The Police Service Commission has approved the appointment of seven Deputy Inspectors-General of Police, DIGs, to constitute a new management team for the Nigeria Police Force.
Ikechukwu Ani, Head, Force Public Relations, made this known in a statement released late Monday evening, saying “The Commission on Monday, approved the appointment of seven Deputy Inspectors-General of Police to man the seven Management Departments of the Force.”
The new DIGs include Shuaibu Gambo, Department of Finance and Administration; Joshak Habila, Department of Operations; Maigari Dikko, Department of Logistics and Supply; H. M. Dagala, Department of Force Criminal Investigations Department, FCID; Emmanuel Inyang, Department of Training and Development; Ntom Chukwu, Department of Research and Planning; Folusho Adebanjo, Department of ICT.
The commission also approved the appointment of Abdul Bube, an Assistant Inspector General of police, AIG, as the Force Secretary.
The statement added that the appointments have been conveyed to the Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris for implementation.
Mike Okiro, chairman of the police service commission said the officers’ promotion letters will follow in due course.
Embattled national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Ali Modu-Sheriff, says he has appealed the Federal High Court judgment which recognized the Ahmed Makarfi-led caretaker committee as the legitimate organ of the party.
Justice Abdullahi Liman of the Federal High Court, Port Harcourt, ruled on Monday that the PDP national convention held on May 21, 2016 in the Rivers State capital, was legal and did not go contrary to any law.
Modu-Sheriff told journalists that he remains the chairman of the party until the Court of Appeal sets aside an earlier ruling of a Federal High Court in Abuja which was in his favour.
He stated that the Federal High Court in Port Harcourt is of equal ranking with that in Abuja and therefore cannot make him vacate office until a higher court rules otherwise.
Meanwhile, chairman of the party’s caretaker committee, Ahmed Makarfi, in a statement after the court ruling in Port Harcourt, appealed to the Sherrif to sheathe his sword and join others in rebuilding the party.
Men of the Nigerian Army, on Monday morning foiled what would have been a huge catastrophe at an Internally Displaced Persons’ Camp in Monguno, Borno state.
According to Sani Usman, the acting director Army Public Relations, three female Boko Haram suicide bombers who attempted to attack innocent Internally Displaced Persons,attacked the IDPs who were fetching water at a borehole located at the outskirt of Monguno town along Marte road.
But they were detected by vigilant troops and were gunned down, but the explosive they were strapped with exploded and injured 2 civilians nearby.
The injured persons are currently receiving medical attention at the 8 Task Force Division’s medical facility.
The third suicide bomber,who followed a different route and detonated her device some distance before troops deployment along the same road at about 7.10am.
Troops have cordoned off the area and imposed restriction of movement into Monguno while they patrol the general area in order to make it safe.
In a related development, troops of 118 Task Force Battalion, 8 Task Force Division sprang a surprised ambush on some Boko Haram terrorists along Gerere Junction, Kukawa Local Government Area, on the northern part of Borno State.
The Boko Haram terrorists were suspected to be fleeing from the advancing troops of 119 Task Force Battalion presently mopping the general area of Kangarwa in Kukawa Local Government Area.
4 Boko Haram terrorists carrying logistics items were killed in the encounter and troops recovered 48 Jerry cans containing 1,440 litres of Premium Motor Spirit, PMS, Automatic Gasoline Oil, AGO, 8 Motorcycles out of which 2 were destroyed, 21 rounds of 7.62mm ammunition, 2 AK-47 rifles, an unprimed Improvised Explosive Device and a 36 Henagar Hand Grenade, as well as assorted drugs.
President Muhammadu Buhari has approved the composition of the Board of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation,NNPC, as provided for under Section 1(2) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Act of 1997, as amended.
The president also removed Ibe Kachikwu as group managing director of the corporation.
This was contained in a statement by presidential spokesperson, Femi Adesina on Monday.
Kachikwu will however remain as minister of state for petroleum and will serve as chairman of the new NNPC board.
The new NNPC GMD is Maikanti Kacalla Baru, according to the presidency.
The new board is composed of the following:
Chairman-Dr Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu, Honourable Minister of State for Petroleum;
Group Managing Director- Dr Maikanti Kacalla Baru;
The Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Finance; and
The following six persons:
Mallam Abba Kyari
Dr Thomas M.A John
Dr Pius O. Akinyelure
Dr Tajuddeen Umar
Mallam Mohammed Lawal, and
Mallam Yusuf Lawal.
President Buhari urges the new board to ensure the successful delivery of the mandate of the NNPC, ” and serve the nation by upholding the public trust placed on them in managing this critical national asset.”
The Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, has dissolved the management board of Skye Bank PLC citing the bank’s inability to meet the deadline of June 30, 2016, giving to the bank to recapitalise.
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the bank also resigned, while four non-executive directors were retained and will be replaced by Muhammad Ahmad, a former Central Bank official, a former head of the Pension Commission and former Chairman of First Bank Nigeria.
Also, Tokunbo Abiru, a former executive director at First Bank Nigeria takes over as the new CEO.
The financial regulator, however says that Skye Bank is not distressed but has fallen below the regulated capital adequacy ratio.
Last year, the central bank gave three commercial banks until June 2016 to recapitalise after they failed to hit a minimum capital adequacy rate of 10 percent.
On Monday, Skye Bank shares fell 9.52 percent to 95 kobo as investors sold almost 11 million shares of the lender whose 2015 financial statements are yet to be released to the market.
Ex-militants from Bayelsa and Delta states have staged a protest over delayed payment of their five-month amnesty stipends by the Federal Government.
The protesters initially blocked the Mbiama-Yenagoa section of the East-West Road, a major expressway linking the South-South with other regions of the country.
Many travelers and other road users were stranded for many hours as motorists, commercial drivers and commuters got stuck in the traffic gridlock.
Heavily armed soldiers and other security personnel were present to prevent any breakdown of law and order.
It took the intervention of the Commander of the Joint Force in the Niger Delta, Operation Delta Safe, Rear Admiral Joseph Okojie, for the former agitators to back track and open the road to traffic.
Okojie urged the ex-militants to be patient with authorities, assuring them that their stipends would be paid to them.
Governor Seriake Dickson had on Sunday, July 3, appealed to ex-militants to be calm and exercise patience with the federal government over the delayed stipends, while also calling on the Presidential Amnesty Office to urgently pay whatever was due the ex-agitators.
Reacting to the protest, the Coordinator, Presidential Amnesty Programme, Paul Boroh, a retired Brigadier General, said the delayed stipends of the ex-militants would be paid this week.
Boroh said it would be counterproductive for ex-agitators to take to the streets at a time the government was making serious efforts to resolve some of the issues confronting the programme.
He called on all agitators in the Niger Delta region to shun acts that were inimical to public peace, as such street protests could be hijacked by hoodlums to cause mayhem and discredit the programme.
A Federal High Court sitting in Port-Harcourt has upheld the removal of former Borno State Governor, Ali Modu-Sheriff as the Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.
Justice Mohammed Liman, delivered the judgment on Monday, declaring that the National Convention that removed Sheriff was legal.
The PDP has been embroiled in internal crisis following the national convention which was held in Port-Harcourt earlier this year, during which Modu-Sheriff was removed as the party’s National Chairman and former Kaduna State Governor, Ahmed Makarfi, was appointed as caretaker chairman.
Modu-Sheriff insisted he remains the party’s National Chairman and even conducted a parallel Governorship primary election in Edo State even after the Makarfi–led faction had earlier held a primary election.
The development left the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in a dilemma as to which of the faction to recognize as authentic.
But the commission told the media it awaits the judgment – which has now been delivered – in order to know which of the two PDP factions to recognize especially with regards to the upcoming governorship elections in Edo and Ondo States.
The governorship election in Edo state has been scheduled to hold on September 10, while that of Ondo will hold in November.
A Federal High Court in Lagos has granted bail in the sum of N250m to two former ministers of the federal republic, Femi Fani-Kayode and Nenadi Usman, who are being tried by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for an alleged fraud of N4.9bn.
Also admitted to bail in the same conditions was one Danjuma Yusuf, who was standing trial alongside the two former ministers.
Justice Muslim Hassan granted the bail with two sureties in like sum, who must possess landed properties within the jurisdiction of the court as well as present evidence of tax clearance in the state.
Justice Hassan also ordered the accused persons to deposit their passports with the court pending the outcome of the case.
The accused were arraigned before Justice Hassan on June 28, on a 17-count of conspiracy, unlawful retention of proceeds of theft and money laundering.
Fani-Kayode, who acted as the Director, Media and Publicity for former President Goodluck Jonathan’s presidential campaign in the 2015 general election, was accused of conspiring with the others to directly and indirectly retain various sums which the EFCC claimed they ought to have reasonably known were proceeds of theft.
The offences were allegedly committed between January 8 and March 25, 2015 in the build-up to the general elections.
But the defendants pleaded not guilty to the charges.
The EFCC says it intends to invite 17 witnesses during the trial.
Justice Hassan adjourned till October 19, 2016 for the prosecution to open its case.
Kano State commissioner for health, Kabir Getso, has disclosed that Kano state records 650,000 cases of pneumonia infection among children annually.
He said available data has also shown that Pneumonia disease claims the lives of over 170,000 children annually in the country.
Getso said there was urgent need to combat the deadly disease so as to save the lives of children
Making the statement while flagging off the Pneumococcal Conjugate Vaccine, PVC, Getso said if the vaccine is effectively administered on children it is estimated that by the year 2018 about 170,000 children are going to be prevented from losing their lives in the country.
According to him, pneumonia is a deadly communal disease, adding that available statistic has shown that 800,000 children under the age of five years die every year globally.
He said: ”Statistic has also shown that about 170,000 children die annually in the country as a result of contracting pneumonia disease ,is a very important disease ,we need to do everything humanly possible to prevent it from claiming the lives of our children.”
Getso further stated that pneumonia is a disease that affects everybody in the society ,but children under the age of five and elderly were more prone to the disease hence the need to introduced the vaccine .
The vaccine will be administered to children under the age of one year, at the age of six ,ten and 14 weeks respectively, which indicated that children will have it three times in their lifetime.
The Abia State Internal Revenue Service, ASIRS, has clarified that the tax certificate it issued the Governor, Okezie Ikpeazu, during his screening for the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP’s governorship primary election in December 2012, was not fake.
Udochukwu Ogbonna, the Executive Chairman of the ASIRS, released a statement on Monday, insisting that the tax certificate issued to Ikpeazu was genuine.
He also added that neither the court nor the plaintiff, Ogah, sought the opinion of the Revenue Board as witness to state the authenticity or otherwise of the tax papers in issue, during the pendency of the subject suit.
Ogbonna in the statement maintained that “the taxes for the years 2011,2012 and 2013 were PAYE taxes deducted at source from his (Ikpeazu’s) personal emoluments by his employers (Abia State Passengers’ Integrated Manifest Scheme and Abia State Environmental Sanitation Authority respectively) and remitted to the service in the relevant tax years,
“That the dates on the tax receipts of the relevant years (2011, 2012 and 2013) did not suggest that they were paid on those dates, but only reflected the date he applied to be issued with the receipts, because that was when he needed them.”
Ogbonna further stated that since the governor’s taxes were deducted by his employers and remitted to the service within the relevant years, it cannot be said to have been paid on the same day, as they were paid as at when due.
“In fact the issue of payment as at when due does not apply to PAYE taxes because the tax payer has no part to play in the deduction and remittance of his PAYE as the same is done by his employer. Where there is failure to deduct and remit PAYE taxes, it is the employer and not the tax payer that is liable.”
The revenue board affirmed that both the Tax Clearance Certificate and the tax receipts referred to in the judgment were the documents of the Abia State Internal Revenue Service as the authority empowered by law to collect tax in the state.
“Finally, we state emphatically for the records and for the attention of the general public that we were never invited (subpoenaed) by the court or the plaintiff, Dr. Uchechukwu Ogah during the pendency of the subject suit that led to the judgment in Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu’s tax matter to state the authenticity or otherwise of the tax papers in issue,” Ogbonna added.
It would be recalled that Justice Okon Abang of the Abuja High Court, on Monday, June 27, sacked Ikpeazu from office over alleged false tax certificate presented before he ran for the April 11, 2015 governorship election and ordered the Independent Electoral Commission, INEC, to immediately issue a Certificate of Return to Uche Ogah, who came second in the primary of the PDP.
Justice Abang had also ruled that the Chief Judge of Abia State, Justice Theresa Uzokwe, do immediately administer the oath of office and swear-in Ogah.
