News
Blackmail, Not Forex, Major Reason for Multinationals Exiting Nigeria – Ekeh

Leo Stan Ekeh, Serial digital entrepreneur has spotlighted the chief reasons why multinationals are exiting Nigeria and warned that if nothing was done, more of such businesses and indigenous ones may close shop in the coming months and years.

Leo Stan Ekeh
In a press statement, Ekeh who is the Chairman of Zinox Technologies Limited, a Nigerian conglomerate with international affiliations, urged President Bola Tinubu to address the critical issues of corporate blackmail and bullying, which he said frustrate the Federal Government’s effort at promoting ease-of-doing-business in the country.
While acknowledging that scarcity of forex is a challenge for businesses operating in Nigeria, he said these challenge can be surmounted especially with the new push by the Tinubu government to inject more forex into the system.
He stated that the depreciation of the naira, which dropped from N422.00/$ in June 2023 to N951.94/$ in December 2023 at the official window, following the floating of the naira by Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is only a convenient reason cited by the exiting multinationals.
“On face value, some of the exiting multinationals cite difficulty in procuring forex as reason for closing shop in Nigeria, but they are only being diplomatic. Many of them have had to contend with all manner of blackmail and corporate bullying from professional blackmailers aided by our slow judicial process.
“This has become an emerging but very destructive business model in our country, and unfortunately, the legal system is handicapped to protect the victims because of the long years it takes to discharge a case,” he said.
According to Ekeh, the escalation of corporate blackmail over the years is responsible for the low attraction of foreign direct investments (FDI) relative to the size of Nigeria’s market and potential.
Referencing an open letter he addressed to President Tinubu, Ekeh cited an issue of blackmail against his Company TD Africa and himself by an Ibadan-based computer firm, Citadel Oracle Concepts Limited owned by an Enugu state indigene, Mr. Benjamin Joseph, as a case study of how much frustration investors suffer for doing business in Nigeria. He said that the matter had been investigated by several constituted agencies and were found to be false.
Consequently, the IGP charged him to court for giving false information in 2016, but for over 8 years Mr. Joseph has not been able to defend a one count charge for false information instituted at the FCT High Court Abuja for a case he reported. Mr. Joseph has been skipping court sessions or feigning ill-health rather than appearing in court to defend himself and prove his claim of fraud after the prosecution closed its case. He rather appeals to successive Attorney-Generals to withdraw the case from court, knowing that his claims and allegations are not true.
Ekeh urged the President to prevail on the Attorney-General, Mr. Lateef Fagbemi SAN, and any other person/institution not to truncate the course of justice but to allow this case and similar cases to run its full course in the interest of justice, fairness and to convince the international community, including international investors, that we respect and abide by the rule of law in Nigeria.
While expressing confidence in the President to address the issue of blackmail, he suggested that Tinubu should aggressively pursue a policy that promotes patronage of indigenous manufacturers and service providers as a way of reflating the economy.
He said: “It is evident that the core of the myriad challenges afflicting the nation today is our failure to develop local capacities. We must embrace self-sufficiency by consuming what we produce and supporting indigenous players across various sectors.”
He regretted that in spite of several local content policies established by the Federal Government, such policies are consistently disregarded by government employees and appointees, wondering why “we send our children to the world’s best institutions, where they excel, yet we overlook the products they create.”
He gave the example of the government of India which recently imposed restrictions on the importation of laptops, tablets, all-in-one personal computers and ultra-small computers and servers with immediate effect. This, according to him, was to boost local productivity both by multinationals operating in India and indigenous Indian companies to create more jobs, encourage proficiency, and discourage capital flight.
“Mr. President, I humbly appeal to you to be deliberate and decisive in encouraging indigenous producers and service providers across all sectors. This way, we create a market for indigenous products, build confidence in our economy and easily attract international investors. The way we treat our local investors will determine how many foreign investors we can attract,” he stressed.
Ekeh also urged the President to activate the suspended national census because “Nigeria has already made substantial investment in the programme with the acquisition of critical technologies and training of personnel”, explaining that allowing those systems to lie fallow would lead to huge waste.
He said Nigeria needs a credible national headcount now more than at any time given the flaws and logistics challenges that attended the distribution of palliatives across the nation, adding “a credible database is key for decision-making for planners, policy makers and investors.”
While stressing the need to bring the suspended census to a closure, he advised the government to release the over 500,000 units of Tablet PCs used during the census to different educational institutions nationwide after the headcount to enable the students acquire relevant digital skills that will make them globally competitive.
News
INTERPOL Report Shows Cybercrime is West, East African Most Dominant Security Concern

Cybercrime has emerged as a dominant security concern across Africa, with more than 30 percent of all reported crimes in Western and Eastern regions linked to cyber activity, according to the newly released 2025 Africa Cyberthreat Assessment Report by INTERPOL.
The report, based on data from African member states and private sector partners, reveals that two-thirds of surveyed countries describe cybercrime as constituting a medium to high share of total criminal cases.
This highlights how cyber-enabled criminal activity is evolving rapidly across the continent. The report identified alarming spikes in scam attempts, with some countries witnessing a 3,000 percent increase in suspected scam notifications in the past year.
Neal Jetton, INTERPOL’s Cyber Crime Director, warned that the threat landscape is evolving faster than enforcement responses.
“This fourth edition of the INTERPOL African Cyber Threat Assessment provides a vital snapshot of the current situation, informed by operational intelligence, extensive law enforcement engagement, and strategic private-sector collaboration.
“It paints a clear picture of a threat landscape in flux, with emerging dangers like AI-driven fraud that demand urgent attention. No single agency or country can face these challenges alone,” Jetton stated.
In the past year, suspected scam notifications rose by up to 3,000 per cent in some African countries, according to data from Kaspersky, one of several private sector partners that work with INTERPOL’s cybercrime directorate
Online scams, particularly through phishing, are the most frequently reported cybercrimes across the continent. Ransomware attacks and Business Email Compromise (BEC) incidents are also increasing, particularly in Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, and Egypt.
“Ransomware detections in Africa also rose in 2024, with South Africa and Egypt suffering the highest number, at 17,849 and 12,281 detections respectively, according to data from Trend Micro, followed by other highly digitised economies such as Nigeria (3,459) and Kenya (3,030),” it stated.
Incidents included attacks on critical infrastructure, such as a breach at Kenya’s Urban Roads Authority (KURA), and on government databases, such as hacks of Nigeria’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the report stated.
News
GSK to Slash Cost of Malaria Jab to Less than $5

The manufacturers of the world’s first malaria vaccine are set to slash the price by more than half by 2028 to less than$5 per dose.
The manufacturers of the shot, known as RTS,S, said a phased reduction in cost would begin immediately, with an ultimate aim to reduce the price to less than $5.
The announcement could hardly come at a more critical moment.
Gavi, a major vaccination initiative which funds immunisations in the world’s poorest countries, is facing a major budget crunch.
In Brussels on Wednesday, Gavi’s replenishment event raised $9 billion to fund immunisation programmes over the next five years. While this sounds like a huge sum, it’s significantly less than the $11.9bn the group had been aiming for.
Governments around the world are cutting development spending dramatically.
The UK, for instance, cut its contribution to Gavi by 40 per cent in real terms, telling The Telegraph it was prioritising defence, while the US has pledged nothing at all.
Though America previously gave Gavi roughly $300m a year, the country’s new health secretary claimed without evidence that the organisation was ignoring vaccine safety.
The announcement from the British pharmaceutical giant GSK and Indian drugmaker Bharat Biotech will therefore be a relief to those trying to balance the books.
In a statement the companies said the price reduction demonstrated their “commitment to Gavi”, and was “driven by process improvements, expanded production capacity, cost-effective manufacturing, and minimal profit margins”.
By the time the price has fallen to below $5 per dose, a technology transfer agreement means Bharat will have taken over production, though GSK will continue to supply the adjuvant piece of the shot.
“For us, this is more than a cooperation, it’s a promise,” said Dr Krishna Ella, executive chairman of Bharat Biotech International Limited.
“By joining forces with GSK, and working closely with Gavi, and the WHO [World Health Organization], we are taking a real step toward closing the gap between vaccine supply and the urgent needs of children at risk of malaria.”
Each year, malaria still kills 500,000 people – the vast majority of them children aged five and under in sub-Saharan Africa.
According to WHO estimates, cases and deaths fell significantly between 2000 and 2015, but progress has since stalled.
Some have high hopes that RTS,S, as well as another vaccine called R21 developed by Oxford University, could prove critical in efforts to turn the tide.
In clinical trials, RTS,S reduced hospitalisations for severe malaria by 30 per cent.
But critics say the shot is too expensive and not as effective as existing tools, such as bed nets and antimalarials.
The reduction in price will bring it more in line with the cost of R21, which is priced at around $4 per dose.
Yet the cost will still add up, as both jabs require multiple shots. For RTS,S, this means four doses – the first three doses are given monthly, starting around five months of age, while the fourth dose is administered 15-18 months later.
Both jabs “provide reasonable short term efficacy – over about a year – so are a useful addition to other measures,” said Professor Nick White, a professor at the Mahidol-Oxford Tropical Medicine Research Unit who specialises in malaria.
“In the past GSK had limited production capacity – one of the reasons the R21 was developed. So reducing the price will be good and the two comparable vaccines can fight it out in the market place.”
A spokesperson for Gavi said the alliance’s goal is to “create sustainable demand backed by predictable financing so that companies – like GSK and Bharat – can continue investing in technology transfer and other efficiencies that bring down costs, thus making critical vaccines more available and affordable.
GSK’s decision to lower its prices, the spokesperson added, is “an important step for the global malaria vaccination programme, and our ability to make this lifesaving tool more widely available to those who need it the most”.
Gavi plans to help fund RTS,S in 12 African countries by the end of this year.
Previously, GSK has said it will supply up to 18 million vaccine doses between 2023 and the end of this year.
The company plans to supply 15 million doses annually from 2026-2028, a spokesperson told Reuters.
News
Rack Centre Signs Collocation Deal with TelCables Nigeria

Rack Centre, West Africa’s Tier III carrier- and cloud-neutral data centre, has struck a collocation agreement with TelCables Nigeria, an Angola Cables subsidiary.
TelCables Nigeria is delivering its high-capacity network and cloud infrastructure, as well as four international subsea cable systems (SACS, MONET, SEBRAS, and EllaLink), directly into Rack Centre’s regional carrier ecosystem as part of the agreement.
According to Angola Cables, the move provides reliable, low-latency south-bound routes to Europe, the Americas, and Latin America, reducing the danger of future cable disruptions along West Africa’s coast and enabling next-generation cloud services across the continent.
“Our unique Africa – to – Latin America route via SACS, combined with MONET, SEBRAS and EllaLink, gives customers the lowest – latency paths to the Americas and Europe,” said Fernando Fernandes, CEO of TelCables Nigeria.
“Businesses in latency sensitive sectors: financial services, content delivery and real-time communications will experience faster transactions, reduced lag and an enhanced user experience.
“By hosting at Rack Centre we also localise Clouds2Africa resources, price them in naira, and remove expensive ingress/egress charges or FX exposure.”
Rack Centre said its 13.5MW data centre campus designed with its recently launched LGS2 facility that delivers a design PUE of 1.35 and powered from sustainable energy sources, already hosts 70+ carriers, ISPs and network operators.
Lars Johannisson, CEO of Rack Centre, commented: “Adding a global operator of Angola Cables’ calibre through TelCables Nigeria dramatically deepens our connectivity fabric.
“We can now offer 99.95 % SLA routes to more destinations, enabling enterprises, governments and cloud providers to meet performance and data-residency requirements while keeping traffic local.”
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