As part of efforts to ensure sustained growth for the Keystone Bank, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has put in place a new board of directors for the lender.

The development was made public on Wednesday in a statement by the commercial bank.

ALSO READ: Floods Displace 404 Million Students Worldwide – World Bank

From the statement, it was gathered that Lady Ada Chukwudozie has been appointed as the new board chairman, alongside five other non-executive directors, made up of Abdul-Rahman Esene, Fola Akande, Akintola Ayodeji Olusoji, Obijiaku Samuel, and Senator Farouk Bello.

The CBN also named two new executive directors, Ladi Oluwole and Abubakar Usman Bello.

Lady Chukwudozie, a prominent figure in Nigeria’s corporate sector, brings nearly three decades of experience in business strategy, management, and administration.

Her expertise cuts across multiple industries, including De-Endy Industrial Company Limited, Dozzy Group, the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria, and Vogue Afrique Magazine.

On his part, Esene, comes with over 43 years of experience in banking, investment management, and corporate finance.

He has held leadership roles in major institutions such as Fidelity Bank, Afrinvest, and Global Arbitrage International Inc.

Similarly, Akande boasts over 25 years of experience in legal, compliance, and risk management. She had worked with global brands like Cadbury, Stanbic Chartered Bank and Shell.

While Olusoji has a distinguished 30-year career in accounting, finance, and business development, having served at institutions such as Sterling Bank, Access Bank, and Intercontinental Bank.

For the board position, Obijiaku comes with more than 35 years of experience in banking and treasury operations, has left a significant mark on Nigeria’s financial sector, previously working with Zenith Bank and Fidelity Bank.

Senator Bello is a seasoned banker with over 20 years of experience, has led initiatives across both the public and private sectors, including the National Assembly and Guaranty Trust Bank.

In the same vein, the two new executive directors bring their vast expertise to the table.

Oluwole, the new Executive Director of Risk Management, comes with over two decades of experience in credit and enterprise risk management, including previous roles at Bank of America.

On his part, Bello, Executive Director for the Northern Directorate, has extensive experience managing corporate, retail, and public sector clients.

On the appointments, Managing Director/CEO, Keystone Bank, Hassan Imam, expressed confidence in the new board members, stating that their wealth of experience would play a crucial role in the bank’s continued repositioning and growth.

“We are pleased to welcome the new chairman, non-executive directors, and executive directors to the board of Keystone Bank. We are confident that their extensive experience will be invaluable as we continue to reposition the bank to seize emerging economic opportunities while maintaining strong corporate governance and providing our customers with a secure and reliable banking experience,” Imam said.

Former U.S. President Donald Trump, alongside his sons and several entrepreneurs, introduced a cryptocurrency platform late Monday, though few details were shared.

During a two-hour online event, the Trump family’s crypto initiative remained vague, with the primary offering being digital “tokens” that allow users to participate in platform decisions by voting.

The event went ahead as planned despite an apparent assassination attempt against Trump on Sunday at his golf club in West Palm Beach, Florida.

READ MORE: Adeleke Hosts Ife Dev’t Board, Moots Better Infrastructure For Ile Ife

World Liberty Financial intends to offer services based on so-called decentralized finance, a mechanism that eliminates the need for an intermediary such as a bank to carry out transactions with a third party, the politics-laced discussion indicated.

Decentralized finance, or DeFi, is based on so-called blockchain technology, which keeps a theoretically open but tamper-proof record of transactions.

World Liberty Financial will enable users to lend or borrow cryptocurrencies to or from one another, a service already offered by many platforms, one of the best-known of which is Aave.

The former president’s son Donald Trump Jr. touted this as “the start of a financial revolution,” during a session streamed on X, formerly Twitter.

Zachary Folkman and Chase Herro, the linchpins of the project and established cryptocurrency entrepreneurs, said the platform would primarily use “stablecoins”, which are backed by a traditional currency, most often the dollar.

As a result, they are free from the sometimes brutal fluctuations experienced by digital currencies untethered to real-world money.

World Liberty Financial wants to attract the masses to cryptocurrencies, creating a platform easily accessible to people, Folkman said.

Project leaders said they would sell tokens that give owners the right to take part in the governance of the platform, with 63 per cent of them offered to the public, 20 per cent going to the founding team and the rest set aside as rewards for users.

No timetable for the project was disclosed.

During his presidency, Trump labeled cryptocurrencies as a scam, but he has since drastically shifted his stance, now portraying himself as a “pro-Bitcoin president” if re-elected in November.

In taking this position, he opposes the Biden administration, which is viewed as advocating for increased regulation of the crypto industry.

The Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) has urged the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC Ltd) to ensure that locally manufactured petroleum products are not sold higher than imported fuel.

The IPMAN took the position on Monday, while reacting to new pricing regime release by the state oil major as it commenced lifting refined products from the Dangote Petroleum Refinery, Lagos.

According to the IPMAN, such a disparity would be counterproductive to Nigeria’s drive for energy self-sufficiency with the possibility of impacting negatively on consumers and marketers alike.

ALSO READ: NNPC Confirms Petrol Purchase From Dangote In Dollars, Naira Transactions Commence Oct

The IPMAN noted that the pricing strategy for locally refined petrol should reflect the advantages of domestic production, which should offer Nigerians a more affordable option.

The association maintained that maintaining competitive pricing was crucial for the success of the Dangote Refinery and for fostering a sustainable fuel market in the country.

The National Welfare Officer, IPMAN, John Kekeocha, shared these view on Channels Television’s The Morning Brief breakfast programme, monitored by Biztellers.

He pondered, “If NNPC can sell Dangote products higher than the imported products then it doesn’t make sense. What is the celebration we are having all these while then?”

Recall that the NNPC Ltd began loading the first batch of petrol from the Dangote Refinery on Sunday, saying it got petrol at N898 per litre from the private refinery.

Before lifting petrol from the Dangote Refinery on Sunday, NNPC Ltd retail outlets in Lagos were selling petrol for around N855 but said a litre of Dangote petrol would henceforth sell for N950 per litre in Lagos and N1,019 in Borno.

However, Dangote Refinery denied selling petrol to the NNPC Ltd at N898.

In a statement late Sunday, Dangote Group’s spokesman, Anthony Chiejina, described the claim by the NNPCL as “misleading and mischievous”.

Cheijina asserted, “It should also be noted that we sold the products to NNPCL in dollars with a lot of savings against what they are currently importing. With this action, there will be petrol in every local government area of the country regardless of their remote nature.”

The NNPC Ltd insisted that it got petrol from Dangote Refinery at N898 per litre and challenged the latter to release the price it sold petrol.

To drive the point home, the state oil major released a breakdown of pricing it sells Dangote petrol at its filling stations across the country.

Last December, Dangote, Africa’s leading industrialist, commenced operations at his $20bn facility sited in Lagos with 350,000 barrels a day.

The refinery, which was initially bogged by regulatory battles, hopes to achieve its full capacity of 650,000 barrels per day by the end of the year.

The refinery started with the supply of diesel and aviation fuel to marketers in Nigeria before progressing to petrol.

Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, faces energy challenges, with all its state-owned refineries non-operational. The country is heavily reliant on imported refined petroleum products, with the state-run NNPC being the major importer of the essential commodities.

Fuel queues are commonplace in the country. Prices of petrol tripled since the removal of subsidy in May 2023, from around N200/litre to over N1000/litre, compounding the woes of the citizens who power their vehicles, and generating sets with petrol, no thanks to decades-long epileptic electricity supply.