj Oyewale, said the major reason for the gas price hike is due to the foreign exchange devaluation.

“Upstream gas contracts are usually priced in dollar, even for gas supply to the domestic market. But due to the scarcity of foreign exchange in recent years, gas suppliers have accepted payment in naira by the gas processors and other wholesale gas buyers, usually at the official exchange rate.”

NNPC blames low supply, says FG doing its best

The Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Malam Mele Kyari, has said poor supply of gas was the main challenge.

Kyari stated this recently when he visited the management of the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) in Abuja.

“Today, this country is under-supplied with gas. I can tell you that we are having difficulty feeding our network across the country with gas. Every day, it is a trouble to deliver gas. Once your supply is weak, it will affect pricing,” he said.

He, however, said the corporation was working with other sister agencies on a strategy to expand its network of availability, which would subsequently lead to gas directly delivered to homes of end-users.

“If we do this, all cylinders will not be of any use. That is why I don’t see them used in many developed countries. When we can power thermal gas plants across the country and very close to the users, ultimately, homes will be run with electric cookers and utensils and that way, you will have less need for cylinders.

“We are transiting and we will continue to add more volume into the market so that we bring down the prices,” he said.

Culled from the Daily Trust News Nigeria

Lifestyle

Kaduna Governor Commissions Nigeria’s First 100-Building Prefabricated Housing Estate

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Kaduna, Nigeria – November 6, 2025 — In a major milestone for Nigeria’s housing sector, the Governor of Kaduna State has commissioned a 100-unit mass housing estate developed by Family Homes and executed by Karmod Nigeria, marking the first-ever large-scale prefabricated housing project in the country.

Completed in under six months, the innovative project demonstrates the power of modern prefabricated construction to deliver high-quality, affordable homes at record speed — a sharp contrast to traditional building methods that often take years.

Each of the 100 units in the estate is designed for a lifespan exceeding 50 years with routine maintenance. The development features tarred access roads, efficient drainage systems, clean water supply, and steady electricity, ensuring a modern and comfortable living environment for residents.

According to Family Homes, the project represents a new era in Nigeria’s mass housing delivery, proving that cutting-edge technology can accelerate the provision of sustainable and cost-effective homes for Nigerians.

“With prefabricated technology, we can drastically reduce construction time while maintaining top-quality standards,” said a spokesperson for Family Homes. “This project is a clear demonstration of what’s possible when innovation meets commitment to solving Nigeria’s housing deficit.”

Reinforcing this commitment, Governor Uba Sani of Kaduna State emphasized the alignment between the initiative and the state’s broader vision for affordable housing.

“The Family Homes Funds Social Housing Project aligns with our administration’s commitment to the provision of affordable houses for Kaduna State citizens. Access to safe, affordable and secure housing is the foundation of human dignity. We have been partnering with local and international investors to frontally address our housing deficit,” he said.

Also speaking at the event, Mr. Ademola Adebise, Chairman of Family Homes Funds Limited, noted that the project embodies inclusivity and social progress.

“The Social Housing Project also reflects our shared vision of inclusive growth, where affordable housing becomes a foundation for economic participation and improved quality of life.”

Karmod Nigeria, the technical partner behind the project, utilized its extensive expertise in prefabricated technology to localize the process, employing local artisans and materials to enhance community participation and job creation.

Industry experts have described the Kaduna project as a blueprint for future housing initiatives nationwide, capable of addressing the country’s housing shortfall more efficiently and sustainably.

With this pioneering development, Kaduna State takes a leading role in introducing modern housing technologies that promise to reshape Nigeria’s urban landscape.

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Books

The Pioneer’s Burden: Building the First Private Network in a Vacuum of Power

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  • Book Title: The Making of Bourdex Telecom
  • Author: David Ogba Onuoha Bourdex
  • Publishers: Bourdex
  • Reviewer: Emeaba Emeaba
  • Pages: 127

In the history of Nigerian entrepreneurship, stories of audacity often begin with frustration. A man waits hours in a dimly lit government office to place a single overseas call, his ambitions held hostage by bureaucracy. From that moment of exasperation, an empire begins. Such is the animating pulse of The Making of Bourdex Telecom, David Ogba Onuoha Bourdex’s sweeping autobiographical account of one man’s effort to connect the disconnected and to rewrite the telecommunications map of Eastern Nigeria.

At once memoir, corporate history, and national parable, the book reconstructs the emergence of Bourdex Telecommunications Limited—the first indigenous private telecom provider in Nigeria’s South-East and South-South regions—against a backdrop of inefficiency, corruption, and infrastructural neglect. Its author, a businessman turned visionary, narrates not merely how a company was built but how a new horizon of possibility was forced open in a society long accustomed to closed doors.

Bourdex begins with a stark diagnosis of pre-deregulation Nigeria: a nation of over 120 million people served by fewer than a million telephone lines. Through a mix of statistical precision and personal recollection, he paints a portrait of communication as privilege, not right—of entire regions condemned to silence by state monopoly. His storytelling thrives in such contrasts: the entrepreneur sleeping upright in Lagos’s NET building to place an international call; the Italian businessman in Milan conducting deals with two sleek mobile phones. That juxtaposition—between deprivation and effortless connectivity—serves as the book’s moral axis.

From these moments of contrast, Bourdex constructs the founding myth of his enterprise. What began as an irritation became a revelation, then a crusade. “I saw a people left behind,” he writes, “a region cut off while others dialed into the future.” His insistence on framing technology as a means of liberation rather than profit underscores the moral ambition that threads through the book. The Making of Bourdex Telecom reads not like a manual of business success but like an ethical manifesto: to build not simply for gain, but for dignity.

As the chapters unfold, Bourdex’s narrative oscillates between vivid personal storytelling and granular technical detail. He recounts his early business dealings in the 1980s and ’90s, the bureaucratic mazes of NITEL, and the daring pursuit of a telecommunications license under General Sani Abacha’s military government. There is a cinematic quality to his recollections—the tense midnight meetings in Abuja, the coded alliances with military officers, the improbable friendships that turned policy into possibility.

These sections recall Chinua Achebe’s The Trouble with Nigeria in tone and intention: both works diagnose the systemic failures of governance but find redemption in individual initiative. Yet Bourdex’s narrative differs in form. Where Achebe offered moral critique, Bourdex offers demonstration—an anatomy of perseverance in motion. He documents the letters, negotiations, and international correspondences with Harris Canada, showing how an indigenous company emerged through sheer force of will and global collaboration.

Such passages risk overwhelming the reader with acronyms, specifications, and telecom jargon—R2 signaling, SS7 interconnection, E1 circuits—but they also lend the book an authenticity rare in corporate memoirs. What might have been opaque technicalities become, under Bourdex’s hand, instruments of drama. The machinery of communication becomes metaphor: wires and waves as extensions of faith and tenacity.

To situate The Making of Bourdex Telecom within Nigeria’s socio-political history is to confront the paradox of private enterprise under public decay. The book chronicles the twilight of NITEL’s monopoly, the hesitant dawn of deregulation, and the emergence of entrepreneurial actors who filled the void left by government paralysis. In this sense, Bourdex’s story parallels that of other indigenous pioneers—figures such as Mike Adenuga and Jim Ovia—whose ventures in telecommunications and banking transformed the national economy from the late 1990s onward.

Yet Bourdex’s tone is less triumphant than reflective. He does not romanticize deregulation; he portrays it as both opportunity and ordeal. The government’s inertia, the labyrinthine licensing process, and the outright extortion by state agencies form the darker undertones of his tale. His clash with NITEL’s leadership—recounted with controlled indignation—stands as one of the book’s most gripping sequences. When a senior official demanded an illegal payment of ₦20.8 million for interconnection rights, Bourdex’s defiant reply, “You are not God,” rang out like an act of civil disobedience. In such moments, the narrative transcends the genre of business autobiography and enters the moral theatre of national reform. The entrepreneur becomes citizen-prophet, challenging a corrupt establishment with the rhetoric of justice and self-belief. That blending of economic narrative with civic conscience is perhaps the book’s most compelling feature.

Stylistically, The Making of Bourdex Telecom occupies an intriguing space between oral history and polished memoir. The prose is direct, rhythmic, and often sermonic, reflecting its author’s background as both businessman and public speaker. Anecdotes unfold with the cadences of storytelling; sentences sometimes pulse with the energy of spoken word: “Amateurs built the Ark. Professionals built the Titanic.” The repetition of such aphorisms imbues the work with a sense of conviction, though occasionally at the expense of subtlety.

Where the book excels is in its evocation of atmosphere—the dusty highways between Aba and Lagos, the sterile corridors of power in Abuja, the crisp air of Calgary where the author first glimpsed technological modernity. These scenes transform what could have been a linear corporate chronicle into a textured work of memory.

Still, the narrative structure is not without flaws. The absence of an external editor’s restraint is occasionally felt in the pacing; digressions into technical exposition or moral reflection sometimes interrupt narrative flow. Readers accustomed to the concise storytelling of international business memoirs—Phil Knight’s Shoe Dog or Elon Musk’s authorized biography—may find the prose dense in places. Yet such density mirrors the complexity of the terrain Bourdex navigated. His sentences, like his towers, are built from layers of persistence.

Beyond its entrepreneurial chronicle, the book doubles as social history—a record of Eastern Nigeria’s encounter with modernization. The chapters on “The FUTO Boys,” a cadre of young engineers recruited from the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, offer a microcosm of the new Nigerian professional class emerging in the late 1990s: educated, idealistic, and determined to prove that technical expertise could thrive outside the state. Their improvisations—installing antennas by candlelight, building networks amid power outages—embody the collective grit that sustained Bourdex’s vision.

The narrative’s cumulative effect is generational. Through the story of one company, we glimpse a society in transition—from analogue isolation to digital awakening. The book captures that liminal moment when the sound of a dial tone became a symbol of freedom.

Running through The Making of Bourdex Telecom is a persistent theology of success. Bourdex attributes every turn in his journey to divine orchestration: friendships “placed by the Invisible Hand,” setbacks reinterpreted as “divine redirections.” Such language, while characteristic of Nigerian entrepreneurial spirituality, acquires here an almost literary force. It recasts corporate history as providential narrative, where the invisible infrastructure of grace mirrors the visible architecture of towers and transmitters.

For some readers, this piety may feel excessive; yet it provides the emotional coherence of the book. The author’s faith is not ornamental—it is constitutive. Without it, the story of Bourdex Telecom would read as mere ambition. With it, it becomes vocation.

The foreword by Abia State Governor Alex Otti and the preface by former Anambra Governor Peter Obi frame the book as both inspiration and instruction. They read Bourdex’s career as parable: the triumph of private initiative over public inertia. Yet their presence also situates the work within Nigeria’s broader discourse on nation-building. The Making of Bourdex Telecom is not only the autobiography of an entrepreneur; it is a treatise on indigenous agency—on what happens when Africans cease to wait for imported solutions and begin to engineer their own.

In this respect, the book extends its influence beyond its immediate industry. Its lessons—about courage, timing, friendship, and faith—extend to any field where innovation must contend with adversity.

Judged as a work of literature, The Making of Bourdex Telecom is direct and sincere. Its prose favors clarity over ornament, and its authenticity gives the story a compelling sense of truth. Bourdex writes not to embellish, but to bear witness—to a time, a struggle, and a conviction that technology could serve humanity. The result is a hybrid work: part documentary, part sermon, part memoir of enterprise.

As a contribution to Nigerian business literature, it deserves serious attention. Few firsthand accounts capture with such detail the messy birth of private telecommunications in the 1990s—a revolution that reshaped the country’s economic and social fabric. In its pages, we hear both the crackle of the first connected call and the larger resonance of a people finding their voice.

Bourdex’s central message endures: progress begins when frustration becomes purpose. His journey from the backrooms of NITEL to the boardrooms of international telecoms is not merely personal triumph; it is a chapter in Nigeria’s unfinished story of modernization.

In the end, The Making of Bourdex Telecom stands as more than the history of a company. It is an ode to enterprise as nation-building, and to the stubborn optimism of those who refuse to let silence define them.

See the book on Amazon: >>>>>

_________

♦ Dr. Emeaba, the author of “A Dictionary of Literature,” writes dime novels in the style of the Onitsha Market Literature sub-genre.

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Houston

Houston and Owerri Community Mourn the Passing of Beloved Icon, Lawrence Mike Obinna Anozie

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Houston was thrown into mourning on September 19, 2025, following the sudden passing of businessman and community advocate Lawrence Mike Obinna Anozie, who peacefully joined his ancestors. Immediate family member in Houston, Nick Anozie, confirmed his untimely death and expressed gratitude for the outpouring of love and condolences from both the Houston and Owerri communities.

Lawrence was born to Chief Alexander and Lolo Ether Anozie of Owerri in Imo State, Nigeria, and will be dearly remembered by family members, friends, and the entire Houston community.

An accomplished accountant, the late Lawrence incorporated and successfully managed three major companies: Universal Insurance Company, LLC, Universal Mortgage LLC, and Universal Financial Services. Through these enterprises, he not only built a thriving business career but also created opportunities for countless individuals to achieve financial stability. His contributions to entrepreneurship and community development will remain a lasting legacy.

According to the family, arrangements for his final funeral rites are in progress and will be announced in due course.

Lawrence will forever be remembered as a loving and compassionate man who dedicated much of his life to uplifting others. He helped countless young Nigerians and African Americans overcome economic challenges by providing mentorship, financial guidance, and career opportunities. His generosity touched the lives of many who otherwise might not have found their footing. A devout Catholic, he was unwavering in his faith and never missed Mass, drawing strength and inspiration from his church community. To those who knew him, Lawrence was not only a successful businessman but also a pillar of kindness, humility, and faith whose legacy of service and compassion will continue to inspire generations.

For more information, please contact Nick Anozie – 832-891-2213

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