By Jefferson Ibiwale, Benin

Four policemen serving with the Special Anti-Robbery Squad, SARS, unit of the Lagos State Police Command have been arrested over the death of a Benin-based car dealer, Benson Obode.

The four SARS operatives, Adeleke Adedeji, Oniyon Musa, Henry Sobowale, and Abena John, are being detained in Lagos and are expected to be transferred to Benin in connection with investigations into the death of the car dealer.

Obode, it was learnt, was arrested by the four policemen in Benin on 21 May, 2015, but died in their custody in yet to be ascertained circumstances.

The deceased is said to have been arrested for allegedly buying a Peugeot 306 car which was allegedly stolen in Lagos.

After he died in their custody, the policemen are alleged to have dumped his corpse at the mortuary of the Central Hospital in Benin even without informing the family.

The late car dealer’s family members are said to have gone looking for him in Abuja, Port Harcourt, Lagos and Kaduna police commands after he disappeared.

Eventually, after searching fruitlessly for over two months, Obode’s relatives learnt that the Lagos State Police Command had told reporters from a radio station in Benin that he died from “mob action.”

The deceased’s landlord, Monday Omosigho, who was also earlier arrested by the policemen, is said to have alleged that he saw Obode being tortured by the police at the Edo police command headquarters.

Obode’s elder brother simply named Solomon, who broke the news of the arrest of the four policemen also raised questions about the ATM cards and cash totalling N200,000 found on his brother at the time of his arrest which have not been accounted for. ‎
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By Samuel Malik

The National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA, has described as worrisome the continued deportation by Cameroonian authorities of Nigerian refugees who fled their homes as a result of the Boko Haram attacks.

This is against the backdrop reports of the deportation of another batch of 2,500 refugees to Nigeria by Cameroonian authorities this week.

Three weeks ago, Cameroon sent 670 refugees back to the country against their wish and with 2, 500 more persons reportedly on their way to the country through the borders in Adamawa state, NEMA said it is concerned that the displaced people are subjected to more hardship.

“Yesterday we were just called to be told that 2,500 (Nigerian refugees) were heading towards Sauda, a border village in Adamawa State,” Sa’ad Bello, the NEMA camp coordinator in Adamawa State, told journalists in Yola, the state capital on Friday.

The NEMA chief decried the treatment meted to the refugees, who reportedly spent six days on the road to Nigeria.

“People that are traumatised, you are adding more to their problem. The way they were packed into lorries is worrisome and they were not even allowed to come with their belongings,” he lamented.

Bello said the agency had to provide clothing to the people, as most of them came with just the clothes they had on, adding that the issue has been reported to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, UNHCR.

In another development, the refugees deported three weeks ago from Cameroon are on their way back to their state, Borno, as the state government sent trucks to convey them.

When our reporter visited the camp where they were kept on Friday morning, he saw eight trucks already loaded with the people, including little children, and ready to leave, with loafs of bread and water also being loaded for their feeding.

The convoy of trucks would have to travel through Gombe due to the inaccessibility of the Yola – Maiduguri road as a result of the insurgency and, with the nature of buses and harsh weather, they would certainly spend more than 24 hours on the way.

The National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA, has confirmed that six persons died in this morning suicide bomb attack at a vegetable market in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital.

Eleven persons were also confirmed injured in the early morning attack.

The North east coordinator of the agency, Mohammed Kanar, who confirmed the casualty figure said that the emergency relief body was called around 7.00 am to offer assistance to victims of the blast.

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He said of the six people killed, two corpses were destroyed beyond recognition and that the suicide bomber triggered the explosive device in a tricycle which was badly damaged.

He said that three other vehicle close to the tricycle at the time of the explosion were also damaged.

Kanar also disclosed that four of the 11 injured people were taken to the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital, UMTH, while the others were rushed to the State Specialist Hospital for treatment.

By Musdapha Ilo, Maiduguri

A suicide bomb attack at a crowded vegetable market in Maiduguri on Friday has left at least five persons dead and an unknown number of persons injured.

A member of the youth vigilance group, Civilian JTF, told our correspondent on phone that the attack at the early morning market occurred at 6:30 am and brought business there to an abrupt halt. It was gathered that the bomb attack was carried out by a woman who arrived the market in a tricycle with others who had come to buy vegetables.

However, sensing that she might not be able to beat the security check at the entrance of the market, she quickly detonated the explosive device strapped to her body at the tricycle park close by.

The bodies of five persons who died in the blast, it was learnt, were retrieved from the scene and taken away by rescue workers while some injured persons were also evacuated to the hospital.

The information officer of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), North east zone office in Maiduguri, AbdulKadir Ibrahim confirmed the attack at the market, but said he did not immediately have figures of casualties.

The director of Defence Information, Chris Olukolade, a Major General, has been replaced flowing his retirement from the Nigerian Army.

Olukolade is to be replaced by Rabe Abubakar a Colonel.

Olukolade gave the hint of his retirement and replacement as defence spokesman Thursday as he resigned his position as chairman of Forum of Spokespersons of Security and Response Agencies, FOSSRA, and handed over to the Director of Information of the Nigeria Navy, Kabiru Aliyu, a Commodore.

Olukolade said at the forum’s monthly meeting in Abuja that he was quitting the army as he had reached the mandatory retirement age.

He explained that he was due to retire in November, 2014 and had actually voluntarily applied to retire but that his request was turned down by the Army Council which extended his service.

The former defence spokesman thanked his colleagues at the forum and their agencies for the support and understanding they accorded him since he assumed office in 2013.

He reminded them that the reason for setting up the forum was to deepen collaboration among agencies in the security and emergency relief sector to engender better crisis and information management among them.

He solicited the cooperation of all for the new helmsman at the forum.

In his response, Aliyu said that Olukolade possessed leadership qualities that helped the forum to record significant achievements.

The executive secretary of Centre for Crisis Communication, Yusuf Anas, a retired Air Commodore, also commended Olukolade for his contributions to crisis and communication management at a critical time in the nation’s history.

Olukolade was appointed defence spokesman in March 2013.

The membership of the forum comprised the spokesperson of the Defence Headquarters, Nigerian Army, Nigerian Navy, Nigerian Air Force, Nigeria Police, Department of State Service, DSS, National Intelligence Agency, NIA, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, Nigerian Customs Service, Nigerian Immigration Service, Nigerian Prisons Service, Federal Fire Service, Federal Road Safety Commission, FRSC, National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA and the Office of the National Security Adviser, ONSA.

Raids by Nigerian troops on several communities in Borno State believed to be hideouts for the Boko Haram sect have resulted in the killing of a large number of the group’s fighters and the rescue of many being held captive by them.

The military offensive operations were carried out by soldiers from the 21 Brigade, 151 Task Force Battalion, and men of the of Nigerian Army Engineering Corps on terrorists camps in Chuogori and Shantumari, Kashingeri, Wale and Kushingari, all in Borno State

These disclosures were made by the acting Director Army Public Relations, Sani Kukasheka Usman, a Colonel, in a press statement on Thursday.

The Army spokesman said that 59 persons were rescued during the raids while all the camps were cleared of terrorists.

According to Usman, an underground silo was discovered in one of the terrorist camps, while a Land Rover and a Tipper were also recovered from the insurgents.

The United States government in its latest report on human trafficking, has indicted the Borno State government for actively supporting the recruitment of child soldiers in the North east.

While praising the federal government for its spirited efforts in combating the activities of Boko Haram insurgents, it, however, indicted the government of Kashim Shettima for supporting “a group involved with the recruitment and use of child soldiers in the fight against Boko Haram insurgency.”

The report, released Monday, ranked Nigeria in its tier two category – the same rating the country received in 2014.

The report noted that while Shettima warned the Civilian Joint Task Force, CJTF, that the recruitment and use of child soldiers was prohibited, the state government tacitly lent its support for the group’s activities.

The Department of State, author of the report, also said although Nigeria took decisive efforts in curtailing the activities of child traffickers, the country remains a main centre for trafficking in persons both internally and externally for the past one year.

“Nigeria is a source, transit, and destination country for women and children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking. Nigerian trafficking victims are recruited from rural and, to a lesser extent, urban areas: women and girls for domestic servitude and sex trafficking and boys for forced labor in street vending, domestic service, mining, stone quarrying, agriculture, textiles manufacturing, and begging,” the report highlighted.

It added that young boys in Quoranic schools, commonly known as Almajiri children, are subjected to forced begging while Nigerian women and children were taken from the shores of Nigeria to other West and Central African countries, as well as to South Africa, where they were exploited for the same purposes.

It however agreed that the Nigerian government had made efforts to comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking.

It noted that the efforts were not yielding results.

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“The government maintained strong anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts. In March 2015, the government passed amendments to the 2003 Trafficking in Persons Law Enforcement and Administration Act, which increase the penalties for trafficking offenders. The law prohibits all forms of trafficking. It prescribes a minimum penalty of five years’ imprisonment and a minimum fine of one million naira ($5,470) for labor trafficking offenses. The law prescribes a minimum penalty of five years’ imprisonment for sex trafficking offenses and a minimum fine of one million naira ($5,470); the minimum penalty increases to seven years’ imprisonment if the case involves a child. These penalties are sufficiently stringent and commensurate with other serious crimes, such as rape,” the report noted.

It also hailed the efforts of the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons and Other Related Matters, NAPTIP, for its laudable efforts aimed at curbing the social scourge.

“NAPTIP conducted 509 trafficking investigations, completed 56 prosecutions, and secured 30 convictions during the reporting period, compared with 314 investigations, 43 prosecutions, and 42 convictions in the previous reporting period. The decrease in convictions is likely a result of a three-month strike by the judiciary. An additional 150 prosecutions remained pending at the end of the reporting period,” the report said.

President Muhammadu Buhari will visit Cameroon Wednesday to hold talks with his Cameroonian counterpart,

Paul Biya and senior Cameroonian government officials on how to further contain the insurgence ravaging parts of both nations.

The talks are expected to centre on regional efforts to be embarked on or strengthened to battle the insurgents who have killed many citizens of the two countries in the last four years.

The leaders would equally appraise the full activation and deployment of the Multinational Joint Task Force, MJTF, currently prepping to increase military pressure on the Boko Haram.

The task force was established under the auspices of the Lake Chad Basin Commission.

Presidential spokesman, Femi Adesina, said that Buhari would be accompanied on the two-day trip by six state governors, the permanent Secretary of the federal ministry of Defence and the director-general of the National Intelligence Agency, NIA.

Prominent amongst the issues to be deliberated upon at the parley between the two leaders are new measures to curb terrorism, violent extremism and other cross-border crimes ravaging both nations.

Buhari is also expected to hold informal talks with Nigerians living in Cameroon during the visit.

After his return on Thursday, Buhari is also expected visit Benin Republic on Saturday for similar talks with President Boni Yayi.

Adesina noted that the visits are part of efforts by the administration to reenergize regional efforts targeting the eventual eradication of violent extremism in the West African region.

Nigerian troops, in recent weeks, have recorded successes against the Boko Haram insurgents, whose operations have now been reduced to sporadic attacks on isolated villages and suicide onslaughts on public places.

Buhari has insisted since his inauguration that it would require regional efforts to rout the insurgents.

By Tosin Omoniyi

Vice President Yemi Osibajo has said that the nation’s professional elite constitutes an important part of the administration’s fight against corruption in the country.

The Vice President also expressed the readiness of the federal government to work on both the judicial and justice sector reforms.

Osibajo, who met with leaders of the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, and the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria, ICAN, on Tuesday, noted that some of the reforms being envisaged will require legislation.

The delegations were led by the two associations’ presidents: Augustine Alegeh, of the NBA, and Samuel Olufemi Deru, of ICAN.

Vice President Osibajo, who is also a lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN, stated that reforms are crucial in the justice sector.

The NBA president, in his remarks thanked the VP for his charge and also expressed the happiness of its members over the elevation of the Vice President, adding that it showed the quality of his personality.

He called for judicial reforms, including the need for appointments especially into the appeal and supreme courts from the academia and deserving legal practitioners.

In a separate meeting with ICAN, Osibajo said there was the need for responsible professional elite in any thriving society, one that is ethical and courageous, especially at this time when everyone knew about the evils of corruption.

He said ICAN was especially rightly placed to expose corruption since its members are the professionals that audit the books of corporations and government agencies.

The Vice President observed that there were several government agencies, financial institutions and professional bodies that fell short of accounting standards and lacked transparency and accountability.

“What is now important is what each and every one of us, especially the professionals, can do to check and expose the evils of corruption,’’ he said.

Osibajo noted that if ICAN members and other professionals were diligent and courageous in the performance of their duty, it would go a long way in helping the administration in its fight against corruption, adding that ICAN members can always expose false accounting and insist on transparency and accountability in their daily work.

He also urged the Institute and other professional bodies to encourage whistle blowers to expose the ills of society.

He equally noted that ICAN had done well, adding that maintaining a smooth transitional process in its leadership clearly showed it was a democratic organization.

The ICAN president in his remarks hailed the resolve of the President Muhammadu Buhari administration to tame corruption, adding that the Institute was poised to support the administration to fight the menace and other ills in the society.

“Our motto is accuracy and integrity and we are ready to support the government in this fight to ensure that our country is economically viable and that we do not imbibe the culture of corruption where anything goes,’’ he said.