The popular Abubakar Rimi market, Kano, has suffered another tragedy as a ”mysterious ” fire which started around 1.00am destroyed no fewer than 600 shops and other property worth millions of Naira.
It will be recalled that few months ago, the same market was razed by fire which destroyed thousands of shops and destroyed properties worth billions of naira.
The fire affected mostly shops where foodstuffs like rice, tomatoes, vegetables and others things were sold.
A trader affected by the inferno, Zenabu Ibrahim, told our reporter that she lost over N300,000 sales proceeds she made on Friday, which she kept in a safe at her shop.
Another trader, Garba Isa, who sells rice and other food stuff, said he lost over 100 bags of rice and beans in the fire.
Isa disclosed that he got a bank loan to replenish his store after it was burnt in the fire that razed the market earlier this year.
Iya Nike, who also deals in food stuff told www.icirnigeria.org that everything in her shop was destroyed, and wondered where she would start from again.
However, all efforts to speak with officials of the state fire service were abortive as they asked the reporter to come back later.
Governor Abdulahi Ganduje was also yet to issue any official statement as at the time of filing this report.
This is the fifth in our series on ecological problems and the failure of government to address them in spite of billion so far spent for that purpose. Written by Anayochukwu Agbo of TELL, it is in two parts.
It may be the last act of defiance for 86 years old Ma Offia Akpan Udoh. Relatives, friends, well-wishers and even the chairman of her Ibiono Ibom Local Government Area Council in Akwa Ibom State have pleaded with her to abandon her one bedroom bungalow at the edge of Ikot Uneke Ravine, that is ravished by gully erosion, all to no avail.
The humble bungalow is not much as a real estate but it holds a world of dream for the octogenarian. She has lived here and raised seven children with late husband, and it is the only inheritance that keeps the memory alive. With all the children grown and gone, she clings to the memory of a past that holds more than the present.
For Ma Udoh, the threat of military occupation of the Niger Delta creeks, a response to the return of militancy in the region, may be a distant drum. She may actually be oblivious of the complexities that attend the campaign of the Niger Delta Avengers, NDA for the environment and the effect on national economy.
The present danger to which she refused to be cowed is the obvious hostility occasioned by nature. All attempts by her children to relocate her fell on deaf ears.
According to Sunday Akpan Ekpo, a relative and a patent medicine dealer who is popularly known as ‘Doctor,’ in the neighourhood, Ma Udoh had regrettably watched gully erosion take over the village footway that passed by her house.
Ariel view of Ma Udo’s endangered bungalow in Ibiono Ibom
From a narrow harmless trail that the villagers shared with erosion when it rained, the water became greedier. It dung deeper and deeper, and gnawed at both sides of the divide until it became a gorge several metres deep. The trail originally led to the village stream called Idem Idem until erosion took it beyond the reach of the villagers.
Etoro-Obong Akpan, a journalist who doubles as a legislative aid to a member of the Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly is from the embattled village. He recalled with nostalgia how he used the same village pathway to the stream about 25 years ago as a young boy growing up in the pastoral countryside of Ikot Usen.
That nostalgia turned into bitterness and anger as he followed our team down to the ancient Idem Idem River, which is now all but buried under tons and tons of erosion silt, leaving a shallow pond where a few children bathed naked.
From the pool, a narrow belt of water stubbornly snaked into the ravine and disappeared down the groove.
“This stream was so deep that we were diving into it from the banks,” Etoro-Obong continued to lament; “now see what is left of it!” He scooped the water with both hands; perhaps to be sure it was real.
It might be the swan song for the embattled stream if help does not come fast enough. The government of Akwa Ibom State awarded a remedial contract to check the problem but the remedy ironically turned into a new malady as the drains were not properly terminated and became the trigger for worse gully erosion.
One of those incompetently terminated drainages is just 200 metres to Ma Udoh’s treasured homestead. TELL did not meet her at home as she was said to have been ill and taken to a hospital by her children at Benin, Edo State.
Improperly terminated drainage close to Ma Udoh’s house
The villagers are praying she stays away until either the house is totally carried away, or help comes from the government.
Ibiono Ibom Local government area is erosion prone. Its undulating landscape leaves both flanks vulnerable to corrosive gully erosion. Construction companies build erosion works into their road contract procurements but these palliatives become new triggers for worse gullies.
Julius Berger controlled the Ikot Adaidem Ravine erosion that was cutting the Ikot Ekpene Road into two at Ibiono Ibom but rather than solve the problem, it rather trapped the water. Without an immediate escape the erosion is now digging around the vegetation, looking for escape.
Consequently, the natural stream that serves the neighbourhood is now subsumed in the stagnant water, which has been polluted by rotting vegetation and flood water.
Perhaps the predicament of Ibiono Ibom would have been mitigated if the contract awarded by the federal government for erosion control in Ibiono Ibom was properly executed.
Ikot Adaidem Ravine, Ibiono Ibom, Akwa Ibom
In 2011, the government awarded a N6.1 billion contract to United Dominion Company Ltd under the supervision of the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, for erosion control in the local government. The contract was to be completed in 104 weeks; that is two years.
All things being equal, the project should have been completed in 2013 but three years after the delivery date, not much has been done.
There is controversy over the federal government agency that awarded the contract. In the list we got from the government, it is listed as Ecological Fund office with NDDC as the supervising agency. However, Ita Enang, special assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on the Senate who was the senator representing the senatorial district in the Seventh Senate when the contract was awarded insisted that the contract is an NDDC contract.
Incidentally, Enang’s village, Ididep, is part of the contract. In any case, what is relevant is whether the job was done to specification. And when asked if he was satisfied by the job done by United Dominion, Enang became evasive and rather asked if we knew the owners of the company.
An indigene of Ididep who conducted the Magazine round the project sites but requested not to be mentioned described the attitude of the company to the execution of the contract as “reckless and insensitive.”
He explained that their “presence was not felt” for such a massive contract. “You have seen our community and the erosion menace, let the federal government come and show us where the N6.1 billion was spent.”
He, however, acknowledged that two other companies, which constructed the internal roads in Enang’s village in another NDDC contract “did well”.
Likewise, Okuku Ime Udosoru, the Ibom of Ibiono Ibom and paramount ruler of the local government doubted the existence of the contract in his domain because he was not aware of it.
“I cannot even spell United Dominion! I don’t know who they are or where they are located. It’s by the grace of TELL that I have been told of United Dominion for the first time!”
Asked if a company that supposedly executed such an important project in his domain did not seek his royal input or local knowledge of the environment, he insisted he was not aware of the contract.
In the same vein, Albert Essien, Akwa Ibom State commissioner for environment, who also comes from the local government, said he had not been briefed about the project.
From 2005 to 2015, several contracts were awarded under the Ecological Fund by the federal government under the supervision of various agencies.
In Akwa Ibom State, these contracts were supervised by the Cross River Basin Development Authority, CRBDA; NDDC, ministry of Niger Delta Affairs and Ministry of Environment.
The following ecological fund projects were supervised by CRBDA in the state: the gully erosion at Itak Ikono Local Government which cost the federal government N264.8 million; Ndue Edue Eket Erosion Project at N283.5m; Ikot Nseyen Ukpom Road Erosion project at N180.7m and Afaha Attai-IkotAkpan Mkpe Road Erosion control at N204.9m.
All these are listed as “completed” by the Ecological Fund Office but due to either incompetence or corruption, or both, the jobs were not properly supervised by the federal government. As a result, the little that was done was shabbily done and the bad termination points have triggered fresh erosion more devastating than the first ones.
However, the erosion and Flood control at A Line, Ewet Housing Estate, Uyo, awarded at the cost of N70m was executed. Between 2007 and 2014, contracts for 19 ecological related projects in the six core Niger Delta states of Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Cross River, Delta, Edo and Rivers were awarded by the federal government at the cost of N38.6 billion.
Essien at the Dominic Etuk Street project site
Essien who conducted TELL round some erosion sites in Uyo and its environs said the state government is worried about the devastation being caused by relentless gully erosion. At the Umoetuk Avenue erosion site, which is being handled by the Federal government, he gave the job pass mark and attributed what is left to the slow pace of relocating the prison complex which is on the water way.
Prior to the remediation, the avenue had been cut into two by relentless gully erosion, which threatened a number of real estates in the area. Down the ravine, a few houses had collapsed under the relentless erosion.
The site engineer, Ubong Etuk said the remediation is for a total of 500 metres, out of which the first most critical 300 metres had been completed.
At St Luke’s Hospital Annua, a popular hospital being run by missionaries, which was massively rehabilitated by the state government, the northern limits of the premises recently collapsed into the Annua Ravine after a heavy rainfall.
Anua Ravine Erosion , by St Luke’s Hospital, UyoRobison showing emergency intervention work at St Luke’s Hospital
Unyime Robison, state desk officer for Nigeria Erosion and Watershed Management Project, NEWMAP, who conducted the magazine round the site, explained that to save the hospital the state government hurriedly carried out an initial intervention to stop further encroachment. But even this had been mostly eroded when we inspected the site, meaning the hospital is still far from safety.
Essien said the Akwa Ibom State government has aggregated about 100 serious gully erosion sites in the state. Though the federal government has awarded contracts for some of these, about 10 percent, he said they were a far cry from the enormity of the menace.
While the government is engaging the ecological fund office for further intervention, it is also seeking the assistance of multilateral agencies to assist. One of such agencies is NEWMAP, an agency of World Bank that is already on location in neighbouring Cross River State to a great relief.
However, what is not happening in Akwa Ibom is that the state government appears not to be following up on federal interventions on ecological problems in the state.
Consequently, some contractors do shoddy jobs and get away with them. These come back to haunt the state as badly terminated drains become fresh triggers for worse erosion. An example is the case of the Ibiono Ibom Local Government contract.
Akwa Ibom State is bordered on the South by the Atlantic Ocean and is currently the highest oil producing state in the country. It has the longest shoreline in the country, measuring 129 kilometres. This long coastline exposes the State to the threats of coastal erosion and flooding. Heavy and prolonged rainfall and the loose nature of the soil have aggravated soil wash and accelerated formation of gullies in the state.
At the moment, the state government has documented over 100 active gully erosion sites spread across the 31 local government areas of the state.
Building along drainage Channels, Calabar
Like Akwa Ibom, Cross River has not followed up on the Ecological Fund projects in the State, leaving room for substandard jobs and outright abandonment of the projects. The biggest heist in the state is the contract for the gully erosion and flood control works at the Eastern Naval Command headquarters, Calabar, which was awarded to Ginscon Construction Limited at the cost of N3.798 billion.
The contract is listed as “completed 100%” by the Ecological Fund office and supposedly ‘executed’ under the direct supervision of the Presidency/Ecological Fund Office.
However, it was found that the contract has not been executed. When TELL visited the naval facility, an officer who spoke off the record said that “the contractor has not mobilized to site.” He reasoned that “maybe the contractor has not been mobilized for the job.”
Unknown to him, the job has been completed on paper. He referred the magazine to the Cross River State government as he said it was not a military contract. Had the State government been up to its game in monitoring the project it would have known that the erosion control job had been ‘completed’ without getting started.
The Naval facility is on the shores of the Calabar River and all the flood water from the state secretariat, G.U. Esuene Stadium, Government House and environs scud down the steep landscape to the Calabar River by the naval headquarters, eating away at the coastline. Naval platforms anchor on the threatened shoreline from where they take control of all maritime security in the Eastern water ways.
The contract was supposed to secure this important military facility, the nearby Cross River State House of Assembly and other security and civil infrastructure.
The naval authorities declined to officially speak on the project, insisting only the state ministry of environment should do that. However, Mike Eraye, an engineer and commissioner for environment said he did not know enough about the project yet to confirm the degree of completion. He promised to ascertain the state of completion and get back to us, which he had not done when the magazine went to bed.
Contract for Erosion Control Works at Convention Centre, Calabar, was also awarded by the federal government at the cost of N200m. On inspection, it was found that the drains were not properly terminated and the necessary landscaping to secure the approaches and exits were not properly done. It is only a matter of time before the floods re-establish its right of way at worse consequences and greater cost.
Likewise, contract for land reclamation and erosion control at Esseien Town, Ekorinin Community was awarded to A. G. Vision Construction Nigeria Ltd on May 12, 2011 at N1.948 billion, under the supervision of Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs.
It was supposed to be delivered in 12 months, but when TELL visited the community it appeared the contract had been abandoned. Erosion is still ravishing their land and the threat of landslides is increasing daily. The indigenes of the community have no idea of what is happening to the contract. The Niger Delta Ministry doesn’t appear to know either. The change of government is taking its toll on the ministry as an audit of projects it inherited is still going on.
A senior staff of the ministry said only the minister, Usani Uguru, can give a status report on the projects inherited. Our request for interview is still with the minister. He gave an appointment once but could not make it due to state duties and promised to reschedule it, which he has not done at press time.
It is not the only project the minister is expected to give an update on. The Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs also supervised the N1.479 billion contract for land reclamation and erosion control at Ibakang Nssit-Ikot Ekpo- Unyehe Road in Nsit Attai Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State, awarded to Apogee Engineering Ltd on November 10, 2010.
It was to be completed 12 months later in November 2011 but though it is officially ‘completed’ the problems it was supposed to solve are still on the ground.
The Cross River Basin Development Authority, CRBDA, supervised several Ecological Fund projects in Cross River and Akwa Ibom states between 2007 and 2015, which were found to have been executed shoddily.
The Magazine visited the headquarters of the agency in Calabar and requested for status update on the ecological fund projects under its supervision and the challenges hampering the completion of projects according to schedule.
The managing director, Etta Eyo-Ita, was evasive and requested for an official letter to enable her respond to our enquiry. The letter was promptly dispatched. But even at that, she has not responded as press time. Cross River, according to the state ministry of environment, has documented over 50 serious gully erosion sites.
The second and concluding part of this report will be published tomorrow
The United States of America is a fascinating country that holds incredible attraction for people and governments of other parts of the world. Whether in Africa, Europe, Asia or the Middle East, citizens and governments admire the US and aspire to attain its social, economic and political standards.
The country is viewed, and rightly so, as holding the gold in terms of high moral and ethical standards for political leaders. In their daily lives, most Americans may appal many by what may be considered their social indiscretions. But the citizens set a high moral and social standard for those who aspire to lead them.
That is why even though promiscuity and infidelity are a common feature of life in this great country, the people would easily reject any aspirant to high office upon the slightest evidence of moral laxity. And there have been several cases of politicians whose ambitions had been terminated because of photographs showing they had cheated on a spouse.
It is also a country of opportunities for hard working people, regardless of your country of origin, race or religion. For decades, America has opened its doors to people of all races who have dreams to pursue. The founding fathers of the country have inspired many around the world with their lofty visions of freedom and liberty for all humans.
The success of democracy in the US has made democracy and the presidential system a desirable model for all citizens of the world, including those in countries with history of monarchy and oligarchy. The American idea of liberty and its political system have also inspired protests in some other countries where social, political rights and freedoms are restricted or denied.
The image of the US has been rightly boosted by its advanced technology which has made it, in the words of Russian President Vladimir Putin, probably the only super power in the world today.
But one area where America is not leading the world is how to respond to religious extremism, especially what the West like to call “radical Islam.” But the truth is that there is nothing like radical Islam or Islamic terrorism. These are wrong but convenient labels to categorise a phenomenon that is changing the world in a terrible and unfortunate way.
What exist is not radical Islam, but Muslims radicalised by their socio-economic experiences to the point that they are willing to take their own lives as well as the lives of those they perceive as their oppressors.
And they would be willing to use whatever weapon, including religion, to mobilise support for their cause.
It is a tragedy of immense proportion that the modern world has not been able to fashion an appropriate response that would win back these young men and women into society and make them give up violence and death. But the world continues to provide more fuel for the fire of extremism and radicalism.
What we see and hear a lot of the time are people and speeches that further push these radicals towards society’s fringes and dim any hope of ever stopping terrorism. In the US, the republicans are demystifying their country and making many wonder whether America and Americans truly deserved our admiration.
It is a waste of time to talk about how Donald Trump, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, has degraded political rhetoric in the world’s leading democracy. He not only shocked the world by the way he elevated bullying and abuse as weapons of campaign in American politics, he wants to “Make America Great Again” by building divisive walls among the diverse people of the country. What a sad joke!
What bothers one is the way his hate speeches have resonated with many Americans, including top members of his party who are now finding their voices because Trump had belled the cat. And the latest addition to the list is Newt Gingrich, former House Speaker and prominent GOP leader.
Just hours after a suicide truck ran over a crowd of people in Nice, France, killing over 80 people including women and children, Gingrich said on Fox News Channel, that all Muslims in the US must face a test.
And what is the test? Every American Muslim must be tested to find out if they believe in Sharia. He said Sharia was incompatible with western civilisation and any American who subscribes to Sharia must be deported.
His words: “We should frankly test every person here who is of a Muslim background and if . believe in Sharia, they should be deported,” he told host Sean Hannity. “Sharia is incompatible with western civilization. Modern Muslims, who have given up Sharia — glad to have them as citizens. Perfectly happy to have them next door.”
He also called for mosques to be monitored for signs of jihadists. “Let me be very clear. You have to monitor the mosques,” Gingrich said. “I mean if you’re not prepared to monitor the mosques, this whole thing is a joke. Where do you think the primary source of recruitment is? Where do you think the primary place of indoctrination is?”
Gingrich betrayed an ignorance that is common among non-Muslims when Islam and Muslims are being discussed.
The problem is not Islam or Muslims as many non-Muslims seem to think. The problem is how society or certain systems radicalise people. The Briton who shot and stabbed Jo Cot, a British MP, to death is not a Muslim. He killed her because he supported Brexit and she campaigned against it. He saw her as a stumbling block and took her out.
Micah Johnson who killed five Dallas white police officers was not a Muslim. He lost patience with an American system that he wrongly believed was skewed against black people.
More revealing to me was what Kalyn Chapman James, the first black Miss Alabama, said in the wake of the Dallas police tragedy. James recorded a two-minute long Facebook clip in her car outside her local church while struggling to hold back tears.
She admitted in the clip that she felt little towards the five police officers killed when Micah Johnson opened fire during a rally in the Texas city recently. She said her heart was with Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, the two black Americans killed by police officers in shootings that sparked the Dallas riot
The former beauty queen said: “I don’t feel sad for the officers who lost their lives and I know that’s not really my heart.”
“I value human life. And I want to feel sad for them but I can’t help but feeling like the shooter was a martyr.”
“I don’t want to feel this way and I know it’s not the right way to feel because nobody deserves to lose their lives. But I’m sick of this.”
“I can’t stop replaying the image of these men being killed in my mind and my heart weeps.’”
If the world wants to stop terrorism and radicalisation of youths, we must begin to end situations that would make a human being call a killer “a martyr.” This is the way the minds of those called Muslim terrorists also work. The way to weaken them and stop them from embracing hate and violence against fellow human beings is for leaders to be more open-minded and work at eliminating the root causes of mass discontentment in the world.
Majority of Muslims the world over are as worried about radicalised Muslim youths as non-Muslims. And I know that many Islamic clerics have used every opportunity to preach against extremism and condemn violence as anti-Islam. Their mission to de -radicalise the youths will succeed only if world leaders help with rhetoric that unite and not divide, and admonish love and not hate.
Any Muslim cleric will tell you that he is scared when non-Muslims, especially those in the West, spew anti-Islam and hate speeches because that is what the terrorists love to hear. They simply use it as weapon of Jihadist recruitment.
If the US and Europe devout half of the resources they throw at solving humanitarian crisis all over the world to addressing this challenge, whether between Israel and Palestine or between government and political oppositions, the world would become more peaceful.
America can learn something from the city of London where a Muslim, Sadiq Khan, was recently elected mayor. Khan, whose parents came from Pakistan, is a British human rights lawyer who has defended many people of colour or Muslims that suffered discrimination. He is also author of several books including, “Fairness Nor Favours” and “How to Re- Connect With British Muslims.”
But his fellow Britons who elected him mayor did not profile him on the basis of his religion and didn’t also see him as an outsider. In the wake of the Nice attack, he condemned the “poisonous and twisted ideology” of the terrorists after denouncing the attack as an “unspeakable act of terror.”
Closing the doors of the US to Muslims, blacks or other people of colour would not make the US safer as long as it continues to have allies in other parts of the world. The US has a long history of religious freedom. The American constitution protects the free exercise of religion while barring any official endorsement of a religion.
To change that because of the unfortunate activities of some misguided youths, is to demystify a great country such as the US.
Police in the German city of Munich have asked members of the public to submit any videos, photos or audio recordings from Friday’s mass shooting.
Nine people were killed and 16 wounded, three of them critically, at a shopping mall by a lone gunman who later shot himself dead nearby.
No motive has yet been established for the attack.
The attack is the third on civilians in western Europe in eight days, following the violence in Nice and Wuerzburg.
Police will give an update on their investigation later today.
Special forces have reportedly searched the killer’s home in the Munich district of Maxvorstadt.
Interior Minister, Thomas de Maiziere has given orders for flags to be flown at half-mast across Germany in mourning for the dead.
Chancellor Angela Merkel has delayed a holiday in the Alps to chair a meeting of the national security council later on Saturday.
The authorities say Munich is returning to normal as public transport services, which were closed down during the huge manhunt following the attack, resumed overnight.
People could be seen laying flowers and lighting candles outside the Olympia shopping mall on Saturday.
The Nigerian Army has deployed another batch of 700 officers and soldiers to Liberia on a peacekeeping mission after a 4-week special training in preparation for their induction into the United Nations Peacekeeping Mission.
During the passing out ceremony for troops at the Nigerian Army Peacekeeping Centre, Jaji, Kaduna State, the Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai, urged them to avoid any act capable of tarnishing the image of the nation.
The army chief who was represented by the Chief of Training and Operations, Hamza Umaru, also reminded the soldiers that the Nigerian Army would not tolerate any act of cowardice or professional negligence while carrying out their operations in Liberia.
He urged them to abide by the Rules of Engagement, exhibit braveness as professionals and to also respect the cultural sensitivity of the people of Liberia, while also reminding them of the United Nations’ zero tolerance for drug trafficking.
Acting Commandant of Nigerian Army Peacekeeping Centre, Adamu Dauda, said he was confident that the high level of enthusiasm and cohesion exhibited by the soldiers would reflect on their operational conduct.
The army authorities say the training exercise is in line with the Nigerian Army Headquarters’ desire to ensure that troops receive the needed robust and theatre-specific pre-deployment training prior to their induction into peacekeeping missions.
The contingents are expected to depart to Liberia in a couple of days.
Maj. Gen. Leo Irabor (centre) during the press conference
Commander of the counter-insurgency operations in the North-East, also called Operation Lafiya Dole, Leo Irabor, has revealed that a first cousin to the Chief of Defence Staff, Abayomi Olonisakin was killed in a recent operation against the Boko Haram insurgency.
Irabor made the revelation during a press conference on recent operations of his command in Maiduguri, the Borno State Capital, saying that nobody is left out in the sacrifice to rid the nation of terrorism.
He said that some soldiers and volunteer youth vigilante group, civilian JTF were still missing in the recent operations against the insurgents.
“I wish to use this medium to indicate that high prices are being paid by officers and soldiers of Operation Lafiya Dole. Our hearts go out to all the families of our colleagues who have paid the supreme price,” he said.
He pledged that the troops would liberate the entire Northeast from the claws of terrorism and insurgency “as our respect to the heroic efforts of these departed colleagues.”
Irabor commiserated with the Chief of Defence Staff over the loss of his cousin in the last operation in Kargarwa, insisting that in the ongoing war against terrorism, every soldier and officer are involved and willing to sacrifice for peace to return to the country.
The army commander narrated that on July 12, “our troops at Kargarwa came under Boko Haram terrorist attack as they consolidate their hold on the location,
“The troops fought gallantly killing 25 Boko Haram terrorists and capturing two RPG tubes, a 60mm mortal tube, two MGs, twelve AK47 riffles, a LMG.”
“The following day, additional three bodies of Boko Haram terrorists were discovered along with other Boko Haram terrorist equipment. Sadly, however, we lost an officer (the CDS’s cousin) and a soldier while 11 others were wounded,
All the wounded have been stabilized with five of them already returned to the front lines after treatment,” he said.
Former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Nuhu Ribadu, has returned to the All Progressives Congress.
The former EFCC boss was one of the founding leaders of the ruling party but defected to the PDP in 2014, few months to the 2015 general elections.
In a statement posted on his social media handle, the former EFCC boss said that he had “finally heeded the calls on me to return to the All Progressives Congress, a party of which I was a founding member”.
“I re-registered as a member of the APC on Thursday through the party’s online portal. After that, the leadership of the party in my Bako ward of Yola South Local Government Area visited me in my Yola residence to welcome me back to their fold,” the former ACN presidential aspirant said.
Ribadu stated further that his decision to return to the APC was informed by “my belief that all politics are local. Almost everyone around me, and with whom we started my political journey believed the time had come for us to make sacrifices and make concessions.”
Gunshots rang out Friday evening at a shopping mall in Munich, the capital of Germany in what police has described as a suspected terror attack.
Police say the perpetrators of the attack are still on the run, and they advise people to avoid public places.
There are reports of at least six people killed, but police have not confirmed that figure.
A big security operation is under way at the Olympia Mall in the North-western Moosach district.
Shop workers have been unable to leave the building and there is no information yet about a possible motive for the attack.
The police quoted eyewitnesses as saying they had seen three attackers carrying guns.
Security forces have been on the alert after a teenage migrant stabbed and injured five people on a train in Bavaria on Monday in an attack that was later claimed by the Islamic State.
The Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, Niger Delta University, NDU, chapter has accused Governor Seriake Dickson of Bayelsa State of establishing a private university named African International University, AIU.
The academic body regretted that the government was thinking of establishing a private university with state resources despite several months of unpaid salaries of lecturers, and underfunding of NDU.
ASUU alleged that Dickson plans to strangulate the state-owned university because of the new private university.
The NDU chapter of ASUU expressed these concerns on Friday during a press conference at the NDU’s Faculty of Law Campus in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State capital.
The Chairman, ASUU, NDU chapter, Stanley Ogoun, who addressed newsmen, said the passage of the bill to establish AIU, a public-private partnership arrangement, to be sited at Toru Orua, Dickson’s hometown, was an attempt to destroy the state-owned university.
Ogoun wondered why a government that was unable to adequately fund the NDU could be tinkering with the idea of establishing a new university under a partnership arrangement via counterpart funding with a promise to make it better than NDU.
He said, “The first concern is the issue of timing. Is this an auspicious time for a policy like this, considering the state government’s failure to pay salaries spanning into several months?
“Who truly owns this African International University, who are the private promoters?
Why is the Governor of Bayelsa State, the Visitor to a supposed private-sector driven university?
Why are the supposed ‘investors’ faceless?
“What is the percentage of equity holding by the Bayelsa State Government and that of the supposed ‘investors’ in the private public arrangement?
“We know that all universities are established by a single law, and therefore, if the African International University is private sector driven which implies a private sector majority shareholding, why should it be the responsibility of the Bayelsa State House of Assembly to pass the law setting up the university?
“Why must a private sector led company be established by a Bayelsa State Government law?”
The ASUU Chairman sought to know why the supposed faceless “investors” involved in the PPP arrangement could not obtain a licence from the National University Commission.
Ogoun also wondered why the state Assembly passed the bill with within 24 hours, without a public hearing as required of bills of such nature.
He said that a glance at the bill indicated clearly that it is simply prototype of the NDU law 2000 as amended in 2004, noting that the NDU Law 2000 was plagiarised.
He, therefore, called on all Bayelsa people, the Ijaw nation and the general public to be vigilant and stand up against any fraudulent intent that would enslave the masses.
But the government in a reaction denied that Dickson owns the private university and kept sealed lips on the owners and promoters.
The government said the allegation that Dickson was planning to establish his private university under the pretence of a PPP arrangement was untrue.
The Commissioner for Information and Orientation, Jonathan Obuebite, said the new university was an idea conceived by private investors who wanted the state partnership.
Obuebite said, “We announced the intention of the State Government to engage the private sector to float a new university to be named the African International University.
“Shortly after the announcement, as expected, the social media was awash with different tales of the idea behind the University and the real intention.
“Some accused us of going to open a new University when we have said we cannot continue to fund the Niger Delta University.
“This wrong notion and interpretation of our move is sad but we thank them for displaying their folly and mischief and commend them also for giving their paymaster a reason to believe they are working.”
250 former members of the youth vigilante, civilian-joint task force, who had been supporting the Nigerian military in the fight against Boko Haram, have been fully inducted into the Nigerian army after concluding their military training.
According to PREMIUM TIMES, the newly-recruited troopers were at the Maiduguri Government House in Maiduguri on Friday to thank the state Governor, Kashim Shettima for the role he played in helping them to join the army.
Benjamin Solomon, the leader of the team and commander of the parade, was full of eulogies for the governor as well as the Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai, while pleading that others, who are currently in the CJTF, be given the opportunity to serve in the military.
“We are here to say thank for making us become soldiers of our great country. We thank the president and we thank our father, the Chief of Army Staff, who ensured that we are soldiers today,” Solomon said.
“We are very many in the state and we are pleading that others too be given the same opportunity to become soldiers as well. We also have graduates among us who could also be given an opportunity to serve as officers of various military and paramilitary services. To us, it is now time to serve our country by laying down our lives to protect its territorial integrity”
Governor Shettima, in his remarks, said “The emergence of the Civilian-JTF is a game changer in the fight against Boko Haram.”
“One major issue that needs to be reported is the once strained relationship that existed between the people of our state and the military. But with the emergence of the Civilian-JTF the relationship became cordial. When the historical epoch of the Boko Haram insurgency is being written, the Civilian-JTF will have a chunk place of recognition,” he said.
Shettima thanked President Muhammadu Buhari and the Chief of Army Staff, “for helping us to absorb our gallant youth into the Nigerian Army,
“We are not going to stop at this; we are not going to get tired in going after all the service chiefs as we are going to keep knocking on their doors until all our Civilian-JTF members are into various military and paramilitary outfits.”
Shettima also advised the new recruits to be good ambassadors of the state and be loyal to the army hierarchy, urging them “to go to wherever you are posted and deal with all enemies of the country the way you dealt with Boko Haram terrorists.”
Kaka Lawan, the state attorney general and commissioner of justice, had earlier said that other batches of the Civilian-JTF would soon be absorbed into the Nigeria Police and other agencies.
He said 30 of the JTF had already joined the Department of State Security, DSS, as junior personnel.
