tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11331647359020462072020-08-11T07:45:59.455+01:00AFRICANET.COM.NGThe African BlogNews Network - The No.1 Nigeria Portal With Africa Source of News.
247 Update For Global News, Latest News, Entertainment, Politics, Celebrity, Health, Sport, Country local and International newsochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.comBlogger1595125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-89048290002646694672020-08-10T14:00:00.001+01:002020-08-10T14:51:36.747+01:00Ethiopian minister suspended from ruling party organ<h2 style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_kRO7qQV6JY/XzFP9xbOBdI/AAAAAAAAFek/1Vo-y6TRKKkdwIW1O7zOMt844ECYpz2HgCLcBGAsYHQ/s300/Mr%2BLemma.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a> <span style="font-weight: normal;">Ethiopian De-fence Minister Lemma Megerssa and two other top officials have been temporarily suspended from the ruling Prosperity Party’s central committee.</span><br /></h2><p style="text-align: left;"> Mr Lemma was once a close ally of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and a key figure in the country’s political and economic reform over the past few years.<br /><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_kRO7qQV6JY/XzFP9xbOBdI/AAAAAAAAFek/1Vo-y6TRKKkdwIW1O7zOMt844ECYpz2HgCLcBGAsYHQ/s300/Mr%2BLemma.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_kRO7qQV6JY/XzFP9xbOBdI/AAAAAAAAFek/1Vo-y6TRKKkdwIW1O7zOMt844ECYpz2HgCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Mr%2BLemma.jpg" /></a><br /> Prior to being appointed as a de-fence minister he was the head of the country’s most-populous state, Oromia.<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_kRO7qQV6JY/XzFP9xbOBdI/AAAAAAAAFek/1Vo-y6TRKKkdwIW1O7zOMt844ECYpz2HgCLcBGAsYHQ/s300/Mr%2BLemma.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a><br /><br /> But last November, Mr Lemma publicly criticized the prime minister’s efforts to reorganize and rebrand the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) - a coalition of four ethnic based parties that has been in power since the early 1990s.<br /><br /> The EPRDF was renamed as the Prosperity Party.<br /><br /> He also cast doubts on Mr Abiy’s philosophy of Medemer (coming together).<br /><br /> The announcement of his suspension comes after the Oromia wing of the ruling party held a two-day summit in the wake of ethnic and religious violence that claimed the lives of more than 170 people.<br /><br /> A spokesperson for the party accused Mr Lemma of disregarding the party and his duties.<br /><br /> It is not yet clear if Mr Lemma will continue holding the position of defence minister.<br /><br /> Teyba Hassen, who was Mr Lemma’s deputy when he was head of Oromia state, is also among those suspended for reasons that are related to the recent violence, the spokesperson said.</p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-90356660796604177202020-08-10T13:40:00.001+01:002020-08-10T13:40:01.138+01:00BBNaija2020: "I Want To Kiss You" - Dorathy to Brighto<h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"> BBNaija lockdown housemates, Dorathy and Brighto being a couple might come as a surprise to many, but that seems likely to happen, after Dora disclosed that she would like to kiss him.</span><br /></h2><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fVJkWbL_vM8/XzE6TMsWu3I/AAAAAAAAFeM/iFtefQN7_rcmVwg3MdtTzsRMSRlgWQZ_QCLcBGAsYHQ/s904/Dorathy%2Band%2Bbrighto.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="904" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fVJkWbL_vM8/XzE6TMsWu3I/AAAAAAAAFeM/iFtefQN7_rcmVwg3MdtTzsRMSRlgWQZ_QCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/Dorathy%2Band%2Bbrighto.JPG" width="640" /></a></div><p><br />As the house continues to get interesting, we have seen Nengi and Ozo have some interest, while Erica, Kiddwaya and Laycon in a triangle. Now Dorathy and Brighto might be the trending.<br /><br />According to Dorathy, she wasn’t pleased with Brighto for turning down her advances when she made her move on him.<br /></p><p><br />This was after Brighto told show host Ebuka Uchendu that Dorothy has feelings for Ozo and that there seems to be a love triangle existing between her, Ozo and Nengi.<br /><br />After the discussion with Ebuka, Dorothy expressed displeasure at what Brighto said about her.<br /><br />Dora could be heard telling Brighto the kiss she wanted from him during the Saturday night party was real and it wasn’t because she was drunk.<br /><br />She stated that she felt offended Brighto denied her t</p><p>hat kiss that moment she wanted it.<br /><br /><strong>Dorathy Said:</strong><br /><br /><em></em></p><blockquote><em>“You offended me Bright because we had a discussion last night and you didn’t take me seriously because you thought I was drunk.<br /><br />“I remember everything, I meant every word I said, including the part I said I wanted to kiss you.<br /><br />“Everyone was shocked, but I said I don’t know, I can’t explain.”</em></blockquote><p></p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-40555990766143205302020-08-10T13:00:00.003+01:002020-08-10T13:00:12.237+01:00Kano launches project to save Nigeria $1.5b spent on milk importation<h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">On Sunday revealed was made that Nigeria disburse $1.3 billion to $1.5 billion annually on importation of milk and other dairy products.</span></h2><p><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TkfXtTNLaXQ/XzEfKVuquQI/AAAAAAAAFeA/ZrSxD647ICU2zay-VZtkVd6DNhVx5omggCLcBGAsYHQ/s275/milk.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TkfXtTNLaXQ/XzEfKVuquQI/AAAAAAAAFeA/ZrSxD647ICU2zay-VZtkVd6DNhVx5omggCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/milk.jpg" /></a>To address the swing, which has caused continued capital flight, the Kano State Agro Pastoral Development Project is investing heavily in local milk production and processing to fast-track the development of indigenous dairy industry for economic growth.<br /><br />The state’s Project Coordinator Ibrahim Garba Muhammad said the <i>“continued importation of processed milk and its products is economically harmful to the Nigerian economy”.</i><br /><br />Garba stated this during the weekend when he hosted the Coordinator of Raw Materials Research and Development Council of Nigeria (RMRDC), Hambali Muhammad, at the project office in Kano.<br /><br />A statement by the Project Communication Specialist, Ameen Yassar, said the Kano State Agro Pastoral Development Project is partnering RMRDC and other research institutions to revitalise the economy.<br /><br />The statement explained that the Agro project will train herdsmen and vendors on basic hygiene and best practices in milk production and processing to add value to their products.<br /><br />It also said the project would engage, in large and community scale, fodder production that will help herdsmen settle down without migrating seasonally in search of pastures.<br /><br /></p><blockquote>According to the Central Bank of Nigeria “<i>the country spends between $1.3 billion to $1.5 billion on importation of milk and other dairy products yearly.</i></blockquote><br /><blockquote><i>“The gap between supply and demand for dairy products in Nigeria is widening by the day. Of this, we have the potential to produce enough milk that will serve our population and even export to other countries. But we must invest appropriately.<br /><br />“So, under this project, we are approaching the issue from different angles. We are constructing 200 milk collection centers to supply high quality, safe and adequate raw milk required by dairy processing firms and, indeed, the general public,”</i> Muhammad said.</blockquote><br /><br />He listed another area of focus as insemination of cows and small ruminants fattening to improve the quality and quantity of milk, meat and leather products in Kano State.<br /><br />The coordinator said the project is keen to gain from the expertise of the Raw Materials Research and Development Council of Nigeria in the establishment of milk collection centers, as well as in the areas of meat and leather development.<br /><br />RMRDC’s Coordinator Hambali Muhammad urged the management of the Agro Pastoral Development Project to use the agricultural research findings of his organization to achieve its vision and mission.<p></p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-91055468066722601112020-08-10T13:00:00.001+01:002020-08-10T13:00:15.345+01:00Sudan floods: 20 dead, 13 injured in Sudan floods<h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Not less than 20 people were killed and 13 others wounded on Sunday yesterday in torrential rains and flooding, the latest victims of days of flooding in Sudan, the civil defence report.</span></h2><p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hsXmLCTsgH0/XzEZ6fF3jVI/AAAAAAAAFd0/k_Im6IhU6aUz-ObfNZouBPSYqe6ACa29gCLcBGAsYHQ/s885/dead%252C%2B13%2Binjured%2Bin%2BSudan%2Bfloods.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="440" data-original-width="885" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hsXmLCTsgH0/XzEZ6fF3jVI/AAAAAAAAFd0/k_Im6IhU6aUz-ObfNZouBPSYqe6ACa29gCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/dead%252C%2B13%2Binjured%2Bin%2BSudan%2Bfloods.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo source: PUNCH on Sudan flood<br /></td></tr></tbody></table> </p><p>According to PUNCH report, Heavy rains typically hit Sudan between June and October each year, and this week the country has been badly battered by the downpour.</p><p>“20 people have died and 13 have been injured while 345 houses were destroyed or badly damaged” across the country on yesterday Sunday incident, the civil defence stated According to PUNCH.</p><div class="code-block code-block-1" style="float: left; margin: 8px 8px 8px 0;"> </div><p>The latest toll brings to 35 the number of people killed since the end of July and to more than 7,000 the number of houses destroyed or damaged as a result of heavy rains and flooding.</p><p>The UN said on Wednesday that more than 50,000 people had been affected by the flooding.</p><p>The civil defence also reported Sunday that it had dispatched helicopters and supplies to eastern Sudan where a group of miners are stranded due to rising waters.</p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-20357587075761953452020-08-10T12:00:00.001+01:002020-08-10T12:00:08.879+01:00Man stabs neighbour to death over alleged promiscuity - Police Hunt<h2 style="text-align: left;"> <span style="font-weight: normal;">The Police Command in Lagos State has launched a hunt for a man, Adekunle Adeyemi, alleged to have stabbed his neighbor, Stanley Dickson, to death in the Grammar School, Ikorodu area of the state.</span></h2><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xeF707z4zSA/XrcEV1hJxiI/AAAAAAAAEqE/obCcIS99Y5UyF93rX-KulnUcP3bCIGc3gCPcBGAYYCw/s260/stab%2Bknife.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="194" data-original-width="260" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xeF707z4zSA/XrcEV1hJxiI/AAAAAAAAEqE/obCcIS99Y5UyF93rX-KulnUcP3bCIGc3gCPcBGAYYCw/s0/stab%2Bknife.jpg" /></a></div><p><br />Adeyemi, currently on the run, was accused of having an affair with a neighbor's wife, identified as Chisom Onuoha, an allegation which led to an argument in their apartment.<br /><br />The incident occurred on Red Block Street in the Grammar School area on July 30, 2020 and was reported to the Ikorodu Police Division.<br /><br />A police report obtained by our correspondent from the division noted that there was an altercation in the apartment over whether Adeyemi and Onuoha were having an affair with each other or not.<br /><br /></p><blockquote>The police said, <i>“A woman, Glory Dickson, came and reported that Adeyemi of the same address came to their room alleging that her husband, Stanley Dickson, told Chisom’s husband, Arinze Onuoha, that he (Adeyemi) was having an affair with his wife (Chisom).</i></blockquote><blockquote><i>“This led to an argument and confrontation and in the process; Adeyemi stabbed her husband with a knife on the left side of his chest. The victim was rushed to the Ikorodu General Hospital by sympathizers where he was confirmed dead. The body was brought back home. Hence the report; the action taken was that a team of detectives led moved to the scene and the victim was found already dead lying on the floor of his apartment.<br /><br />“The whole compound has been deserted. On observation of the victim, marks of violence were seen on the left side of the chest and photographs taken. The corpse was evacuated to the general hospital mortuary for an autopsy.”</i></blockquote><br /><br />The Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, SP Bala Elkana, confirmed the incident.<br /><br /><blockquote>He said, <i>“We have commenced investigation into the case. We have launched a manhunt for the suspect who fled the scene immediately after the incident.”</i></blockquote><p></p><br />ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-3618455436328394482020-08-10T11:30:00.001+01:002020-08-10T11:30:03.191+01:00Twitter shows interest in buying TikTok<h1 style="text-align: left;"> <span style="font-weight: normal;">Twitter Inc has approached TikTok’s Chinese owner ByteDance to express interest in acquiring the U.S. operations of the video-sharing app.</span><br /></h1><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QIuI-ube4YY/XzERGnoW5eI/AAAAAAAAFdg/nBC-Vmhx_Z0AFEDxK3K0Ow8HzDzMXRHkwCLcBGAsYHQ/s299/tiktok.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="299" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QIuI-ube4YY/XzERGnoW5eI/AAAAAAAAFdg/nBC-Vmhx_Z0AFEDxK3K0Ow8HzDzMXRHkwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/tiktok.png" /></a><br /></div><p> According to Reuters, the talks are ongoing, but experts raised doubts over Twitter’s ability to put together financing for a potential deal.<br /><br /> It is far from certain that Twitter would be able to outbid Microsoft Corp and complete such a transformative deal in the 45 days that U.S. President Donald Trump has given ByteDance to agree to a sale, the sources said on Saturday.<br /><br /> The news of Twitter and TikTok being in preliminary talks and Microsoft still being seen as the front-runner in bidding for the app’s U.S. operations was reported</p><p> earlier by the Wall Street Journal.<br /><br /> Twitter has a market capitalization of close to $30 billion, almost as much as the valuation of TikTok’s assets to be divested, and would need to raise additional capital to fund the deal, according to the sources.<br /><br /> “Twitter will have a hard time putting together enough financing to acquire even the U.S. operations of TikTok. It doesn’t have enough borrowing capacity”, said Erik Gordon, a professor at the University of Michigan.<br /><br /> “If it (Twitter) tries to put together an investor group, the terms will be tough. Twitter’s own shareholders might prefer that management focus on its existing business”, he added.<br /><br /> One of Twitter’s shareholders, private equity firm Silver Lake, is interested in helping fund a potential deal, one of the sources added.<br /><br /> Twitter has also privately made a case that its bid would face less regulatory scrutiny than Microsoft’s, and will not face any pressure from China given that it is not active in that country, the sources said.<br /><br /> TikTok has come under fire from U.S. lawmakers over national security concerns surrounding data collection.<br /><br /> Earlier this week, Trump unveiled bans on U.S. transactions with the China-based owners of messaging app WeChat and TikTok, escalating tensions between the two countries.</p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-10734439479954148942020-08-10T10:30:00.002+01:002020-08-10T10:30:13.161+01:00Senator Kashamu burial: Mourners defy COVID-19 regulations <h1 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"> The body of Buruji Kashamu was laid to rest yesterday Sunday around 12.45pm in his Ijebu-Igbo home in the Ijebu-North Local Government Area of Ogun State.</span></h1><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_N8JEhH79Is/XzEAavGumlI/AAAAAAAAFdA/RoZusheOf8EUTO0w3qTSY1hghkmSYWW6wCPcBGAYYCw/s640/Kashamu1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" height="240" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_N8JEhH79Is/XzEAavGumlI/AAAAAAAAFdA/RoZusheOf8EUTO0w3qTSY1hghkmSYWW6wCPcBGAYYCw/w320-h240/Kashamu1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p style="text-align: justify;"> Senator Buruji, who is in charge of Ogun East Senatorial District on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party in the 8th National Assembly, died on Saturday at the First Cardiology Consultants Hospital, Lagos, from COVID-19 complications.</p><div class="code-block code-block-1" style="float: left; margin: 8px 8px 8px 0;"> </div><p style="text-align: justify;">Mourners, who mob his country home, betrayed emotion as the body of their benefactor was brought out from his room for interment.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">When it was the time to bury Kashamu’s remains in an Islamic way, the mourners defied social distancing protocol to bid him farewell.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The crowd could not be controlled by security agents when the body was brought out of the building.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The Janazah prayer was led by the Grand Mufti of the League of Imams and Alfas, Ogun State, Sheik Mikail Rufia.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">In his sermon, Rufai described death as an inevitable end of all living beings.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The cleric described the late politician as a generous man, who placed highest premium on the welfare of the people of his community.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">He prayed for the repose of Kashamu’s soul and for the safety, protection and provision for the family he left behind.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The widow of the deceased, Susan, and the children wept uncontrollably as his body was lowered into the grave.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TC3gTiK04Og/XzEGGgc5PXI/AAAAAAAAFdI/LSIUY0JFBsAl6r2lNhPY94GUxJvaAbv3ACLcBGAsYHQ/s885/Mourners%2Bdefy%2BCOVID-19%2Bregulations%2Bas%2BKashamu%2Bis%2Bburied.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="440" data-original-width="885" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TC3gTiK04Og/XzEGGgc5PXI/AAAAAAAAFdI/LSIUY0JFBsAl6r2lNhPY94GUxJvaAbv3ACLcBGAsYHQ/s640/Mourners%2Bdefy%2BCOVID-19%2Bregulations%2Bas%2BKashamu%2Bis%2Bburied.png" width="640" /></a></div> <p></p><div class="code-block code-block-2" style="float: left; margin: 8px 8px 8px 0;"> </div><p style="text-align: justify;">Those present at the burial were the Ogun State Governor, Dapo Abiodun; the senator representing Ogun East, Lekan Mustapha; former Ogun State deputy governors, Senator Gbenga Kaka and Segun Adesegun; and the state Commissioner for Environment, Abiodun Abudu-Balogun.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Also at the burial was the former spokesperson for ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, Dr Reuben Abati, who was Kashamu’s running mate in the 2019 governorship election; as well as the Speaker of the state House of Assembly, Olakunle Oluomo.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Other dignitaries in attendance at the burial were the representative of the immediate-past governor of the state, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, Abdul-Majeed Ekelojumati; former Chairman of the Ijebu North Local Government Area, representatives of traditional rulers as well as leaders and members of the League of Imams and Alfas in the local government.</p><div class="code-block code-block-3" style="clear: both; margin: 8px 0;"></div><p style="text-align: justify;">Abiodun arrived at Kashamu’s home around 10.39am in company with some of his cabinet members.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Speaking with journalists, the governor described the deceased as a friend of 25 years.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">He also described Kashamu as a courageous, passionate and a cheerful giver, adding that the state’s political landscape would not be the same without him.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Abiodun said, “Senator Buruji was someone I have known for the past 25 years. He was very courageous, passionate and most importantly a cheerful giver, especially to the needy.</p> <p style="text-align: justify;">“His death is one too many to the people of Ogun State. The state’s political landscape will never be the same without him. We offer our deepest condolences on behalf of myself, my family and all the good people of Ogun State.”</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Kaka, in his tribute, described the death of Kashamu as a big loss, saying he lived his life in the way God wanted him to live.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">He asked God to forgive his shortcomings and grant him eternal rest.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Abati expressed concern that most of those who benefitted from Kashamu politically failed to show up at the burial.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Meanwhile, a National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, in a statement on Sunday by his media office, described Kashamu as a true grass-roots politician, who fought for his convictions.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">He said, “Senator Kashamu was also a good party man. He was unwavering in his support for his party, the PDP, through all the twists and turns of his political life. His passing is a big loss to the larger political family in Nigeria.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">“His passing has lengthened the grotesque list of important personalities that have been lost to the COVID-19 pandemic. It is also a sad reminder that the deadly virus remains very much with us.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">“I mourn with his family, particularly his wives, children and grandchildren. May Almighty Allah lay His hands of protection on them at this moment.”</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Also, the APC in Ogun State described Kashamu as a courageous politician, who gave his all to any cause he believed in.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The APC, in a statement by the Publicity Secretary of the state caretaker committee, Tunde Oladunjoye, commiserated with the family and members of the Peoples Democratic Party in the state over Kashamu’s death.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">“Even as a candidate, who just lost elections, he was quick to congratulate the winner, and also visited the Iperu country home of Prince Dapo Abiodun to congratulate him a day after the announcement of the 2019 governorship elections results,” the statement read in part.</p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-52457392513227178132020-08-10T10:08:00.000+01:002020-08-10T10:08:02.940+01:00BBNaija 2020: What I will do if I get evicted tonight - Nengi<p> Big Brother Naija 2020 participator Nengi, has revealed what she will do if she gets evicted from the ongoing BBNaija reality TV show tonight.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-y6H8NgaXFrw/XzENHZIREhI/AAAAAAAAFdU/ttuevh8kDNEpE3LCcJXS367TIkn36dK2gCLcBGAsYHQ/s300/Nengi.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="184" data-original-width="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-y6H8NgaXFrw/XzENHZIREhI/AAAAAAAAFdU/ttuevh8kDNEpE3LCcJXS367TIkn36dK2gCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Nengi.jpg" /></a></div><p> </p><p>In a diary session with Biggie hours before</p><p> eviction night, Nengi stated that she will focus on expanding her shoe line business if she gets evicted.<br /><br /> However, her goal before coming for the competition is to make it to the final.<br /><br /></p><blockquote> Nengi said: <i>“Sundays are always sad for me because I could leave or someone I’m close to; but I’m hopeful and staying strong for the best days.<br /><br /> “Before I came to this house, my goal is to be in finale and I’ve not achieved that.<br /><br /> “If I’m evicted tonight, I’ll expand my shoe line business and take one step at a time to make my life better.”</i></blockquote><p></p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-2223124483454641162020-08-10T09:11:00.003+01:002020-08-10T09:11:33.825+01:00Senator Buruji Kashamu Is Dead<h1 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"> <span>Buruji Kashamu a Nigerian politician who served as a Senator representing Ogun East in the 8th National Assembly</span>, is dead.</span></h1><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_N8JEhH79Is/XzEAavGumlI/AAAAAAAAFc8/atSE1XjN2dgv6jWC4NmZM1Pbr4SwtTlKACLcBGAsYHQ/s640/Kashamu1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_N8JEhH79Is/XzEAavGumlI/AAAAAAAAFc8/atSE1XjN2dgv6jWC4NmZM1Pbr4SwtTlKACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Kashamu1.jpg" /></a></div> <p></p><p> Kashamu, who represented Ogun-East senatorial district between 2015 and 2019, died at First Cardiology Consultants, Lagos.<br /><br />The hospital is the same facility where a former Governor of Oyo State, Abiola Ajimobi; and the President’s Chief of Staff, Abba Kyari, died.<br /><br />It was learnt that Kashamu, who had diabetes and high blood pressure, was admitted at the hospital for over a week before giving up the ghost.<br /><br />Confirming his death, a former lawmaker, Senator Ben Murray-Bruce, said the deceased would be sorely missed.<br /><br />Murray-Bruce wrote on his verified Twitter handle, <em>“I have just lost my good friend of forever to COVID-19. Until his death, Sen. Buruji Kashamu and I were inseparable. He died today at First Cardiology Consultants, in Lagos. May his gentle soul rest in peace. I pray his family and loved ones the fortitude to bear this heavy loss.”</em></p><p style="text-align: center;"><em><img alt="" height="446" src="https://www.tori.ng/userfiles/image/2020/aug/08/Kashamu.JPG" width="450" /></em></p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-65518052990857407692020-08-10T09:02:00.003+01:002020-08-10T09:02:33.707+01:00General Overseer Impregnates Two Teenage Sisters In Ogun<h1 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">A man known as pastor and General overseer of a particular church in Ogun state got arrested for impregnating two sister who is a member of the church.</span></h1><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Mother to the girls discover after the fell sick and the secret was revealed on how the general overseer impregnated them.</span></h2> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QY1zf_qW_64/XzD-LojabgI/AAAAAAAAFcw/eQVjN2SzzS4KMttP8QAWXd5f0xYSgiVvgCLcBGAsYHQ/s510/Ajigbotoluwa.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Pastor Ajigbotoluwa" border="0" data-original-height="299" data-original-width="510" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-QY1zf_qW_64/XzD-LojabgI/AAAAAAAAFcw/eQVjN2SzzS4KMttP8QAWXd5f0xYSgiVvgCLcBGAsYHQ/d/Ajigbotoluwa.JPG" title="General overseer pastor Ajigbotoluwa" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: smaller;"><em>Ajigbotoluwa</em></span></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>The founder and General Overseer of The Church of Lord, Olomore Abeokuta identified as Ajigbotoluwa has been arrested by police officers in Ogun state for defiling and impregnating two teenage sisters. <br /> <br />It was gathered that the General Overseer was arrested after the mother of the victims told the police at Lafenwa. <br /> <br />In her narration, she revealed fell sick sometimes in 2018 and was taken to the church for spiritual healing. She accused the said pastor of seizing the opportunity to ask her entire family of six to relocate to the church premises to avoid being afflicted with the same sickness. <br /> <br /><blockquote><i>“There and then, the prophet started having sex with her daughters of 16 and 13 years of age, unknown to her. The pastor impregnated the two underage girls and went on to procure abortion for them in a private clinic,” The Ogun State Police Public Relations Officer, Abimbola Oyeyemi, said</i>. </blockquote><br /><br /> <br />Aside from this, the prophet was also said to have defrauded the family of N2million naira cash, which he reportedly collected for what he called ‘spiritual cleansing’. <br /> <br />Upon the report, the DPO of Lafenwa division, CSP Muraina Ayilara, led his men to the church but the place has been deserted, it was gathered. <br /> <br />The Ogun State Commissioner of Police, according to Oyeyemi, then directed that the suspect be hunted for and brought to book. <br /><br /> <br /><blockquote><i>“In compliance with the CP’s directive, the DPO and his men embarked on intelligence and technical-based investigation, and their efforts paid off when the prophet was arrested on the 6th of August 2020 at about 5am. <br /><br /></i> <i><br />“On interrogation, the suspect confessed to the commission of most of the allegations leveled against him and that it was the reason why he ran away when he heard that police are looking for him,” the PPRO informed.</i></blockquote>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-77424880896806265522020-08-08T13:20:00.001+01:002020-08-10T13:39:46.478+01:00Nigerian Pastor Who Became A Kidnapper To Raise Money For Charity Makes Mind-Blowing Confessions<h1 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">The founder of New Life Light of God Ministry located at Lukosi in Shagamu area of Ogun State has made confessions after being nabbed for kidnapping. </span></h1><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Pastor Adetokunbo Adelekan, the General overseer and the founder of Light of God disclosed that he got his courage from David in the Bible that cared for his people, after going round to feed his people.</span></h2><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-s5BhhBFtn0I/XzE9_cTg4pI/AAAAAAAAFeY/k8KkLJ66FCUDhzyaGZjJGcvWuvwxPBlrwCLcBGAsYHQ/s537/pastor%2Bdavid.JPG" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="332" data-original-width="537" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-s5BhhBFtn0I/XzE9_cTg4pI/AAAAAAAAFeY/k8KkLJ66FCUDhzyaGZjJGcvWuvwxPBlrwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/pastor%2Bdavid.JPG" /></a></div></span></h2><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"> </span><span style="font-size: medium;">According to the Force Public Relations officer, DCP Frank Mbah who paraded the suspects before the media, Adelekan was nabbed by detectives attached to the Intelligence Response Team (IRT) alongside three others identified as Chigozie Williams, Linus Ugorji and Emmanuel Ani while their latest victim, Jonathan Ekpo who was kidnapped on July 17, was rescued from their underground hideout located in the church premises.</span></p><h2 style="text-align: left;"></h2><p></p><blockquote>According his statement from SunNews report:<i> “I got my courage from David in the Bible that cared for his people. If you read the book of Samuel, you will see how David would go round and raid and take care of his people and still pay tithe. This is the portion of the Bible that I used to encourage and convince myself. Had it been police did not arrest me I would have felt like David but I thank God that I was arrested because I would have moved from not using weapons to using sophisticated ones.”</i></blockquote><i></i><p></p><p>Those were the words of Adetokunbo Adelekan, pastor and founder of New Life Light of God Ministry located at Lukosi in Shagamu area of Ogun State. He was arrested, recently by the police for kidnapping.</p> <p>The search for 35-year-old Jonathan, a dispatch rider with a logistics company began when the suspects alerted the firm of the kidnap, demanding for a N20 million ransom. The IRT operatives were able to trace the suspects to a church where the pastor led the detectives to an underground hideout constructed to keep victims. The victim was found there tied up.</p><p><b>Pastor’s testimony</b></p><p>In tears and begging for a second chance to correct his mistakes, Pastor Adelekan claimed that he landed in trouble due to his desire to be seen as a man who can feed the poor consistently. </p><p></p><blockquote><p>According to him, <i>“I am 53 and from Ijebu Ife in Ogun state. I am happily married with three young children. I grew up in a broken home and my mother who is not Nigerian took me away from my dad. I grew up outside Nigeria before I returned in 2004 and was reunited with my father and his family. It was while I was away that I learnt a little thing about medicine because I served with the Red Cross during the Liberian war. Upon my return, I established a school and also acquired this land, which I planned to use to build a church. That dream materialized in 2017. But before then, every celebration, I will organize a carnival for the children and even adults free of charge.</i></p><p><i>“Unfortunately, the land grabbers who could not take my land from me attacked me and I nearly died in the process. This was why I constructed an underground house. Anytime there is an attack we will rush in there.</i></p><p><i>“During the recent lockdown, there was so much hunger in the land and I started feeding people every day. Most of my members lost their jobs, so I was no longer getting support from the church. I still continued feeding them till I ran out of money and the Ileya (sallah) feast was around the corner. A lot of Muslims who benefited from us were seriously expectant and I did not want to disappoint them. It was then that I remembered how David in the Bible survived.”</i></p></blockquote><p><i></i></p><p>Narrating how he managed to lure his victim, Pastor Adelekan claimed that he ordered for product online and when the dispatch rider came, they grabbed him. “I knew that the company selling the food supplements is rich, so the plan was to kidnap the dispatch rider till they pay millions as ransom. When we grabbed the man I used Ketamine injection to force him to sleep because he was struggling so much. We called his company and demanded for N1million. We also used his ATM card to withdraw N60, 000 from his account. It was the money that we used to organize free feeding in the church the day police arrested us. They saw everything; I even offered to give them food if they were hungry. It was at the police station that I learnt that his wife had paid N100, 000.” He insisted that the only weapon that he used was a fake one constructed to scare people especially land grabbers. <i>“We don’t use weapons, after the attack on my family; we had to do something to scare people”, </i>he said in tears.</p><p><b>Strange palliatives</b></p><p>According to the other three suspects, they decided to work with the pastor because he was feeding them after they lost their jobs because of the COVID-19.</p><p>The first suspect, Chigozie Williams, a native of Bende in Abia state claimed that he was only given N5000 out of the little money they found in the account of their victim.</p><p></p><blockquote><p>According to him, <i>“After my secondary school, I relocated to Lagos to live with three of my siblings who later died during an explosion in the manufacturing company that they were working. I had no other choice but to survive on my own since my father who married four wives never cared for us. I managed to get job with a construction company but after six months we were asked to go home due to the lockdown caused by COVID-19. The little savings I had finished and my friend who was in the same situation introduced me to Pastor Adelekan’s church. He helps the poor by giving them foodstuffs on credit, which you will pay back at the end of the month. I started collecting from him although I knew I had no job till he realized that I cannot pay. He then asked me and two others to start working for him as security men guarding the church. He promised to pay us N18, 000 every month.</i></p><p><i>“One day, he took us to his underground house and said that we should move his family to that place if there is any attack from the villagers. Few days later, he called us and started preaching. He lamented that things were hard and that he can no longer sustain the feeding of the poor. He told us that he would kidnap the rich and get money from them. I thought he was joking till a dispatch rider came and he ordered us to grab him. We tried grabbing but he was so strong for the three of us. We were still battling to hold him down when pastor injected him and he became quiet. We took him to the underground house ad tied him up. When he woke up, we took his ATM card and withdrew N60, 000. I was given N5000 and we were waiting for ransom when police arrested us.”</i></p></blockquote><p><i></i></p><p></p><blockquote><p>The second suspect, Linus Ugorji insists that the pastor is a true man of God who just wanted to raise money to help the poor.<i> “I am a graduate and I was born and brought up in Lagos. All my effort to get a decent job failed and my attempt to join the military also failed because they said that I have a flat foot. I met Chigozie in a construction company that later folded up. It was while we were searching for palliatives that we met the founder of New Life and Light ministry. The pastor gave us cooked food and also foodstuffs to take home. He later selected three of us to work for him as security men.</i></p><p><i>“One night, he called us that he wants to have a discussion with us. He told us that he wants to collect from the rich and give to the poor. We asked what he meant, he said that we will capture people and collect money from them. On July 17, he told us that a man was coming to drop food supplements for him that we should make sure that we hold the man. We held the man but he was too strong. The pastor injected him and he was unconscious and we tied him up and took him to the underground special guest house. On July 26, police came to the church. On that day which is a Sunday, we did a feast and fed everyone in church. It was the money we got from the man’s account that we used to cook the food. This is the first time I saw him do it. The man is sound spiritually. He used to talk about David, that he is the man after his heart; that David used to go to the camp of the enemies to steal and feed the Israelites”</i></p></blockquote><p><i></i></p><p><b>Freedom at last</b></p><p>Grateful to God for the timely intervention of the police, Jonathan said while he was struggling to free himself from his attackers, </p><p></p><blockquote>he was injected. <i>“They ordered the product online and I was asked to deliver it. When I got to the address, I realized that it does not exist and called the contact person. He told me that they have moved and started directing me. When I got to a church the man asked me to bring it into his office and while I was about to bend down, unzip my bag, three young men grabbed me. I struggled before I felt a sharp pain. By the time I opened my eyes, I was inside a room without window. I was fed three times a day and forced to give them my ATM password. I also contacted my employers and family and they started negotiating with them. Luckily for me police rescued me.”</i></blockquote><i></i><p></p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-40728867413059294052020-08-07T14:55:00.000+01:002020-08-10T15:19:51.303+01:00Facebook employees to work from home until July 2021<p> Facebook Inc (FB.O) will allow employees to work from home until July 2021 due to the Coronavirus outbreak and will give them $1,000 for home office needs, a spokeswoman for the social media giant report on Thursday.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LpMuSMW4Kf0/XzFXAGtg_eI/AAAAAAAAFew/pvJYr0OyYJwo8yi7UHhC2fECHDfegwkMQCLcBGAsYHQ/s683/facebook%2Blogos.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="379" data-original-width="683" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LpMuSMW4Kf0/XzFXAGtg_eI/AAAAAAAAFew/pvJYr0OyYJwo8yi7UHhC2fECHDfegwkMQCLcBGAsYHQ/s640/facebook%2Blogos.png" width="640" /></a></div><p><br />The company joins other big technology firms that have taken similar steps recently.<br /><br />Late in July, Alphabet Inc’s (GOOGL.O) Google said it would allow employees who do not need to be in the office to work from home until the end of June 2021, while Twitter Inc (TWTR.N) had proposed remote work indefinitely for some of its employees.<br /><br />“Based on guidance from health and government experts, as well as decisions drawn from our internal discussions about these matters, we are allowing employees to continue voluntarily working from home until July 2021”, a Facebook spokeswoman said in an emailed statement.<br /><br />“In addition, we are giving employees an additional $1,000 for home office needs,” it added.<br /><br />Facebook also said that the company will continue reopening offices in a restricted capacity where government guidance permits and where virus mitigation has taken place for about two months.<br /><br />However, the company added that it was unlikely many locations will reopen in the United States and Latin America before the end of the year, due to the high number of COVID-19 cases.</p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-29914567806479811122020-08-07T13:24:00.004+01:002020-08-07T13:24:44.828+01:00Lagos Court fines Naira Marley N100,000 after pleading guilty<p> Nigerian controversial singer, Afeez Fashola, aka Naira Marley, has been charge with the sum of N100,000 fine by the Lagos State Special Offenses (Mobile) Court, Oshodi for breaching interstate travel ban.<br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-l5rKwZiGvRI/Xy1HHsYusxI/AAAAAAAAFcY/INnAZy-zs_Y5PQMbU76y7fVCCmQkMdJ4gCLcBGAsYHQ/s300/Nairamarley.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Nairamarley on stage at Abuja concert" border="0" data-original-height="203" data-original-width="300" height="271" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-l5rKwZiGvRI/Xy1HHsYusxI/AAAAAAAAFcY/INnAZy-zs_Y5PQMbU76y7fVCCmQkMdJ4gCLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h271/Nairamarley.jpg" title="Nairamarley on stage at Abuja concert" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Naira Marley on Stage<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><br />Recall that the singer flew to Abuja from Lagos, vice versa, in June for drive-through concert in Abuja.<br /></p><p><br /> which a report was made on Thursday that Naira Marley was arraigned before a court by the Lagos Police Command.<br /><br />The singer appeared before the court yesterday alongside his manager and they both pleaded guilty to the charges.<br /><br />A statement from the spokesperson of the state police command, Bala Elkana, said Naira Marley was arraigned alongside his Manager Seyi Awouga on a one-count charge of ''breach of the cessation of movement and interstates travel order made by the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria under Regulation 4(i) of the Lagos State Infectious Disease Emergency Prevention) Regulation No 2 of 2020 and committed an offense punishable under Section 58 Public Health Law, Ch. P16, Laws of Lagos State 2015''<br /><br />Naira Marley and his manager were awarded a fine of one hundred thousand naira each by the presiding Magistrate.</p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-34970542989260719032020-08-07T13:12:00.002+01:002020-08-07T13:12:58.087+01:00 Artress Cossy Ojiakor has gotten engaged to her Nigerian-German boyfriend<h1 id="article-123" style="clear: right; text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"> Nollywood actress, Cossy Ojiakor has gotten engaged to her Nigerian-German boyfriend, Abel she announced this through Instagram.<br /></span></h1><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ek9VVrNcW8Y/Xy0-Z4_VD7I/AAAAAAAAFcM/7HaSQCLu1OA9X9IRUyxzY8qDz69uNHC9gCLcBGAsYHQ/s300/cossy%2Bget%2Bengage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ek9VVrNcW8Y/Xy0-Z4_VD7I/AAAAAAAAFcM/7HaSQCLu1OA9X9IRUyxzY8qDz69uNHC9gCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/cossy%2Bget%2Bengage.jpg" /></a></div><p id="article-123" style="clear: right;"><br /> Taking to Instagram excitedly, Ojiakor showed off the picture of the engagement ring she got and captioned it:<br /><br /> "Ring Alert. Yes, Yes, Yes 2020. A beautiful year to plan a wedding".<br /><br /> Just last year, Ojiakor revealed that the amount which will be paid as her bride price is N4 million and that it will only cover the first year of marriage.<br /><br /> She made this known while listing the things she has to offer to a man.<br /><br /> The actress wrote: “Wife Material, baby la hot. Lovely front pillow, soft soothing voice to send u asleep in no time. I'm a good rider you know. Ask hmmmmm …never mind. Just pay the dowry into my account already let’s get married. No need to cheat and hide. I won’t bite, just bring my spec. We can do all the cheating together so send the dowry to Cossy Ojiakor Uba account 2012202005 So ama roll up for a date. It’s just 4m for the first 1yr of marriage".<br /><br /> </p> <blockquote class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/CDjRBAEg-tM/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="12" style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255) none repeat scroll 0% 0%; border-radius: 3px; border: 0px none; box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.5) 0px 0px 1px 0px, rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.15) 0px 1px 10px 0px; margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0px; width: 99.375%;"><div style="padding: 16px;"> <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CDjRBAEg-tM/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255) none repeat scroll 0% 0%; line-height: 0; padding: 0px; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; width: 100%;" target="_blank"> <div style="align-items: center; display: flex; flex-direction: row;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"></div> <div style="display: flex; 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font-family: "arial", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;"> View this post on Instagram</div></div><div style="padding: 12.5% 0px;"></div> <div style="align-items: center; display: flex; flex-direction: row; margin-bottom: 14px;"><div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; transform: translateX(0px) translateY(7px); width: 12.5px;"></div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; flex-grow: 0; height: 12.5px; margin-left: 2px; margin-right: 14px; transform: rotate(-45deg) translateX(3px) translateY(1px); width: 12.5px;"></div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; transform: translateX(9px) translateY(-18px); width: 12.5px;"></div></div><div style="margin-left: 8px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 20px; width: 20px;"></div> <div style="border-bottom: 2px solid transparent; border-left: 6px solid rgb(244, 244, 244); border-top: 2px solid transparent; height: 0px; transform: translateX(16px) translateY(-4px) rotate(30deg); width: 0px;"></div></div><div style="margin-left: auto;"> <div style="border-right: 8px solid transparent; border-top: 8px solid rgb(244, 244, 244); transform: translateY(16px); width: 0px;"></div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; flex-grow: 0; height: 12px; transform: translateY(-4px); width: 16px;"></div> <div style="border-left: 8px solid transparent; border-top: 8px solid rgb(244, 244, 244); height: 0px; transform: translateY(-4px) translateX(8px); width: 0px;"></div></div></div></a> <p style="margin: 8px 0px 0px; padding: 0px 4px;"> <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CDjRBAEg-tM/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" style="color: black; font-family: "arial", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; overflow-wrap: break-word; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰 Happy Belated birthday @abel_jurgen 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰</a></p> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: "arial", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0px 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;">A post shared by <a href="https://www.instagram.com/cossybarbie/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: "arial", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px;" target="_blank"> @cossyojiakor</a> (@cossybarbie) on <time datetime="2020-08-06T14:23:59+00:00" style="font-family: "arial", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px;">Aug 6, 2020 at 7:23am PDT</time></p></div></blockquote> <script async="" src="//www.instagram.com/embed.js"></script>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-59662989920246310822020-08-07T12:29:00.002+01:002020-08-07T12:29:26.251+01:00NNPC takes step to ending Oil Mining Lease 130 disputeThe Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, China’s CNOOC Ltd and South Atlantic Petroleum signed a preliminary agreement to resolve a dispute over Oil Mining Lease 130, the West African state oil firm said on Thursday.<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JQz_Qyvnk8M/Xy06mupwyuI/AAAAAAAAFcA/ngQb0mxRXvIoBewOXC-Lzs9de2VUCjqbwCLcBGAsYHQ/s300/NNPC.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="171" data-original-width="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JQz_Qyvnk8M/Xy06mupwyuI/AAAAAAAAFcA/ngQb0mxRXvIoBewOXC-Lzs9de2VUCjqbwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/NNPC.jpg" /></a></div><br />NNPC tweeted on its official Twitter account that it signed a Heads of Terms (a non-binding broad outline of a deal) with the Chinese and Nigerian firms that seeks to address disagreements over the mining lease’s production sharing contract.<br /><br />It did not provide details of the dispute nor the new proposed terms.<br /><br />Oil Mining Lease 130 contains fields including Akpo and Egina.ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-59108637541005360202020-08-07T12:12:00.002+01:002020-08-07T12:12:39.271+01:00NEMA: communities in Cross River prone to flooding<h1 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"> 254 communities in 14 local government areas are flood-prone stated by National Emergency Management Agency in Cross River State.</span></h1><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WSBZoU2ceiw/Xy02d52dSbI/AAAAAAAAFb0/gutoZlwOTxUj2YsmTIeynKfMwD4xbhw1ACLcBGAsYHQ/s885/communities%2Bin%2BCross%2BRiver%2Bprone%2Bto%2Bflooding%2B%25E2%2580%2593%2BNEMA.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="255" data-original-width="885" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-WSBZoU2ceiw/Xy02d52dSbI/AAAAAAAAFb0/gutoZlwOTxUj2YsmTIeynKfMwD4xbhw1ACLcBGAsYHQ/s640/communities%2Bin%2BCross%2BRiver%2Bprone%2Bto%2Bflooding%2B%25E2%2580%2593%2BNEMA.png" width="640" /></a></div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;">The Director General of NEMA, Air Vice Marshal Mohammed Mohammed (retd.), announce the report in Calabar on Thursday at a flood sensitization programme for residents in Calabar Municipality and Calabar South LGAs.</p><div class="code-block code-block-1" style="float: left; margin: 8px 8px 8px 0;"> </div><p style="text-align: justify;">According to PUNCH report, Mohammed was represented by the South-South Zonal Coordinator of NEMA, Mr Walson Brandon, residents must clear their gutters and desist from dumping refuse inside the drainage to avert flooding.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">“NEMA is carrying out this sensitization of vulnerable flood communities in Cross River following the release of the 2020 Annual Flood Outlook by NIMET.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"></p><blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;">“The forecast captured 14 local government areas in Cross River to be affected and this will spread across 254 communities in the state,” he said.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><em>The Director General of the Cross River State Emergency Management Agency, Mr Princewill Ayim, said the agency had put in place sensitisation committees across the affected local government areas and warned residents against dumping their refuse along the waterways to avoid flooding.</em></p></blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;"><em></em></p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-7619381961310694462020-08-06T21:59:00.002+01:002020-08-06T21:59:22.120+01:00Abuja concert: Naira Marley charge to court<h1 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Nairamarley has been charge to court for violating the law of COVID-19 from government. </span><br /></h1><h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Nigerian artiste, Azeez Fashola, aka Naira Marley, has been taken to the Lagos State Special Offences Court at Ikeja. </span></h2><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Hre37Cn8YrQ/XyxusNz8cJI/AAAAAAAAFbo/3BlHE9quiDUuxJbkPbvE0jSKjcVoMVTWQCLcBGAsYHQ/s275/naira%2Bmarley.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: block; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Hre37Cn8YrQ/XyxusNz8cJI/AAAAAAAAFbo/3BlHE9quiDUuxJbkPbvE0jSKjcVoMVTWQCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/naira%2Bmarley.jpg" /></a>As of press time, The PUNCH learnt that the police had filed charges against him for violating the COVID-19 order banning interstate travels earlier put in place to curb the spread of coronavirus.<br /></div><p style="text-align: left;">The controversial artiste left Lagos for the Federal Capital Territory for a concert on Saturday, July 13. <br /><br />The concert, which held at the Jabi Lake Mall, drew public outrage. <br /><br />The government thereafter shut down and mall and stopped the operation of the airline whose plane he chartered. <br /><br />The Inspector-General of Police was said to have ordered Naira Marley’s arrest. <br /><br />The Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Bala Elkana, said Naira Marley presented himself at the command headquarters on Thursday. <br /><br />“We are in court as we speak. He will be arraigned for violating the interstate travel order. That is the aspect that concerns Lagos State,” he added.</p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-28215485020696548642020-08-05T12:39:00.000+01:002020-08-05T12:39:08.044+01:00Jim Hackett, the CEO of Ford, to step down in October<div><h1 style="text-align: left;"><span><span style="font-weight: normal;">An American businessman popular known as </span></span><span><span><span style="font-weight: normal;">James Patrick "Jim" Hackett, </span></span><span style="font-weight: normal;">the president and chief executive officer of Ford Motor Company has decided to drop down after three years of being CEO.</span></span></h1></div><div style="text-align: left;"><h2><span style="font-weight: normal;">The chief executive of Ford, would resign from his position in October 1, 2020, the car company announced yesterday on Tuesday.</span></h2></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4wa5WGPomac/XyqZQBxILKI/AAAAAAAAFbY/E4NSYNvlqW08bWR234Odfq9vdInJcvYqACLcBGAsYHQ/s212/Jim%2BHackett.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="James Patrick "Jim" Hackett is an American businessman." border="0" data-original-height="119" data-original-width="212" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4wa5WGPomac/XyqZQBxILKI/AAAAAAAAFbY/E4NSYNvlqW08bWR234Odfq9vdInJcvYqACLcBGAsYHQ/d/Jim%2BHackett.jpg" title="James Patrick "Jim" Hackett" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span>James Patrick "Jim" Hackett.</span></td></tr></tbody></table><div>Ford said that Hackett would be replaced by longtime auto executive Jim Farley as the car giant pushes further into digital and electric investment.<br /><br />Hackett, 65, will stay on as a special advisor through March 2021. Farley joined Ford in 2007 after a long tenure at Toyota and currently serves as chief operating officer.<br /><br />Hackett joined Ford in 2017 from furniture company Steelcase and was known for his skills in turning around struggling organisations.<br /><br />Hackett has overseen some major shifts at the 117-year-old Detroit auto staple, including phasing out most sedan models and launching the Mustang Mach-E, an all-electric sport utility vehicle built on one of the auto industry’s most iconic brands.<br /><br />Ford Chairman Bill Ford credited Hackett with “slaying the sacred cows” during his run and characterized Farley as a true car expert, noting he enjoys racing vintage cars as a hobby.<br /><br />“Jim Farley matches an innate feel for cars and customers with great instincts for the future and the new technologies that are changing our industry,” Ford said.<br /><br />“Jim’s passion for great vehicles and his intense drive for results are well known, and I have also seen him develop into a transformational leader with the determination and foresight to help Ford thrive into the future.”<br /><br />Shares of Ford jumped 3.0 percent to $6.89.</div>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-56300214255771633002020-08-05T12:12:00.002+01:002020-08-05T12:12:26.875+01:00President of Algeria to reopen mosques for public <div style="text-align: justify;"><h1><span style="font-weight: normal;">Mosques are to be reopen soon stated by the President of the country, Abdelmadjid Tebboune last Monday, since the down of city and some things during this COVID-19, worship places has not been open for citizen to worship together.</span></h1></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-UB_ay1YgWJ4/XyqNcz86J1I/AAAAAAAAFbM/ObYYiZxfkAIXyvIjKLTXnreEZEw2TLYtACLcBGAsYHQ/s300/President%2BAbdelmadjid%2BTebboune%2Bof%2BAlgeria.jpg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="President Abdelmadjid Tebboune of Algeria" border="0" data-original-height="195" data-original-width="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-UB_ay1YgWJ4/XyqNcz86J1I/AAAAAAAAFbM/ObYYiZxfkAIXyvIjKLTXnreEZEw2TLYtACLcBGAsYHQ/d/President%2BAbdelmadjid%2BTebboune%2Bof%2BAlgeria.jpg" title="President Abdelmadjid Tebboune of Algeria" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container"><tbody><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span class="image_caption"><span>President Abdelmadjid Tebboune of Algeria</span></span></i><div class="noPrint"><div class="med_rec_lg_min"></div></div></td></tr></tbody></table></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;">Abdelmadjid Tebboune, the Algerian President announced late on Monday that his country “is reviewing the possibility to reopen mosques for the public,’’ the official APS news agency reported.</div><div style="text-align: justify;">The president made the remarks during a meeting of the High Security Council attended by top military and security officials as well as cabinet members to assess the COVID-19 epidemic inside the country.<br /></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="height: 36px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; text-align: left; width: 1px;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-UB_ay1YgWJ4/XyqNcz86J1I/AAAAAAAAFbM/ObYYiZxfkAIXyvIjKLTXnreEZEw2TLYtACLcBGAsYHQ/s300/President%2BAbdelmadjid%2BTebboune%2Bof%2BAlgeria.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"></a><br /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;"><br />Tebboune instructed Prime Minister Abdelaziz Djerad to programme a gradual reopening of mosques.<br /><br />He added that the first phase of the programme will be limited to 1,000 large mosques in the country, which “will be able to allow the essential physical distancing with the imperative wearing of masks by all’’.<br /><br />The prime minister was authorised to estimate the reopening of beaches and other places for recreation and relaxation.<br /><br />Mosques, beaches and parks in the country have been closed since mid-March, as part of measures taken by the authorities to stem the spread of the COVID-19 epidemic. (Xinhua/NAN)</div> ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-11143858609298359932020-08-01T22:27:00.003+01:002020-08-01T22:27:49.551+01:00Nelson Mandela: The strange tale of gold-cast handsIn May 2003, Nelson Mandela—former South African president, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, and hero to millions—sat down at the dinner table of his house in Johannesburg and laid his right hand, palm side down, into a lump of cold dental putty. A team of technicians from the precision-casting division of Harmony Gold Mining Co. was present to supervise, and Mandela chatted amiably with them as they worked, pausing to sip coffee with his free hand.<br /> <br /> The silicon-based putty had been chilled to make it harden more slowly, but the men had only six minutes of malleability to work with—time they used to get the material into every wrinkle and crease, almost perfectly capturing Mandela’s fingerprints as well as the scars from his hard labor on Robben Island. Then they poured more on top to encase his knuckles and fingernails.<br /> <br /> Harmony would use the molds from that day to create resin replicas, then casting of Mandela’s hand in 99.999% pure gold. This prototype was to be the first in a series: at least 27 gold hands, weighing 5.7 pounds to 8.8 pounds each, to mark the years of his imprisonment, followed by silver versions for each month, and finally thousands of bronze copies to mark each day. <br /> <br /> They would be sold to raise money for the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund, the charity to which he devoted much of his time in retirement—and serve as advertisements for Harmony’s casting expertise in the process. Throughout the making of the moldings, Mandela was “amazingly helpful, patient, and funny, and he kept everyone entertained with stories,” according to an account in the company newspaper, Harmonize.<br /> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rtiKFk3nwcM/XyXcJl_S5XI/AAAAAAAAFag/7Z9JsQi7bqkwHA6s_t7WYebTdJikxStgQCLcBGAsYHQ/s600/Nelson%2BMadela.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Mandela sitting for the casting" border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="600" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rtiKFk3nwcM/XyXcJl_S5XI/AAAAAAAAFag/7Z9JsQi7bqkwHA6s_t7WYebTdJikxStgQCLcBGAsYHQ/d/Nelson%2BMadela.jpg" title="Mandela sitting for the casting" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Mandela sitting for the casting</i></td></tr></tbody></table> <br /> That may well have been the happiest that Mandela ever felt about the project. Not long after the castings were made, he became concerned that too many people were profiting from “Mandela art,” a cottage industry that included selling sketches he’d purportedly drawn and putting his face on dishes, teapots, and commemorative tchotchkes. <br /> <br /> After Mandela dispatched a team of lawyers to shut down the trade, Harmony stopped producing hands, leaving only a tiny initial batch. The project was largely forgotten.<br /> <br /> Except, that is, by Malcolm Duncan. Then a 47-year-old auto parts entrepreneur, Duncan had met Mandela a few years before, during an event at a cancer clinic in the township of Soweto. Like many who came face to face with the legend, Duncan was overcome. <br /> <br /> “I couldn’t talk, because he was so humble,” he recalls. “I had such a lump in my throat.” When Duncan learned about the hands, he had to have them. Not long after the castings, he managed to buy four gold examples; he’d wanted two more but couldn’t get them before the project was shut down.<br /> <br /> Duncan says he intended to make the hands the centerpiece of a collection of Mandela memorabilia, both for personal inspiration and to show to friends and family. He describes them as objects of reverence, near-supernatural totems of Mandela’s legacy. Like secular versions of the supposed saintly relics that inspired pilgrimages in medieval Europe, the castings were the closest thing to a literal piece of South Africa’s post-apartheid hero. Not unrelatedly, Duncan also figured they’d make a good investment.<br /> <br /> None of that came to be. Instead, the castings became Duncan’s proudest possessions but also a source of enduring distress, an almost too-neat illustration of the perils of getting what you wish for—and of the uncomfortable questions that arise when veneration meets commercial gain.<br /> <br /> “I’ve been to hell and back with these hands,” he says. “To hell and back.”<br /> <br /> Duncan, who has silver hair, thick black eyebrows, and a face that frequently breaks into an animated, puppyish grin, spent most of his childhood in Penge, a remote village where his father was an electrical engineer at an asbestos mine.<br /> <br /> He completed his military service—mandatory in those days for White South Africans—in 1977, entering the workforce as the apartheid system was beginning to buckle under the weight of internal protest and economic isolation.<br /> <br /> It was also a time of rising international interest in African culture, a trend whose commercial potential wasn’t lost on Duncan. In 1986, the same year Paul Simon released Graceland, Duncan flew to Miami with a suitcase full of masks, soapstone carvings, and wooden jewelry sourced from roadside vendors. Finding buyers was initially slow going; after weeks driving from state to state, he pulled into Los Angeles with only $43 to his name.<br /> <br /> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gPf_q7-0K5Y/XyXcJdsgWuI/AAAAAAAAFaY/saG71SPd4dka_Ax3Rz88BY0cflLKfX5igCLcBGAsYHQ/s600/Mandela%25E2%2580%2599s%2Bfingerprint.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Mandela’s fingerprint" border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="600" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gPf_q7-0K5Y/XyXcJdsgWuI/AAAAAAAAFaY/saG71SPd4dka_Ax3Rz88BY0cflLKfX5igCLcBGAsYHQ/d/Mandela%25E2%2580%2599s%2Bfingerprint.jpg" title="Mandela’s fingerprint" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Mandela’s fingerprint</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /> But Angelenos proved receptive to what he was selling, and within a week Duncan had unloaded all his items. He returned to South Africa with $4,000 in profit—hardly a fortune, but enough to help get him started. He ended up selling running boards for cars, importing them from a company in Indiana before setting up his own factory.<br /> <br /> Duncan’s admiration for Mandela was late blooming. Like many Whites of his generation, he’d been raised to view the African National Congress, the resistance movement and political party in which Mandela was a senior leader, as something like a terrorist organization—the opinion of the apartheid government, which convicted Mandela of “sabotage” in the infamous Rivonia Trial in 1964. <br /> <br /> But his grace when he was released from prison in 1990—pursuing reconciliation with his persecutors and laying the groundwork for a multiethnic democracy—changed Duncan’s views, and by the time Mandela became president, he was a convert. <br /> <br /> When he happened to meet a bus driver who knew Mandela’s private secretary, it seemed like fate. Duncan got to know the secretary and negotiated with her to help fund the Soweto clinic, which Mandela was also supporting, giving him the chance to meet his hero.<br /> <br /> Duncan wasn’t in attendance when the prototype hand went up for auction in June 2003. The sale went well, with an unidentified private buyer paying 425,000 rand, then about $46,000. Duncan made his move a few months later. The four hands he bought included a clenched fist symbolic of 1964 and a three-part set, corresponding to 1990, consisting of another fist, an outstretched hand, and a palm imprint. <br /> <br /> Unlike the prototype, they were hollow, like chocolate Easter bunnies, to prevent excess weight from deforming their shape over time. Half the 2.7 million rand that he says he paid was to be donated via Harmony to the Children’s Fund, a condition that Duncan says won him Mandela’s blessing. <br /> <br /> (The Children’s Fund didn’t respond to requests for comment, while the Nelson Mandela Foundation, which functions as the primary custodian of Mandela’s legacy, didn’t provide one before the deadline for this story.)<br /> <br /> Duncan secured the hands in a bank vault, figuring he’d decide later how to display them. But attitudes about objects honoring the former president soon changed dramatically. <br /> <br /> In 2005, Mandela filed a suit against his former lawyer, Ismail Ayob, and Ross Calder, a publisher who’d worked with Ayob on what buyers assumed was officially sanctioned Mandela art, accusing them of exploiting his image. <br /> <br /> Mandela was 86 at the time, and the implication of the suit was clear: that the pair had been taking advantage of an increasingly frail legend. Later that same year, Mandela expanded his legal fight, going after dozens of companies selling similar paraphernalia. (The legal action against Ayob and Calder was never concluded; both denied wrongdoing.) The market for Mandela art collapsed.<br /> <br /> For Duncan, this presented a problem. Not long after buying the hands he’d decided to relocate to Canada, spurred by a home invasion in which his 11-year-old son was held at gunpoint. He needed capital to set up an auto parts company there, and selling the hands seemed like an obvious way to obtain it. <br /> <br /> But the controversies around Mandela art meant buyers were scarce, and anyone willing to contemplate a purchase wanted proof that Mandela had authorized their casting and sale to Duncan—assurances, in other words, that he wasn’t just another profiteer. <br /> <br /> Duncan couldn’t offer any. He had no formal ownership papers, only metal plates that Harmony supplied and Calder signed. He had no way to get in touch with the ailing Mandela to clear things up, nor could he prove the hands were among only a few in existence. <br /> <br /> In 2015 he thought he was near a sale—to a Saudi family he says was willing to pay $27 million—only to have it fall apart when he couldn’t produce the necessary paperwork.<br /> <br /> With no buyer willing to write a check, Duncan was increasingly fearful that someone would steal the hands. At one point he painted them black—“I thought, if nobody knows they’re gold, who’s going to steal a hand,” he says—and buried them under his garage in Calgary.<br /> <br /> It took Duncan years to establish the hands’ provenance to the standards expected by the international art market, just in time for a boom in a commodity that arguably has even less real-world utility than gold. In 2018 he met Len Schutzman, a former PepsiCo executive who was running a cryptocurrency startup in Waterloo, Ont., the home of the BlackBerry. The company, Arbitrade, had an unconventional pitch for investors: It would back every virtual coin it minted with physical gold. When Schutzman learned about the hands, he made Duncan an offer: $10 million for all four. The shiny appendages, Schutzman said, would become the centerpiece of an Arbitrade promotional tour and symbols of the gold-backed stability the company offered. A longer-run plan, of questionable taste even by crypto-world standards, would see the hands back a Mandela-themed digital currency.<br /> <br /> Duncan loved the idea of putting the hands on tour. He wanted them to be seen, providing the same inspiration to others that he’d drawn from them over the years, but he didn’t have a way to display them to the public himself. And Arbitrade seemed to be good for the money, paying about $5.8 million, according to legal filings, to take possession of two hands and pay for part of a third. The others would follow once the balance was settled.<br /> <br /> But Arbitrade’s dream of uniting crypto-enthusiasts and gold bugs was not to be, and the company ran into trouble in 2019. The hands Arbitrade had paid for went to one of its backers. Duncan was dejected. As an aesthetic matter, he’d always thought the four hands should be displayed as a set; from a financial perspective, he was also certain they’d have more value sold all together. But there seemed to be no way that would happen. And then he got a call from Arlan Ettinger.<br /> <br /> Guernsey’s, the New York auction house Ettinger founded with his wife, Barbara Mintz, in 1975, has many of the trappings of the high-end art market: an Upper East Side address, a Rolodex of deep-pocketed buyers, and a lengthy catalog of prior sales. But it’s a rather different animal than Sotheby’s or Christie’s. Instead of Picassos and Monets, Guernsey’s specializes in memorabilia, with past auctions for items such as Jerry Garcia’s guitar, a Rolls-Royce driven by Elizabeth Taylor, and, on one unusual occasion, a house owned by Rosa Parks. (Originally on a lot in Detroit, an artist had restored and disassembled it.)<br /> <br /> Ettinger says he heard about the hands from a lawyer involved with Arbitrade and thought they were perfect for Guernsey’s—especially if they could be reunited as a group. Duncan was supportive of the idea. So, he says, was the person who’d taken the other hands, an investor in Utah named Max Barber. (Barber didn’t respond to requests for comment.) Guernsey’s booked a room for the auction at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York, and Duncan flew up from Austin, where he now lives, with his wife, Jacki. Ettinger informed him there were already two potential buyers. The auction, Duncan told me shortly before it began, could be a quick one.<br /> <br /> <br /> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7F9wZfkm9E8/XyXcJQcMp8I/AAAAAAAAFac/PQSgyFoMeEYF6fPq-dixKn2ZBaltZdKfgCLcBGAsYHQ/s600/Mandela%25E2%2580%2599s%2Bfingerprint%2B1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="gold-cast hand" border="0" data-original-height="399" data-original-width="600" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7F9wZfkm9E8/XyXcJQcMp8I/AAAAAAAAFac/PQSgyFoMeEYF6fPq-dixKn2ZBaltZdKfgCLcBGAsYHQ/d/Mandela%25E2%2580%2599s%2Bfingerprint%2B1.jpg" title="gold-cast hands" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>gold-cast hands</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /> “Why should I focus on what transpired, as long as things aren’t stolen, as long as things are what they claim to be? That’s all I care about. I do not want to know the details”<br /> <br /> Ettinger revealed the hands to the public on March 1, the day before they would go on the block. In person they were marvels. The black paint had long since been removed. Each was set in a box made from kiaat, a rare South African wood, and lit from above, shimmering under the stage lights in every imaginable shade of gold. The detail was extraordinary, capturing calluses, wrinkles, and bones with perfect clarity. <br /> <br /> But they also looked faintly creepy, like amputated souvenirs kept by a Bond villain. Not to mention lonely—except for Ettinger’s team and a few security guards, the room was deserted.<br /> <br /> When I asked whether he’d advertised the sale, Ettinger responded, with barely disguised irritation, that Guernsey’s usually counts on journalists for that—a point his public-relations team had made by pushing for a “pre-auction” story that would stimulate “wide global interest.” He also bristled when I asked if the past controversies around Mandela art, or Duncan’s difficulties establishing that he’d bought the hands with Mandela’s blessing, made him hesitant about selling them. “Meaningful” works, Ettinger said, rarely made it to his auction block without some drama, whether a divorce, a soured transaction, or a family feud. “Why should I focus on what transpired, as long as things aren’t stolen, as long as things are what they claim to be?” He continued: “That’s all I care about. I do not want to know the details.”<br /> <br /> As the day went on, only a few people turned up to view the hands. One was G. Lynn Thorpe, a lawyer and inventor—his latest project is a portable folding tray table—who was representing Barber. Thorpe took a philosophical view of the objects, describing himself as honored to be involved with a piece of Mandela history, especially as a Black man. “When Nelson Mandela went into jail, that was just a spike in all our hearts,” he said. It was a shame, he added, that other historical figures hadn’t cast their own digits in precious metal. “If Gandhi, for example, had had it done, if Jesus Christ had had it done, it’d be the holy grail.”<br /> <br /> Thorpe wasn’t alone in ascribing profound meaning to the hands. Almost no public figure of the past 100 years attracts such unreserved adulation as Mandela, a degree of reverence usually reserved for deities or their offspring. Abby Goldman, an Upper West Side resident who stopped by the viewing toward the end of the day, couldn’t make it through a sentence without choking up. “I don’t know why I’m crying, but it’s very emotional,” she said. She lifted her own hand just above the imprint of Mandela’s palm, as though imagining what it would be like to touch him. “He represents human rights and freedom and equality,” she said. “In the current political climate it definitely resonates.” Another onlooker, Brienna McClarin, had come during a break in her waitressing shift at a bar across the hall. “I’m getting chills,” she said when she saw the hands. Neither of them, however, was about to put down $10 million or more—the number Duncan hoped to get for the set.<br /> <br /> As the viewing closed, a Guernsey’s staffer pulled on white gloves and carefully covered each hand in bubble wrap, tearing off lengths of tape with his teeth. For some reason he had only three black pouches, so the fourth hand was crammed into a FedEx envelope and loaded with the others into a sturdy suitcase. Ettinger wheeled it away.<br /> <br /> The next morning, Duncan texted to say he was talking to a prospective buyer “from the Middle East. Might be massive.” The auction was scheduled for that evening, with the hands still available for viewing until then. As the day wore on with few people turning up, Ettinger snapped that having a reporter and photographer “just sitting there” was scaring off business. He later apologized, pivoting to a story about an auction in which he’d sold the entire contents of an ocean liner.<br /> <br /> At dinner in a restaurant a few floors down, Duncan seemed to be preparing himself for the possibility that the hands wouldn’t sell. It might even be a blessing in disguise, he speculated. Why not buy back the whole set and find a celebrity endorser to give them the prominence they deserve? “You’ve got Bono who loves Mandela. You’ve got Elton John who loves Mandela,” he said. “Why not Bill Clinton?”<br /> <br /> With 30 minutes to go, the room finally started filling up. Ettinger’s aides took up their positions, with two deputies at desks prepared for phone and online bids. Thorpe was back, along with an Orthodox rabbi, numerous friends and associates of Barber, and Faye Wattleton, the former president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, who’d been helping Ettinger drum up buyers. “I had expected that there would be greater interest in them from wealthy African-Americans I reached out to,” Wattleton said. She noted it was difficult to understand the hands’ impact without seeing them in the flesh, as it were. “What would you say if somebody called you up and asked, ‘Would you give me $12 million for some gold hands of Nelson Mandela?’?”<br /> <br /> At 7:40 p.m., Ettinger asked everyone to take their seat. He opened at $12 million for all four hands. No takers. He dropped the ask to $10 million, then $8 million, then $7.5 million. “I’m not allowed to, nor should I, go any lower than that, so I’ll hold another minute.” Silence.<br /> <br /> It was time for plan B: selling the hands one at a time, with the 1964 fist the first to go. This time Ettinger started at $4 million, quickly dropping from there. “3.5?…?3?…?2.5?…?2.25.” One of his staff cut in to say he had a remote bid for $1 million, but Ettinger rejected it as too low. He soon withdrew the fist, though the same anonymous bidder agreed to pay $2.3 million for the impression of Mandela’s palm. When the third hand came up, the staffer said he had a $1 million offer from the same buyer. Trying to push up the number, Ettinger turned to another aide with a potential buyer on the line.<br /> <br /> “Susan, tell your bidder there are only two hands left.”<br /> <br /> “I’m supposed to tell you there are only two hands left.”<br /> <br /> “Tell him life is short.”<br /> <br /> “Arlan says ‘life is short.’?”<br /> <br /> No luck. That hand, too, had to be withdrawn. The fourth went to the same buyer as the second, for $2.25 million. The whole auction was over in 15 minutes. In the front row, Jacki had her hand on Duncan’s knee. “I hope he gets what he needs,” she said softly.<br /> <br /> The room began to empty out, but after a few minutes it became apparent that Ettinger wasn’t finished. He was still on the phone, seemingly with the two-hand buyer. Suddenly he put down the receiver to make an announcement: The buyer had agreed to take the remaining hands, for a total of $9 million. Duncan’s face lit up; Guernsey’s staffers shook their heads in disbelief. <br /> <br /> Ettinger said he needed to sit down “before I collapse.” The buyer wished to remain anonymous, Ettinger said, offering an unconvincing explanation of why this person would pay $9 million for all four when they’d been available at the start of the auction for $7.5 million. “To try to imagine what they’re thinking is impossible,” Ettinger offered. “You get into a mood, you get things happening. I can’t say why.”<br /> <br /> “I knew it was a safe investment, but I admired Mandela passionately. If Mandela had asked me to go to war, without thinking I would have done what he asked”<br /> <br /> Duncan and Jacki flew back to Austin the next day, assured by Guernsey’s that the deal would be finalized soon. But then, nothing. Ettinger told Duncan the mystery buyer needed more time to gather the funds because of the financial turmoil of the coronavirus pandemic, and a May 1 deadline to make the transfer came and went.<br /> <br /> A few days later, Duncan received an email from Ettinger with what seemed like great news: The buyer would be willing to throw in another $1 million if he could have some time to get the money together. Duncan was still optimistic. “Let’s give him the benefit of the doubt,” he said. “The buyer must really want it.”<br /> <br /> A week afterward there was still no sign of the cash, and Duncan was getting anxious. It all felt like déjà vu, a version of the check-is-in-the-mail assurances he’d received right before the Arbitrade deal fell through. He’d asked Ettinger repeatedly to connect him with the buyer directly, to no avail. He was starting to wonder, he said, whether there was really anyone on the other side of the phone at the auction. In a mid-July interview, Ettinger rejected that speculation, saying he’d been in regular contact with the buyer, who “was hit broadside, as many, many people have been, by the virus” and its effects. “The sale is still live,” he said. “We’re hoping for the best and remain optimistic.”<br /> <br /> Despite Duncan’s difficulty closing a deal, and his insistence that the hands deserve to be seen by as many people as possible, he says he has no plans to donate them to a museum or charity. For one thing, he’s counting on the cash to expand his latest venture, a company that converts shipping containers into off-grid shelters for disaster zones. <br /> <br /> And he says he sees no contradiction between admiring Mandela and seeking a profit from selling the hands—as even the most dedicated collector might, if the opportunity arose. “I knew it was a safe investment, but I admired Mandela passionately,” he said of his purchase. “If Mandela had asked me to go to war, without thinking I would have done what he asked.”<br /> <br /><div> Meanwhile, Duncan is still convinced that his big score is on its way. Like a rubber ball, he’s unsquashable. In June he said that an old friend had put him in touch with a possible buyer in Italy, in case the Guernsey’s sale never happens. What did he know about this new lead? “Absolutely nothing.” He’d been on a conference call with someone who said he was representing the Italian, but no more than that. “We expect a call from him any day now.” —With Michael Cohen</div><div style="text-align: right;">BLOOMBERG<br /></div><br />ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-52865814354887525202020-08-01T13:00:00.000+01:002020-08-01T13:00:05.725+01:00 Trump faces impeachment as US election postpone <div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-5"><div align="center"> </div></div><div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-4"><div align="center"> </div></div><h1 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">United States President, Donald Trump has attracted impeachment calls.</span></h1><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2ECHCHJXXQY/XyVY8fT-d_I/AAAAAAAAFZ8/-JMqLOfw2Z8CKXazYtT8hhcL1JNNwJrAQCLcBGAsYHQ/s300/trump.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2ECHCHJXXQY/XyVY8fT-d_I/AAAAAAAAFZ8/-JMqLOfw2Z8CKXazYtT8hhcL1JNNwJrAQCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/trump.jpg" /></a></div><p>The demands are trailing Trump’s suggestion that the US 2020 presidential election be postponed.</p><p>He said with the universal mail-in voting, 2020 will be the most inaccurate and fraudulent election in history.</p><p>“Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safe vote???”, he tweeted.</p><p>Critics are condemning his tweet, saying the president went too far.</p><p>One of them is Steven Calabresi, Co-founder of Federalist Society.</p><div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-2"><div align="center"> </div></div><p>In 2019, he strongly opposed Trump’s impeachment.</p><p>Calabresi now thinks otherwise, warning that postponing the poll would be “illegal, unconstitutional and without precedent.”</p><p>In an article The New York Times published, the Professor of Law wrote: “Until recently, I had taken as political hyperbole the Democrats’ assertion that President Trump is a fascist.”</p><p>Calabresi declared that the tweet “is fascistic and is itself grounds for the president’s immediate impeachment again by the House of Representatives and his removal from office by the Senate.”</p><div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-2"><div align="center"> </div></div><p>Recalling that America faced grave challenges, he said such situations never caused delayed or cancelled presidential election.</p><p>Calabresi cited how in the midst of the Great Depression in 1932 and during World War II in 1944, election still held.</p><p>Likewise, Kevin McCarthy, House Republican Leader, opposed the president.</p><p>“Never in the history of the federal elections have we ever not held an election and we should go forward with our election”, he said.</p><div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-2"><div align="center"> </div></div><p>Trump will slug it out with Democratic candidate, Joe Biden, in November.</p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-12576808155335890212020-08-01T10:51:00.003+01:002020-08-01T10:51:40.651+01:0030 Nigerian girls stranded in Lebanon seek Buhari’s intervention <div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-5"><div align="center"> </div></div><div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-4"><div align="center"> </div></div><h2 style="text-align: left;">Nigerian girls stranded in Lebanon begged the Nigerian government to release them.</h2><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bdaBwQadyZ0/XGhKvvc9_vI/AAAAAAAADP0/8i-xC38W1RoB0lntHBUPigpW1VQGBnpmACPcBGAYYCw/s620/President-Muhammadu-Buhari-cancelled-his-trip-to-Rwanda.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Nigeria president, Buhari Mohammed" border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="620" height="206" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bdaBwQadyZ0/XGhKvvc9_vI/AAAAAAAADP0/8i-xC38W1RoB0lntHBUPigpW1VQGBnpmACPcBGAYYCw/w320-h206/President-Muhammadu-Buhari-cancelled-his-trip-to-Rwanda.jpeg" title="Nigeria president, Buhari Mohammed" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nigeria president, Buhari Mohammed<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: right;">They made the appeal in a statement by the President of Journalists International Forum for Migration (JIFORM), Mr Ajibola Abayomi, made available to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Saturday.<br /></p><p style="text-align: right;">Abayomi told NAN that the message was being relayed following their encounter with the victims.</p><p style="text-align: right;">He disclosed that the ladies are all camped in one room with faulty toilet and other utilities in a building at Dawra city in Lebanon.</p><div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-2"><div align="center"> </div></div><p style="text-align: justify;">One of the victims, Miss Adebisi Comfort-Oluwatoyin with Passport No. number A10597908, had informed JIFORM that they had to escape from the inhuman treatment by their mistresses and hosts.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The victim is said to be a 23-year-old lady from Ondo State, who was a resident in Osun State before departing Nigeria in December 2019.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">“Help us appeal to the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), National Agency for Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) and others to save us,” she begged.</p><div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-2" style="text-align: justify;"><div> </div></div><p style="text-align: justify;">She added that the Nigerian embassy in Lebanon had tried to secure their return but their belongings and international passports were seized.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">“Our employers cut our hairs with razor blade and the police and their immigration are always on their side. We are not getting justice and our lives are in danger,” Abayomi quoted the victim as saying.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Recall that NIDCOM had recently secured the return of Peace Busari and other girls back to Nigeria.</p><div class="code-block code-block-center code-block-2" style="text-align: justify;"><div> </div></div><p style="text-align: justify;">Peace and 21 other Nigerians stranded in Lebanon were evacuated to Abuja by the federal government.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Peace Ufoma, who was trafficked to Lebanon was rescued after she was put up for sale on a social media platform by Wael Jerro, a Lebanese man.</p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-1370696417231871292020-08-01T09:26:00.004+01:002020-08-01T09:28:07.156+01:00How Lagos Hawker became Africa’s costliest Footballer - €81m Napoli deal <p style="text-align: justify;"><i>Nigerian striker Osimhen’s humble beginnings from Olusosun, the Lagos area famed for its dumpsite, to the ambience of one of Europe’s oldest cities, Naples, famed for its wealth of historical monuments, is truly one of football’s Cinderella tales, reports ’TOSIN OLUWALOWO</i></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: right;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vKzTna5ArFE/XyUloc1oVHI/AAAAAAAAFZw/rRlTKJ91Snc58IWaQ6_q8QVaCOMMSyyOQCLcBGAsYHQ/s186/Victor%2BOsimhen.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img alt="Victor Osimhen" border="0" data-original-height="96" data-original-width="186" height="165" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vKzTna5ArFE/XyUloc1oVHI/AAAAAAAAFZw/rRlTKJ91Snc58IWaQ6_q8QVaCOMMSyyOQCLcBGAsYHQ/w320-h165/Victor%2BOsimhen.jpg" title="Victor Osimhen" width="320" /></a></div><i></i>On Friday, Napoli officially announced the signing of Nigerian striker Victor Osimhen from Ligue 1 side Lille on a five-year deal worth €81 plus add-ons. <p></p><p>Aside the mega-money move making Osimhen the most expensive African footballer ever, the forward, according to close sources, will earn a whopping N4.5m annually – the highest ever by a Nigerian footballer — as salary at the Italian giants.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The 21-year-old, now regarded as one of the hottest youngsters in global football — after a phenomenal rise in two seasons at modest Belgian side Charleroi and Lille — never had the best of beginnings while growing up.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Living in one of the many makeshift houses around the Olusosun dumpsite in Lagos, Osimhen and his family had a hellish time trying to cope with the environmental and health hazards posed by the dumpsite, noted for its emission of thick smokes, foul smell and routine fire outbreaks.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The 100-acre Olusosun landfill, which receives up to 10,000 tons of rubbish each day, is regarded as one of the largest dumpsites in the world. And it’s also a hideout for criminals, who hide dangerous weapons and hard drugs inside the massive dumpsite.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Living under these terrible conditions posed enough headache for the footballer’s family, but at just six, Osimhen, last child among seven siblings, lost his mother, while his father lost his job, leaving him and his siblings in the dark world of uncertainty.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Insecurity, poverty and the perennial fear of eviction by the Lagos State Government stared his family in the face.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The setback, however, didn’t deter the teenager, who made lemonade from the lemons life threw at him: he opted to hawk water, popularly known as ‘pure water,’ on the streets of Lagos.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i></i></p><blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“I come from a place where so many dreams have died but I’m the kind of person who doesn’t give up irrespective of my situation. So, I was forced to go out and get myself a life,” Osimhen said.</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“In Lagos, they sell water (bottle or sachet) which is the easiest, but the hardest because you have to run and give somebody the water and collect money.”</i></p></blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;"><i></i></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Running on the ever-busy Lagos roads chasing passengers was the perfect training for Osimhen, who turns 22 in December, on the way to stardom. And he combined this with street football.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">But while hawking put food on the family’s table, street football didn’t, then.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">The skinny up-and-coming footballer eventually caught the attention of the country’s U-17 coaches and scouts, who selected him for the 2015 U-17 World Cup in Chile, but not without a story.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i></i></p><blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“Getting into camp was a different life, a different story,”</i> Osimhen told <i>Elegbete TV.</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“When we got to the FIFA Goal Project pitch in Abuja (where the U-17 officials were screening players), there was a huge crowd, it was like two million players. I thought, ‘how can this man (coach Emmanuel Amuneke) see me when some players had been there for several days?’</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“The screening was just for 15 minutes. Amuneke said if you’re talented, you don’t need one hour to show it. ‘In 10 minutes, if you show what you’ve got, you can be in the team,’ he said. And I said, ‘no problem, let’s go.’ In a spate of 15 minutes, I scored two goals. But the coach was so tired and said, ‘just go.’ He chased everyone out. I told the person who brought me, ‘I came to Abuja to do my bit but I wasn’t picked, I think we should go back to Lagos.’</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“But the team doctor told Amuneke, ‘I think you should try the guy on green.’ That’s me they didn’t know my name. When he (Amuneke) called me, he said, ‘don’t you eat, why are you like this?’</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“He told me to sit down and I was happy. Then I played against the main team in camp and I was fighting really hard, giving them problems.</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“After screening, the coach told some players to go but asked me to come back the following day. And he fell in love with me. The final day I was picked, the U-15 players at the Goal Project were very happy for me.”</i></p></blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;"><i></i></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Osimhen would go on to lead the Golden Eaglets to a record fifth U-17 World Cup triumph, scoring 10 goals, the highest ever at the tournament, and scooping the Golden Boot and Silver Ball in the process.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">He was also named CAF Youth Player of The Year for 2015.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">That attention-grabbing achievement sold the rising star to the world and German side Wolfsburg grabbed him.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">However, street hawking also counted for something in his burgeoning career.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">His pace and strength, qualities you must possess in the highly competitive Lagos hawking business, gives opposing defenders nightmarish moments.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i></i></p><blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“It wasn’t easy, but I had to do it and that set my path in which I will never give up in life no matter the situation or where I am and that gave me the zeal and momentum no matter what life throws at me,” </i> Osimhen said.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">He added, <i>“Growing up in a family when it was hard to get three square meals in a day, I can say that I have seen it all in life; the hardest part was when I was at Wolfsburg. It was really a tough period for me and at some point, I started doubting my abilities.</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“I had thought that everything was going to be smooth after my days with the Golden Eaglets but I thank God for the experience I went through at Wolfsburg and it made me realise that life is not that easy as it seems.”</i></p></blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;"><i></i></p><p style="text-align: justify;">After his Wolfsburg experience, where he was plagued by a series of injuries, making just 12 Bundesliga appearances and scoring no goal, Osimhen’s career seemed set for a decline after Belgian clubs Zulte Waregem and Club Brugge, who had shown interest in the striker, both turned him down under inexplicable circumstances.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">But an amazing career revival at Belgian side Sporting Charleroi, where he scored 20 goals in 36 games in the penultimate season, soon set him on the path to the top.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">Last summer, the Nigerian joined Lille for €12m and scored 18 goals with six assists in 38 games across all competitions. He was voted the club’s Player of The Year and also scooped the Marc-Vivien Foe prize for the best African player in Ligue 1, before Italian giants Napoli grabbed him from the French club on Friday, after protracted talks, following the player’s change of agents.</p><p style="text-align: justify;">He will wear the respected No.9 jersey at the two-time Italian champions next season.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i></i></p><blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“We are very happy at Osimhen’s arrival,”</i> Aurelio De Laurentiis, Napoli president, said on <i>Radio Kiss Kiss</i>.</p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“The young man has been enchanted by Partenope. He will wear the No.9 jersey.</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“(Gennaro) Gattuso (Napoli manager) really wanted to sign Osimhen. (Director of sport Cristiano) Giuntoli did a great job because the lad changed his agents during the negotiations.</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“Lille will receive circa €80m, while the player over the years will get between €4m and €4.5m per season.”</i></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“We don’t have to expect everything and immediately, even if he doesn’t score 25 or 30 goals, but he should express himself well in this extraordinary team and also make the other Azzurri score.”</i></p><br />The player himself is hoping to deliver the goods in the highly technical and demanding Serie A as he charts a new career course as Africa’s most expensive footballer ever.<p style="text-align: justify;"><i>“The next chapter @Napoli is a very exciting one and I can’t wait to get on the pitch with the team. I want to thank the fans for the past few weeks. I will definitely give my all on the pitch for the common good of the club,”</i> Osimhen tweeted on Friday.</p></blockquote><p style="text-align: justify;"></p><p style="text-align: justify;">Playing alongside experienced professionals like captain Lorenzo Insigne, José Callejón, Fernando Llorente, Hirving Lozano, Dries Mertens, David Ospina, Kalidou Koulibaly and Arkadiusz Milik will surely come handy in helping Osimhen develop into one of football’s best strikers, as he hopes to leave the dreaded Serie A defenders in his wake, on a regular basis.</p><p style="text-align: right;">Punch Report<br /></p>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-1572116437480777532020-07-13T09:51:00.003+01:002020-07-13T09:51:40.477+01:00UK Reject Air Peace Landing Rights To Evacuate Stranded Nigerians<p>Since the UK government declined Air Peace landing right, the airline cover the extra cost of engaging a foreign carrier to ensure that the Nigerians were brought back to the country. <br /></p><p>In what stakeholders see as another brewing Aero-politics, the British Government has denied Nigeria’s carrier, Air Peace landing permit to evacuate Nigerians stranded in the United Kingdom.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wtoFW8nlvQA/XwwfiYEyk_I/AAAAAAAAFXk/v4akNJpPFRIcNSTQry3Nr2sUBmu7W8qdgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1128/Airpeace.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Air Peace" border="0" data-original-height="629" data-original-width="1128" height="223" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wtoFW8nlvQA/XwwfiYEyk_I/AAAAAAAAFXk/v4akNJpPFRIcNSTQry3Nr2sUBmu7W8qdgCLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h223/Airpeace.JPG" title="Air Peace" width="400" /></a></div><p><br />The Nigeria high commission in London which released a statement on Sunday July 12, said the evacuation flights from London Heathrow to Abuja and Lagos will now depart from Gatwick Airport on Tuesday July 14.<br /><br />The statement read; <br /><em></em></p><blockquote><p><em><br />“This is to inform all prospective evacuees that have been issued tickets for the Air Peace flights departing on July 13, 2020, from London Heathrow to Abuja and Lagos, that due to landing clearance issues, the flights have been rescheduled to depart on Tuesday, July 14, 2020, at 10:00am from Gatwick Airport. <br /></em></p><em>“Furthermore, Air Peace Airlines has contracted Air Partner to operate the flight on its behalf and any other information will be communicated directly to the passengers.<br /><br />“In light of the foregoing, the mission wishes to extend its appreciation to the chairman and management of Air Peace Limited for ensuring that our stranded nationals in the United Kingdom returm home safely."</em><br /><br />The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama who reacted to the development said UK authorities decided to withdraw landing rights close to departure despite strong representations by the Nigerian Government including pointing out the hardship that would be caused to hundreds of Nigerian evacuees.<br /><br />Onyeama further stated that though Air Peace could have just refunded the passengers, they exceptionally, patriotically and altruistically agreed to find an alternative carrier acceptable to the UK authorities to carry out the evacuation a day later than scheduled but for much higher fares.<br /><br />The Minister added that the Nigerian Government will review its Air agreements with various countries as a result of the unacceptable treatment of Nigerian carriers during this pandemic.<br /><br /><strong>He Tweeted; </strong><br /><br /><em>"Having been allowed to carry out one very successful evacuation of Nigerians from London at very low fares, @flyairpeace in coordination with the @NigeriaGov and full knowledge of the UK authorities scheduled two additional flights.<br /><br />All the arrangements were made including payments, only for the UK authorities to withdraw landing rights close to departure despite strong representations by the Nigerian Government including pointing out the hardship that would be caused to hundreds of Nigerian evacuees.<br /><br />Air Peace could have just refunded the passengers but exceptionally, patriotically and altruistically agreed to find an alternative carrier acceptable to the UK authorities to carry out the evacuation a day later than scheduled but for much higher fares.<br /><br />These higher fares could legitimately have been passed on to the evacuees but Air Peace bore this huge cost itself. This is to let the aggrieved evacuees know that the objects of their grievance should neither be Air Peace nor the Nigerian Government.<br /><br />They should rather be eternally grateful to Air Peace. The Nigerian Government will review its Air agreements with various countries as a result of the unacceptable treatment of Nigerian carriers during this pandemic".</em></blockquote><em></em>ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1133164735902046207.post-27020092230305064912020-07-12T13:49:00.000+01:002020-07-12T13:49:01.482+01:00Nigerian Army confirms resignation of 356 soldiers<h1 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">The Chief of Army Staff, Lt Gen Tukur Buratai, has approved the resignation of at least 356 Nigerian soldiers, the army has confirmed.</span></h1><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LwNBxmAi9rQ/XwsF59GN5wI/AAAAAAAAFWM/YHrF1cRdB24PBhHAcTJddFwTrwS8EnKkwCLcBGAsYHQ/s275/soldiers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="266" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-LwNBxmAi9rQ/XwsF59GN5wI/AAAAAAAAFWM/YHrF1cRdB24PBhHAcTJddFwTrwS8EnKkwCLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h266/soldiers.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Nigeria Army<br /></td></tr></tbody></table>According report, All 356 soldiers are from the North-East and other theaters of operation and they were granted voluntary disengagement as contained in a 17-page circular from Buratai, AHQ DOAA/G1/300/92, signed by Brig Gen T.E. Gagariga for the army chief and obtained by our correspondent on Saturday.<br /><br />Reports revealed that the soldiers, who wrote to the army chief on July 3, 2020, under Reference NA/COAS/001, quoting the Harmonized Terms and Conditions of Service soldiers/rating/airmen (Revised) 2017, cited “loss of interest” as their reason for disengagement.<br /><br />Also, the document was copied to Headquarters, Theater Command, Operation Lafiya Dole, Borno State, the Headquarters of 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 81, and 82 Divisions of the Nigerian Army and other formations.<br /><br />Military sources attributed the soldiers' resignation to loss of morale, poor weapons, unimproved allowances and the continuous loss of soldiers to Boko Haram attacks.<br /><br />Since the beginning of 2020, the Nigerian Army has lost more than 50 soldiers due to Boko Haram onslaughts on military locations in the North-East <br /><br />In March 50 soldiers were killed in Gorigi near Allargano Forest area and the Damboa Local Government Area of Borno State.<br /><br />In May, an insurgent attack on an army location belonging to the 156 Battalion in the Mainok area claimed the lives of five soldiers.<br /><br />In June, the Boko Haram terrorists became emboldened and shot dead an acting Commanding Officer of the army, Major K. Yakubu, during a gun battle in the Doron Naira and Magaji areas of Borno State.<br /> <br />The late CO, who was in charge of 401 Special Forces Brigade, also lost some of his troops in the terrorist attack.<br /><br />The 356 soldiers who applied for voluntary retirement citing loss of interest are Master Warrant Officers, Warrant Officers, Staff Sergeants, Sergeants, Lance Corporals, Corporals and Privates.<br /><br />The total number on the list of voluntary disengagement is 380; while 356 cited loss of interest, 24 cited “to take a traditional title.”<br /><br />Writing on behalf of the army chief, Buratai, in the document, Gagariga said, “In compliance with the provisions of Reference A, the COAS vide Reference B has approved the voluntary and medical discharge of the above named MWO, and 385 others listed as Annexes A and B.<br /><br />“The soldiers are to proceed on terminal leave December 3, 2020, while their disengagement date takes effect from January 3, 2021, in accordance with the Nigerian Army Administrative Policy and Procedures No 27 Paragraphs 3 and 4. Accordingly, I am directed to request formations and units to release all affected soldiers to report at the Headquarters, Garrison, with their unit service documents for documentation.<br /><br />“All forms of military-controlled items, arms, ammunition, and items of combat kits are recovered from the soldiers prior to their disengagement date and certify that they are properly de-kitted. Please acknowledge.”<br /><br />A military source said the mass disengagement was indicative of the general discontentment in the army, and against the leaders.<br /><br />Soldiers in recent times have also appeared in viral videos complaining about the poor quality of their fighting equipment in the North-East and how the Boko Haram terrorists are able to attack and kill troops due to alleged insiders’ connivance.ochefizzyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12405494234206725373noreply@blogger.com0