Time for youths in Nigerian Leadership – Ifeanyi Fortune

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The time is near for a change of leadership in Nigeria. A new era of fresh ideas eager the redesign the political landscape of our country. We cannot hide our appreciation to our fathers who set the foundation for our freedom. Which implies we owe them much in service and contributing our own quota in our own time. But to be realistic, their time is thinning to vacate the leadership of our country, Nigeria.

 Because every father prays for his son(s) to be greater than him and took over the baton of power when mature. You’ll agree with me that our fathers know that we have write our own destiny having watched them build till now. Yet I refuse to speculate that they’ve refuse to relinguish position of authority or have we not demanded our rightful responsibility to prove to them that we are now ready to lead.

Japan To Provide $2 Billion To Africa Resources Projects

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Japan will provide $2 billion worth of financial support over five years to back Japanese firms’ resources development projects in Africa, media reported on Saturday. Japan’s Trade Minister Toshimitsu Motegi made the announcement at the Africa-Japan Ministerial Meeting for Resources Development held in Tokyo on Saturday, Japanese news agencies Kyodo and Jiji said. The financial support is to be channeled through state-run Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corp (JOGMEC), reports said.

A number of Japanese firms have been participating in resources projects in Africa, including Mitsui & Co’s (8031.T) LNG project in Mozambique and Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp’s (5401.T) coking coal project also in Mozambique.

Ibinabo Fiberesima sets up foundation for families of accident victims

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The actress and Actors Guild of Nigeria president was involved in a car accident in 2006 which led to the death of a medical doctor. She hit his car along the Lekki/Epe Expressway in Lagos. She was sentenced to five years imprisonment for manslaughter in 2009 but only spent a few months there. She came out of prison a completely changed woman, bidding farewell to alcohol, cigarettes and partying. The single mother of three who is now a born again Christian is setting up a foundation to cater for the welfare of families of accident victims. Ibinabo explains

“I do have a foundation which I’m setting up. In 2006, I had an accident and a medical doctor, Mr. Suraj Giwa died in the process. A lot of things went wrong, I was sent to jail because of the accident. It is quite painful, it’s taking me this long because I needed to find myself again. The foundation is going to be for the families of accident victims. I’m going to get people to talk to them and to heal their wounds. What I went through, I was healed by the grace of God.”

Ancient tree falls in Imo State, kills over 50 People

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An ancient tree (believed by some to be a tree of the gods) fell on Thursday May 16th, killing over 50 people at Umudagu Mbieri, Mbaitoli in Imo State. The Osisi Ukwu Uko, which has been in existence for over 200 years, fell during heavy rainstorm around 8pm Thursday night, collapsing on buildings, people selling their wares and customers buying good in a market under the tree. Those who didn't die lost body parts and are being treated at the hospital.

People in the community had for many years called for the removal of the tree over safety concerns but the community elders refused to chop the tree down arguing that it was an  ancestral landmark.  Some people in the village are speculating that the gods occupying the tree were angry with the villages over something and decided to strike. Urm, OK! See more photos after the Break.

Jonathan approves appointment of 12 new judges for Industrial Court

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Abuja - President Goodluck Jonathan has approved the appointment of 12 new Judges for the National Industrial Court of Nigeria (NIC).

This is contained in a statement issued in Abuja on Friday by Mr John Tergema, the Deputy Chief Registrar of the court.  They judges are; Justices Edith Agbakoba, Anthonia Ubaka, Olufunke Anuwe, John Peters, Oyejoju Oyewumi, Kenneth Amadi, Peter Lifu, Rakiya Haastrup, Waziri Abali, Rabi Gwadu, Lawal Mani and Ebeye Isele.

The statement said the appointment was sequel to the recommendation of the National Judicial Council (NJC).

Police confirm attack on Katsina police station

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Daura – Katsina State Police Command on Friday confirmed the death of five suspected gunmen who attacked two police stations and four banks on Thursday in Daura.

The Nigerian Army had earlier announced the death of three soldiers during the shooting.

Briefing newsmen in Daura, the Commissioner of Police, Alhaji Abdullahi Magaji, said one of the suspects was killed on Thursday night while the other four were trailed and killed on Mani-Dutsi road around 9.30 a.m. on Friday.

Army condemns use of fake military camouflage by Boko Haram members

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The Nigerian Army on Friday in Abuja decried the rate at which the Boko Haram insurgents have been using fake military camouflage to attack civilians.  Maj.-Gen. Mobolaji Koleoso, the Chief of Civil Military Affairs of the Nigerian Army, said this while briefing newsmen on the security situation in the country.  He said the Army had observed with dismay the illegal possession and abuse of military camouflage by the Boko Haram insurgents.

 “This trend is indeed worrisome, hence the need to enlighten the public to be cautious and report suspicious persons using illegal camouflage, to relevant security agencies.  “A recent exchange of gun fire with the insurgents in the North Eastern part of the country which resulted in a large number of causalities on their side showed that the insurgents were dressed in fake military camouflage.

 “For the unsuspecting populace, these insurgents would have been misconstrued as soldiers of the Nigerian Army,’’ he added.

Anambra plans to shut down markets, companies over tax

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The Anambra Government on Friday warned that it would shut down more markets and corporate organisations if their nonchalant attitude toward payment of their taxes did not change.

 The state’s Chairman, Internal Revenue Services, Mr Nwanne Ejikeme, stated this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria  in Awka.  Ejikeme said, “We are also in the process of charging those who have refused to pay their taxes.

 “Very soon you will see that it is not just markets that will be closed, but also business centres, chambers, banks and corporate organisations.   “Even residents, who refuse to pay their taxes will not be spared.”

 According to him, the public ought to know that governance is not free of charge.

 He said that many people were yet to realise that they had a contribution to make to the development of their states.

Court disbands My Pikin company, jails employees 28 years

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A Federal High Court, Lagos has wound up Barewa Pharmaceutical Ltd, the manufacturer of My Pikin Baby Teething Mixture, which allegedly killed about 80 babies in 2008.

Justice Okechukwu Okeke, in his judgment on Friday, also sentenced two of company’s employees to a total of 28 years imprisonment.

Jonathan’s Aide Wants Dialogue With Boko Haram Sustained

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The Special Adviser to the President on Niger Delta Affairs, Kingsley Kuku has called for a continuation of dialogue with members of the Boko Haram sect despite the declaration of a State of Emergency in three northern states.

Mr Kuku said this while addressing past and present leaders of the National Association of Nigerians Students.

Recently, President Jonathan said the growing insecurity in Adamawa, Yobe and Borno states had compelled him to declare a state of emergence, exercising his powers as enshrined in Section 305 Subsection 1 of the Nigerian Constitution.

3 soldiers, several gunmen killed in Daura attack – Army

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Kaduna – The Nigerian Army on Friday confirmed that three soldiers were killed in an attack by gunmen in Daura, Katsina State.

Maj.-Gen. Garba Wahab, General Officer Commanding (GOC) 1 Division, Nigerian Army, who disclosed this to newsmen in Kaduna, said several of the attackers were also killed.

He said that the army and other security personnel had cordoned off three areas in the city and were conducting a house-to-house search “to fish out some of the wounded gunmen who forced their way into peoples’ homes’’’.

He also said that the army was coordinating with security agencies in Niger Republic as “80 to 90 per cent of these gun men are not Nigerians’’.

Mother Held Over ’5-Year-Old’ Frozen Babies

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The mother of two baby boys whose bodies were found after five years in a freezer in the basement of the supermarket where she worked, has been detained Russian police detained, investigators said on Thursday. The Investigative Committee said the boys were born alive, but died shortly afterwards from exposure. Their mother had kept the bodies in her refrigerator before moving them to the supermarket where she worked in western Russia.

Local police said that the owners of the supermarket were being questioned. “It should be clarified why over the course of five years no one in the management of the shop did anything regarding the contents of the freezer,” Itar Tass quoted a police source as saying.

Lagos State Introduces ''MERRIMENT TAX'' For Every Party Celebration ( What Do You Think?)

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Have you ever heard of merriment tax? Lagos State Government says residents of Lagos spend more than N1 billion on merriment and entertainment monthly.

The state Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, MrAdemorin Kuye, gave the figure at a news conference organised to mark Gov.Babatunde Fashola`s sixth year in office.

He said the figure was derived from a research recently conducted by the Ministry of Budgeting and Planning, which showed that the residents spent a lot of money on entertainment. Kuye lamented that the benefits of entertainment had not been fully tapped to boost revenue generation in terms of taxes. "There is merriment tax in the constitution, it is part of the rates local governments can collect. We have not fully utilised the benefit of the entertainment industry in this state. "Over N1 billion is spent monthly in Lagos state on entertainment, we have the records to confirm this and these people, how many of them pay tax?

The Tragic Proof That Sometimes Love Really CAN’T Conquer All

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Few love affairs can have been more intense than the one Rick and Leanne Clement shared. Rick was a soldier, a sergeant in the Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment, and his relationship with Leanne was punctuated by partings and reunions; by yearning and then passion.

But three years ago, Rick was critically injured while on duty in Afghanistan. He stepped on a Taliban mine while leading a foot patrol in Helmand Province and lost both his legs.  The injuries to his lower body were, quite simply, catastrophic. Rick, 33, was not only deprived of his s*x life and his chance to have children, he also ceased to feel any physical attraction for the woman he still adored. 

Loved: Despite their marriage Leanne has left Rick and the spacious four-bedroom home they shared in Blackpool because their relationship disintegrated after he stepped on a mine.

Over 900 CCTV Camera’s Deployed In Lagos

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Over 900 closed-circuit television, CCTV, cameras have been deployed in Lagos State and already supplying video footages to relevant agencies, State Commissioner for Science and Technology, Mr. Adebiyi Mabadeje, has said. Mabadeje, at a briefing in Alausa, Ikeja, Lagos, said that the current deployment of the CCTV by the Federal Government was not in conflict with the earlier efforts by the state government.

According to him, the state would soon embark on the pilot resident registration exercise, which would enable the government to collect, collate and manage a database of all residents. He noted that the state government had advertised and called for the expression of interest by private investors with requisite expertise and funding for “a world-class’’ forensic laboratory under a Public-Private Partnership in which the government will provide land in Badagry.

Mabadeje stressed that the state government expects to receive inputs from the Federal Government and security agencies in executing the project, which he claimed would save the state hard-earned foreign exchange expended in carrying out forensic investigations and studies on crime and health-related matters overseas.

Borno: Troops capture Boko Haram’s camp

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Early reports of military operations in the three North-East states under emergency rule, on Thursday, indicated that Nigerian soldiers had recaptured three of the local government areas where insurgents had been in control in northern Borno.

The names of the recaptured councils could not be confirmed out of the lot in possession of the violent Islamic sect, Boko Haram. The areas where the insurgents were said to have been in total control before the military operation launched on Thursday were Marte, Magumeri, Mobbar, Gubio, Guzamala, Abadamin, Kukawa, Kaga, Nganzai and Monguno.

Also, the troops reportedly invaded and took over a training camp of the violent Islamic sect, Boko Haram, known as Sambisa on the outskirts of Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, in the early hours of Thursday.  Borno as well as Adamawa and Yobe states fell under emergency rule by presidential proclamation on Tuesday.

President Goodluck Jonathan said all efforts to bring the violence in the area under control had failed hence the need to use force to force insurgents out of the states, especially Borno where the President said insurgents had taken control of the northern part.

14yr old girl killed & set on fire by boyfriend because he thought she was pregnant

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Shaniesha Forbes, 14, (pictured above) was killed by her 20 year old boyfriend who then burnt her body and dumped her remains on a beach just because he thought she was pregnant.

The family of the 14-year-old Brooklyn girl who was allegedly killed by her boyfriend and dumped on a beach blasted him this morning for cowardly slaying her after he thought she was pregnant.

Police had arrested Christian Ferdinand, 20, in Maine on Tuesday, where he had fled after he allegedly suffocated Shaniesha Forbes, 14, and burnt her body before dumping the remains at Gerritsen Beach.

"On the record, she wasn’t pregnant at all. As a 20-year-old man, that is something you could easily find out,” said her devastated cousin Kerry-Anne Thomas. “You had the courage and the balls to kill her and bring her body, and lay her on the beach. But you couldn’t go to the pharmacy to buy a pregnancy test to find out if it was actually true.”

4 in 1 Ugly Scenario: A Woman Jailed In Dubai After she was r-aped by three heavy men of her colleagues.

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In June 2008 Alicia Gali took a job in the UAE at a luxury hotel operated in Dubai by one of the world’s biggest hotel chains, Starwood.

Alicia Gali  was using her laptop in the hotel’s staff bar when her drink was spiked. According to this report, she:

Awoke to a nightmare beyond belief: she had been savagely defiled by three of her colleagues.

Alone and frightened, she took herself to hospital.

What she did not know is that under the UAE’s strict sharia laws, if the perpetrator does not confess, a r*pe cannot be proved without the testimony of four adult Muslim male witnesses.

UN prepares report: Infinite usage of drones changes the "laws of war"

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The United Nations Human Rights Council is preparing a report covering all aspects of the use of combat drones in the fight against terrorism. This document must be ready in the second half of this year. Military experts, legal experts and human rights organizations are becoming more and more concerned over the fact that the use of drones is limited by nothing at all, and international legal experts believe that combat drones dramatically change the “laws of war”.
Ben Emmerson, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counterterrorism headed the work on this document. According to him, the use of drones is regulated neither by the international law nor by any laws.
Continue Reading After The Break

7 Dead As Building Collapses In Umuahia, Abia

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Abuja - Seven people were killed when a building under construction collapsed in Umuahia in the Abia state capital. Efforts by the Red Cross Society and other rescue operations are on-going to rescue people trapped in the building that is situated at the Agbama Housing Estate.  This is the latest in a series of recent incidents of buildings collapsing worldwide. There was no immediate comment from the officials attending the scene.

Last week, several people were killed when a church building collapsed in Lagos.