World Sight Day: 400,000+ Beneficiaries, One Priceless Gift

World Sight Day: 400,000+ Beneficiaries, One Priceless Gift

A child can't read, a trader struggles to recognise a customer, and an older person needs help finding their way home. When it becomes hard to see, it also becomes difficult to learn, earn, and live independently. Sometimes an eye test, glasses, or prompt treatment can help. But what happens when that care isn't available?

That is the need First City Monument Bank (FCMB) and the Tulsi Chanrai Foundation (TCF) set out to address when they launched Priceless Gift of Sight in 2009. By July 2024, the programme had provided free eye care to over 400,000 Nigerians, including eye tests, optical services, surgeries, and disease management.

Last week’s World Sight Day commemoration brought the next challenge into focus: how to make care accessible to more people—and keep it available.

FCMB held a roundtable meeting with the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, through the National Eye, Ear and Sensory Functions Health Programme, and TCF to discuss partnerships and sustainable funding.

The task is practical. Eye tests need to lead to treatment. Clinics need skilled people and functioning equipment. Patients need support to complete their care.

After more than 15 years of partnership, the goal remains close to everyday life: helping more people see a lesson, serve a customer or find their way home.

BREAKING: FG Announces 30-Day Discount On NNPC Petrol

BREAKING: FG Announces 30-Day Discount On NNPC Petrol

Bola Tinubu Bola Tinubu Access Services

The Federal Government has announced a 30-day discount on petrol sold by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), with public transport operators to receive priority under the arrangement.Shop African Art

 Politics Nigeria reports that the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, disclosed this on Thursday at a press briefing on fuel prices and subsidy-related issues in Abuja.

Oyedele explained that the measure was not a return to petroleum subsidy but an arrangement through which the government would make petrol available at cost for the period.

“We are offering a discount on petrol dispensed by NNPC limited for the next 30 days in the first instance with priority for public transporters nationwide. So, it’s not a subsidy, government is just saying we sell to you at cost,” the minister said.

The announcement followed growing pressure from organised labour over the impact of rising petrol prices and transportation costs on workers and households across the country.

Recall that the Nigeria Labour Congress had demanded an immediate reduction in the price of petrol, a nationwide wage award for workers and the commencement of negotiations for a new national minimum wage.

In an Independence Day statement signed by its President, Joe Ajaero, on Wednesday, September 30, 2026, the NLC warned that Nigerians were facing what it described as a worsening survival crisis.

The union said persistent inflation had significantly reduced the purchasing power of workers, while higher petrol and transport costs had contributed to increases in the prices of food, school fees, rent and other basic necessities.Track Exec Orders

“We stand at the crossroads of a full-scale survival crisis. The real value of wages has been devoured by structural inflation. Petrol now sells at ₦1,430 per litre or higher in major cities and far more in remote areas,” the NLC said.

The labour union also revisited the Federal Government’s decision to remove petrol subsidy in May 2023, describing the resulting increase in fuel prices as a “systematic assault on the working class.”

It questioned the government over the use of funds saved from the subsidy removal, arguing that Nigerians had yet to see the infrastructure and social services it said were promised as part of the reform.Shop African Art

“Government claimed subsidy removal would free up resources for infrastructure and social services. Three years later, petrol prices have multiplied several times over, yet the promised infrastructure and social services remain mirages. Where exactly did the subsidy savings go? Nigerians deserve an answer, and they deserve it now,” the NLC said.

The union further criticised the country’s continued dependence on imported refined petroleum products despite Nigeria’s status as Africa’s largest oil producer.

According to the NLC, dependence on imported products had exposed Nigerians, particularly workers, to fluctuations in international oil prices and intensified the pressure created by higher fuel costs.

The union identified a reduction in petrol prices as its first priority, arguing that transportation was one of the major channels through which increases in fuel prices translated into broader inflation.

“Without cutting this chain, any effort to ease the suffering of the people is futile,” it said.

Beyond fuel prices, the NLC demanded the immediate implementation of a nationwide wage award for workers across the federal, state and local governments.

Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele

Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele

It argued that the measure should be treated as an emergency response to declining real incomes rather than a welfare gesture.

“A wage award is not charity. It is an emergency intervention against the collapse of real income,” the union said.

The Federal Government’s latest announcement, however, comes against the backdrop of President Bola Tinubu’s continued defence of his administration’s economic reforms and rejection of calls for the restoration of petrol subsidy.

Tinubu, in his 66th Independence Day address last Thursday, maintained that the reforms introduced by his administration were producing results and argued against reversing the subsidy removal policy.Access Services

Upon assuming office in May 2023, Tinubu announced the removal of petrol subsidy as part of a broader package of economic reforms. The policy was followed by a sharp increase in the price of petrol and subsequent pressure on household incomes and transportation costs.

Atiku flays Tinubu’s desperate reintroduction of fuel subsidy, says move election driven Mr Atiku restated his commitment to making life affordable again.

Atiku flays Tinubu’s desperate reintroduction of fuel subsidy, says move election driven

Mr Atiku restated his commitment to making life affordable again.

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has condemned the Federal Government’s proposed 30-day fuel discount at NNPC stations, describing it as a desperate, temporary gesture that cannot repair the damage caused by the crushing cost of fuel.

In a statement issued by Phrank Shaibu, Director of Strategic Communication of the ADC Presidential Campaign Council, Atiku said the Tinubu administration’s attempt to dangle a fuel subsidy as bait for Nigerians was reckless, disgraceful and scandalous.

He said the same government had watched Nigerians endure excruciating hardship without offering meaningful relief. Now, as the election draws closer, President Tinubu is dangling a temporary discount at the very epicentre of the cost-of-living crisis that has tormented households and businesses.

“Atiku totally rejects this calendar-scheduled, election-laced subsidy package. Nigerians are not fools to be offered a month of discounted fuel after years of punishing prices and then expected to forget the hardship when the discount expires. This is shameless and heartless,” he said.

Atiku said the proposed 30-day discount was not an economic plan but a political bandage on a wound the government had helped create.

“What happens on Day 31? Nigerians wake up to the same brutal prices, the same punishing transport fares and the same rising cost of food. The government cannot manufacture relief for one month and expect Nigerians to applaud while the hardship remains,” he said.

He noted that the offer is limited to NNPC stations, while the government has yet to state how much motorists will save per litre or guarantee that any savings for transport operators will be passed on to passengers through lower fares.

The former vice president said the administration’s sudden reversal on this sensitive social welfare issue was itself an admission of guilt over the hardship Nigerians have endured. It also exposed the weakness of the government’s repeated claims that meaningful relief was impossible.

“This volte-face proves that the production-support proposal I have advanced is workable, achievable and not complicated. The Tinubu government and its spin doctors have tried to make it sound impossible, yet they are now reaching for a temporary subsidy-style intervention because the pain has become impossible to ignore,” Mr Atiku said.

He reiterated his proposal for capped and budgeted production support tied to fuel refined in Nigeria, with safeguards to ensure that the benefit reaches consumers and supports local refining.

“Nigerians need lasting relief, not a countdown to the return of hardship. Tinubu’s government cannot spend years telling Nigerians to endure, then offer 30 days of relief and call it a solution,” he said.

Mr Atiku restated his commitment to making life affordable again.

“Tinubu made life expensive. I will make life affordable again.”

Phrank Shaibu

Director of Strategic Communication

ADC Presidential Campaign Council

BREAKING: DRONES LOCATE KIDNAPPERS' HIDEOUT OF ABDUCTED NYSC MEMBERS IN IMO BUT MINES PLANTED AROUND THE AREA!

BREAKING: DRONES LOCATE KIDNAPPERS' HIDEOUT OF ABDUCTED NYSC MEMBERS IN IMO BUT MINES PLANTED AROUND THE AREA! 

The Imo State Commissioner of Police has broken silence on the search for the abducted NYSC members.

HIS WORDS:

"We have located the kidnappers' hideout with drones. But mines are planted around the area."

Let that sink in.

Technology has found them. Drones have seen them. But the enemy has booby-trapped the ground. They are not just hiding. They are waiting. They are prepared. They are daring us to come.

But hear this: they may have planted mines. They may have dug trenches. They may have set traps. But they cannot hide from the Nigerian security forces forever.

To the kidnappers you can run. You can trap the ground. But you cannot trap justice. We are coming. And when we come, there will be no escape.

This is not just a rescue mission. This is a statement. Nigeria will not abandon its children to criminals.

STAY STRONG. STAY HOPEFUL.

Traders Shocked As Aboki Returns Life Savings Of D£af Man Who passed ∆way At Ogbe-Ijoh Market

Traders Shocked As Aboki Returns Life Savings Of D£af Man Who passed ∆way At Ogbe-Ijoh Market

There was shock at the popular Ogbe-Ijoh Market after the savings of a deaf and mute trader who passed away yesterday were revealed.

The trader, who is well known in the market, was said to have been keeping all his daily earnings with an Aboki man for safekeeping for years.

After news of his dea**th spread yesterday, the Aboki man returned to the market today with all the money he had kept for him and handed it over to his family, leaving traders surprised at the amount he had saved.

Traders have praised the honesty of the Aboki man for returning the money intact, describing it as a rare act of integrity.

Traders Shocked As Aboki Returns Life Savings Of D£af Man Who passed ∆way At Ogbe-Ijoh Market

Traders Shocked As Aboki Returns Life Savings Of D£af Man Who passed ∆way At Ogbe-Ijoh Market

There was shock at the popular Ogbe-Ijoh Market after the savings of a deaf and mute trader who passed away yesterday were revealed.

The trader, who is well known in the market, was said to have been keeping all his daily earnings with an Aboki man for safekeeping for years.

After news of his dea**th spread yesterday, the Aboki man returned to the market today with all the money he had kept for him and handed it over to his family, leaving traders surprised at the amount he had saved.

Traders have praised the honesty of the Aboki man for returning the money intact, describing it as a rare act of integrity.

Traders Shocked As Aboki Returns Life Savings Of D£af Man Who passed ∆way At Ogbe-Ijoh Market

Traders Shocked As Aboki Returns Life Savings Of D£af Man Who passed ∆way At Ogbe-Ijoh Market

There was shock at the popular Ogbe-Ijoh Market after the savings of a deaf and mute trader who passed away yesterday were revealed.

The trader, who is well known in the market, was said to have been keeping all his daily earnings with an Aboki man for safekeeping for years.

After news of his dea**th spread yesterday, the Aboki man returned to the market today with all the money he had kept for him and handed it over to his family, leaving traders surprised at the amount he had saved.

Traders have praised the honesty of the Aboki man for returning the money intact, describing it as a rare act of integrity.