Wednesday, July 8th, 2015 Edition

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Wednesday, July 8, 2015/ Ramadan 21, 1436 AH

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Vol. 16 No. 57 N150

Again, EFCC quizzes, releases ex-gov Lamido, 2 sons

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How Zaria blast killed 2-yr-old, 24 others l El-Rufai bans street begging, hawking l As death toll rises to 51 in Jos attack

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Members of Jamaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;atu Nasiril Islam First Aid Group, Red Cross, and security agents evacuating Kaduna state Governor Nasiru el-Rufai (middle), and state Commissioner corpses from scene of explosion carried out by a suspected suicide bomber, during Kaduna of Police, Alhaji Umar Shehu-Usman (right), at the scene of the explosion state workersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; screening exercise, yesterday at Sabon Gari Local Government secretariat, yesterday.

Photo: NAN in Zaria, Kaduna state.

Photo: NAN

APC expels Senator Goje T for anti-party activities

By Ali Abare Abubakar & David Hassan, Gombe he All Progressives Congress (APC) in Gombe State has expelled one of its stalwarts and former governor of the state, Senator Mohammed Danjuma Goje (APC, Gombe Central) over alleged anti party activities.

Disclosing this development to journalists in Gombe, state APC chairman, Magaji Doho, said Goje was expelled Contd on Page 2

450 Days after FG disowns AGF, says excess Will the abducted Chibok schoolgirls ever be rescued?

crude account intact

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

News CONTENTS News 2-11 Editorial 13 Op.Ed 14 Letters 15 Politics 16-18 Business Stockwatch

19-22 23

S/Report 24-25 Property 27 Motoring 28 Arts

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APC expels Senator Goje over alleged anti-party activities Contd from Cover page from the party for allegedly running a parallel state party exco, stressing that the former Gombe governor was expelled with effect from July 1, 2015 for his engagement in anti-party activities.

In Doho’s words: “Having gone through the rigours of campaigns and the 2015 general elections, some of our members, led by Senator Danjuma Goje, have decided to have parallel state executives of the party.

Metro

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Int’l 39 S/World

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Digest 40 Sports 41 Columnist 48

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the party chairman said.

He said that some members of the state executive council of the party that decided to support Goje by operating a parallel executive council were relieved of their positions but could remain as members of the party.

He warned that the party could not fold its arms and allow bad eggs among its members and supporters to destroy the good reputation the party had built over the years.

The Gombe State APC

chairman emphasised that whoever was out to destroy the party in the state and Nigeria at large would be put to shame because the APC would succeed at all levels.

However, efforts by our reporter to get reactions from both Senator Goje and the APC National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed over the matter proved abortive as Goje’s phone was switched off while the party’s publicity secretary failed to pick the numerous calls put to his phone.

people were killed.

Another eye witness said that five vehicles were burnt down in the blast even though some of the occupants were not inside the vehicles while the administrative block was totally destroyed.

Governor El- Rufai in a statement signed by his Special Assistant on Media and publicity Samuel Aruwan expressed sadness at the mindless attack on innocent citizens.

According to the statement 25 were confirmed dead while about 32 injured.

El- Rufai Speaking at the scene sympathized with the direct victims and the residents of Zaria city in general. He prayed Allah to grant the souls of the deceased victim’s peaceful repose.

“Governor El-Rufai condemned the attack as an inhuman act of terror and urged the people of the state State as a whole to be vigilant, even as they preserve the peace.

The governor said residents of the state should promptly report all suspicious persons and activities to the security agencies and community leaders.

The governor further announced the deployment of extra security forces across the state.

Malam El-Rufai urged the people of the state to shun large gatherings but, where that is unavoidable, to exercise and practise maximum vigilance and vigorous checks on persons, vehicles and luggage.

The state government will announce further steps to strengthen our security and safety in the next few days, and call on our people to cooperate fully with law enforcement agencies in these trying times.

The Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Zubairu Abdullahi said the police and other security agents have cordoned the area and anti bomb squad are already on ground.

In a swift reaction on Tuesday, the Kaduna State Government asked all beggars and hawkers to stay off the streets within state metropolis until further notice.

A statement signed by the state governor Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Samuel Aruwan said any beggar or hawker found on the streets will be arrested, until these measures are

relaxed.

The government commended the people of the state for promptly embracing the crucial necessity of watchful vigilance and attention to security.

“The government reiterates that the ban on motorcycle taxis (achaba) remains in force, and the law will be strictly enforced in this regard.

“The government hereby urges all citizens to report all suspicious persons and movements to the security agencies, and to afford these agencies their maximum cooperation.”

Aruwan said these measures take immediate effect.

Meanwhile, the National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA has confirmed that the death toll in the twin bomb bomb blasts in Jos, the caplital of Plateau State has risen to 51.

The North Central Zonal Coordinator of NEMA, Mohammed Abdulsalami while speaking to newsmen in Jos yesterday said an injured victim had died yesterday while additional corpses had been recovered from the scene of the blast added to the earlier figure given.

He said those corpses recovered were later identified by their relatives and had since been taken for burial.

This is just as tragedy struck community of Damboa Local Government Area of Borno yesterday when two female suicide bombers detonated explosives

hidden under their dresses, killing themselves and three others.

It was gathered that the incident happened at Sabon Gari market when traders were busy conducting their commercial activities.

Sources said two teenagers, dressed in traditional attires, with containers on their head, sneaked into the weekly market and disguised as hawkers.

However, the quick intervention of the youth vigilante who kept vigil on all those entering and going out of the market has minimized the casualty figures.

“The initial mission of the bombers was to go into the midst of the crowd and detonate the explosives, but upon realising that the vigilante members were trailing them for the normal thorough body search, they hurriedly blew themselves off and killed three persons”, a witness who declined identification said.

The state Commissioner of Police, Mr. Aderemi Opadokun also confirmed the incident to newsmen, saying said that five other persons were also injured at the incident.

“Today at about 1100 hours Improvised Explosive Devise (IED) explosion occurred at Sabon Gari Market in Damboa LGA when two suspected female suicide bombers detonated explosion strapped to their bodies. Three persons died in the explosion, while five others sustained injuries,’’ he said.

How Zaria blast killed 2- yr- old, 24 others From Mohammad Ibrahim, Femi oyelola, Kaduna, Ado Abubakar Musa, Jos and Mustapha Isah Kwaru, Maiduguri

I

Bird flu: Why Nigerian farmers need urgent compensation – Page 4

“Secondly, Danjuma Goje, is grossly involved in anti-party activities and we have, therefore, decided to expel him from the party from the first day of July, 2015, to instill discipline in our great party.”

The APC chairman said the state executive council had written a detailed report to the national secretariat of the party, indicting Goje.

“We have expelled Goje from the APC because of his activities, disloyalty and going contrary to the constitution of the party,”

t was a scenario of uncontrolled wailing of tears for the residents of ancient city of Zaria as a suspected suicide bomber detonated an improvised explosive device killing herself and 25 others at Sabon Gari Local Government Area of Kaduna state.

Eye witness account informed Peoples Daily that a two year old child was among those killed in the dastardly act..

The female suspected suicide bomber disguised as a staff to gain access into crowd of civil servants who were undergoing audit and verification exercise at the secretariat.

It was also gathered that the centre serves for the verification of staff from seven local government areas making up zone one of the state.

Majority of the deaths according to eyewitnesses were women because many were with their babies at the venue.

Immediately after the blast, security operatives comprising men of the Nigeria Army, State Security Services, Nigeria Air Force, Nigeria Police and Nigerian Civil Defence Corps, stormed the area for rescue operation.

Peoples Daily gathered that many people were injured and taken to Shika Hospital in Zaria for treatment.

At the ABU Teaching Hospital, Shika, a wife to one of the victims, Mrs. Esther Bawa said her husband , who was a staff of the Directorate of Educational Inspectorate, Zone One left his house this morning (Tuesday), for the verification exercise.

According to Esther who was in tears, she has not seen her husband because he was in intensive care.

She was sighted in the company of other people to thronged in to verify what happened to relations and loved ones.

Malam Musa Muhammed a trader opposite the scene of the incident informed Peoples Daily that he counted about 32 corpses that were moved away from the scene and was surprised that the state government said it was 25

Again EFCC quizzes, releases ex-Gov. Lamido, 2 sons

By Joy Baba Yesufu

T

he Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has again quizzed and released former Jigawa State governor, Sule Lamido, and his two sons, Aminu and Mustapha over alleged N1.3 billion fraud.

Peoples Daily checks revealed yesterday the ex-governor and his two sons were rearrested Tuesday.

The spokesperson for the EFCC, Wilson Uwujaren, confirmed the arrest of the former

governor to the media following inquiries.

Recall that Lamido’s sons had earlier been arrested in Kano and flown to Abuja in November 2013 while their father enjoyed immunity as the Jigawa State governor.

The now ex-governor surrendered himself to the commission at the end of his tenure on June 15.

They were accused of using their positions to siphon Jigawa State funds.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

News

Ramadan Timing Day 21

FG disowns AGF, says excess crude account intact • Bailout fund from LNG – Idris

By Lawrence Olaoye & Sunday Etuka

T

he Federal Government yesterday countered the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF), Ahmed Idris, by saying that the Excess Crude Account (ECA) was yet to be shared by the three tiers of government.

Idris had told State House correspondents after a meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari that the President had authorized the sharing of the $1.7 billion domiciled in the Excess Crude Accounts to the three tiers of government.

But the Presidency in a statement by by the Special Adviser to the President on media and publicity, Femi Adesina, said Idris was wrong maintaining that the account was still intact.

“For the purpose of greater clarity on the matter, the measures approved by President Buhari to deal with the problem of unpaid public sector salaries in many states are as follows: The sharing of the $2.1 Billion dividend paid to the Federation Account by the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas Company (NLNG); A Central Bank-packaged special intervention fund that will offer financing to the states, ranging from N250 Billion to N300 Billion. This will be a soft loan available to states for the purposes of paying backlog of salaries; and Debt relief programs designed by the Debt Management Office which will help states restructure their commercial loans currently put at over N660 Billion, and extend the life span of such loans while reducing their debt-

servicing expenditures.

The measures approved

by President Buhari definitely do not include drawing down the remaining balance in the Excess Crude Account or the “liquidation” of the account as some media outlets have wrongly reported.

Meanwhile, the AccountantGeneral of the Federation (AGF), Alhaji Ahmed Idris also yesterday clarified that the amount of money distributed at the emergency Federation Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) meeting held on Monday 6th July 2015, was not from the Excess Crude Account (ECA) as was widely reported.

Alhaji Idris however said, the amount (N359, 374,355, 607.60) distributed was rather the accrued company income tax (CIT) realised from the Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG).

Inadequate English, Mathematics teachers our biggest challenge – Masari

By Maryam Garba Hassan

F

ormer Speaker House of Representatives and Katsina state Governor, Aminu Bello Masari, has said the biggest challenge the state is presently faced with is the inadequate number of qualified English and Mathematics teachers in both primary and secondary schools in the state.

Masari disclosed this yesterday in Abuja when he led a delegation on a courtesy call on the Executive Secretary of Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), Professor Suleiman Bogoro, at the headquarters.

Lamenting, the Governor said the first College of Education in Nigeria was established in Katsina but today the state is backward educationally adding that the performance of students in the state in national examinations is below 10 per cent.

He said the average population of students in the state is 111 for

a class of 40, 70 for a class of 35 and 1000 students with only 3 to 5 teachers who are National College of Education certificate holders.

He said for his government to restore the lost glory of the state, it needs qualitative education which he said is his priority.

Earlier in his welcome address,

Executive Secretary of TETFund, Prof. Suleiman Bogoro, who expressed satisfaction with the governors’ initiative to channel the state’s resources to revamping and building a strong foundation for education, assured him that TETFund will play its role at tertiary level.

By Joy Baba Yesufu

and search is in no way a return of roadblocks. Any unprofessional conduct should be reported “Citizens are enjoined to bear with the Nigeria Police Force during this security operation which is a temporary measure put in place to address the intelligence received.

“The general public is advised to cooperate with Police operatives by providing answers to questions that may be asked as well as allowing their vehicles to be searched.”, the statement said.

Police begin special stop, search operations nationwide

S

equel to intelligence report, the Inspector-General of Police, IGP Solomon E. Arase has directed the commencement of special stop and search on Roads and Highways nationwide, with emphasis on roads in and out of major cities and towns.

A statement from CSP Abayomi Shogunle, Deputy Force Public Relations Officer, Force Headquarters yesterday said that, the special security measure, stop

Gunmen kill 13 people in plateau

From Ado Abubakar Musa, Jos & Yakubu Mustapha, Minna.

N

o fewer than 13 people have been reported to have been killed in an attack by unknown gunmen in Sho village of Barkin Ladi local government area of Plateau state.

According to the Peoples Daily gathering, the perpetrators stormed the community in the afternoon of yesterday and killed the victims.

But when contacted for comment on the development, the Special Task Force (STF) keeping peace in the state which confirmed the attack said the gun

•As communal clash claims 11 in Niger men had ambushed members of the community who were being escorted by some police officers.

However, the member representing the attacked constituency in the state house of Assembly, Peter Gyendeng confirmed the attack to newsmen in the state lamenting the situation, saying such incident has become the order of the day in state.

In a related development, five persons have been confirmed killed while 11 others were critically injured in a communal clash between two villages in

Agaie local government area of Niger State over farm land dispute.

The crisis occurred in Mazza and Tswachiko villages which have been at dagger’s drawn over a piece of farm land for over four years, until it got to a peak last Tuesday when four people lost their lives following an attack and counter attack by the two communities.

The state Police Public Relations Officer, Mr. Baba Elkan confirmed the incident and said that Police has commenced investigations on the matter.

Towns Magrib Alfijr Abakaliki 6.51 6.02 Abeokuta

7.09 5.19 Abuja 6.56 4.59 Akure

6.56 5.11 Auchi 6.56 5.06 Ankpa

6.51 4.59 Argungu

7.13 4.59 Azare

6.49 4.39 Bama

6.34 4.27 Bauchi 6.47 4.48 Benin 6.57 5.11 Bichi

6.57 4.47 Bida

7.00 5.03 Birnin Gwari 6.59 4.58 B/Kebbi Gwandu 7.14 5.02 Calabar

6.45 5.02 Damaturu 6.42 4.32 Daura/Kazaure 6.58 4.44 Dutse 6.52 4.45 Enugu 6.50 6.02 Funtua/Malumfashi 7.00 4.53 Gombe

6.41 4.40 Gumi

7.09 4.59 Gusau

7.02 4.52 Gwadabawa 7.11 4.57 Gwoza

6.34 4.29 Hadejia 6.51 4.39 Ibadan

7.06 5.14 Ife

7.04 5.12 Ilesha Baruba

7.10 5.13 Ilorin 7.06 5.10 Jalingo

6.38 4.41 Jere/Suleija

6.55 4.54 Jos

6.50 4.49 Kabba

6.59 5.05 Kafanchan

6.52 4.52 Kafin Maiyaki

6.57 4.48 Kaduna 6.57 4.54 Kano

6.55 4.47 Katsina 7.02 4.48 Kontagora 7.04 4.45 Lafia

6.49 4.53 Lagos

7.06 5.18 Lokoja 6.56 5.02 Maiduguri 6.37 4.27 Makurdi 6.49 4.55 Minna

6.59 5.00 Missau

6.45 4.40 Monguno

6.37 4.23 Ningi

6.50 4.46 Ogbomosho 7.06 5.12 Okene

6.57 5.05 Onitsha

6.52 5.06 Oyo

7.07 5.13 Port Harcourt 6.50 5.07 Potiskum 6.45 4.35 Sagamu

7.06 5.16 Sokoto 7.10 4.57 Takum 6.41 4.51 Warri 6.56 5.11 Wurno 7.10 5.55 Yola

6.34 4.37 Zaria 6.57 4.52 Cotonnou-Benin 7.09 5.23 Ndjamena-Chad 6.30 4.30 Niamey-Niger 7.24 4.59 Zinder – Niger 6.58 4.40 Garoua – Cameroun 6.20 4.33 Younde-Cameroun 6.30 4.51 (Source: Society for the Propagation of Islam Kaduna)

Recommended DU’A for Day Recommended DU’A for 06 Day 21 Pray an 8 Rak-a’t Salaat.

In every after the Pray a 8 Rak-a’tSalaat, In every Rak-a’t afterRak-a’t the recitation of Alrecitation of Al-Faatih’ah, recite Suatul Qadr 20 Faatih’ah, recite any ither Surah. After salam, say the following: times. After Salam, say the following Du’a: “Allahummaj-‘al-lee feehiilaamardhaatikadaleelawalaataj’allishAllaahumma Qawwinee Feehi A’laa Iqaaamati Amrika Wa‘alayyasabeelawaj’allil-jannatakeemanzilanwamaqeeAd’iqnee Feehi H’alaawata D’ikrika Wa shaitaanfeehi Awzia’-Nee Feehi Li-Adaaa-I Shukrika Bikaramika laayaaqaadiyalhawaa-iji-taalibeen.”

Wah’-Faz’nee Feehi Bi-H’ifz’ika Wa Sitrika Yaa Meaning: O Allah, on this day, show me the way to in your pleasure, do Abs’aran Naaz’ireen not let ShytanOhave a means overday, me. Make paradise an Meaning: Allah, on this strengthen meabode in and a resting place forYour me, Ocommands, the one who fulfils of thesweetneedy. carrying out let the merequests taste the ness of Your remembrance, grant me, through Your graciousness, that I give thanks to You. Protect me, with Your protection and cover, O the most discerning of those who see.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Page 4 Report

Bird flu: Why Nigerian farmers need urgent compensation

By Ese Awhotu

B

ird Flu or Avian flu is a serious contagious viral disease in animals with a potential for some strains to infect humans, with all the health implications. The disease, since January 2015, had been reported in many West Africa countries, with Nigeria recording the first cases followed by Burkina Faso, Niger, Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire.

The bird flu outbreak in Nigeria and its effect on the health of Nigerians, the economy and the livelihood of farmers is no longer news to Nigerians and the government which has been taking decisive steps to contain its spread.

Experts have described the disease as a viral one, largely infecting birds, whereas humans are rarely infected.

Recall that in 2007, there was one human case in Nigeria.

Globally, the majority of human cases of infection have been associated with contact with infected live or dead poultry.

Controlling the disease in poultry is the first step in decreasing risks to humans.

It is also common knowledge that the famers are the major actors in the poultries. Their importance cannot be over emphasized.

Yesterday, the Nigerian Veterinary Medical Association of Nigeria (NVMA) urged the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to conclude its payment of compensation to 339 poultry farms.

The National President of NVMA, Dr Sunday Edgar, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday in Abuja.

He said the farms were among the 437 affected in the latest Avian Influenza outbreak across the country.

“The ministry depopulated 1.5 million birds in 437 farms and one zoological garden in 18 states.

“Out of them, the Ministry paid compensation to 38 farms and one zoological garden leaving out 399 farms not compensated,’’ he said Edgar said that the payment of compensation to the remaining farms was critical toward eradicating the disease as it would encourage others to report fresh cases in their farms.

He said this first category of farmers got compensation amounting to N130 million, at the rate of N1, 450 per bird, for the depopulation of the affected birds.

“The mode of payment was done after depopulation which entailed; collecting from the farmers the figures of the depopulated birds through filling forms.

“The government officials then paid the compensation into the 38 farms’ account directly after they

Birds affected with flu had concluded their verifications.

“In the second and third batches affected, the Ministry sent a team to the affected farms; depopulated the birds and eggs without paying them compensation,’’ he said.

Edgar alleged that in spite of the reduction in the unit-price compensation from N1, 450 to N750 initially announced by the past Minister, Dr Akinwumi Adesina, majority of the farms were not paid.

“The Federal Government then decided that it was going to pay N500 as compensation per bird while the state government will provide N250 to make up the figure so that the budget will not be solely borne by the Federal Government,’’ he said.

Edgar, however, said that the association had begun to compile a new list of affected farms.

He urged the Federal Government to verify those claims and pay them their necessary compensation as promised since government is continuous.

“Since we have not yet eradicated the disease, it is possible some poultry farmers may experience the outbreak but will refuse to report such cases because of their past experiences in relating with government.’’

The Federal Government should verify those claims and then pay to make effective way of eliminating the disease, he said.

“In 2006, when we had an outbreak, it was curtailed and was eradicated. We can still do so,’’ Edgar said.

He said the government could still work with the technical committee set up on avian influenza in 2006 to curtail the further spread disease and handle the situation in good time.

A source at the Ministry told NAN that it actually agreed to pay N1, 450 per bird killed to control further spread of bird flu.

The source said, “After paying the first batch on the affected birds, the ministry could no longer sustain N1,450; saying it could only afford to pay N750 per

“

bird.

“This is because some poultry farmers, who were not affected by the flu, began to depopulate their farms as they expected to be compensated by the government then,’’ the source said.

However, the federal government had voted to offer 600 million naira (NGN) to compensate the owners of poultry farms hit by avian influenza.

A total of 18 states and 322 poultry farms were affected by the recent Avian Influenza outbreak in Nigeria, the immediate past Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr. Akinwunmi Adesina, said. Minister said over 1.1 million birds have also been depopulated nationwide while 140 farmers have been paid a compensation worth over N600 million.

Adesina disclosed that at least 49 percent of infections occurred in 21 Local Government Areas of Kano State in northern Nigeria.

The Minister revealed this in an address delivered at a

It is also common knowledge that the famers are the major actors in the poultries. Their importance cannot be over emphasized.

Yesterday, the Nigerian Veterinary Medical Association of Nigeria (NVMA) urged the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to conclude its payment of compensation to 339 poultry farms.

workshop in Ibadan, Oyo State, for poultry industry officials.

Adesina said the government has continued to monitor the progress of the disease through the ongoing comprehensive disease surveillance.

“And our analysis indicates that the absolute number of positive cases from the laboratory is on the decrease,” he said.

Despite the progress, the Minister said, the disease remains active in Oyo, Plateau, Bauchi and Kaduna States.

“We are strategising and focusing on the states where there are active cases in order to contain the spread of the disease,” the Minister said in remarks read by a representative at the workshop.

Also speaking at the workshop, the United States Consul-General in Lagos, Jeffrey Hawkins, said bird flu is a serious threat to the economy and human health and warned Nigerians not to eat raw chickens or eggs at the moment until the disease is fully contained.

“I do not know if any of you eat raw chickens or eggs. If you do, please do not do it now,” Hawkins said, adding that “with thorough cooking, those who eat chicken and eggs can be safe from the virus.”

The latest outbreak has not affected any human.

Since 2006, the U.S. Government, through USAID, the U.S. Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, has contributed approximately $1,750,000 in response to bird flu outbreak in Nigeria, USAID said.

In addition, USAID contributes $473 million a year to improve health and education, create jobs and improve public administration in Nigeria.

USAID also has a humanitarian programme, providing emergency response to Nigeria’s northeast.

The development underscores the need for the Nigerian government to immediately resolve the issue of settlement of farmers affected by bird flu in the country.

In the United States of America, Washington State Veterinarian Joe Baker said on Monday that bird flu could return next winter with new strains that are more prevalent in wild birds and more deadly for chickens,.

“We have to be ready for the worsening scenario,” he said.

The Washington State Department of Agriculture has been reviewing last year’s outbreak and planning to prevent and respond to a reoccurrence.

One lesson from last year: It could have been worse.

It is apparent that the threats of Bird Flu are global and each country is taking careful and proactive actions to stop the spread of the disease into its shores, Nigeria cannot be left out.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

News

Boko Haram: Dogara urges Nigerians to persevere in prayers

By Umar Muhammad Puma

T

he Speaker of the House of Representatives Yakubu Dogara, has called on Nigerians to persevere in prayers for the country.

While condemning the bomb attacks in Jos and Zaria which left scores dead, Dogara said recent happenings in the country cannot be solved through convention human wisdom but divine intervention from the Almighty God. A statement issued by his Special Adviser on Media and Public Affairs, Turaki Hassan, said the Speaker made the remarks at the commissioning of a church at Ubulu-Uku, built

by Hon. Evang. J.O. Mrakpor representing Aniocha/Oshimili Federal Constituency of Delta State on Tuesday.

“I will urge that we continue with prayers for Nigeria.

If Nigeria will be exalted it will be on the account of righteousness,” the Speaker said.

He said with prayers there is nothing that cannot be achieved as a nation as it is the promise of God that He will listen to the prayers of His people and that the word of God is “eternal and immutable.”

As leaders, the Speaker said, “we need prayers from all Nigerians. When you continue to pray for your leaders for righteousness to rein in the affairs of the nation, definitely, Nigeria will be exalted and it will reflect on our citizens.”

“These very uncommon times, we live in the times that our hearts are beginning to fail us as a result of the many sad events in our nation. These are very uncommon times and all we need to survive is prayers.

And that is why altars like this is necessary,” he added.

He said he knows the value of altars because “the world we live in is dictated by words and there are godly and satanic altars. When we sleep people are trying to reprogramme our world. We must also speak from our altars.

He said prayers and giving of alms “give us the power confront the forces of darkness because our strength is light.”

In his sermon, Arch Bishop Avwomakpa, who is also the chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) South South region, spoke on the need for Christians to build for the Lord.

While reading from the books of II Chronicles 15: 22 and Acts 10:1-7, Arch Bishop Avwomakpa, said one of the last assignments carried out by King David was to prepare materials for building of the temple in Jerusalem.

Buhari mandates agric ministry to end farmers, herdsmen clashes

By Lawrence Olaoye

P

resident Muhammadu Buhari has mandated the Ministry of Agriculture to fine tune strategies for ending farmers/herdsmen clashes in the country.

Permanent Secretary of the ministry, Sunny Echono, who briefed Villa correspondents after a meeting with the President made the disclosure yesterday.

Buhari urged bureaucrat to adopt the template formulated during his tenure as the Chairman of the Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF) some years ago.

Echono said alternatives being considered for checking the incessant violent attacks and

consequent loss of lives between nomadic Fulani cattle rearers and their host farmers, include creating grazing reserves and stock routes.

“The President also asked the Ministry to work towards restoring the agriculture extension services scheme; and to create employment for the youth through agriculture,” said Echono.

Issues of climate change and late arrival of rains as they affect programmes of the Ministry were also tabled at the meeting with Buhari, the Permanent Secretary revealed.

He used the opportunity to clarify that the Growth Enhancement Scheme (GES) of the Ministry has not been reversed

following the decision of the Kano state government to procure fertilisers for its farmers.

According to him, the state government intervened because of some bureaucratic delays occasioned by the transition period.

The issue is being adequately resolved as “we are expecting presidential directives shortly after which we will get across to other states. The GES is transparent and effective policy, and is still very much on course.”

Meanwhile, the President also met with officials of the Ministry of Water Resources, led by the Permanent Secretary, Musa Istifanus, whom Buhari directed to re-prioritise issues of

importance to the Ministry and report back to him.

Istifanus told journalists after the meeting that the team reviewed the Ministry’s handover notes with the President, informing him of immediate challenges of flooding and how the River basins in the country could be of immense help.

While a number of dams are controlling the River Niger basin, only one is controlling the Benue River basin which gets tragically flooded whenever the Lado Dam in Cameroon is opened.

The River Basins issue will be given highest priority when the team reports back to the President because it can also generate employment, Istifanus added.

R-L: President Muhammadu Buhari, receiving United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation’s Achievement Award from Permanent Secretary, Ministry Agriculture, Mr. Sunday Echono, yesterday at the State House, in Abuja.

Photo: Joe Oroye

NYSC urges government agencies Muslims urged to act in accordance to holy teachings to accept corps members

By Maryam Garba Hassan

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uslims across the Nigeria have been charged to imbibe the teachings of the Holy Quran and Hadith as the only way to sustain a peaceful coexistence in the country and possibly win the fight against insurgents and terrorism in the country.

Chairman of NAWA property Abuja, Alhaji Abdulrahman Buhari made the call yesterday during the annual Zakkat (arms) giving adding that there was need the for the whole country irrespective of religious variation, pray for the success of President Buhari led administration.

He called on Muslims to be more prayerful while putting the teachings of the holy prophet Mohammed into practice as they observe the holy month of Ramadan with the fasting.

Buhari therefore urged the Muslims to always intensify efforts towards good deeds and abstain from any acts that could cause violence in the country.

He charged Muslims to make use of this month to seek for repentance, forgiveness and attain special spiritual status before Allah.

According to him, the problems confronting Muslims was lack of proper understanding of Islam, adding that Muslims should be aware of those issues that were open to disagreement and those that were not.

He advised Muslims to always be vanguard of peaceful coexistence as enjoined by Prophet Muhammed while praying for her husband, President Buhari for God’s guidance to be able to fulfill his campaign promises to the people of Nigeria.

By Albert Akota

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he Management of the National Youth Service Corps has urged organizations, especially Ministries, Departments and Agencies of Government to accept Corps Members posted to them for primary assignment.

The Management further stated that Corps Members posted to various agencies are based on their disciplines and within the limits imposed by the current NYSC Posting Policy.

“All Corps Employers are to note that the Corps members answered the clarion call to participate in the National Service out of patriotism and have always passionately looked forward to rendering services for the progress of their fatherland.

“In view of the foregoing,

all stakeholders, including employers, are requested to always give the young men and women of the Scheme the necessary support and encouragement by accepting them whenever posted for primary assignment.

“It is noteworthy that rejection of Corps members posted to organisations, resulting in some of them roaming the streets in search of places of service, is at variance with the ideals of the founding fathers of the NYSC Scheme and should therefore be discouraged by all well-meaning Nigerians.”

The National Youth Service Corps remain committed to contributing to the socioeconomic development of the country through harnessing of the potentials of patriotic youths.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

News CBN currency scam: EFCC accuses defence counsel of scuttling trial T

he EFCC’s lead counsel in the alleged CBN currency scan, Mr Rotimi Jacobs, on Tuesday said the defence counsel was scuttling further trial of the accused persons.

Jacobs made the remark while addressing journalists after further hearing was grounded due to the inability of the defence counsel to serve process.

He said it was a situation in which the defence counsel, whose clients were refused bail, had a dirty gameplan to ensure that the applications slated for the day were not heard.

“Their gameplan is to scuttle

further trial of the case and they have successfully done that.

“The judge directed us at Monday’s hearing that everyone should file his process that day, but the defence counsel did not, this was contrary to our agreement and court’s order.

“We were supposed to have been calling our witnesses since the last three weeks, but they started filing series of applications to ensure that the trial did not commence.

“Our witnesses are ready to start giving evidence, but they are trying to block those witnesses.

So, we’ll now have to wait till October.

“Their strategy is that the matter must not go ahead before these current judges, they want to wait for the appeal court to decide,” Jacobs said.

He said there was no amount of reform that could sanitise the system.

According to him, the defence

counsel has observed that the suspects don’t have a good case, and hence, have refused to change their habits of stalling trials through frivolous applications.

He, however, stated that the truth would eventually prevail, no matter the delay.

In his argument, Mr Olalekan Ojo, one of the defence counsel, debunked the accusation made by the prosecution, referring to it as ‘most unwarranted and unnecessary’.

“There is no diligent defence counsel that will fail to raise the kind of objection that we raised, except the defence that is indifferent to the success of his client.

“What we simply asked the judge to do is to disqualify himself in this case, because we don’t trust him-- based on his pronouncement.

“If this amounts to scuttling trial, so be it,” Ojo stressed.

Ahmadu Bello foundation donates relief materials to Adamawa IDP’s

From Umar Dankano, Yola

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Non Governmental Organization under the auspices of Sir Ahmadu Bello Memorial Foundation yesterday donated relief materials to the Internally Displaced Persons at NYSC Camp in Adamawa state.

Donating the materials, leader of the group Barnabas Omali noted that the gesture was in line with the organization’s resolve to come to the rescue of displaced persons anywhere in the country.

While commiserating with the government and people of the state over the Boko Haram insurgency that brought untold hardship to the people, Omali noted that to ease the travails of the displaced persons, the group deemed it necessary to come to the rescue of the IDP’s.

“We are here to identify with Adamawa state government and we express sympathy for the IDP’s,” he said.

He urged the displaced persons to make judicious use of the items donated by the group.

In his response, Executive Secretary Adamawa State Emergency Management Agency (ADSEMA) Haruna Furo promised the group judicious use of the items adding that they will share it according to the population of the IDP’s.

He noted that with the success Nigerian troops recorded in routing Boko Haram insurgents, the population of the camp has shrank from 7,000 to 3,000 people.

Furo added that he is ready to give account of how he distributed the relief materials any time the donors wish to enquire about the transparency of the process.

R-L: Katsina state Governor, Hon. Aminu Bello Masari, Executive Secretary, Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund), Professor Suleiman Bagoro, TETFund member of Board of Trustees representing South-East, Barrister Chinedu Onu, and TETFund Director, Human Resources Management, Malam Aminu Anas, during Governor Masari’s visit to TETFund headquarters, yesterday in Abuja. Photo: Mahmud Isa

Restore military check points in Kogi, NUJ pleads with Buhari From Ahmad Ibrahim, Lokoja

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he Kogi State Council of the Nigeria Union of Journalists has pleaded with President Muhammadu Buhari to, as a matter of urgency, restore military check points in the state, to curb the deplorable security situation in the state.

The call which was contained in a statement made available to

newsmen in Lokoja yesterday, noted that the spate of robbery and kidnapping shortly after the withdrawal of the military check points is not only alarming but disturbing.

The statement which was signed by the acting Chairman of the Union, Mr. Sunday Aro and the Secretary, Mr. Adeiza Momoh Jimoh added that

armed bandits have taken over major highways, operating with reckless abandon.

It further posited that twelve innocent lives were on Monday morning lost at Irepeni village in the central axis of the state, due to accident caused by barricades mounted by armed hoodlums.

The statement maintained that the impunity with which the

robbery gangs operate in the state show that the police alone cannot effectively tackle the security challenges on the highways.

It therefore appealed to President Buhari to restore check points on the two major highways, Lokoja-Okene road and Lokoja-Ajaokuta-Anyigba roads so as to enable the citizenry sleep with their two eyes closed.

Tribunal orders INEC to produce Taraba gov election materials for inspection

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he Governorship Election Petition Tribunal for Taraba, on Tuesday in Abuja ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to produce the election materials used to conduct the April 11governorship election, for inspection by petitioners.

The petitioner, Sen. Aisha Alhassan of APC, had approached the tribunal, seeking to nullify the election of Gov. Darius Ishaku, joining APC as co-petitioners, PDP and INEC as co-respondents.

Delivering ruling on a motion ex-parte filed by the petitioners’ counsel, Mr Mahmud Magaji (SAN), the Tribunal Chairman,

Justice Musa Abubakar, ordered INEC to produce the materials within 21 days for inspection.

“The application dated and filed on June 23, 2015, is meritorious and it is hereby, granted as prayed.

“It is, hereby, ordered that the 3rd respondents produce the election materials which were used in conducting the governorship election in Taraba within 21 days for inspection by the petitioners,’’ he said.

Tuesday’s sitting was slated for the hearing of an ex-parte application seeking a court order extending time within which the petitioners could inspect the

election materials.

Mr Muzzammil Yahaya, the petitioners’ counsel, who stood in for Magaji, had moved the motion accompanied by an 11-paragraph affidavit deposed to by him, and a written address, in chamber.

The application, he said, was brought pursuant to the provisions of Paragraph 45 (1) (2) of the First Schedule of the Electoral Act, 2010, as amended.

Yahaya argued that the petitioners were unable to comply with a June 11 order of the court on same issue, due to the respondents’ noncompliance within the 14 days earlier ordered, which had

elapsed.

He, therefore, prayed for a leave of the tribunal granting a court order extending time within which the petitioners could inspect the election materials accordingly.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) recalls that Alhassan had alleged that the election which produced Ishaku as Taraba governor was fraught with gross irregularities and other forms of election malpractices.

She had, therefore, urged the tribunal to nullify the election and declare her the winner and governor of Taraba. (NAN)

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

News

Court dissolves marriage for alleged threat to life

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n Igando Customary Court in Lagos on Tuesday dissolved 12-year old marriage between Mr Omotayo Ogunbode, 40, and his wife, Alaba, on alleged threat to his life.

The Court President, Mr Hakeem Oyekan, in his judgment, said that it was obvious from the available evidence and the respondent’s refusal to appear in court that the marriage had failed.

“Throughout the duration of this case, the respondent, Alaba, has refused to honour the court process by refusing to appear in court.

“Therefore, the court has no choice, but to dissolve the marriage between the couple.

“The couple can no longer stay together because the marriage has broken down totally, both parties are no longer husband and wife, they are free to go their separate ways,” Oyekan ruled.

The president said that the issue of custody of the children should be referred to the family court within the Lagos judicial division that had the right to determine children’s plight under the age of 18.

He ordered the petitioner to contribute N50, 000 for the rehabilitation cost.

The petitioner’s wife had failed to appear in court after being summoned several times by the court.

“My wife wanted to kill me; she always stabbed me with sharp objects,’’ he said, describing her as a troublesome person.

Teenager female bomber blows up self near Kano Mosque From Edwin Olofu, Kano

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teenager blew herself up near a mosque on Monday night in an apparent suicide attack attempt in Kano, Nigeria’s secondlargest city, police said.

Police spokesman Magaji Majiya said the girl’s target was likely the Umar Ibn Al-Khattab mosque and that she was the only casualty.

The attempted attack bore the hallmarks of the Islamist militant group, Boko Haram, which was behind a wave of violence last week that killed 200 people. On Sunday, at least 44 people died in two attacks in the central city of Jos. Kano has not been attacked since February this year when two suicide bombers struck a bus station killing at least 10 people.

On Monday in Kano, two witnesses said they saw the girl crossing a road before they heard a loud bang.

Boko Haram has been waging an insurgency since 2009 to establish a state in Nigeria’s northeast adhering to strict sharia law. Boko Haram took over large swaths of territory last year but have since been repelled from most parts by Nigerian forces with the help of Chad, Niger and Cameroon. VOA

Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) Lagos state chapter picketing Thisday Newspapers, yesterday at Apapa, in Lagos, over nonpayment of nine months’ salary of its workers.

Kidnappers of Delta poly lecturer demand N20m ransom From Osakhare Erese, Asaba

K

idnappers of Mr. Chike Gbemudu, lecturer at the Delta State polytechnic Ozoro, isoko South Local Government of the state yesterday, established a contact of N20 million with his family

members.

As it were, Mr. gbemudu was abducted in the early hours of Friday at his residence along NDC road Ozoro, and was whisked away to an unknown destination by his abductors who were said to have been armed with AK47s.

His wife, Mrs. Pat Gbemudu,

who confirmed the incidence with the husband’s abductors, said efforts were being made to ensure his release unhurt.

It would be recalled that the State Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Celestina Kalu, had confirmed the abduction of Mr. Gbemudu saying that efforts

were being made to secure his release.

Although his family members were looking depressed over the incident, but a member of the Polytechnic Academic Staff Union, Comrade Thomas Ojuye, described Gbemudu’s kidnap as unfortunate.

EFCC docks ex-PHCN staff, Yakubu Ndam, for N5.5m fraud

By Joy Baba Yesufu

T

he Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, yesterday arraigned one Solomon Yakubu Ndam before Justice Jude Okeke of the FCT High Court, Maitama, Abuja, on a 13-count charge bordering on forgery, impersonation and obtaining money by false pretence to the tune of N5,540,000( Five Million, Five Hundred and Forty Thousand Naira).

Nduma, a former employee of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, obtained the money from some unsuspecting

persons, claiming that he would help them acquire some pieces of land being sold by the PHCN. Count one of the charges reads: “That you, Solomon Yakubu Ndam, on or about the 18th day of May, 2012 at Abuja in the Abuja Judicial Division of the High court of the Federal Capital Territory Abuja, with intent to defraud did make a forged document titled RE: APPLICATION FOR PLOT ALLOCATION, REF: 273/ADMIN/20/165/2012, purportedly signed by A.O. Obadofin and issued by the Power Holding Company of Nigeria Plc,

Abuja Electricity Distribution Company acknowledging receipt of payment of the sum of N500,000 (Five Hundred Thousand Naira) from you for land allocation with the intention of causing it to be believed as genuine and thereby committed an offence punishable under Section 364 of the Penal Code Cap 532, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria (Abuja) 1990.

The accused pleaded not guilty when the charges were read to him.

In view of his plea, counsel to the accused, J.D Ndam, moved an oral application for bail.

However, prosecution counsel, Samuel Okeleke, opposed the bail application and prayed the court to remand the accused person in prison.

After listening to both counsels, Justice Okeke, refused the oral application for bail sought by the defence counsel and ordered him to file a written bail application.

Justice Okeke ordered the accused to be remanded in prison custody and adjourned the case till September 28, 2015 for ruling on the bail application.

N1.4bn subsidy fraud: Trial of Helen Aninye, others commence today

By Joy Baba Yesufu

A

t last, hearing in the case of Helen Aninye, Chizobam Ben-Okafor and their company, Pon-Specialized Services Limited, before Justice Olasumbo Goodluck of the Federal Capital Territory High

Court, Abuja, will commence today.

The duo alongside their company were arraigned by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, on Friday, May 31, 2013 on an 18-count charge of conspiracy to obtain money by false pretence to the

tune of N1, 413,507,951.50 (One Billion, Four Hundred and Thirteen Million, Five Hundred and Seven Thousand, Nine Hundred and Fifty One Naira and Fifty Kobo) from the Federal Government of Nigeria under the Petroleum Support Fund for the importation of 15,000

MT of Premium Motor Spirit.

But a string of applications by the defence had delayed the commencement of trial.

When the case was called up yesterday the defence counsel, Solomon Edeh, representing Tayo Oyetibo, SAN, pleaded with the court for an adjournment.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

News

NEMA’ll partner NSA to tackle maritime crime- DG From Mohammad Ibrahim, Kaduna

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ational Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), DirectorGeneral Sani Sidi said the agency would collaborate with office of National Security Adviser (NSA) on how to tackle maritime crime in the country.

According to him, there is need for a sound strategy and support of all stakeholders towards making Nigerian

maritime environment safe.

The Director General disclosed this at the opening of a five-day simulation exercise on response to maritime crime at the Armed Forces Command and Staff College (AFCSC), Jaji, Kaduna State.

Sidi said criminals elements use Nigeria’s Sea heritage for piracy, smuggling and dumping of toxic waste and is unacceptable.

According to him, any threat to the nation’s maritime interest will have significant consequences

on the economy. `` It is in this regard that NEMA recorgnises the need to support the office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) for a coordinated and collective fight against such threats. ``We are aware that no single response organisation is competent enough to handle any form of disaster alone, the need for concerted efforts toward cooperation and collaboration to achieve timely and effective response.

“ Total Spectrum Maritime Strategy (TSMS) is central to war on maritime terrorism especially with the emerging threats to our collective security safe nets,``he said Commandant of the College, AVM John Ifemeje said the exercise had been staged for participants to evolve mechanism ofprotecting Federal Government marritme assets. ``The effort is meant to tackle the current upsurge on Sea Piracy, Pipeline vandalism, kidnapping and illicit oil bunkering affecting

our national economy.`` He urged participants to take the training seriously in order to achieve the desired objectives.

He commended NEMA for organising the exercise to ensure effective response in combating challenges of the maritime sector and other territorial crimes.

Commandant said the exercise would prepare participants to tackle the country’s unfolding challenges in the maritime sector.

Wrath of God awaits Boko Haram, says PFN From Osaigbovo Iguobaro, Benin

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L-R President, Association of Professional Bodies of Nigeria (APBN), Mr. Foluso Fasoto, APBN 1st Deputy President, Dr Omede Idris, Senior Leadership Consultant, International Leadership Foundation, Dr Victor Koh, and Chairman of the Summit, Professor Anya Oko Anya, during the APBN 2015 Summit of the Professionals, yesterday at the NAF Conference Center, in Abuja.

Photo: Joe Oroye

Ramadan: Niger gov’s wife preaches peace, tolerance From Yakubu Mustapha,Minna.

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ife of the Niger State Governor, Dr. Amina Abubakar Bello has tasked Nigerians, especially women, to always work towards strengthening peaceful coexistence and good neighbourliness in the country.

Amina Bello gave the charge in a statement issued in Minna yesterday by her Press Secretary, Aisha Wakaso, after the daily Ramadan breakfast with women

religious groups yesterday in Minna.

The governor’s wife lamented over invisible gap that has been created by misconception that the average Muslim hates the average Christian which has caused a major division among the adherents of the two major religious faithfuls.

“It is not true that an average Muslim hates Christians, it is just a misconception because from the way we are, II know that we all have nothing against each other and coming together

to breakfast with women leaders of both religious groups is a way to bridge the gap and show our followers that we love one another”.

She also urged women religious leaders to preach tolerance among the laity so as to check the activities of quack religious leaders who preaches hate and intolerance.

“If we start this way, it will send a message to the people that if their leaders can be together peacefully, then they should also emulate by respecting other

people’s religion and the sky will be our limit” she said.

Apparently, Mrs Bello urged the women to use the holy month of Ramadan to reflect and teach the younger generation to be tolerant and allow people around them practice their religion without hitch, let or hindrance.

“I pray that we will take our time in this holy month to reflect and teach the younger ones a new way to look at life and that life can be as simple as it can if we all live together peacefully”.

NYSC identifies impediment to entrepreneurship programme

By Albert Akota

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he National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), yesterday, identified lack of skill acquisition centre as one of the major factors affecting its Skill Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development (SAED) programme for all serving corps members.

The Director of SAED, NYSC, Mrs. Mary Danabia explained that the programme was introduced in 2012 in a bid to empower young graduates in the country, but the real goal

had not been fully realised due to some impediments, ranging from inadequate funding among others.

Danabia, who stated this in an interview with newsmen in Abuja, said in spite of the challenges, they had been able through the programme to reduce fear of finishing the one year mandatory service and get into the labour market among Nigerian youth.

She maintained that over 500, 000 corps members had so far been trained by the programme, while 1600 of them had been fully turned entrepreneurs.

Danabia noted that several of them were out there doing their various businesses, but not yet fully licensed due to bureaucratic processes, adding that the scheme had been in consultation with regulatory agencies to lessen the burden of registration to enhance their growth.

She disclosed that the scheme and the Central bank of Nigeria (CBN) are working out facility that would take care of problem of getting collateral by corps members to access credit facility for their businesses.

Meanwhile, the NYSC has

appealed to all organizations, especially Ministries, Departments and Agencies of Government, to always accept Corps Members posted to them for Primary Assignment.

A statement signed in Abuja by the NYSC Director of Press and Public Relation, Mrs Abosede Aderibigbe said; “all stakeholders, including employers, are requested to always give the young men and women of the Scheme the necessary support and encouragement by accepting them whenever posted for primary assignment.”

he Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) yesterday warned merchants of death group, Boko Haram insurgents and it’s collaborators to urgently stop the mindless killings in the Country or face judgement of God. It particularly condemned the onslaught by the outlawed group against places of worship in north-East of Nigeria as ungodly, clarified that places of worship are sacred and peaceful The notice by the group contained in a statement PFN by its national President, Rev. Dr. Felix Omobude, is on the sidelines of the recent coordinated attacks on the Redeemed Christian Church of God, Yobe State, and other locations in Jos, Plateau States, which led to the deaths of about 50 persons, according to reports.

“Attacking such holy places is ungodly and should not continue. restated that places of worship are sacred and peaceful where worshippers have fellowship with their creator (God) “We condemn the acts and others be they Christian or Moslem worshipping centres and warned the masterminds that their collaborators and sponsors to desist from such dastardly acts in order not to continue to incur the wrath of God. The statement called on the Federal government not to quiver in the fight against insurgency within the framework of the laws by protecting lives and property of all Nigerians.

It also pledged its support of the Christian leaders to the Nigerian to victims of terror and the Nigerian Army in its bid to tame the insurgents.

Omobude urged Nigerians not to lose hope but rather to continue to pray to God for His divine solution to the security problems and called on Nigerians irrespective of their tribes, religious and political affiliations to be united and take a courageous stand against wanton destruction of lives and property by members of the sect.

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Page 9

News

Muslim youth hails PMB on bailout to states

L-R: Mr. Reginald Ikpeawujo, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Water Resources, Dr. Istifanus Musa, and Director River Basin Operations, Malam Musa Ibrahim, jointly briefing journalists after their meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari on Water Resources Ministry, yesterday at the State House, in Abuja.

From Ayodele Samuel,Lagos

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ational Council of Muslim Youth Organisations, NACOMYO has commended Presidents Muhammadu Buhari’s approval of N713.7b as a bail funds for depressed states to offset workers arrears of salaries.

The Muslim youth, said the action is a demonstration of government’s responsiveness and commitment to people’s yearnings and welfare, just as it also demonstrates that the President has a listening ear.

The group in a statement signed by its National President, Alhaji Kamal’ddin Akintunde said the development, coming at the wake of soon to be concluded Ramadan fast provides succor to salary-starved families and a good omen to the forthcoming fast breaking yuletide.

Warning that workers and pensioners welfare should never be politicized and for smooth economic growth as well, the group emphasizes need to fast rack process of releasing the fund as unnecessary bottleneck characterized of fund-releasing agencies can jeopardize governments effort at improving the lot of citizens.

The group also charged states to educate people on the emergent economic recession and to seek their understanding for an aggressive IGR that will target economic growth and social infrastructural development.

“A robust IGR will complement federal allocation that will aid and facilitate democratic dividends.” , the group said.

Photo: Joe Oroye

Victims of Lagos tanker explosions get N30m relief From Ayodele Samuel,Lagos

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agos state governor, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode yesterday presented cheques worth N30 million to the 243 enumerated residents and traders whose property and goods were destroyed in the Iyana Ipaja and Egbe-Idimu tanker explosions in Alimosho local government in Lagos State.

Also a Committee set up to proffer solution on the spate of tanker explosion in the State submitted its reports to governor Ambode.

The committee headed by the Secretary to the State Government, Mr. Tunji Bello submitted the report on Tuesday behind closed doors.

Ambode who disclosed this at the presentation of financial assistance to the victims of the disasters at the Igando relief camp, Egbe-Idimu Local Council Development Area, LCDA, said

that they have submitted the report and soon, the government would come out with its white paper on it.

The governor who was represented by his deputy, Dr. Idiat Adebule said “We do not hope to witness this type of disaster in Lagos again. We are committed to protect the citizens’ lives and property.”

He stressed that the “money isn’t enough but with the belief that you will put it into judicious use will go along way to help restore lost property.”

Earlier, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Special Duties and intergovernmental relations, Dr. Aderemi Desalu said that the total fund was given to assist the victims secure accommodation and others.

A breakdown of the entire victims showed that 76 persons were enumerated in Iyana-Ipaja while 167 were affected in EgbeIdimu.

According to him, “From the Iyana-Ipaja tanker explosion, seven landlords were given financial support of N500, 000 for their burnt houses. Each of the 64 shop owners affected by the inferno received N150, 000 while 5 commercial tricycle operators, Keke Marwa received N50, 000 each. “Of the 367 Internally Displaced Person, IDP at the Igando Relief camp, 167 were adults. They were issued N100, 000 cheques” he added.

“The victims of the Iyana-Ipaja tanker explosion weren’t brought to the relief camp in Igando. They didn’t need to come to the camp; they didn’t need our help. It was the victims of Egbe-Idimu that were brought to the camp.

“We suspect that some people who didn’t come to camp among the victims of the Egbe-Idimu explosion will come later to claim that there houses were affected.

So there issue would be verified again to know if they truly lost

their houses. The chairman of the council and LASEMA will work together to ensure that the issue is addressed.

Desalu further disclosed that N9 million was returned into the government purse from the N100 million released by the state government for the 2, 000 victims of the fire disaster that gutted the Balogun Market in March 2015.

He stated “for instance during the presentation of cheques to the affected traders and property owners affected by the market inferno, we discovered that some of those who claimed to be victims were not.

“Due to this, we returned over N9 million back to the purse of the state government because those who earlier claimed that they were affected could not provide valid evidence to back their claim.

So anyone among the victims of the explosions who failed to meet the criteria would not receive any money,” he added.

Rivers guber: APC accuses INEC, PDP of conspiracy to frustrate tribunal

By A’isha Biola Raji

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he All Progressives Congress (APC) and its gubernatorial candidate in the April 11, 2015 governorship election in the state, Dakuku Peterside Monday accused the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) of disobeying an order by the Tribunal requesting the electoral body to allow them inspect election materials used for the election thereby delaying and frustrating the process of the tribunal.

It will be recalled that the three-member panel of the Tribunal, headed by Justice

Muazu Abdulkadir Pindiga had, at the last hearing of the petition, granted a motion exparte filed on June 8, 2015 by the petitioners, allowing the inspection of Card Readers and records of electoral materials used in all the polling units in the state.

While opposing the application by Governor Nyesom Wike to set aside the ex parte order for inspection of the materials, counsel to APC’s candidate Dakuku Peterside, Akin Olujimi (SAN) faulted the ubmission by INEC that it is not opposing PDP’s applications challenging the jurisdiction of the tribunal and to set aside

the order for inspection as a conspiracy.

At the resumed hearing of the matter yesterday, Olujimi informed the court that INEC declined to make the materials available for inspection, in total disobedience to an earlier order of the Tribunal in that direction.

Olujimi asked the court to defend its integrity as the order was directed against INEC but the electoral umpire has not complained formally about the order.

According to Olujimi, “an order for inspection was obtained and directed at INEC, which it has not complained of before the Tribunal, but chose, on its own to disobey the order

of the Tribunal”.

He said the application by the counsel representing the 2nd respondent (Gov Nyesom Wike), Emmanuel Ukala (SAN), praying the Tribunal to set aside its order on the inspection of the election materials was a calculated attempt by the respondents to delay proceedings in the petition.

However, INEC Counsel Onyechi Ikpeazu (SAN) urged the court to discountenance the allegation on the grounds that the petitioner has filed no application to that effect.

He prayed the court to set aside the order allowing the inspection of the election materials on the ground that the

Tribunal lacks the jurisdiction to entertain the petition in the first place, and that the Tribunal ought to have addressed the issue of jurisdiction before exercising any judicial powers in line with Section 6 (6) of the Constitution.

But Olujimi in his counter affidavit maintained that election petitions tribunals are regulated by special provisions.

He urged the court to dismiss the submission for lack of merit since the applicant also asked to be accommodated in the inspection.

The Tribunal, after listening to arguments on the application, adjourned till July 9, 2015 for ruling.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

NOTICE OF PUBLIC CONSULTATION/WORKSHOP FOR THE PROPOSED TARIFF REVIEW BY KANO ELECTRICITY DISTRIBUTION PLC In line with the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission’s (NERC) guidelines for Consumer Consultation by DISCOS before applying to NERC for approval of Application for Revenue Requirement, Rate Design and Customer Reclassification, Kano Electricity Distribution Plc hereby gives notice to the general public within its franchise areas of Kano, Katsina and Jigawa States of its proposed Consultation/Workshop on Tariff Review as follows: 1. KANO STATE: DATES: 22nd& 23rd July, 2015 VENUES: a) TAHIR GUEST HOUSE, KANO (22/7/15) b) AFFORESTATION CONFERENCE HALL, KABUGA (23/7/15) 2. KATSINA & JIGAWA STATES.: DATES: 29th& 30th July, 2015 VENUES: a) KATSINA: i) 29/7/15 LIYAFA PALACE HOTEL, KATSINA ii) 30/7/15GOV’T DAY SECONDSRY SCHOOL, FUNTUA b) JIGAWA i) 29/7/15 MANPOWERDEVELOPMENT INSTITUTE,DUTSE ii) 30/7/15 MAIMUNA GUEST PALACE, HADEJIA SIGNED MANAGEMENT KANO ELECTRICITY DISTRIBUTION PLC

Page 11

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

EDITORIAL

Still on that suspicious Kankia killing

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he same week that may have killed the girl that the very nose of the police and a popular Islamic spread the rumour to cover their hospital staff, he was seized scholar, Sheikh tracks”. Muhammed further and set on fire and he burned Muhammad Awal speculated that ‘the girl may to death.

Adam Albani, his have been raped by some people We are shocked that jungle wife and son, were shot and and after she died, they dumped justice still exists in parts of killed in Zaria by unidentified her body in the place where it our country that is supposed gunmen, a Christian cleric was was found and turned round to to be governed by the rule of mulled by a mob in an apparent blame the pastor as they may not law. But we are more alarmed case of mistaken identity. like his activities or stay in the by the failure of the police to Sheikh Albani was killed on the protect a presumed innocent first day of the second month of citizen from a mob. Why was 2014, while Pastor Dike Ocha police security not provided at of Assemblies of God Church the hospital where the citizen in Kankia, Katsina state, was taken? We are also disappointed beaten and burned to death on by Police Commissioner February 5, same year.

Muhammad’s explanation of The sordid details of Pastor what happened that fateful day.

Ocha’s killing were provided It was all speculative, nothing by the Commissioner of definitive: “mischief makers Police in Katsina state, Hurdi may have killed the girl”, “the Muhammad. He said that girl may have been raped” and a crowd set on the pastor, “some people may not like his suspecting him to be the killer of (pastor’s) activities or stay in a little girl, Fatima Muhammad, the area”. whose decomposing body was It is our belief that all those found in the building close uncertainties would have to the pastor’s residence. been cleared if the pastor He described the killers had survived to tell the story. as ‘mischief makers’ who As it is, the opportunity has implicated the pastor in the been lost forever, more so area. girl’s death because they that no arrests were made in resented his presence in the The horror of the Kankia killing lies spite of the ample time the in the persistence of the mob and area. killers of Ocha took to carry the manner of the execution of “When the body of the girl was out their dastardly act. There their objective.

First, they went discovered close to his house”, is something that doesn’t sit to Ocha’s house and descended Muhammad explained, “Some properly in this case, and the on him heavily.

Somehow, mischief makers went about police have a responsibility to neighbours rescued him and he spreading the rumour that it straighten out this matter. They was rushed to a hospital.

But the was the pastor that killed her. owe the nation and themselves mob trailed him there and under It may be that it was those who this duty.

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But the mob trailed him there and under the very nose of the police and hospital staff, he was seized and set on fire and he burned to death.

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Opinion

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Buhari’s critics and their early lead

By Olalekan Waheed Adigun

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ictory is sweet; no one wants to be associated with defeat in a culture that makes people avoid defeat like a plague. Not wanting to be classified as “failures” after their “hero” last the presidential election, President Muhammadu Buhari’s opponents or better still critics appear to be cruising off with an early lead. The most recent his critics have done is to label him “Baba Go Slow” referring to his seeming lack of activities. But is it all about an early lead?

Watching from a far, I have come to realise that Buhari’s critics can fall under any of the following categories: First, are the career Jonathanians or GEJites as they are now popularly known. Leading this pack is our dear Femi Aribisala. In fact one of these people had openly written that he will not accept Buhari as his President. These people were so sure that their boss or hero will win no matter the costs. They “prophesised” that Buhari will never “smell” Aso Rock. In fact, Aribisala once wrote under the title: HOW TO LOSE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION FOUR TIMES in one of his columns stating his reasons why Buhari would lose the fourth time. If wishes were horse, they say, men will ride. How time flies. Anyways, they are foremost among Buhari’s critics!

Not all Buhari’s critics are pro-Jonathan as many may think though it is very difficult to vouch for this distinction. We can have a second group as those having issues either personally with Buhari himself or his party the All Progressives Congress(APC).

This group accommodates people like a former Governor of old Kaduna state Alhaji Abdulkadir Balarabe Musa and a renowned writer Okey Ndibe. One really cannot explain Balarabe Musa’s issues with Buhari considering the fact that they are from the same state, Katsina. He was noted to have criticised President Jonathan vociferously at some points and I am not aware he has rescinded on his opinion about Jonathan. His criticisms of President Buhari is what one finds hard to explain, other than the fact that he may probably know something about Buhari (both of whom come from the same state) that is not to public knowledge. On the other hand Okey Ndibe’s case can be because he had issues at some point with the way the APC was been run. I am not sure Ndibe will be your first choice of a Jonathanian or GEJite.

Either way they constitute a pack of their own.

The third group are perhaps the most reckless. They are nothing but tribal pirates, ethnic buccaneers and religious Vikings.

In this group we boldly include Radio Biafra and its sponsors.

They are myopic in views; tactless in approach and reckless in criticisms. On the one hand they urged their “people” not to vote in the election on the other hand they want Jonathan to win in an election they forced their people not to vote. I find it difficult to reconcile these contrasting objectives. More confuse was I when I knew that former President Jonathan is Ijaw, a tribe that proudly supported the Federal Army during the Nigerian Civil War. It was only this radio that broadcast the news that President Buhari authorised the bombarding of “Biafran

territories”, by which they mean Cross Rivers and Akwa Ibom.

While they told their viewers that “Igbos are not Nigerians”, one is left to wonder at what point did the Efiks, Ibibios, Orons, etc(which they also claim as part of “Biafran territories”) became Igbos. Apart from this pirate radio which, I later knew, broadcast from London, no other credible news medium reported the “bombardment”!

The fourth group can be neglected as mere “professional” critics, wanting no more than mere attention or patronage.

Some of them may have good intentions you never can tell!

The most brilliant of these criticisms is “Baba Go Slow”. I only laugh anytime I hear these critics on social media make this argument. I have carefully avoided taking part in these discussions because once you air your views you are most likely either going to get insults or get intellectually-insulting answers.

While not making excuses for sluggishness, I think these critics must get their facts right. First,

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they have done their very best to compare Buhari to Jonathan.

They tend to forget that Jonathan’s early missteps were just enough to turn Nigerians against him. Second, they also tend to forget that unlike Buhari, Jonathan has close to two years before his election in 2011 so there were no issues about “smooth transition”.

Third, Jonathanians, in particular, must by now be aware that the Buhari transition committee submitted its report only recently because the Jonathan administration will not cooperate with the committee.

When they hammer the argument that Buhari’s administration is slow, two things come to my mind. The first is the Aesop’s fable The Hare and the Tortoise. The moral of that story is very simple: Thoroughness and quality counts for more in the long run than speed. The race is usually not to the swift as there is no sense in starting fast and ending poorly. Alas! This is one of Life’s terrible lessons.

Second, I remember Franklin

When they hammer the argument that Buhari’s administration is slow, two things come to my mind. The first is the Aesop’s fable The Hare and the Tortoise. The moral of that story is very simple: Thoroughness and quality counts for more in the long run than speed.

D. Roosevelt, the 32nd United States’ President.

Like Buhari, Roosevelt defeated an incumbent President, Herbert Hoover in 1932. In the weeks following the election, Roosevelt took withdrew from public glare leaving the space for his enemies in the Republican Party to criticise him. He is not prepared for the challenge, so they say. Their criticisms become even more personal and aggressive. At his inauguration, he gave a rousing speech in what is now known as “Hundred Days” that serves as a major blow to the GOP leaders’ attacks. Roosevelt will then go to win the next three presidential elections, which is unprecedented and unsurpassed in US history. This appears to me to be the position of Buhari’s critics today!

For those celebrating Buhari’s “sluggishness” is only a demonstration of the fact that they are bereft of political wisdom. They are revealing their cards too early into the game. They perhaps need to be reminded that the People’s Democratic Party(PDP) had congratulated then President Jonathan for “early lead” as the results for six states was been announced. In fact, the loquacious Femi Fani-Kayode, the PDP Campaign spokesman, had told the world that the party was in “early lead” in 22 states.

This is how “early lead” win!

This is my humble opinion, I may be wrong!

Olalekan Waheed Adigun can be reached on Email: olalekan@olalekanadigun. com, adgorwell@gmail.com or on twitter @adgorwell

My heart and mind is with the Greek people

By Benjamin Obiajulu Aduba

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hat Greece needed was courage in the face of a bully world and that is what the ordinary Greeks demonstrated on Sunday. Greece has an over 2500 year history. Egyptians Phoenicians and Arabs had brought civilization to Europe via Greece. The contributions of Greece to Europe and the development of the modern world are too many to name but we cannot forget that the very Democracy which is the mantra the West uses to bully the world was first invented in Greece.

They fought their way to integration and unity; they advanced the Christian religion as one or two apostles travelled to Greece (St. Paul is one of them) to evangelize the nation; even portions of the early Bible were written in Greek; the value of exercise was admired which has given rise to modern Olympics.

Greeks built mesmerizing Temples and demonstrated

architectural vision yet to be matched, sciences, literature are among Greece’s gift to the world. If you have not read Homer’s epic stories you should try and read them. You will be entertained.

But this essay is not about Greek History. It is about how a small country stood up to a bully world–sharks. In return for some money sleazy “Big Brothers” lent to Greece EU called a people to commit suicide so that they would get their loans back.

It is as Shakespeare wrote in The Merchant of Venice. Shylock demanded a pound of flesh to be cut from a point nearest to Antonio’s heart because Antonio defaulted on a loan. Greece was asked to cut expenses, increase taxes and destroy their economy. Greece went along for a time until it discovered that no amount of concessions would please the sharks and she stopped paying. That is what small nations all over the world should do all the time.

Greece’s future is now at its hands. There is trouble ahead

for all her citizens. She will be expelled from the Euro Zone; stifling blockade would be imposed; drachma will return as the Greece money and would be exchanged for less than naira if the Euro zone accepts it at all.

With all these coming at rattling speed Greece’s survival may at first be in doubt.

But time will change things as Greeks learn to adjust to hard times. Greeks should look

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up to our recent history. They should look to Cuba’s survival after more than a half century of bullying by another Big Brother.

Cuba survived and the Big Brother is now at the table and both are talking as equals.

Greece is not an island as Cuba is so access to other countries would not be as difficult as it was for Cuba. Smugglers would cross the borders to do business.

Greece will survive.

Greece was asked to cut expenses, increase taxes and destroy their economy. Greece went along for a time until it discovered that no amount of concessions would please the sharks and she stopped paying.

That is what small nations all over the world should do all the time.

Greece’s “NO vote” should be the standard for third world countries. If the poor countries should listen to Karl Max and rise and be united, they would lose nothing but their chains. Blockade of Greece is the making; that of Cuba has been perfected; blockade of Iran, Russia, Palestine, etc. are enforced.

Eventually the entire world would be blockaded and the West will discover that they have just each other to trade with. Blockade cuts both ways as trade is between people. When that happens a humbled West would discover that military might with big ships to enforce blockades goes but thus far.

A more peaceful world; a more equitable world; a less antagonistic world, would emerge. That is the promise of Greece’s “No Vote” to the world.

Out of the ashes of Greece would emerge a Brave New World!

Benjamin Obiajulu Aduba is a public commentator

PAGE 13

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Comment

The pros and cons of negotiating With Boko Haram

By Ogundana Michael Rotimi

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he debate whether the Nigerian government is weak if it negotiates with the dreaded Islamist sect, Boko Haram is out again. This was as a result of the statement credited to the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina.

During an interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), he was quoted to have said: if “Boko Haram is willing to negotiate, why not?”. Following that, a press release was issued from his Abuja office to clarify the government`s position on the matter. Part of the press release reads thus: Most wars, however furious or vicious, often end around the negotiation table. So, if Boko Haram opts for negotiation, the government will not be averse to it. Government will, however, not be negotiating from a position of weakness, but that of strength.

This statement has generated a lot of controversies as it has been widely believed that, it is only a weak government with less military might and poor intelligent gathering mechanisms that negotiates with terrorist. You see, in reality this is almost completely false.

The argument against negotiating with terrorists is simple: Democracies must never give in to violence, and terrorists must never be rewarded for using it. Negotiations give legitimacy to terrorists and their methods and undermine actors who have pursued political change through peaceful means. Negotiations can destabilize the political systems of a government, undercut international efforts to outlaw terrorism, and set a dangerous precedent.

However, history has shown that it is almost impossible to defeat an

organisation composed of individual people with guns and bombs without unbearable infringements on the human rights of the innocent.

In the case of prolonged internal campaigns of terrorism, the promise of negotiations can be used as a bargaining tool to end violence, and will almost always lead to a ceasefire.

This has been seen in almost every case where terrorist groups have been brought to the negotiating table. In the case of more isolated incidents, such as hostage-taking, it is worth making concessions in order to save the lives of the people who the government has no right to sacrifice for any reason whatsoever.

Meanwhile, in practice, democratic governments around the world secretly often negotiate with terrorists either directly or indirectly but deny doing that publicly. The lists of negotiations between democratic governments and terrorists are numerous, some are: In 1991, the British government maintained a secret back channel to the Irish Republican Army (IRA) even after the IRA had launched a mortar attack on 10, Downing Street, which nearly eliminated the entire British cabinet.

In 1988, the Spanish government sat down with the separatist group Basque Homeland and Freedom (known by its Basque acronym ETA) only six months after the group had killed 21 shoppers in a supermarket bombing.

In 2011, contrary to their principle, The Isreali Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu approved the release of 1,027 prisoners that were responsible for the deaths of 569 Israeli civilians to meet the demands of Hamas in order to secure the release of the kidnapped Corporal GiladShalit.

Even the U.S. that often brags

of its non negotiation policy with terrorists also has a long list of negotiations with terrorists throughout history. Some of which are: 1979: Iran Hostage Crisis – Iranian revolutionaries take more than 60 Americans hostage from the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, prompting a substantial response from President Jimmy Carter.

After several strategies including embargoes and economic sanctions fail, Carter’s negotiations with the revolutionaries led to the unfreezing of over $8 billion in Iranian assets.

The hostages were freed after 444 days of imprisonment, just after Carter left office and Ronald Reagan was sworn in.

1985: The Iran-Contra Affair – In direct opposition to an arms embargo, President Reagan authorizes the selling of arms to Iran, in exchange for seven American hostages held by Iranian terrorists in Lebanon. Amid heated backlash, Reagan denies any wrongdoing, only to later admit his knowledge of the affair.

1995: Bill Clinton met with Gerry Adams, the political leader of the Irish Republican Army, ignoring not only requests from Britain not to meet with Adams, but also the IRAs position on the State Department terror list. The IRA remained on the list until 1998.

2002: The George W. Bush administration paid a large sum $300,000 ransom to Abu Sayyaf, an Islamist extremist group in the southern Philippines, to secure the return of two American missionaries, Martin and Gracia Burnham. Efforts by the Philippine military to rescue the missionaries results in Martin’s death, and Gracia’s return to the United States.

2009: Tom Pickering and Robert

Malley, former U.S. government officials, met with leaders of the Palestinian terrorist group, Hamas.

The meeting, held in Zurich, is just one of a long string of meetings between Hamas and U.S. officials with ties to both the Clinton and Obama administrations.

2010: British hostage Peter Moore is released in Iraq, in exchange for the release of Qais alKhazali, a prisoner being held by the U.S. military. Khazali, the leader of the Shia military group League of the Righteous, was suspected to be involved not only in Moore’s kidnapping, but also in the killings of five American soldiers.

2014: Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, an American soldier was released by the Taliban in exchange for five Taliban fighters held at the Guantanamo Bay prison by the US. Through all the noise and controversy surrounding the return of Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, one thing has remained clear, President Obama is not apologizing for his decision to bring Bergdahl home.

“We do not leave anybody wearing the American uniform behind,” he said.

The point is, one may choose to agree or disagree with the policy of not negotiating with terrorists, there are valid arguments on both sides of the debate. But suggesting that the practice is unprecedented and anything other than routine in international affairs is misleading.

Should Boko Haram care for negotiation, the Nigerian government should negotiate with them. However, the government should negotiate from the point of strength and not from that of weakness. Negotiations with people like AbubakarShekau can lead to an outcome that is better than the status quo and avoids more loss

of lives and damage of properties.

Boko Haram in the past few years of its existence have been responsible for the loss of thousands of lives, damage of thousands of properties, displacement of millions of people and the abduction of groups and individuals.

It is the primary responsibility of any government in the world to save the lives and protect the properties of her citizens. It doesn`t matter the way it goes about it, so long it is for the good of the people and the nation, it must be done!

Those that have in one way or another been victims of one form of terror or the other either by loss of loved ones or properties know better. They careless about the tactics the government chose to employ in putting an end to the Boko Haram insurgency. The only thing they care about is living in a society where their lives and properties are safe.

Negotiations with terrorists are not an easy task. However, it is worth trying to reach a peace agreement.

Personally, I really wish that the military can completely root out the deadliest terrorist sect and stop them from committing further harm. But now that this is not coming through and the terror spree continues, if negotiation becomes an option the government should debate We have tried to use our force and the combined forces of our allies and yet the desired results are not coming forth, perhaps now it`s the time to start thinking of really bringing negotiation to the table.

God Bless Nigeria Ogundana Michael Rotimi is a commentator, and public Speaker. He tweets @ MickeySunny.

Power consumer advocacy: Matters arising

By Biola Sobowale

“Power consumer advocacy network collapses after two months.”PUNCH, Friday, July 3, 2015, p34.

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he story by Okechukwu Nnodim, writing from Abuja went on to say that “The Nigerian Electricity Consumer Advocacy Network, which was inaugurated by the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission about two months ago has collapsed.” Reading the report, it is obvious that the NERC and the members of the Nigerian Electricity Consumer Advocacy Network, NECAN, cannot agree about who is to fund the programme. There is fault on both sides as will be demonstrated presently. But first a few questions need to be answered.

Who are the members of the NECAN and how were they selected or appointed to represent consumers? Which consumer groups do they represent, private, corporate, public or foreign missions? The second question is important because all the Governments of Nigeria, Federal, States and Local Governments are also consumers; so are foreign

missions (US Embassy, British High Commission etc). When were they recognized as an advocacy group? And why was NERC, itself a consumer, inaugurating NECAN if it had no intention of funding it?

For NECAN, only two questions will be sufficient. Who sent them on this mission? And did they embark on it expecting the Federal Government to fund it, in other words, another piece of cake to share?

Permit me to start with NECAN and the advocacy it had undertaken.

As someone who had been involved in advocacy before, Christian Governor in Lagos State in 2015 being the latest, it would appear that altruism is lost the minute those embarking on advocacy rely on third parties, government or otherwise, for the initial funding.

Christian Conscience, CC, an NGO which resulted from my articles in November 2011 was funded exclusively by the members, and, later, some well-wishers. No appeal was made to government or any of the political parties who were the targets of our advocacy.

The principle is clear, “Who pays the piper dictates the tune.” Once your programme is funded by government, there is proscription

on what you can do.

With regard to electricity, the service quality and the charges, the Federal Government had handed us over to the Distribution Companies, DISCOs, without spelling out for us what our rights as consumers under private companies will be. In fact, by the very pregnant silence, the Federal Government had created a class of privileged private companies, called DISCOs, which can rob consumers at will – without any apparent recourse. The NERC is an agency of the Federal Government, and was a party to this rape of the consumers. Clearly, it makes no sense to expect NERC to promote an advocacy network whose objective is to liberate consumers from financial slavery.

NECAN should never have been inaugurated by NERC. There is another reason for NERC to stay out of this advocacy.

This time it involves fairness to the DISCOs. Much as we love to hate them, there is still a need to ensure that as we move towards resolution of several contentious issues between us as consumers and the DISCOs, we must still be aware that we are fighting with our friends and Fellow Nigerians – not foreigners and enemies. And when the fight

is over, meaning when all issues have been resolved, they will still be our friends and Fellow Nigerians.

NERC, which is part of government has no business sponsoring NECAN because that would amount to the Federal Government sponsoring one group of citizens (consumers) against another group of corporate citizens (the DISCOs). I am not a shareholder in any DISCO and will not be. But, in fairness to DISCOs, the NERC had no business inaugurating NECAN. It is just as well that it had collapsed like a sand castle built on the beach by kids.

That still leaves unanswered the question: should there be a NECAN or something like it? The answer is definitely YES!!! But, on what foundation should it rest?

“Hereditary bondsmen, know ye not who would be free must strike the blow?” Lord Byron, 1788-1824. (VANGUARD BOOK OF QUOTATIONS, VBQ, p 67).

History is replete with examples of injustices and inequities endured by people until they themselves rise up to say “Enough is enough”. Before Christian Conscience, I had been involved in other advocacies. One other effort resulted in Alternative Dispute Resolutions, ADR, now an integral part of our legal system.

With Nigerian Courts being overburdened, justice delayed, cost of litigation escalating, it was obvious something needed to be done. Governments were not the game-changers, people like Barrister Kehinde Aina of NCMG, and others were. But, the first great break when a friend of mine, William Braxton, then in the US Embassy, helped to bring a retired US Judge to deliver a lecture on ADR. Prior to that, in the late 1960s, I was a warrior, in every sense of the word, fighting for black Americans to be able to vote.

I still have the scar from one violent encounter.

Today, Obama is President of USA. Governments never assist in redressing injustice until the victims themselves act.

If we want a strong Nigerian Electricity Consumers Advocacy Network, then it must be financially independent of governments and headed by people ready for combats not cake-sharers. The justice for which that network will fight will be lasting and NECAN will constitute the peoples’ watch dog over DISCOs. But, we must create it ourselves.

Sobowale is reachable at biolasobowale@yahoo.com

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

PAGE 14

News

Yobe: NUJ seeks assistance as windstorm, erosion threaten centre From Uche Uche, Damaturu.

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he Nigerian Union of Journalists has called on the state government, well to do and well meaning individuals, philanthropists to come to its aid in renovating and protecting the press center from destruction by windstorm and gully erosion which are threatening the viability of the structures.

Chairman of the union in the state, comrade Isa Yusuf made the call yesterday after taking members of the union round the center to see the extent of damage done and being done by the two forces of nature which is very frustrating.

Windstorm which is a perennial phenomena recently pulled off the roofing zincs on all the buildings, these was replaced but the windstorm trucked back and removed the zincs while the gully erosion had already pulled down part of the northern

and southern wall fencing and continues to deepen and widen with every rainy season, this is very frustrating indeed.

The union is equally willing to allocated portions of the vast land

for business ventures to those who wishes so as to make the center more viable.

Located along Gashua road in Damaturu the state capital, the NUJ press center has served

different individuals and groups as a place to hold events, but how frustrating it would be to hold any function under such licking roofs when the rain is falling.

This is why the union is

pleading for assistance to find a lasting solution to the perennial destruction of the roofs, possible by putting up a strong roofing structure that can withstand the force of the windstorm.

Anglican diocese of Gombe ordains 5 priests, four deacons From David Hassan,Gombe

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he Anglican Diocese of Gombe has ordained five priest and four deacons who will be deployed to work in the Anglican churches across the state.

Speaking to news men in Gombe yesterday shortly after the ordination service, Bishop Henry Ndukuba of the Anglican Diocese of Gombe, said, the occasion was so important to the life of the church.

According to him, they were following what Jesus Christ himself started. “Even though he is God, but he sought for men to work with them in the cause of enlarging the gospel of God. “The aim was to enlarge the gospel, as well as building up people in the faith and word of God. “Today we are celebrating ministry of the ordained in the church, is not the responsibility of the ministers alone, but the entire followers of Christ” he said.

He further said, the newly ordained priest and deacons coming to ministry in a very difficult and delicate generation, that defined sin and remained in sin.

“But I want you to always remember that, you will never follow a crucified lord without expecting trouble” he explained. “Always be ready with your spiritual warfare, look unto the lord, never miss your way, he will surely see you through” he said.

In his sermon, guest speaker Vulnerable Esau Saidu from Anglican seminary Wusasa Zaria, emphasized on the need for every Christian faithful, to bear the yoke of Christ.

“If you carry the yoke, you will do what you were unable to do, do not allowed side attraction to be clouded you” he said. Our correspondent report that, the preacher text was taken from the gospel according saint Mathew 11:29-30.

L R: Coordinator, State of the Union (SOTU), Mr. Anya Okeke, Founding Director, Women Aids Collective (WACOL), Chief Joy Ezeilo, Executive, Director, Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC), Auwal Musa Rafsanjani, and Coordinator, Women Political Empowerment Project, North-Central Zone, Hajiya Rabi M. Abdullahi, during a civil society group press conference on anti-gender politics and commending the appointment of Hajiya Amina Zakari as Acting INEC Chairperson, yesterday in Abuja.

Photo: Mahmud Isa

Okowa urges NASS, presidency synergy to curb insurgency From Osakhare Erese, Asaba

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elta State Governor, Senator Dr Ifeanyi Okowa has called for synergy between the National Assembly and the Presidency to check insurgency.

The Governor made the call on Monday when the Speaker, House of Representatives, Rt. Hon. Yakubu Dogara led some members of the House of Representatives to pay him a courtesy visit at the overnment House, Asaba.

Governor Okowa who decried the magnitude of damage caused in the country as a result of insurgency, stated that President Mohamadu Buhari requires the support of all Nigerians, especially, the National Assembly to tackle the menace.

“I believe that the backbone of Mr. President is the National Assembly, I urge for collaboration

between the National Assembly and the Presidency without tampering with ind ependence of the Assembly,” he said, adding, “we in Delta State are praying that God will give the National Assembly and President Buhari the wisdom to handle the issues of insurgency in the nation.”

He reiterated, “we regret the death of people as a result of the insurgency, when we collectively talk with one mind, pray together, we will overcome this insurgency, we require divine intervention at this point in time.”

Senator Okowa used the occasion to challenge the National Assembly to speedily pass the Petroleum Industry Bill and the National Health Insurance Scheme Bill because of the importance of such bills to the development of Nigeria.

“I want to thank you for bringing the PIB bill to fore, it is

my prayer that we can speedily pass the bill in both houses and it gets a quick assent from the President because, non-passage of this bill has set the country backward, I pray that it is passed early in the life of this Assembly,” the Governor stated adding that the passage of the NHIS bill was very important as it will affect the generality of Nigerians.

According to him, the NHIS bill desires speedy attention because the NHIS act of 2004 was not all inclusive, decrying a situation where the number of Nigerians covered by Health insurance is still below 20 per cent.

“If we truly want to touch the lives of the poor, it is to touch their health and education, once we get it right, you have truly touched them,” he said.

While congratulating Rt. Hon. Dogara for his successful

emergence as the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the Governor expressed confidence in the ability of the Speaker to lead a vibrant and robust Assembly.

Earlier, Rt. Hon. Dogara who said he was in Asaba to commission a project executed by the member representing Aniocha/Oshimili Federal Constituency, described Governor Okowa as a man who knew what he wants for his people, noting that while some Governors were still contemplating on what to do about governance, Governor Okowa “has hit the ground running.”

“I am quite impressed with the quality of personalities you have as Commissioners,” he said, and thanked the Governor for his support during the race for the Speakership position.

was in recognition of the role of social media in governance.

He said that the new unit would operate closely with the office of the Special Adviser on Media and Public Affairs. ‘’ The Unit will coordinate the activities of all pro-government online groups, and will interact,

on behalf of the government, with interested persons and groups seeking information about government’s policies and programmes,” he said..

He further said that adequate training would be organised for youth to equip them with the latest knowledge in online

information management.

“By the creation of this Unit, we hope to engage our youth and also get their inputs in the running of the government.

“We want them to do more by offering quality suggestions on their vision for Sokoto State,” he said.. ( NAN)

Tambuwal creates social media unit

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ov. Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto state has approved the creation of Social Media Unit, to be domiciled in the Governor’s office.

Tambuwal’s spokesman, Malam Imam Imam, said in statement in Sokoto on Tuesday, that the establishment of the unit

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

N713 billion Bailout: Buhari on track, says Osun lawmaker

R-L: Sokoto state Governor, Hon. Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, discussing with the Senior Special Assistant on Media to the President, Malam Garba Shehu, after the governor’s closed-door meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari, yesterday at the State House, in Abuja.

From Suleiman Idris, Lagos

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n Osun State House of Assembly member representing Obokun Constituency, Olatunbosun Oyintiloye has averred that the approval of comprehensive relief package of N713.7billion by President Muhammadu Buhari to end the lingering crisis of unpaid workers’ salaries across the country has put him on a right track to stabilise the economy.

Oyintiloye hinted that the relief package involving the sharing of about $2.1billion (N413.7bn) between the states and the federal government and the Central Bankpackaged special intervention fund of N300bn as soft loan, would automatically stabilised the economy.

He also said a debt relief program proposed by the Debt Management Office (DMO) that would help states restructure their commercial loans of over N660 billion has indicated his commitment to the yearning of Nigerians.

The lawmaker reasoned that the action of the President implies that he has done a “stop gap analysis” of the situation which led him to approve the financial quick fix in line with the International Standard, agitation and yearning of Nigerians.

According to him, this gesture abundantly reassured Nigerians that President Buhari is a listening leader and responsive to the clamour of millions of Nigeria who voted for change.

“This action of President Buhari is a bold statement that the president is working in the best interest of the country. He has not only inspired hope, it has boosted the confidence of Nigerians in his capacity to redeem the battered economic image of the country”.

Oyintiloye who reiterated his earlier position that the leadership of All Progressive Congress (APC) was conscious of the challenge of service delivery and would not fall short of the expectations of the people, stressed that irrespective of political affiliations, every Nigerian should support the President to reposition the nation for a sustainable growth.

The parliamentarian pointed out the need for Nigerians to give President Buhari the needful benefits of doubts to evolve enduring policies at his own tempo, rather than stampede him unnecessary to action through sarcastic criticism.

“With the approval, states of the federation will secure a degree of succour and work out strategies to wriggle themselves out of the financial stress brought about with the economic let-down.

Oyintiloye noted that though the development was a strategic and temporary relief, it has the potential to jump start the economy.

Photo: Joe Oroye

Al-makura has no hand in councils’ financial crisis-Keffi LG chairman

By Ali Abare Abubakar

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hairman of Keffi local government of Nasarawa State, Honorable Mohammed Yakubu Dikko has further exonerated Governor Umaru Tanko Al-makura of alleged complicity regarding the financial crisis rocking local governments in the state.

Speaking with Peoples Daily yesterday in Keffi, the council chairman noted that a lot of people have wrong understanding of the current financial constraints being experienced by the councils not only in the state but across the country.

“The problem has to do with the dwindling federal allocations and has nothing to do with the state government. In fact, since we came on board, Al-makura never touched allocations belonging to the councils” he explained.

According to Hon Dikko, any

money allocated to the councils goes into the local government accounts, with chairmen of the 13 LGs are responsible for the allocations through the Ministry for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs.

“We pay our salaries consistently until we begin to have shortfalls in federal allocations” he said.

On how he’s coping with the situation, Dikko explained that the councils experimented variously to tackle the issue but finally resolved after due consultations with stakeholders, to make do with what is available to the councils.

“When we first experienced the problem, we approached the governor to use the little excess money we had. The subsequent month we went for overdraft but the charges were becoming high and after that we realized if we continue like that we may end up operating at a lost. We decided to sit together

at the ALGON level to rob minds together with stakeholders agreeing to utilize whatever is available.

“Frankly speaking, with the cooperation of the state government and ministry, we are able to pay 1OO percent of last month’s salaries, what is left is left is 70 percent and since the allocation has been appreciating with the coming of this new government, we hope the salary issue will pass.

“Since Al-makura introduced the new minimum wage, which is among several good things he did for the state, there was no time that he was not able to pay salaries until we begin to experience shortfalls in federal allocations which is not only peculiar to Nasarawa” he stated.

On the need for the councils to augment federal allocations through the generation of internal revenue, Dikko said the council is pursuing aggressively internally generated revenue.

He explained that so far the council has executed some projects from internal revenues which the people could appreciate, such as the social service department recently commissioned by the Nasarawa First Lady. “They abandoned the chairman’s cup and after nine years, we revived it and we are encouraging sporting activities.

Children’s day was also celebrated after nine years in limbo. In Jikwada ward, we constructed speed bumps to curtail road accidents in the area.

We also increased allowances for our security agencies to meet up with challenges.”

The council chairman however lamented the burden of security challenges occasioned by the activities of commercial motorcycle operators as well as the influx of Abuja workers taking up residences in Keffi, calling on relevant authorities to compliment the effort of the council.

PDP: Why party must prevail on Wada to bow out-Group

By Ali Abare Abubakar

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s the Kogi State governorship election draws nearer, a group, Democratic Young Patriots, has called on the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to prevail on incumbent Governor Idris Wada to bow out of the race gracefully.

DYP in a release issued to journalists yesterday, signed by its National Coordinator, Dare Atoye said it’s high time the PDP be told the truth following the outcome of the 2015 general election where the

party lost out in its stronghold of North-Central.

“As the Kogi governorship election draws near, our group is not hesitating to tell our party a timely truth, because the future and the political fortune of the PDP matter to us greatly beyond Kogi State. No more should we allow the interest of an individual or a group to undermine the overall interest of the party, its fortune and good governance at any level. Kogi State is critical to the political revival of the PDP ahead of Bayelsa, Edo and Ondo States governorship polls” the

group stated.

The group maintained that with the current political realities in Kogi, there is no way Governor Wada can retain his position, urging the leadership of the party to prevail on the governor to step down and relinquish his ambition to recontest.

“With due respect to Gov. Wada, he has tried his best but the current political reality in Kogi is such that, just any credible and known politician on the platform of another known party will defeat Gov. Wada.

No amount of contrived adoptions,

sponsored campaigns and fabricated pronouncements can make Gov. Wada to win the election.

“The consequences of getting it wrong with Kogi State will be far more painful than the outcome of the general elections for the PDP because we have all the facts at our disposal to act and save our party from another electoral misfortune. Nevertheless, Kogi State governorship election could be salvaged if we can take a bold, painstaking and firm decision in the interest of the people and field a credible and popular candidate” the group warned.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Politics

APC hails Buhari for ending workers’ misery

By Umar Muhammad Puma

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he All Progressives Congress (APC) has hailed President Muhammadu Buhari for coming to the aid of the longsuffering Nigerian workers with a multi-billion-naira package that will not only ensure that all arrears of salaries owed by many states across the country are immediately paid, but will also make it easier for the states to meet their monthly salary obligations henceforth.

In a statement issued in Abuja yesterday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said it was particularly delighted that the President has shown that he is truly the father of the nation by eschewing partisanship in approving the intervention fund for all the states, irrespective of which parties they belong to. ‘’We say this because when states were financially handicapped during the tenure of the last federal government, opposition states

were hung out to dry while states belonging to the then ruling PDP got generous bailouts,’’ it said.

APC said by his action, President Buhari has practicalized his deep understanding of the essence of governance which, more than anything else, is the about the well being of the citizenry.

The party said worthy of note and commendation is the fact that the special intervention fund approved

by President Buhari was packaged without any external borrowing,

despite the paucity of funds occasioned by the fall in the price of crude oil and the unprecedented profligacy of the immediate past administration that dried out the pot of national resources.

It said so early in the life of his administration, President Buhari is walking his talk by showing that with prudence, financial discipline and creativity, plugging financial leakages and a deep sense of patriotism, even the nation’s dwindling resources can still be

L-R: Senate President Abubakar Bukola Saraki, and Chairman, Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Mr. Ekpo Nta, during a visit by the ICPC chairman to the Senate President, on Monday in Abuja.

Photo: Mahmud Isa

Benue guber tribunal to commence proper hearing August 3 From Uche Nnorom, Makurdi

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he Benue State Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Makurdi has adjourned till 3rd August, 2015 for commencement of hearing in the petition brought before it by Hon. Terhemen Tarzoor.

Tarzoor is contesting the election of Governor Samuel Ortom on the grounds that he was not qualified to contest under the All Progressives Congress, APC.

At yesterday’s sitting, Tarzoor through his counsel, Tunde Babalola announced the withdrawal of his earlier motion for inspection of Independent Electoral Commission, INEC materials used during the conduct of the April 11th 2015 election.

He explained that the materials had already been gotten from INEC as they are pleaded in the petition.

Counsels to all the respondents, including Adeniyi

Akintola for Ortom, Sabastian Hon for APC and Anthony Ijohor did not oppose the withdrawal of the motion.

Consequently, the chairman of the tribunal Justice Elizabeth Karatu granted withdrawal of the motion.

In another vein, Sabastian Hon, SAN brought a motion seeking to delete paragraph 10 c in the reply of the petitioner.

The motion was not opposed by Tarzoor, Ortom and INEC. It was

granted by the tribunal.

Before adjourning, the tribunal formatted issues for determination during the hearing amongst them; whether it has the jurisdiction to hear the case and whether or not Ortom was lawfully declared and returned winner of the April 11th, 2015 governorship election. The tribunal chairman also ordered all parties to inspect INEC materials on Wednesday and report back to them.

Lalong swears in new Head of Civil Service From Ado Abubakar Musa, Jos

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lateau State governor, Barrister Simon Bako Lalon, has sworn in the newly appointed Head of Civil Service of the state, Mrs. Huldah Fwangchi.

The new Head of Civil Service was sworn in yesterday at the main conference Hall of Plateau State

Government House, Rayfield in Jos, the capital of the state.

Lalong in a speech during the swearing in noted that, Fwangchi’s appointment was not as a new comer to government affairs having served in the state civil service but that the appointment is hinged on her qualification as the most senior

Permanent Secretary.

“Therefore you are expected to bring to bear your wealth of experience you have garnered over the years in the discharge of your new duties,” Lalong charged the new appointee.

In her remarks, the new HCS while appreciating her appointment assured all civil

servants in the state of effective and vibrant leadership, calling on them to support her in the discharge of her duties.

Earlier in his speech, the governor had asked workers in the state to be patient as government has started paying salaries and would sustain the payment as promised.

more effectively utilized for the benefit of Nigerians, rather than be looted by thieving public officials who abuse their office.

APC described as uncharitable and a clear indication that shame has taken flight the situation in which those who created the rot that is now being cleared by President Buhari are the same ones daring to point accusing fingers at the government that inherited their rot. ‘’The PDP that spent the past 16 years plundering and pillaging Nigeria has boasted that the Nigerian people will soon come, cap in hand, to beg them to return to power. What delusion! What arrogance! Who presided over the looting and the mismanagement of public funds that made it impossible for the nation to absorb the shock of the falling oil prices? Who depleted the Excess Crude Account (ECA) without authorization? Who has degraded the standard of living of Nigerians?’’ the party queried.

APC said the multi-pronged package approved by President Buhari includes the sharing by the Federal and State Governments of $1.7 billion out of the $2 billion remaining in the ECA; the sharing of about $2.1billion sourced from the LNG’s payment to the Federation Account; and a CBN-packaged special intervention fund that will offer financing to the states, ranging between N250 billion to N300 billion, as a soft loan available to states to access for the purposes of paying backlog of salaries.

“Also, the President has approved a debt relief programme that will help states restructure their commercial loans currently put at over N680 billion. The implication is that the life span of such loans will be extended, while reducing the states’ debt-servicing expenditures, thus leaving the states with enough resources - which otherwise would have been removed at source by the banks - to meet their monthly salary obligations, among others. ‘’History is repeating itself before our very eyes. Some 31 years ago, Buhari, then as a military head of state, also inherited a huge national rot similar to what has been bequeathed to it by the NPN government and had to approve 480 million Naira for the payment of arrears of workers’ salaries. Truly, the President is a man of destiny,’’ the party said.

It said that with thousands of workers made destitute by the frittering away of the commonwealth under a rapacious and wasteful PDP government now being given a new lease of life, their purchasing power being boosted and the nation’s economy being reflated, the change which the President and his party promised the nation has just begun. ‘’We thank Nigerians for voting the APC into power at the centre and for believing in us even when the horizon became hazy, not out of our making but because of the misdeeds of the past. By their relentless support for President Buhari and the APC, Nigerians have indeed demonstrated that what is worth fighting for is worth defending,’’ APC said.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Politics

Regional autonomy antidote to Nigeria challengesYoruba groups tells Buhari

Secretary to Bauchi State Government, Alhaji Ahmed Suleiman (left), and other dignitaries at the swearingin of some officials of the state government, on Monday in Bauchi.

From Ayodele Samuel, Lagos

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Photo: NAN

Investigate MKO Abiola’s death- Activists tell Buhari From Ayodele Samuel,Lagos

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cores of activists who gathered at the tomb of the late Moshood Kashimao Abiola, MKO, yesterday to mark the 17th anniversary of his demise in the hands of the military junta on 7 July, 1998 has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to investigate his death.

Speaking at the memorial gathering organised by the Campaign for Democracy, CD, and the Women Arise Initiative pro democracy activists said the late MKO last moments should be investigated into.

The gathering had former military governor of Lagos and leader of the defunct National Democratic Coalition, NADECO, Ndubuisi Kanu; former President, Nigeria Bar Association, Priscilla Kuye; Comrade Femi Aborishade; Lagos Governor,

Akinwunmi Ambode, represented

by Mrs Idowu Obasa, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources; Hafsat AbiolaCostello, Abdul Abiola, among others in attendance.

CD national president Dr. Joe Okei-Odumakin, said Abiola displayed uncommon courage, unparalleled dignity and unusual candour in defence of the mandate reposed in him by change-seeking Nigerians who trooped out to vote for him in on June 12, 1993 and engaged all the illegal regimes that held sway while the legal president was languishing in jail.

“Seventeen years after his elimination, President Abiola still stands tall than all his adversaries and his murderers. He represents what Nigeria is capable of being but which we are not because of the machinations of a greedy cabal,” she said.

Okei-Odumakin said CD demanded that the June 12 election result as belatedly declared by Humphrey Nwosu be gazette while there should be posthumous recognition for Abiola as President of Nigeria and that his portrait be displayed among past Nigerian presidents and heads of state.

“President Buhari must give effect to the resolution of the past Senate that Abuja National Stadium be named after Abiola and a judicial commission of inquiry be set up to unravel how the high treason was carried out in custody,” she said.

Speaking, Kanu said Abiola represented hope for the Nigerian people, saying that he would have taken the nation to greater heights if he was crowned president.

Also, Abiola-Costello, daughter of the late business mogul, said her father sacrificed all for the nation at the expense of the suffering of his

family, adding that the family he left behind now suffering because of the decision her father took not to be a traitor if he had betrayed the mandate accorded him by the people then.

“He lost his life because he did not want to betray his people.

We accept all the suffering we go through. Your family (Abiola) suffers in your absence. Nigeria can’t be great if people did not suffer for the nation,” she said.

According to her, the lesson to be learnt from June 12 is for the nation to abolish poverty which her father sought to exterminate, but lamented that the nation’s political leaders were busy fighting themselves for positions instead of tackling poverty.

“We have about 4.5 million refugees today because of Boko Haram. Now is the time for our leaders to sacrifice all for the nation,” she said.

Osun: Group condemns Aregbesola for sending thugs to disrupt rally

By Doyin Ojosipe

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human rights group, the Centre for Human Rights and Social Justice (CHRSJ) has strongly condemned Osun State Governor, Mr. Rauf Adesoji Aregbesola for sending alleged thugs popularly known as “State Boys” to disrupt a peaceful protest against his government which was organized by no fewer than 20 human rights and faith-based groups under the aegis of Civil Societies Coalition for the Emancipation of Osun State (CSCEOS).

The rights group also accused

……. says police are bias the police under the watch of CP Abubakar Marafa of bias by supervising the thugs to disrupt the peaceful rally in the state, saying that it is duty of the Nigeria Policemen to protect the lives and property of the citizenries.

This was contained in a statement issued and signed by the group’s Director of Mobilization and Planning, Comrade Abass Onikoyi, which a copy was made available to newsmen in Osogbo, the state capital yesterday, disclosing that

Nigeria citizens have legal right to peaceful protest as being stipulated by the amended 1999 constitution.

Onikoyi supported his argument by citing section 40 and 41 of the Constitution which says that “Every person shall be entitled to assemble freely and associate with other persons, and in particular, he may form or belong to any political party, trade union or any other association for the protection of his interest. Also, every citizen of Nigeria is entitled to

move freely throughout Nigeria and to reside in any part thereof, and no citizen of Nigeria shall be expelled from Nigeria or refused entry thereto or exit there from”.

Comrade Onikoyi described the police action as undemocratic, antimasses and unacceptable to the tenet of democracy and good governance and the good people of the state, alleging that police were watching when the thugs were shooting sporadically at the protesters on the directive of Governor Aregbesola, adding that the present Osun State government has become a disaster and cancer to the people of the state.

oalition for Yoruba Autonomy COYA, yesterday said only a restructured Nigeria with regional autonomy can curb the crises of governance, corruption and underdevelopment in the country.

Speaking at a press conference in Lagos to celebrate Yoruba Martyrs, COYA President Evangelist Kunle Adeshokan said that a new federal structure with powers vested on the regions in relation to states within the respective jurisdiction of the regions would create ample opportunities for democratic engagement in driving accelerated development.

“It has become a matter of urgent imperative to again reassert that regional autonomy is the antidote to the maladies confronting the Nigeria’s project.

“For the Yorubas in particular, it has become pertinent to demand regional autonomy to define the pace and momentum of development within the Nigeria’s polity,” Adeshokan said.

The coalition comprising of the Federation of Yoruba Consciousness and Culture (FYCC); Ojo-Ola Yoruba Initiatives (OYI); O’odua Revolutionary Movement (ORM); United Self-Determination Platform of O’odua (USEPO) and Yoruba Transformation Alliance (YTA) also lamented that true national heroes and heroines are not celebrated in country.

The groups said the Yoruba Martyrs Day is to celebrate late Chief Moshood Kashimawo Olawale (MKO) Abiola, the winner of June 12, 1993 Presidential Election annulled by the military junta who died in a “controversial and yet unresolved circumstances while in detention for daring to demand for the mandate freely given by the Nigerian people.”

Adeshokan said “ there is no justifiable reason why MKO Abiola should not be celebrated as pan Nigeria hero the same way the likes of Martin Luther King (Jr.), Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela are celebrated in other clime.”

The group noted that apart from Chief MKO Abiola, “there are numerous unsung Nigerian heroes and heroines of Yoruba origin.

The Yoruba groups however demanded that the contributions of Yoruba sons and daughters in conjunction with other citizens from ethnic groups in the struggle for nationhood should remain evergreen in the subconscious of well-meaning Nigerians as a way of making patriotism a virtue.

The group lamented that the prevailing order in Nigeria tends to obfuscate history in celebration of crass mediocrity rather than recognize genuine patriotic contributions to the development of the country.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

FEDERAL MINISTRY OF EDUCATION

FEDERAL SCHOLARSHIP BOARD It has come to the notice of the Management of the Federal Ministry of Education, Abuja, that some fraudulent persons who claim to be staff of Federal Scholarship Board are contacting Federal Scholarship Applicants/Scholars, via telephone calls and text messages demanding payment of some amount of money into some particular Bank Accounts, before their scholarships are awarded or processed.

2. The General Public is hereby informed that these fraudulent acts are not from the Federal Ministry of Education and that the Federal Scholarship Board does not demand money for awarding or processing scholarship from applicants/scholars.

3. The general public may also wish to know that the Federal Scholarship Board processes three main categories of awards, namely:i. The Bilateral Education Agreement Scholarship (BEA) Award from the countries that have Bilateral Education Agreement with Nigeria e.g Russia, Ukraine China, Serbia, Macedonia, South Korea, Mexico, Japan, Cuba, Turkey, Hungary, Algeria, Egypt, Morocco etc. ii. The Commonwealth Scholarship and Fellowship Plan (CSFP) for United Kingdom, New Zealand, India, Malaysia etc. iii. The Nigerian Award (NA) Scholarship tenable in Nigerian Tertiary Institutions.

4. The procedures for obtaining the above awards are through on-line application followed by selection interview and finally selection is done by the InterMinisterial Committee consisting of; Federal Ministry of Education, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Women Affairs, Federal Character Commission and National Planning Commission. It should however be emphasized that no payment of money is required throughout the entire processes.

5. The General Public is therefore advised to disregard these calls and messages, and whoever does any transaction does so at his/her own risk.

Signed; DR. MACJOHN NWAOBIALA PERMANENT SECRETARY FEDERAL MINISTRY OF EDUCATION

Politics

NDDC lacks clarity of ideas – Oshiomhole

From Osaigbovo Iguobaro, Benin

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do State Governor, Adams Oshiomhole said the Niger Delta region will benefit immensely from the government of President Muhammadu Buhari, with a caution that the NNDC lacks clarity of ideas.

The governor who declared that the commission has been over politicised in the past, hinted that south- south governors have scheduled a meeting for the last week of July to draw up a developmental agenda on how to develop the region, which he assured would benefit more under President Muhammadu Buhari’s government.

Speaking on Monday during the visit of the Chairman of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Senator Bassey EwaHenshaw who led other members of the board including the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of NDDC, Mr Bassey Dan-Abia to his office, Oshiomhole advised the state commissioners on the board to ensure that the views they canvass at the commission reflect the expectations of the people of their states.

According to him, events of the past few years have shown that the friends of the Niger Delta are not necessarily

from the region. “I am aware that the Board has initiated a number of projects and according to you, you have over a thousand of them totaling over a trillion naira.

“I also know that the Board has been afflicted by critical Nigerian disease namely: clarity of ideas; the need to take extraordinary measures.

“The law is specifically clear as to how NDDC should be funded and all that is expected is that the Federal Ministry of Finance...

“I am very confident that President Muhammadu Buhari, given his passion for development as a trusted friend of the poor masses which is his own main constituency, will do everything possible to look at the letter and the spirit and do whatever has to be done to ensure that the law of NDDC is complied with.”

“We governors of the South-South region are meeting in the last week of this month and one of the issues to be discussed will be how we can collaborate to ensure that NDDC delivers on its mandate and gets the support of the appropriate authority so that it has the wherewithal to deal with projects that will impact on the region.”

“One major weakness I have observed in the running of the commission is that it has been over-

politicized. It was not meant to be a political vehicle. Nigeria has opted for a multiple political democracy and our people from time to time could replace a government and a political party. No party will be too good to govern forever. Regardless of the government, there are certain key principles that must never be sacrificed, namely that composition of the Board must be made of people who bring to it the aspirations of their respective states”, he said.

Chairman of the Board, Senator Bassey EwaHenshaw had earlier told the governor to intervene on behalf of the NDDC to get the funds due to the board released.

According to him, the NDDC has not been funded, according to law, since 2001 and over N800 billion due to the board unremitted.

He said the “vision of the Board is one that can provide a platform and the avenue for integrating and developing the Niger Delta sub-region through strategic intervention and key infrastructure development in road, rail and education.

“We can create business investment and employment opportunities for our people. We are not unaware of the negative perception of our people, but as a Board we have come determined to change that”, he said.

Developing Delta should be collective responsibility – Comm From Osakhare Asaba

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Erese,

he development of Delta State should not be left for government alone, the Commissioner for Energy, Barrister Newworld Safugha has said, noting that Delta State should be seen as everyone’s baby whose development to maturity must be all Deltans’ concern.

The Commissioner who spoke to our correspondent after his inauguration said “Deltans should replicate the enthusiasm and confidence exhibited during the general elections that produced the present government so that the administration can fulfill prosperity for all Deltans agenda.” .According to him, it is

God’s doing, and that he will not be economical in giving the best expected to justify the trust. . Safugha disclosed that the state have blessing of the wealth of vast resources, the power of talents and the potentials.

“It is imperative Deltans grasp the opportunities before them to meet the challenges of the state”.

The Energy commissioner opined that if the people of state continue to maintain the harmony, confidence and work together for the common good, the plans which the government has already set in motion for the progress, happiness and development will bear rich fruits for all Deltans.

He said the process of establishing a society in which men and women will

have no anxiety about work, food and shelter should be a collective responsibility.

He advised Deltans not to compromise over principle, saying any compromise over principle is the same as an abandonment of it Safugha pointed out that it is on record Delta State was the only state where the party primaries did not have petition at the PDP headquarters, saying the people of Delta State should build on it by giving Senator Ifeanyi Okowa’s administration the enabling atmosphere to fulfill desired Deltans dream.

He thanked the governor and all those who were instrumental to his victory, saying the success of Delta State largely depends on the people of Delta.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

How ex-accountant, Garba, others stole pension funds-EFCC witness

By Joy Baba Yesufu

A

witness in the ongoing trial of Tahir Abdullahi Garba, a chief accountant in the Pension Office of the Office of the Head of Service of the Federation whose company, Charo Bureau De Change Limited was allegedly used to siphon stolen pension funds, Mohammed Goji today told Justice Gabriel Kolawole of the Federal High Court, Maitama, Abuja that, a number of fraudulent payments were made into the accused person’s account from the Pension Account.

Led in evidence by counsel to EFCC, Egwuagu Emmanuel, Goji told the court that, “our investigation revealed that, fraudulent payments emanating from the office of Head of Service of the Federation known as collective allowances running into the several millions of naira were made into the accused person’s account.”

Goji, who is the third prosecution witness, PW3, and an operative with the Commission, through the prosecuting counsel, tendered Exhibit 1D &1E and Exhibit 4series dated August 31, 2009 which are all payment mandates from the office of the HOS in support of his claim.

“My Lord on March 31, 2010, another lodgement was made into Garba’s account with one of the new generation banks in the sum of N4.96m (four million, ninetysix thousand naira) as contained in Exhibit 1D”, Goji further stated.

According to him, a sum of N7.8m (seven million, eight hundred thousand naira) was transferred from the accused person’s account to Zenith Bank

on April 3, 2010. He tendered the account opening package obtained from the bank in support of his claim.

Goji however revealed that, “our team of investigators also came across a circular to the effect

that, all Federal Ministries and Parastatals are directed that all payments should be e-payment without a movement of cash.”

Justice Kolawole has adjourned to July 21, 2015 for continuation of hearing.

A statement from Wilson Uwujaren Head, Media & Publicity of the EFCC which disclosed this yesterday said that,Garba is being prosecuted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission,

EFCC alongside his company, Charo Bureau De Change Limited on a 23-count charge of fraud to the tune of N514.9m, allegedly stolen from the Pension Account, Office of the Head of Service of the Federation.

Group Managing Director of THE NNPC, Dr Joseph Dawha (left), presenting the winners’ trophy to fct contestants, Messrs Egbunu Mordi, Andrea Dallacosta, and Suleiman Ibrahim, during the grand finale of the 14th NNPC National Quiz Competition, yesterday in Abuja. With them is the FCT Coordinator of the Junior Engineers, Technicians and Scientists (JETS), Alhaji Guregi Ibrahim (right). FCT won the competition with 130 points, Lagos and Katsina states followed with 120 AND 105 points respectively.

Photo: Justin Imo-Owo

NNPC 2015 Quiz Competition: Abuja wins, students get N250, 000 each

By Etuka Sunday

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he three (3) students who gave the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) victory at the just concluded Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) 2015 Annual Quiz Competition got scholarship and bursary fee of N250, 000 each.

NNPC said the initiative which was part of its Corporate Social Responsibilities (CSR) was to encourage students to study science based subjects so as to contribute efficiently to the economy of the country.

The students who were drawn from across the six geo-political zones of the country; Akwa Ibom state for South South, Anambra State for South East, FCT, Abuja for North Central, Gombe for North East, Katsina for North West and Lagos for South West competed in English, Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry,

Biology and General Knowledge respectively.

Speaking at the grand finale of the event at the NNPC Towers, Abuja, the Group Managing Director of the Corporation, Dr. Joseph T. Dawha felicitated with the winners and assured of the readiness of the NNPC to sustain the programme in order to mentor the leaders of tomorrow to succeed in their academic pursuits.

Dr. Dawha said the competition which is the 14thedition has lived up to the objectives for which it was instituted, adding that most of the winners of the competition in the past have graduated with flying colours from various universities across the country.

According to him, “since the National Quiz Competition had its debut 14 years ago, it has helped in developing the interest of young Nigerians in studying

science and technology courses in tertiary institutions across the country and beyond.”

He said the scholarship scheme has not only helped the development of science and technology in the country but has also gone a long way in assisting the nation’s future leaders to prepare towards contributing their quota to national development.

He assured that NNPC would not relent in supporting this National Quiz Competition and other community-based efforts aimed at building national human capacities and capabilities stressing that the NNPC would continue to execute many more strategic community development projects, particularly those that would rapidly improve the lives of Nigerians.

Dr. Dawha announced the increase of the bursary from N100, 000 to N250, 000 annually for all NNPC scholars throughout

their first degree programmes.

On his part, the Permanent Secretary Ministry of Petroleum Resources, Mr. Taiye Hassan Haruna represented by the Director Reform and Coordination Mrs. Edna Eneh commended the NNPC for giving the young ones the opportunity to compete at the national stage stressing that hard work is the only way out of hard life.

Delivering a key note address, the Permanent Secretary Ministry of Education Dr. MacJohn Nwaobiala represented by Mrs. Justina Ibe, Director Support Services in the Ministry applauded the NNPC for encouraging science based education saying it would go a long way to sustain the development strides of the Federal Government.

Presenting a goodwill message, a pioneer winner of the NNPC quiz competition Modungwo Andrew Nwabu

expressed gratitude to the NNPC for the award of scholarship that saw him through his University education and called on the winners to do the Corporation proud.

In his remarks, the Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, OHI ALEGBE, said the NNPC as a responsible and responsive corporate citizen, would continue to contribute its quota to adding value to the educational sector through its annual quiz competition.

At the end of the Competition, students representing Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja came first as overall Champions of the 2015 Edition with 130%, followed by Lagos, 120% and Katsina 3rd with 105% respectively.

Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone from Etisalat. Enjoy high speed mobile broadband on any of our Easyblaze plans.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Aviation Medview airline commences operation to Maiduguri airport on Friday

F

ast growing domestic carrier, Medview Airline has disclosed that in response to assurance by aviation authorities that Maiduguri Airport is safe, it has concluded arrangements to commence four flights weekly to once again reconnect the region to other parts of the country beginning on Friday, July 10.

Managing Director/CEO of the airline Medview Airline Alhaji Muneer Bankole in a statement said the four flights will take place on Friday, Sunday, Monday and Wednesday affirming that the airline aimed at reducing the

long hours of stress on the road which the people of that region go through to get in and out of Maiduguri.

Already, the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) and Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) have given a nod to the airline to operate into Maiduguri airport, which has been closed to commercial flights due to activities of insurgents.

Bankole commended Governor Kashim Shettima of Borno state for his clarion call to

investors to return to the state as there was now relative peace in the region. “Our decision to commence flights to Maiduguri was informed by the need to link up the people of this region to other parts of the country,” Alhaji Bankole said.

The four flights from Lagos to Maiduguri will be routed via Abuja, the statement said With Maiduguri, Kano and Kaduna on its schedule, Medview Airline now flies to eight destinations, Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Yola and Enugu on domestic routes and Accra on the regional route. It

said Abidjan, Cote de’ Voire and Conakry, Guinea will soon join the airline’s network.

Meanwhile, staffs of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria have been enjoyed to remain committed to successful operations as the Maiduguri Airport opens for commercial operations.

The Managing Director of FAAN, Engr. Saleh Dunoma who stated this also commended staff for ensuring that facilities and equipment of the Authority where maintained while the airport was shutdown.

He called on them to make

safety; security and passenger comfort their key objectives in line with the mandate of the Authority. Engr. Dunoma assured them of the managem ent’s support as they operate in midst of security challenges urging them to keep supporting the Federal government especially the Armed Agencies using their facilities.

In his response, Maiduguri Airport Manager, Mr. Saidu Nazeef appreciated the Managing Director for his support and special interest noting that staffs have been reinvigorated to excel in their duties.

Nacho gets NAMA convenes cooperation meeting with ASECNA and GCAA NCAA approval n a bid to further enhance Aerial Navigation Safety in Africa management of traffic across the management of traffic in the safety of air navigation within and Madagascar (ASECNA) in their common borders within the oceanic airspace are expected on new cargo to continue at a later meeting African airspace. the AFI region, the Nigerian Lagos.

She said “Vital resolutions that slated to hold between July 13th General Manager, Public Airspace Management Agency charges (NAMA) said it hosted a two-day Affairs of the agency told would aid in the management and 15th in Dakar, Senegal to be

I

T

he Nigerian Aviation Handling Company (Nahco Aviance) has obtained the approval of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) to implement a 20 per cent increase in cargo tariff.

The ground handling firm recently introduced an increase in tariff on cargo. With the new regime, nahco will charge N46 per kilogramme for cargo as against the old fee of N38 while Courier handling charge will cost N54 per kilogramme as against N45.

The approval was contained in a letter signed by its DirectorGeneral, Captain Muhktar Usman to the Managing Director Nahco, Mr Nobert Bielderman.

The letter reads: “In line with powers conferred on the Authority

by Part 18.7.3.1 of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Regulations (Nig. CARs) 2012, approval is hereby given to your company to increase the Import Handling Charge from N38/ kg to N46/kg and the Courier Handling Charge from N45/ kg to N54/kg as agreed with the stakeholders.”

The NCAA chief praised Nahco for consulting with stakeholders before embarking on the increase, NCAA said: “We wish to advise that Nahco Aviance should continue to ensure adequate consultations with the stakeholders in line with the laid down guidelines and regulations guiding review or introduction of any charge.”

It said NCAA should be invited as an observer in future consultations. Nahco and the Association of Nigeria Licenced Customs Agents (ANLCA) and the National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF) last month agreed to a 20 per cent tariff increment.

At a meeting at the head office of Nahco in Lagos, on May 15, the negotiating team of ANCLA led by the Vice Chairman, Hon. Bola Ashiru-Balogun, the Treasurer, Afolabi Azeez and the Financial Secretary, Obanla Alex, said they reached the agreement with NAHCO in the interest of the industry.

tripartite cooperation meeting with Ghana Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) and Agency for

reporters the meeting seeks to among other issues, sought to ensure safe, effective and efficient

of traffic in the upper airspace within the three states were also reached. Further discussions on

presided by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)” in a statement.

Aero-flight

Air Force, airlines seek cooperation to improve security at airports Stories from Suleiman Idris, Lagos

T

he Nigerian Air Force and domestic carriers have agreed to put heads together to seek better ways to improve security around Nigeria airports.

The synergy is coming at the heel of the new airport commandant in Lagos; Group Captain Idi Sani desire to ensure a safer environment around the Murtala Muhammed Airport for both domestic and foreign irlines using the facilities.

During a courtesy visit to Arik Air management, Sani reiterated that the Nigerian Air Force is committed to partner the airline on ways of improving security at airports nationwide.

Sani said the visit to the airline form parts of proactive measures to engage the operating environment on ways the Air Force could assist to close existing gaps in security at airports nationwide.

The commandant affirms that security remains a collective responsibility that requires the input of all stakeholders within and outside the airport and urged airlines to call on the Air Force at any point there is an issue that requires their intervention.

Group Captain Sani said he decided to embark on such working visit upon assumption of office in order to have first hand information of the airline operations.

Managing director of Arik Air, Mr. Chris Ndulue who

described the visit as a novel one commended the airport commandant for his visit, Ndulue said there is need to manage security very well around the airport with close collaboration with the military.

He said, “This is a good relationship between Arik Air and the Nigerian Air Force. The decision to visit Arik Air by the new Air Force commandant is very innovative. It is a proactive measure and good initiative to improve good relationship to improve security at the airport.

We are very delighted at this visit and must commend the Air Force for coming to our rescue anytime we have had issues around the airport. We pledge to work assiduously with the Air Force to manage challenges of

security.”

According to him” We are excited over your tour of our facilities to father closer ties , just as the Air Force in the time past has assisted Arik Air since 2006.

There were times we had issues at the Enugu Airport, and the Nigerian Air Force base in a Port Harcourt and the Air Force came to our rescue.

“There are many security challenges around airports nationwide, and we ate calling on the Air Force has always come to our rescue. We are looking forward to areas we could explore training possibilities to forge relationships that are robust and enduring. When operational issues came up In Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt, the airline came to our assistance.”

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Pension/Insurance

Page 21

NPF decries high rate of fake motor insurance Stories from Ngozi Onyeakusi, Lagos

T

he Nigerian Police has decried high rate of fake motor insurance certificates in the country.

The Division Police Officer,

SA Insurance re-enforces staff strength for effective service delivery

D

etermined to create fresher beneficial ways of doing the underwriting business and open a new page of a more rewarding customer service delivery system for the nation’s insurance sector, the management of Standard Alliance Insurance Plc, one of the country’s frontline general insurance companies, has engaged tested professionals in the industry to drive key areas of its operations.

The company’s Group Managing Director, Mr. Bode Akinboye, who dropped this hint in a statement by the organization explained that the move was “part of our deliberate corporate plans to take our operational practices to a level comparable with the best modern international ways of doing insurance business.”

According to him, “to achieve this, we carefully hunted for and engaged key tested professionals from competing insurance companies,” noting that “with the expected results we are already seeing, we are sure of meeting the board’s mandate to race the company to the topmost part of the performance and quality service delivery ladder of the nation’s insurance sector.”

The statement quoted him as saying that among those engaged by the company between January and early May were Mr. Thompson Akhigbe who was brought on board from AIICO Insurance Plc and heads the Internal Control Division, Mr. Olukolajo Ezekiel from Old Mutual Nigeria who heads the Technical Division and Mr. Jegede Biodun, Divisional Head, Brokers/Multi-Clients Marketing, who joined the company from Associated Insurance Brokers.

Akinboye further said the company also engaged, among others, Mrs. Bosede Akintomide and Blessing Ana from FBN Insurance to head itsBrokers’ Unit and Financial Institutions respectively; Mr. Alo Olusola who heads the Energy and Special Risk Unit from Guinea Insurance Plc and Messrs.

Akeem Obembe and Temidayo Akerele who are from Equity Assurance Plc and they head the Financial Institutions Unit and Public Sector/Emerging Markets respectively.

Sabo Police Station, SP Mary Ubangha who made the observation lamented that 90 percent of motor insurance certificates issued in licensing offices in Nigeria were fake.

Making a presentation at the June edition of Nigerian Council of Registered Insurance Brokers (NCRIB), brokers evening sponsored by Old Mutual Nigeria in Lagos, stated that most vehicle users are face with no choice than to purchase fake insurance policies being issued in most licensing offices across the country.

Dwelling on the theme: “Police Concern on Insurance Fraud” Ubangha added that the only time when these fake policies are discovered is when

accident occurs, you find out that most of the vehicle owners have fake insurance policies.

She noted that even the third party and comprehensive are not left out in this business, adding that more vehicle owners in Nigerian roads ply the roads with fake policies that is why when accident occur they find it difficult to settle.

She said that the Nigerian Police are burdened about the rot going on in the industry, urging insurers and brokers to think out of the box and devise means to sanitize industry so that confidence will return in the industry and thereby reducing the huge insurance loss to fake insurance businesses in the country.

In his opening remark the President of NCRIB, President Ayodapo Shoderu assured members that it will defend and protect the interest of its members to ensure that they are not emasculated by the proposed Code of Corporate Governance which draft was recently issued by the National Insurance Commission (NAICOM).

He noted that the code has been generating some ripples, adding that the proposed 10 years tenure for Managing Directors in the code is inimical to broking operations.

He said the NCRIB is quite proactive on the matter and will ensure that the interest of its members are in no way

emasculated by the code, stressing that as part of practical steps, the council has made a powerful representation at the Public Hearing held by the Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria (FRCN) held in Lagos.

He maintained that the mandate of the NCRIB is to protect and preserve the existence of all members and that it will not shy away from the vision under any guise.

Shoderu also called on the government to inculcate the culture of insurance in every citizen as a tool to managing risks.

He appealed to the government to also partner insurance industry to enforce all the compulsory insurances.

L-R: Chief Executive Officer, Africa Standard Chartered Bank, Mrs. Diana Layfield, Group CEO, Standard Chartered Bank, Mr. Bill Winters, CBN Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, and Chief Executive Officer, Standard Chartered Bank of Nigeria, Mrs. Bola Adesola, during the bank’s officials’ visit to CBN governor, yesterday in Abuja.

Photo: Mahmud Isa

Old Mutual assures of prompt claims settlement

O

ld Mutual plc has pledged its commitment to prompt claim settlement.

According to the company claim settlement is key to its mission and core value which is to be customers’ most trusted partner as it desires to be responsible in all its daily decisions and actions.

The Regional Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Old Mutual West Africa Mr. Zomunoda Chizura, who gave the assurance in Lagos, stated that the company was committed to being a

responsible business entity in each of the markets in where it operate.

Chizura said the company operates through a five pillars application of responsible business, through its corporate values and interaction with stakeholders.

He named the pillars to include, ‘Responsible to our customers, Responsible investment, Responsible to our employees, Responsible to our communities,Responsible to environmental management’.

Chizura stated that the Company’s segments include , Emerging markets, Old Mutual Wealth, Property & Casualty, Nedbank and US Asset Management adding that he Company generates revenues from four primary business activities.

‘These are life assurance (premium income), asset management business (fee and commission income), banking (banking interest receivable) and general insurance (premium income). The Emerging Markets

and Old Mutual Wealth segments generate revenues from life assurance and asset management activities.

The Property & Casualty segment generates revenues from general insurance. The Nedbank segment generates revenues from banking and asset management and the US Asset Management segments generates income from asset management.

The Company’s key brands include Oldmutual, Nedbank, Oldmutual Wealth, Mutual & Federal’ Chizura disclosed

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Business Dangote to increase its $150m investment in Cameroon

By Etuka Sunday

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he President of Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, at the weekend, disclosed the company’s fresh investment drive towards expanding the output from its Douala plant from the current 1.5 million metric tonnes per annum (mmtpa) to over 3 mmtpa by investing in a similar plant in the vicinity of Yaounde.

Dangote during his recent visit to Cameroon met the Prime Minister Philemon Yang , minister of industry , mines and technological development

Emmanuel Bonde and the minister of trade Luc magloire Mbarga Atangana, thanked the government for creating an enabling environment for cement production in the country.

He said the company is already in the process of signing a contract for the construction of the additional cement production line, in anticipation of a growing demand for cement occasioned by massive investment in infrastructure.

According to him: “The successful completion of Dangote Cement’s 1.5 mmtpa plant in

Douala, Cameroon, made the country self-sufficient in cement production, as plans have commenced for the export of the product to neighboring countries soon.”

Aliko Dangote had also informed the prime Minister that the Group has already imported 220 trucks and trailers to resolve the present crisis of transport issues and now the cement can be deilivered directly to the customers in the villages and the effects of it will be visible in respect of availability of cement at the right places and as a result

Group Managing Director/CEO, UBA Plc, Mr. Phillips Oduoza (middle), Divisional Head, IT Project Management, Mr. Lanre Bamisebi (left), and Director, Information Technology, UBA Plc, Mr. Rasheed Adegoke (right), during the press launch of the bank’s simplified solution for Biometric Verification Numbers (BVN) registration, on Monday in Lagos.

Shoreline plans $2bn bonds to buy energy assets across Africa From Ngozi Onyeakusi, Lagos

S

horeline Group, a Nigerian company with interests in oil and gas operating in six African countries, is planning to sell $2 billion in debt to buy crude and gas assets on the continent.

This was disclosed by the Chief Executive Officer of the company, Kola Karim last week in Lagos.

According to him, Shoreline was eyeing assets purchases in Equatorial Guinea and Tanzania.

The debut issue of as much as $500 million of five- to sevenyear Eurobonds will probably happen before the end of the year, Speaking after a twoweek roadshow in the U.S. and Middle East, arranged by two international banks he declined

to identify, “The winner of this market is going to be the guy who has access to not only local, but international capital.

I’m bullish about gas and gas infrastructure. If this country is going to grow that’s going to be huge,” said Karim.

Shoreline is seeking to profit from an energy deficit in Nigeria, where homes and businesses rely on generators rather than grid power, which works for only a few hours a day if at all.

That has created a gap that can be filled by Shoreline, whose operations span infrastructure and engineering, power and telecommunications.

Founded in 1997, Shoreline produces about 60,000 barrels of oil a day, with crude accounting

for around 60 percent of its overall business, he said.

Shoreline is one of at least five local businesses that bought fields in the Niger Delta region after foreign companies including Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Total SA and Eni SpA sold onshore assets.

More than a dozen small indigenous producers account for about 20 percent of Nigeria’s production of 1.9 million barrels a day.

Investors would be keen to “back the right horse” even after a drop of more than 40 percent in crude prices over the past year, Karim told Bloomberg.

Karim said he has approached all three major international ratings companies and is looking to sell the $2 billion of bonds in three or four tranches.

may lead to a price stabilization.

The importation of trucks will be creating jobs up to 5000 either directly or indirectly.

After Dangote’s foray into cement production in Cameroon, where other operators are also active, local production of the product is now set to outpace local consumption which presently stands at 3.2 mmtpa.

Dangote however urged the Cameroonian government to continue to formulate policies that make investments thrive, saying such investment-friendly policies encouraged him to bring investment into Cameroon in the first place.

While commending the government for attracting investors into Cameroon, Dangote also appealed to them to consider creating an environment that will help protect and sustain the investment in order to ensure viability and good returns.

He said: “In this direction, we want to inform you that today with the commissioning of our plant, the total local production capacity is now 3.2 mmtpa.

This is now sufficient to meet local demand and continued importation of cement into the local market in Cameroon will need to be reviewed, especially as the imports come mainly from countries who seem to have policies that encourage dumping of their excess capacity in other countries at highly subsidised prices.

“If there is a conducive environment that allows investment to thrive, the

investors will be encouraged to reinvest in output expansion to meet rising demand. This is our policy everywhere we operate and Cameroon will not be an exception.”

He thanked the people and government for the warm welcome which was extended to his company when it first came seven years ago.

“We are proud to report to you, your excellency, that within the short period that we have been in the market, our 3x brand of cement is already recognised as the first choice for cement users in Cameroon because of its strength and high yield which translates to the best value for money,” he stated.

Prime Minister, expressed happiness at the completion of the Dangote Cement plant within a record time and stressed that the plant helped his government’s agenda of massive job creation.

Prime Minister said his government would continue to support genuine investors and urged other African entrepreneurs to invest in Africa as Dangote has done.

It would be recalled that the Dangote cement plant in Ethiopia was commissioned last month amid fanfare with the government expressing its appreciation to Dangote for deeming it fit to come to Ethiopia. Mr Dangote had requested the Prime Minister to grace the occasion of official commissioning of the plant within the next quarter.

Authority investigates how Emirates aircraft rip stationary plane in Lagos From Suleiman Idris, Lagos

T

he Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) yesterday said it has commence investigation into an incident involving a United Arab Emirate UAE base flag carrier, Emirates Airlines aircraft, a Boeing 777200LR that ripped through the wing of a stationary aircraft belonging to Nigeria base HAK Air. The Emirates Airline plane report said was taxing on the domestic runway preparatory to takeoff at around 9:30pm (Local Time) on Monday and suddenly had the ground collision with the domestic airline B737-400 aircraft owned by HAK Air. AIB in a statement yesterday it promptly deployed a team of investigators to determine the circumstances surrounding the serious incident with a view to making possible safety recommendations.

The statement made available

to journalists by its spokesperson Mr. Tunji Oketunbi said “The aircraft marked A6-EWD was taxiing for a take-off en-route Dubai when its wing tip cut into the B737-400 aircraft parked on the apron of the domestic wing of the airport.

While the Emirates aircraft had a little damage on its wing tip the Hak Air B737 sustained substantial damage.”

Oketunbi said the Emirates flight was aborted and the passengers evacuated immediately.

Commissioner of AIB, Dr Felix Abali also yesterday inspected the scene of the occurrence and promised that the investigation shall be handled with speed.

“Every incident is a safety issue that must be thoroughly investigated. This will help in preventing accidents and sustain safety in aviation. This investigation will be conducted with speed”, he said.

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Stock Watch:

Tuesday, July 7, 2015

PAGE 25

Peoples Daily, Wednesday, July 8, 2015

PAGE 24

Special Report

How two men survived a prison where 12,000 were killed

C

hum Mey had never heard of the CIA before, but after 10 days of torture he was ready to confess to being a secret agent for the US. We are in Tuol Sleng prison, Phnom Penh, in the very cell where he was held. Almost four decades on, Chum Mey still has nightmares and yet he returns to this place every day.

“If those guards hadn’t tortured a false confession out of me, they would have been executed - I can’t say I would have behaved any differently [in their position],” he says.

Tuol Sleng, codenamed S-21, was converted from a school to an interrogation centre on the orders of Pol Pot when his Khmer Rouge movement took control of Cambodia in April 1975.

At least 12,000 people who were held here were killed. Just 15 prisoners survived.

Eighty-three-year-old Chum Mey is one of the few still alive today. Bou Meng, 74, is another.

One a mechanic, the other an artist, their practical skills were useful to the Khmer Rouge and their impending death sentences were put on hold.

For the past three years, the pair has taken up a sort of dayresidence at S-21, which is now preserved as a genocide museum - this is how they have chosen to spend their retirement.

They are also allowed to sell their memoirs - at $10 a copy, they make a modest living this way.

There is something ambassadorial about their presence. They are celebrity survivors, modern-day reminders of Cambodia’s dark past.

Tuol Sleng is Cambodia’s most notorious prison - in the 1970s, at least 12,000 people were tortured there and murdered.

Only a handful of prisoners survived but now, 40 years after Pol Pot took control of the country, two of them return to the cells every day to remind people what happened.

“The important thing is to document what happened here,” says Bou Meng. He sits at a stall in the prison courtyard, decorated with a large banner that reads: SURVIVOR. “I want people around the world to go home and tell their friends and family about the genocide of the Khmer people.”

Buy their books and you’ll be presented with a business card and encouraged to sit down with them for a photograph. They recognise the potency of photographs. The museum houses row upon row of headshots taken of prisoners when they first arrived.

I accompany them both separately on a walk around the museum. Like living artifacts, they shuffle in and out of the cells, nodding their thanks to visitors and studying the photographs on the walls.

“So young,” says Chum Mey, gently tracing his finger along a row of teenage boys and girls.

They say they are haunted by the faces that look back at them and that these faces compel them to return every day and tell their stories.

Chum Mey had been working as a mechanic for the Khmer Rouge, when suddenly he was arrested on 28 October 1978 and taken straight to S-21. He still doesn’t know why.

A painting by Bou Meng © Kirstie Brewer

“I was blindfolded and my hands were tied behind my back - I pleaded with my captors to let my family know where I was,” he recalls.

“Angkar [the ruling body of the Khmer Rouge] will smash you all,” a voice hissed in his ear.

Upon arrival, after being measured and photographed, prisoners were stripped and shackled to the floor of a cell barely big enough to sit down in.

“After that I cried because I felt so hopeless and confused,” says Chum Mey. In the 12 days that followed, he was taken from his cell three times a day and tortured in one of the prison’s interrogation rooms.

Two guards took turns beating him with a stick covered in twisted wire. Eventually they decided to pull out his big toenail. He looks down at his feet and explains in unflinching detail how the guard tugged and twisted the nail until it came out.

“I could tolerate the pain of being beaten and even having my toenail pulled out, but it was the electric shocks I was terrified of,” he says, tapping the side of his head.

These were administered by electrodes placed inside the ears.

Chum Mey is deaf in one ear as a result and says he hears the sound

of rushing water when he moves his head.

“It felt like my eyes were on fire and my head was a machine - after that I started telling them whatever they wanted to hear.

I didn’t know what was right or wrong anymore.”

He sits down at the desk where his confession was typed up by his two interrogators. In front of the desk is a bed frame and heavy iron shackles. There is dried blood on the ceiling. A photograph on the wall shows an emaciated man lying on the bed with his throat cut.

Most of the people who ended up in these cells were Khmer Rouge cadres and their families, accused of collaborating with foreign governments or spying for the CIA or KGB. “The regime was a breeding ground of paranoia,” explains a museum guide. “Soldiers would grow to know too much and then they themselves could be subject to torture and death.”

Chum Mey’s fellow survivor, Bou Meng, was originally a Khmer Rouge supporter - an artist by trade, he had painted some early propaganda posters.

He and his wife were arrested on 16 August 1977. “They screamed in my wife’s face that Angkar had never arrested the wrong person,” he recalls.

Bou Meng shows how he was restrained © Kirstie Brewer

One of the rooms where prisoners were tortured The first thing Bou Meng does when we sit down in the prison courtyard is show me an illustration he has drawn of his wife.

“Ma Yoeun,” he says with tears in his eyes, gesturing for me to repeat his late wife’s name. In the picture she is screaming, stooped over a mass grave, and her throat has been cut.

Most S-21 inmates were

Visitors can see the skulls of some of the victims at the museum

eventually trucked by night to Choeung Ek - one of the sites that became known as the Killing Fields. A team of teenage executioners would be waiting they were told ahead of time how big a grave to dig.

Ma Yoeun was a midwife but only Bou Meng was deemed worth saving. “Why couldn’t they keep her alive too?” he asks. “She only ever looked after people.”

The couple had been separated on arrival at S-21. Bou Meng was photographed and taken to a large holding cell filled with emaciated prisoners.

Like Chum Mey, he was relentlessly questioned and beaten - he shows me the scars on his back. He too is deaf in one ear as a result of regular torture.

Prisoners were given two ladles of watery porridge a day. Chum

Mey was so hungry he would eat the rats that scurried into his cell.

A small ammunition box served as a toilet. “If any waste spilled out we had to lick it from the floor,” he says.

Bou Meng still remembers the oppressive stench in the air. “At first I thought it was something like dead fish or mice because I had never smelt rotting human flesh before.”

Pol Pot leading a group of his men in the 70s

After several months of interrogation, Bou Meng also relented and gave a false confession, admitting to being part of a CIA network, and naming other “collaborators”.

Painting portraits “saved my life,” he says. When the prison chief, known as Duch, found out that he was an artist, he told him to reproduce a black and white photograph of Pol Pot. Duch warned him that if it wasn’t lifelike he’d be killed.

Bou Meng took three months to finish the painting - it was 1.5m wide and 1.8m high.

Pleased with his work, Duch later requested large portraits of Karl Marx, Lenin and Mao Zedong, as well as several more of Pol Pot. Bou Meng was also told to draw the Vietnamese communist leader, Ho Chi Minh, stranded on a rooftop in the middle of a big storm.

“I don’t know why Duch needed these paintings, and I didn’t dare to ask,” he says.

Duch kept Chum Mey alive because he could fix typewriters - crucial for taking down confessions. He also fixed sewing machines, used to make thousands of black Khmer Rouge uniforms.

In 2009, both men testified at a UN-backed war crimes tribunal against Duch - a former Maths teacher who became the architect of the torture and execution methods at S-21. Like their return to S-21, it has helped bring them some solace.

S-21 was a microcosm of what took place across Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge. An estimated 90% of artists, intellectuals and teachers were killed in an effort to return the country to “Year Zero” - Pol Pot’s vision of a classless, agrarian society.

By the time Pol Pot fell from power, about two million people a quarter of the population - had been murdered, starved or struck down by disease.

Bou Meng’s two young children were among those who died from disease during the Pol Pot years and it was only during the 2009 war crimes tribunal that he learned his wife had probably ended up in a mass grave.

He returned to the prison in the 1980s to look for Ma Yoeun’s photo as well as his own.

He shows me a copy of the photo taken of his wife when she first arrived here - he never found his own. “I see her here, in front of us right now,” he says, staring into the middle distance. He would like to be able to visit her grave and say prayers over her bones.

Testifying at Duch’s trial, he was given a chance to ask one question, so he asked Duch where his wife was killed. A tearful Duch was unable to say.

Chum Mey never found his photo either, only a copy of his confession and a list of prisoners.

Next to his name was a note: “Keep for a while.”

His wife also remained alive until 7 January 1979, when Vietnamese troops captured Phnom Penh, signalling the end of the Khmer Rouge’s grip on the country. The events caused panic at S-21 and the guards took their prisoners and fled into the suburbs to await orders. Here Chum Mey was reunited with his wife and newborn son.

But only he survived the fighting between the Khmer Rouge and opposition forces.

He had already lost his threeyear-old son to fever during the forced evacuation of Phnom Penh in 1975. His two daughters disappeared while he was in S-21.

Bou Meng and Chum Mey both remarried and have new families.

Chum Mey’s grandchildren are playing in the prison courtyard as we talk.

“Visiting every day brings me closer to the victims in those photographs,” he says. “I feel their presence here and our responsibility to tell the world what happened.”

Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge 1968 Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge launches an insurgency aiming to return Cambodia to “Year Zero” and build an agrarian socialist utopia.

1973 - 1974 Khmer Rouge controls most of Cambodia - citydwellers are forcibly moved to the countryside.

April 1975 Khmer Rouge captures the capital, Phnom Penh.

1976 The regime divides citizens into three categories, which determine their food rations. Urban residents, land owners, former army officers, bureaucrats and merchants fall into the “undeserved” category and face execution, starvation and hard labour. All religion and money is banned.

January 1979 Vietnamese armed forces and the Kampuchean United Front for National Salvation capture Phnom Penh.

Pol Pot flees.

15 April 1998 Pol Pot dies in Cambodia on the day it is announced that he will face an international tribunal. He is swiftly cremated, prompting suspicions of suicide.

2009 Kaing Guek Eav, known as Comrade Duch, is the first Khmer Rouge leader to face the UN-backed Khmer Rouge Tribunal. He is sentenced to 35 years in jail, later extended to life.

2014 - Two more Khmer Rouge leaders, Nuon Chea and Kheiu Samphan, are sentenced to life in prison for crimes against humanity.

Source: BBC

PAGE 26

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Property

REDAN wants Buhari to create new housing policy to cater for ‘common’ people

By Mashe Umaru Gwamna

N

ational President, Real Estate Developers Association of Nigeria, REDAN, Rev. Ugochuckwu Chime has appealed to President Muhammadu Buhari to create new housing policy which can cater for the common people in the country.

The National President made the call at the end of a one-day multistakeholder’s interactive workshop on housing development in Abuja.

Rev. Chime who appealed to the Federal Government to channel part of workers’ contribution into the National Pension Fund, NPF which presently stands at N4.9 trillion, to bridge the country’s 17 million housing deficit.

The REDAN boss recommended that the National Housing Fund, NHF, which has been workers’ contribution to own their houses through the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria, FMBN and the Pension Fund be coalesced into a pool to create jobs in the sector and at the same time bridge the housing deficit in the country.

“The NHF and the Pension

Funds are funds created to ensure that while in service or retirement; the average Nigerian worker is catered for. We know that three elements form the basic needs of man, that is, food, shelter and clothing and government has been intervening on the issue of food. Unfortunately policy makers have not deemed it necessary to implement some of the provisions

Nigeria National library under construction

Hqtrs building gulps over 70% allocation – National Librarian

By Mashe Umaru Gwamna

T

he Director/Chief Executive Officer of National Library of Nigeria (NLN), Mallam Habbib Abba Jato has said that more than 70 percent of the institution’s yearly allocation goes to the construction of the on-going national headquarters located at the Central Area of Abuja.

Mallam Jato made the statement while reacting to recent publication by a national daily alleging that upon the huge allocation the institution receives as yearly budgetary allocation, it still trails behind.

This was contained in a press statement released in Abuja and made available to newsmen. Jato said that the library building on completion will be a masterpiece that will stand the test of time.

His words, “The National Library of Nigeria has not received more than N5.1b in the last three years; of which 70 percent has gone into the gigantic headquarter building project strategically

located at the Central Business District of Abuja”.

He stressed that funds are needed to commence operations at Jigawa, Borno, and Kogi states, saying the home governments have given the institution the approval to operate in the respective states.

“Funds are also required t o co m m en ce ope rations at Jigawa, Borno and Kogi States.

The State Governments have given the institution the nod to operate in their domains, office accommodations are ready of which the placement of equipment and reading resources are required” he said.

He noted that the National Library remains the only institution that is saddled with the responsibility of keeping the nation’s data bank and memory.

In its statutory responsibility, and being a social service organization, the National Library, NLN, is the apex Library in Nigeria and the nation’s intellectual memory, databank of learning and remembering process, in line

with her vision statement to build an informed and enlightened citizenry through the provision of information resources that are readily available and easily accessible.

According to Jato, the NLN in its efforts to ensure efficient performance of its statutory responsibilities was internationally recognized by the Board of the International Center for Administration of International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) in Paris, France as the Recipient of Year 2014 Award in recognition for the commitment, consist efforts and impressive achievements of the ISSN team, the econd in Africa.

He further stressed that the NLN equally served meritoriously at International pedestals as chair to UNESCO information for All Programme (IFAP), member of Universal Availability of Publications (UAPs) Committee and the Nodal Office for UNESCOs information Communication.

“NLN cannot be counted as one of the dormant or inactive

education agencies in Nigeria, considering its achievements since the present management came in the saddle of the organization, “he said.

He noted that the National Library of Nigeria remains the only institution that is saddled with the responsibility of keeping the nation’s intellectual data bank and memory, which is being vigorously pursued, and presently the NLN operates in 27 states including Abuja.

Malam Habib Jato

of the NHF. The provisions of the NHF and the Pension Fund which is now the contributory scheme, were all dovetailed into the welfare of the worker and there must be a linkage because if you contribute money, the value of the money at the point of contribution is not comparable to the value of the money at the point of retirement, “he emphasised.

Adding that “You will find out that inflation has eaten up the money so that whereas what you are getting at the point of retirement as pension fund and retirement savings account is only a negligible percentage in terms of its purchasing power.”

Rev. Chime called on the government to adopt a more creative strategy to see that the Nigerian workers who are contributors to the pension fund, reap from their long years of labour.

“Now we are saying that we have to have a creative way of doing these things, because if we can invest in food without Nigerians begging in the streets, why must we allow Nigerians to be homeless and suffering in the squatter settlements before we take a critical look and restructure and reform the housing sector and then inject the needed funds. We in REDAN are saying that there are supposed to be four sources of contribution to the NHF, but it is only one source that has been working. The banks, government and insurance companies are supposed to be contributors to the NHF. Unfortunately these three are not contributing and the burden is left on the Nigerian worker and it is not fair. This is not fair because it will take a worker to contribute up to a thousand years before what he has contributed is sufficient to provide him accommodation, baring inflation,” he said.

Chime frowned at the governments under capitalisation of FMBN. Insisting there must be a synergy between the NHF and the Pension Fund, Chime declared: “We are saying that there should be a linkage and synergy between the NHF and Pensions Fund to ensure that the trillions of naira in the Pension Fund are brought to bear on the welfare of the worker at a time that welfare will make meaning to them now not on retirement when the purchasing power of that money would have depreciated very alarmingly.”

In her remarks, Executive Director, Policy and Corporate Strategy, Nigeria Mortgage Refinance Company, NMRC, Mrs. Chika Akporji advocated a common pool of funds for housing development.

“On the Pension Fund, I totally applaud Chime’s recommendation of coal escing all the contributions made by workers to a pool. The whole idea of Pension Fund is not just to keep contributing as workers are supposed to make returns on the investment because they are investible funds and they need to enjoy some returns on it and see the linkages between the NHF and Pension Fund,,” she said.

PAGE 27

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Property From Lawal Sa’idu Funtua, Katsina

T

he outgoing General Manager of Katsina State Housing Authority, Alhaji Sirajo Aminu Makera has disclosed that he had never allocated any of the houses built by the immediate administration of the state to non-indigenes.

Makera made the disclosure yesterday while handing over to the newly appointed General Manager of the authority, described as falsehood a posting on the social media where it was

I didn’t allocate houses to Katsina non - indigenes, says GM alleged that he allocated houses in Abuja to non-indigenes.

The General Manager clarified that the only houses allocated to non-indigenes were according to him those allocated to a late commissioner of police in the state and a security officer that near lost his life in ensuring

security in the state.

He similarly added that 28 houses located within the premises of the Abuja houses were according to him not own by Katsina state government, advising people to shun unnecessary rumours and allegation they cannot prove.

Makera further disclosed that he was leaving behind N2 billion

naira as proceeds of the deposits made on the houses by those who purchased them and revenue generated from the sales of the houses.

According to him, the authority under his stewardship has built 250 Fatima Shema housing units, 151 houses in Abuja and 510 Muhammadu Dikko housing units

in Katsina, calling on the staff of the authority to support the new general manager to succeed.

In his response, the new general manager, Engineer Salisu Abubakar commended the outgoing GM for the successes he recorded, promising to keep the flag playing and always consult him for advice.

Enugu partner with firm to deliver 1000 mass housing

By Mashe Umaru Gwamna

T

he Enugu State Government has signed a deal with a local real estate development firm, BTG Group Nig. Ltd., to deliver 1000 housing units with a new mass housing solution for people in the state.

The BTG Group has concluded on a partnership agreement with WEILER GMBH Germany, to set up a large scale Precast Factory in Nigeria. The firm described the collaboration as an “innovative and revolutionary” the agreement is to promote production of large-scale real estate solutions, capable of mass housing delivery in Nigeria at affordable prices.

Dr. Ijeomah Arodiogbu, Executive Chairman of BTG Group, said that the purpose of the partnership is to boost provision of affordable homes in Nigerians and to reduce the gap in housing deficit in the country.

He noted that the precast concrete elements would be produced to meet low-cost housing on a large scale, townhouse complexes, modern and unique office buildings, schools and hospitals, including commercial and industrial buildings.

Arodiogbu listed precast concrete advantages to include durability and that it can be shaped to meet any design, including high fire resistance.

“BTG Group Nigeria Limited is happy, committed and feels privileged to be investing in the future of Nigerian real estate sector and most especially introducing innovative solution on a large scale to bridge he gap within the affordable homes provision to Nigerians.

“In these tough economic times, Nigeria needs smart organizations, like BTG Group Nigeria Limited, that has Nigerians’ interest at heart to support government in its quest to uplift Nigeria’s homeownership drive through provision of investment funds”.

He noted that the innovation has been nurtured to reality under the total management of “Terra Motion, The Netherlands”, which over a short period of time has been able to bring all parties together and identified business synergies that finally paved the way for the partnership.

The Sales Director, Weiler GmbH, Mr. Christoph MuellerBernhardt observed that the

entire world, not only Nigeria, is facing increasing demands for qualitative, affordable, highquality with quick delivery time homes for people due to the population explosion all over, and Nigeria is more than committed to provide these homes to its citizens.

He said that Weiler GmbH was happy that its global leading precast technologies, machines, and services has been core to this unique business partnership

with BTG Group Nigeria Limited with sole objective of providing high quality affordable homes & buildings on a very large scale in Nigeria for the huge population of Nigeria within a very short time frame.

According to him, precast concrete in Africa’s future, which is a revolutionary approach to construction, is needed in Nigeria considering the 17million housing deficits in Nigeria With precast concrete you have a little

installation time, its strong and extremely durable, fire resistance and quick to assemble.

Terra Motion B.V Representative, Mr. Charles Yemi Farimoyo, said the firm is a holding company servicing industrial enterprises, as partner to enter the African market, with is head quarters in the Netherlands and the official and exclusive agent for Weiler in Nigeria.

Former Nigerian Ambassador to the Netherlands, Charles

Onwuagbu, said that the partnership would help to connect and build platforms that would bring development to Nigeria adding that Weiler Ghmb and BTG group are mutually leveraging using appropriate technology.

He observed that the traditional building method has been static for many years, stressing that with the precast solution; we will see an explosion that would help bridge the housing. deficit in Nigeria.

Property of the Week

Money Laundering: Court orders Forfeiture ex- gov Nnamani’s property to FG

By Joy Baba Yesufu

J

ustice Mohammed Yinusa of the Federal High Court, Lagos yesterday convicted four companies associated with former governor of Enugu State, Chimaroke Nnamani and ordered that their property be forfeited to the Federal Government.

The four companies are Rainbownet Nigeria Limited, Cosmos FM, Capital City Automobile Nigeria Limited and Renaissance University Teaching Hospital The companies had on May 19, 2015 pleaded guilty to a 10-count amended charge brought against them by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC. The companies are alleged to have failed

to comply with lawful inquiry made by the Commission.

At yesterday’s sitting, counsel to the EFCC Kelvin Uzozie prayed the court to make an order of final forfeiture of the companies based on their plea. Justice Yinusa after reviewing the facts convicted the companies and made an order of final forfeiture of their assets to the Federal Government, citing provision of the EFCC Establishment Act on Final Forfeiture.

A statement by Wilson Uwujaren, Head, Media & Publicity said that the property are located across the five states in the South East geopolitical zone.

Among them are 22 Duplex buildings in Ebeano Under Tunnel Estate now known as Fidelity

Estate; Renaissance University Te achin g Hos p i t a l ; Cos mos 105.5 FM Digital Station (Ceuna Communications); and Capital City Automobile Limited, located at 12 Station Road ,GRA, Enugu. Also forfeited to the Federal Government include properties of Hill Gate Investment - Plot No H12, H13, H14, H15, H21`, H116, H188, Plot 10, Plot H11, Plot H16, Plot H17, Plot H18, Plot 19, Plot H20, Plot H49, Plot H50, Plot H117, CP/4 (HCR2), CP5 (HCR2) CP/6(HCR2) CP/7 (HCR2) CP/8 The assets also include several undeveloped properties/plots of land of Rainbownet Nigeria Limited in Enugu, Abakaliki, Aba, Owerri, Onitsha, Awka and Umuahia.

Property of Rainbownet Communication which include

BTS, Microwave Avenue Radio, Rectifiere, and a host of the equipment in various sites in Anambra States are also to be forfeited to the Federal Government.

Aside the landed property, over N35 million from the frozen bank accounts of the companies are also to the forfeited to the Federal Government of Nigeria.

Uzozie who is pleased with the ruling of the court said the Commission had to sought for a separate trial of the companies as the first accused person, former governor of Enugu State, Dr. Chimaroke Nnamani had stalled proceedings on the matter on account of frequent application to travel abroad for medical treatment on grounds of ill-health.

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Hyundai Elantra looks fresh compare to other sedans

Motoring

PAGE 28

T

he 2016 Hyundai Elantra still looks fresh compared to other small sedans, and that’s quite an achievement for the segment’s elder statesman.

But the fact remains that the current-generation Elantra debuted way back in 2011, and it exceeds all other major players for length of tenure. A savvy consumer might wonder whether the Elantra can continue to compete against its relatively youthful rivals or whether this head-turning Hyundai is finally past its sell-by date.

Judged purely on its value proposition, the Elantra has hardly aged a day. Hyundai always seems to throw in more features than you’d expect, and that trend continues for 2016 with the attractively priced Value Edition.

Stuffed with desirable add-ons like alloy wheels, a sunroof and keyless entry and ignition, this new trim level may make you question the point of the pricier Limited and Sport.

B u t those trims c o m e with even more accoutrements should you want them, and the Limited and Sport are priced lower than the premium versions of many competitors.

If you’re looking for signs of age, then, you won’t find them on the equipment list. That means you’ll have to get to know this Hyundai a little better. Driven back to back against its rivals, the Elantra impresses with its quiet cabin, but its suspension struggles to absorb major impacts so it doesn’t ride as smoothly as some other small sedans. The popular 1.8-liter engine, meanwhile, can struggle a bit when climbing hills or dealing with a full roster of passengers. Opting for the Sport with its stronger 2.0-liter engine could be wise, but you’ll lose some fuel efficiency in the process.

Those may seem like minor quibbles, but if you sample the Mazda 3, for example, you’re bound to notice its relatively zesty performance and refined ride, with no fuel economy compromise.

Same goes for the Ford Focus, although, like the Hyundai, it’s getting on in years. You’ve also got the affordable Kia Forte and the well-rounded Honda Civic to consider, while the Volkswagen Jetta offers diesel engine frugality in a slightly larger package. But the 2016 Hyundai Elantra can still hold its head high in this distinguished company, and that says a lot about its fundamental goodness.

The 2016 Hyundai Elantra sedan comes in four trim levels: SE, Value Edition, Limited and Sport.

Standard SE features include 15-inch steel wheels, full power accessories, intermittent wipers,

air-conditioning, cruise control, a trip computer, a tilt-andtelescoping steering wheel, a height-adjustable driver seat, 60/40-split folding rear seatbacks and a six-speaker sound system with a CD player, satellite radio and a USB port.

A Popular Equipment package is optional on SE, though only if you spring for the automatic transmission. It adds 16-inch alloy wheels, automatic headlights, foglights, heated mirrors, a driver blind-spot mirror, extendable sun visors with illuminated vanity mirrors, steering-wheel-mounted audio controls, a sliding center armrest, Bluetooth phone and audio connectivity, voice controls, a 4.3-inch touchscreen display and a rearview

a 7-inch touchscreen display, a navigation system and an upgraded audio system.

Finally, the Sport does without leather upholstery, automatic climate control, heated rear seats and Blue Link but otherwise includes most of the Limited’s standard equipment, substituting black exterior accents, a sporttuned suspension and steering system and a more powerful engine (with an available manual transmission).

The Sport’s optional Tech package (automatic transmission required) is similar to the Limited’s Ultimate package, also adding Blue Link.

The 2016 Hyundai Elantra SE, Value Edition and Limited are powered by a

camera.

The Value Edition starts with all of those items and adds a sunroof, keyless entry and ignition, heated front seats and a leather-wrapped steering wheel and shift knob.

The Limited loses the sunroof, but it adds 17-inch wheels, projector headlights with LED accents, LED taillights, adjustable steering effort, a six-way power driver seat (with power lumbar), leather upholstery, dual-zone automatic climate control, heated rear seats and Blue Link telematics.

Optional on Limited is the Ultimate package, which adds the sunroof back and throws in

1.8-liter fourcylinder engine that produces 145 horsepower and 130 pound-feet of torque. A six-speed manual transmission is standard on the SE, while a six-speed automatic is optional there and standard on the Value Edition and Limited.

During Edmunds testing, an Elantra Limited sauntered to 60 mph in 9.7 seconds, which is about a second slower than average for the segment.

The EPA pegs fuel economy at 31 mpg combined (27 city/37 highway) for the manualequipped SE and an identical 31 mpg combined for the automaticequipped Limited. The other

trims return 32 mpg combined (28/38) with the automatic transmission. These are solid numbers, though some rivals offer special, fuel-economythemed models that are even more frugal.

As for the Elantra Sport, it boasts a 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine that’s good for 173 hp and 154 lb-ft of torque. The manual transmission is standard and the automatic is optional. At our test track, an Elantra Sport with the automatic zipped to 60 mph in 8.2 seconds, which puts it on the quicker side of the compact sedan spectrum.

EPA fuel economy estimates for the Sport stand at 28 mpg combined (24 city/34 highway) with the manual and a similar 28 mpg combined (24 city/35 highway) with the automatic.

Standard safety features for all 2016 Hyundai Elantra sedans include antilock disc brakes, hill-start assist, stability and traction control, front-seat side airbags and side curtain airbags.

A rearview camera is optional on the SE and standard on the other trims.

The Blue Link emergency

telematics s y s t e m (standard on Limited, optional on Sport) provides services such as remote access via smartphone app, emergency assistance, theft recovery and geo-fencing (allowing parents to set limits for teenage drivers).

In Edmunds brake testing, a Hyundai Elantra Limited sedan came to a stop from 60 mph in 126 feet, which is just a bit longer than average for cars in this class. An Elantra Sport improved to an admirable 118 feet.

Source: Edmunds.com

Page 29

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Arts & Culture

FROM THE LIVE STAGE with Patrick-Jude Oteh 0803 700 0496, 0805 953 5215 (SMS only)

STONE COUNTRY (4)

I Employee’s poses as they hold ‘Silver Certificate’ by Andy Warhol at Sotheby’s auction house in London.

Sotheby’s sees record London contemporary art sale despite Bacon failure

By Michael Holden

A

ndy Warhol’s “One Dollar”, the first in his dollar bill series, fetched 20.9 million pounds ($32.4 million) at Sotheby’s on Wednesday, the top-seller in what the auction house said was its highest ever total sales for an auction of contemporary art in London.

However, the auction’s star attraction, Francis Bacon’s “Study for a Pope I”, which had been estimated at 25 to 35 million pounds, went unsold after bids failed to reach the reserve price.

“It wasn’t the night for that one picture,” said Oliver Barker, Sotheby’s senior international specialist in contemporary art.

As a result, overall sales at the auction came in at just over 130 million pounds, below the presale low estimate of 142 million pounds.

Despite the Bacon

disappointment, Cheyenne Westphal, Sotheby’s co-head of contemporary art, said the auction house had seen sales of more than half a billion pounds in recent weeks in London, establishing the British capital as an art hub to rival New York.

Last week, Sotheby’s saw sales of 178.6 million pounds at one auction in London, with 10 of the 51 lots selling for more than 10 million pounds, while on Tuesday an auction of post war and contemporary art at Christie’s totaled 95.6 million pounds.

The soaring sums come after two weeks of sales in New York in May brought in well over $2 billion at both houses.

Wednesday’s Sotheby’s auction was dominated by eight works by Warhol, inspired by the U.S. dollar and with the American pop artist ‘s 1962 hand-painted “One Dollar Bill (Silver Certificate)” exceeding its top of estimate of 18 million pounds to reach 20.9 million.

The works sold for a combined total of 34.3 million pounds, while another 11 in the series go under the hammer on Thursday.

Among the other big sellers was Gerhard Richter’s 1987 work “A B, Brick Tower”, which sold for 14.2 million pounds, and David Hockney’s “Arranged Felled Trees”, which went for 3.4 million pounds, more than a million above its high estimate.

Although Bacon’s standout painting failed to inspire bidders, two other works by the Irish-born British artist - a 1975 self-portrait and “Three studies for a SelfPortrait” - sold for 15.3 million pounds and 14.7 million pounds respectively.

“Four Eggs on a Plate”, a 2002 work by Lucian Freud which he gifted to the late Duchess of Devonshire, saw the fiercest bidding of the night. It sold for 989,000 pounds, almost 10 times its pre-sale estimate.

Nigeria’s arts industry, a veritable economy booster - Sunny Nneji

S

unny Nneji, a renowned musician, said that the nation’s creative industry could be a veritable economic booster if it was well structured by the various tiers of government.

Nneji told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos that there was the need for the government to recognise the economic potentials of the entertainment industry. ``Nigeria could use films, music, and performing arts to showcase the impressive spectrum of our awesome art and creativity. ``We need to put Nigeria on

the front-burner of international cultural and artistic excellence. ``For these to take place, Nigeria needs to build a strong legal and financial framework within which the nation’s creativity could be expressed,” he said.

The musician said that apart from the expression of creativity, the work must be protected and used to create jobs, sustain lives and showcase our rich cultural heritage.

He, however, said that the Nigeria’s creative industry would continue to contribute more in GDP and employment.

``Viable policy measures could help to establish effective copyright protection and enforcement mechanism.

“Such measures could increase supply of creative and original content by overcoming constraints in the industry.

“The arts sector is very fundamental to literary, visual, performing and musical arts.

“Nigeria has produced winners in almost all arts, we need to reinvent the whole industry and guard our intellectual properties,” he said.

(NAN)

n the last one week, I have been on the road. I have travelled and marvelled at the amount and number of lofty, grandiose and unbelievable white elephant projects that now dot our landscape. Some of them are so huge and obscene that they simply numb the senses. All over the nation, governors, even those that handed over to themselves are claiming that they have empty treasuries. These projects range from new government houses, new secretariats to new legislators quarters. It is like every new administration sets its sights on out-doing the previous administrations and the tendency is to engage in projects that make little or no meaning and have absolutely no bearing in making the lives of the people better. Pray, of what use is a N20b new secretariat? Of what use is a N17b new government house?

Of what significance is a brand new N10b new legislators quarters? How on earth does all of these impact on the lives of the people? As tourist attractions? These are places that the common man on the street are not even allowed to access? What kind of advice leads to all these kinds of monumental waste? How does the plethora of advisers arrive at the decision that what a state where the average earning power of each person is below $1 needs is a new secretariat? The journey convinced me that what some states get as governors are simply megalomaniacs who masquerade as men of wisdom.

With the exception of maybe three or four states, most states are tottering on the edge of bankruptcy. Somehow, I fail to understand the reasoning of some of them – they owe workers, they owe contractors, they owe everyone except themselves. I have seen in one of the states where I visited, the gigantic edifice that the previous governor bequeathed to himself with giant water tankers fit for a vegetable fruit manufacturing company. The choice land on which this edifice is situated can comfortably sit over one hundred three bedroom bungalows! What manner of opulence is this? And the ridiculous aspect of it was that the man was clamouring for N10b loan in his last three months in office. Yet this is a state that is owing workers and contractors. This is a state that is home to three houses of assembly. The very first house of assembly built in the 1950’s is still as elegant and respectable. In saner climes, this colonial edifice would have been maintained and rehabilitated to serve both as a historical reference, tourist attraction and a place of respect where laws are made. But No! We are a grandiose people so we must build another and yet another in the name of leaving a legacy!. The previous house is now being occupied by families who have absolutely no sense of history of the place they are desecrating so blatantly.

In another state, a government parastatal buys a building off another parastatal with similar functions. All it needed to do was to possible repaint the building in its own colours and open its doors for business. But what happens? As soon as it takes possession of this building, it proceeds to demolish the entire thing from the top to its underneath safes and bunkers. Mind you there was absolutely nothing wrong with the previous building.

Just a change of hands. They are presently trying to build.

I asked what was wrong with the previous building? And I was told nothing!. It is just that the new owners must be seen to be building or at least doing something and in the next couple of years someone wakes up and says that the parastatal needs a bail out! How we love to borrow phrases!!!

I am sure that almost all those clamouring for ‘bail-out’ now will use them not for any justifiable projects but rather for the same kind of waste that dogs every path of most of the things we do in our dear country. The mind set seems to be – why spend N1m when you can spend N5b?

Does it mean that most of these states that are now crying foul, never saved for rainy days? Does it mean that they never saved or put aside little funds as emergency funds?

I certainly can understand new helmsmen shouting themselves hoarse that they met empty treasuries but I really do not understand the position of those who handed over to themselves also shouting that they met empty treasuries.

Page 30

Arts & Culture

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Book Review

Book Title: Bongel Author: Maryam Bobi Publisher: Parresia Publishers Ltd Year: 2015 Reviewer: Paul T. Liam

Advancement of the Feminist Agenda in “Bongel”

B

ongel is a bold statement by the young author, Maryam Bobi, to a society that equates the value of a girl-child to that of a cow, a mere item of misogynist aggrandisement, an object to be owned by men, especially financially buoyant men like Alhaji Tanko, who in the story insists on possessing Bongel to bear him a male child. A machine that must work according to the dictates of its owner such as in the case of Mallam Buba who runs a slave house where his wife, Jummai, bears him wares (daughters) he trades to amass wealth for himself.

And they his — wife and daughters — must always do his bidding because he is the “man” and owner of the house. Bongel’s older sisters have been traded by their father before their thirteenth birthday and so must all his daughters. But Bongel dares to break the jinx by refusing to be married to Alhaji Tanko who is already married to three wives and has the wealth that would change the fortune of her family for the better. Bongel is twelve and the brightest pupil of the primary school she just passed out from and her one desire is to get a college education and become a woman of class and quality like her primary school Headmistress.

However, Buba’s dream for his young daughter is to be married to a man old enough to be her father or grandfather. Buba’s concern is the size of his treasuries; he must collect the cows Alhaji Tanko is offering as bride price.

Child marriage is a predominant social and cultural anomaly in northern Nigeria and other parts of Nigeria. It continues to be a serious cause for concern especially in the north, in spite of the encroaching fangs of modernity everywhere.

While the girl-child is encouraged and educated in other parts of the country, many parts of northern Nigeria is still witnessing the rather alarming practice of girl-child marriage. The evil of girl-child marriage is perpetuated under the guise of often misinformed religious teachings or traditional beliefs. This evil to an extent is a preserve of the poor folks with mal-nutritional sense of judgement and misplaced priorities when it comes to determining what is most appropriate for their female children. The practice is very rare among the rich and educated folks, who ensure that their female children acquire education just as their male ones. This bizarre indulgence by the society is what Maryam Bobi’s novella, “Bongel”, is condemning via the graphical portrayal of the negative consequences or afflictions of such actions on the victims who are helpless children who cannot defend themselves because the society has

“

The story of Bongel is told in the third person in ten chapters and set in “Bobi Village” but sometimes the narration shifts to Tegina and Rijau respectively

seized their voice. The fact that Bobi finds this thematic occupation still relevant for discussion underscores the fact that the subject is still prevalent and perhaps may not be abated any time soon in spite of the prominence of Western education in the region.

The story of Bongel is told in the third person in ten chapters and set in “Bobi Village” but sometimes the narration shifts to Tegina and Rijau respectively. The characters are up and doing. The narration is smooth and engaging. The narrator recounts events that sum up Bongel’s life with rich descriptive strength and special affection for details. There are also beautiful metaphors for those who admire elegant collocation. “Bongel” is also a tale of love between Bongel and Abdul, Kauthar’s elder brother who returns from the UK after his Master’s Degree programme and falls in love with Bongel. Kauthar is Bongel’s best friend and roommate at the El-khamar School for Medical Sciences. But a serious problem breaks out when Kauther’s family finds out about the past that Bongel has been concealing. Abdul seeks Bongel’s hands in marriage but Bongel fears that her past might prevent her from possessing a future she so much craves with him. It is the discovery of her previous marriage that breaks up the once beautiful union between Bongel and Abdu and Kauther, who are disappointed at Bongel’s ugly past of having being married to Alhaji Tanko, her giving birth to a still-birth and eventual divorce.

This unfortunate incursion into

Bongel’s past which brings back the ugly memories of her childhood life as told by the narrator who takes us back on a journey into the past and the events that eventually defines Bongel’s present. Through the flashback technique the reader watches the breakdown of Bongel’s life story in quite significant detail.

The narrator does a nice job by supplying the reader with personal knowledge of the happenings.

The crux of the storyline is that a present romantic affair between Bongel and her Romeo, Abdu risks extermination because of a past that was not her making. Bongel is therefore victimised by her erstwhile best friends.

The story is soul stirring and inspiring, especially as little Bongel continues to plead and insist on going to school. The boldness with which she confronts her father is rare of children of her age especially that none of her older siblings had dared to challenge their father. Her father trying to convince Bongel to reason with him takes to the cattle ranch behind their hut and shows her the new herds of cattle given to him by Alhaji Tanko as her dowry, but she is not impressed by it. See the ensuing conversation between them they are all ours, Bongel. Your dowry paid in full by your generous husband. Can you now see that that Headmistress of yours and your mother are naïve?

The path you and I have chosen is one that has ensured the continual survival of the family.

“I don’t want this; you do!” She cried out and yanked her hand away from his hold. She scampered away

from him, no longer able to stand his insensitivity. “I want to go to school, just as Juma has done. Her father let her go to school,” (p.56) Bongel is not alone in the struggle and humiliation; her mother Jummai shares her daughter’s aspirations and tries endlessly to convince her husband Buba to reconsider his marriage stand. But she too becomes an object of abuse and derision by her husband who accuses her of being a bad wife and mother to their daughter. Even the Headmistress’s intervention would not dissuade Buba from carrying out his plan of enslaving his daughter. Bongel eventually is forced into marriage and according to the narrator this is what Bongel considers her first night with Alhaji Tanko to be: The moment his wrinkly skin touched her, she felt like shrivelling away into the earth. His sandpaper palms first found her head before frisking their ways down to her hips in search of the knot of her wrapper.

When she resisted and tried to push him away, he became so furious he tore the wrapper off her body and pinned her on the bed. Bongel felt her executioner grunting like a pig, breathing hot tepid air down her face, and burying her in an envelope of acrid smells. The tearing pain that hit her brain was worse than any pain she had ever felt in her life. (p.68) Bongel’s saving grace according to the story is when she miscarries a pregnancy which Alhaji Tanko labour for with all his might by visiting her three times or more in a day so she would conceive him a male child. According to a friend of his the more frequent conjugal visits to the twelve years old bride would certainly culminate into the conception of a male child. All the huge dowry of cows given to her father is to secure the prospects of a male child. Bongel gets afflicted with Vesico Vaginal Fistula and Alhaji Tanko divorces her for miscarrying his pregnancy. Her mother too is divorced by Buba who accuses Bongel of deliberately mismanaging the pregnancy with the support of her mother thereby ruining his chances with Alhaji Tanko. Both mother and daughter are divorced on the same day by their husbands. Although, Bongel’s quest to be educated is met with several challenges as shown in the story, she, however, eventually graduates from medical school against all odds.

The story is a struggle for the liberation of the women folk and a clarion call on the need for the education of female gender. The feminist approach to the story is very conspicuous. The portrayal of the male characters as insensitive beasts is an obvious point to be easily picked out by the reader. The women in the story are presented as being the only sane beings alive.

The story succeeds in a strange way in the sense that it makes the reader despise the insensitivity of the men and their greed for material possession. Buba is shown as a man who cares more for the size of his cows than his daughters’ life.

POEM OF THE WEEK

Mariama Hotel

By Fabian Kaduka

A thousand pound bomb, They said, dug that crater The size of a football field.

Human flesh flung here and there, Broken bones and split skulls Mingled in the cauldron of blood And earth as steel melted in the Heat and fortified concrete blocks Turned into pelting marbles.

Mariama Hotel! The hub of the Rich and famous, lay in ruins Of smoldering fire.

The crowd stood nearby, Shocked and shaken at the Perpetuation of human evil, Too fearful to approach, lest It too got swallowed in The gaping, solitary abyss.

“Who gave them the right To do this to us?”

Eyes misted in tears, the nameless Woman crumbled.

Five mangled bodies were all That remained of her children.

Had they not played on that Narrow street by day?

Had they not chased each other, Squealing with joy as QUOTE their Paper planes made somersaulting Manoeuvres? Was it fate that by Winged objects would they Someday sacrifice their lives?

PAGE 31

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Bizman bags 4 months imprisonment for cheating customer

T

he Zuba Upper Area Court, in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) - Abuja, has sentenced a 36-year old businessman, Ayebo Adebayo, to four months imprisonment for cheating a customer of N590,000.

Adebayo of Airport Road,

Abuja, was also charged with criminal breach of trust.

The Presiding Officer of the court, Malam Aminu Sa’ad, handed the sentence, after the accused pleaded guilty to the twocount charge of criminal breach of trust and cheating.

He, however, gave the convict an option to pay a fine of N15, 000 and an order to refund the N590, 000 to the nominal complainant as compensation.

The prosecutor, Insp. Haruna Danlami, had earlier told the court that on July 1, one Azubuike

Emodi of Deidei, Abuja, came to Zuba police station to report the matter.

Danlami said Emodi told the police in his statement that sometimes in 2011, he gave the convict the amount in question to supply him with timber wood, but

Adebayo converted the money to his personal use.

The prosecutor told the court that his offences contravened the provisions of sections 312 and 322 of the penal code respectively.

(NAN)

Illegal petrol: Police confiscate two vehicles laden with drums

T

Police men scuffle with an individual yesterday at Gwagwalada, in Abuja, over alleged traffic offence.

Board to open School of Almajiri in Gwagawalada

By Stanley Onyekwere

T

he Federal Capital Territory Universal Basic Education Board (FCT-UBEB) has confirmed that it will ensure that the Gwagawalada school of Almajiri will be opened to the teeming number of children desiring to learn both Islamic and Western education by next academic session.

The board made this revelation at a recent media briefing and stakeholders’ interactive session organised by the Public and Private Development Center (PPDC), held at UAC building, Central Area, Abuja, towards increasing citizens’ participation.

Representative of the Board, Sidi-Aliyu Adamu, pointed out that there is need to have a fence around the school, adding that’s why there is a delay.

Citing that another challenge is the access road to the area, Adamu notes: “We are discussing with the chairman to have road leading to the school” adding that, the computers and books are all ready and in a central store.

“We have the plan before the beginning of next academic session we are going to start” While denying that the community is not been carried along in the project, he insists: “if the community says they are not aware of the school, They are been

economical with the truth.

“In fact there were farmers on the land when we came to the place at first. Those that are within that area are aware.”

Earlier in her remarks, Coordinator, PPDC’s Procurement Monitoring Programme, Nkemdilim Ilo, said the interactive session with the community members where this school are situated is not to castigate the government but to appraise the challenges, issues that came up with the community of the Almajiri school.

She added that the interactive session is to find possible solutions to the problems for a useful conclusion.

According to her, PPDC had found out that the Almajiri School in Gwagwalada has been completed since 2014 but it’s not yet in use.

One of the community members, who doubled as one of the almajiri teachers in the area, Mallam Musa Saheed, said they also would want to benefit from the school as they can only speak and communicate in Arabic and Hausa languages, but would want to learn English language from the school so as to better their lives.

He therefore urged the government to provide the access road, water and commence the school for the benefit of these almajiri students.

he Commissioner of Police in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Wilson Inalegwu, says the police have impounded two vehicles fitted with a large drum each for use in the illegal sale of petrol.

Inalegwu told newsmen last week that two suspects had also been arrested in connection with the crime, saying that each of the drums could take up to 200 litres of petrol.

He said that the suspects and the vehicles were apprehended at a filling station in the Central Business District (CBD) by a task force against the illegal sale of petrol and sundry crimes in the FCT. “Sale of fuel in jerry cans is banned; but we have observed that some individuals continue to sell fuel in jerry cans and have turned their cars to fuel tankers, which is against the law. ``And this endangers lives and property.

“Now there are those two vehicles there fitted with drums and the manner in which these drums were wielded is alarming; and those two cars you see, if anyone of them is driven into object, it can cause serious mayhem, it can cause fire outbreak that can lead to loss of lives and property.

“So, all we want to say is that these things are criminal acts that must be avoided by all,” he stressed.

Inalegewu, who is the chairman of the task force, which comprises the police, military and paramilitary personnel, also said that the team had impounded more than 4,000 motorcycles from commercial operators who were found to have operated in the city centre illegally.

He reiterated that the ban on the sale of petrol in jerry cans within the territory was still in force, and called on Nigerians to maintain orderliness in the territory to reduce crime. (NAN)

PAGE 32

Photo Splash

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Generators repairer on duty, yesterday Zone 3 Shopping Complex, in Abuja.

Scavenger searching for used valuables in refuse bin, yesterday at Central Area, in Abuja.

Tailors sewing their clients clothes, yesterday at Garki, in Abuja.

Traditional singers entertaining dignitaries at an function, recently at Kwali Area Council, in Abuja.

Commercial motorcyclists waiting for passengers, yesterday at Kudu District, in Abuja.

Photos: Justin Imo-Owo

PAGE 33

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Metro

A woman hawking corn, yesterday at Durumi , in Abuja.

Housing: Chukwu laments rapid expansion of Abuja slums

By Stanley Onyekwere

T

he Permanent Secretary, Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA), John Obinna Chukwu, has lamented that the resultant effect of the influx of the people to Abuja is the growing over crowdedness in homes, neighborhoods and communities, causing the rapid growth of slums in the Territory.

A development, the Permanent Secretary observed further increases pressure on infrastructural facilities, resulting in rapidly deteriorating

living environment, health and social order.

Chukwu, who made this point while speaking at the opening ceremony of the Abuja Housing Show, on Monday, however disclosed that the FCT Administration has created the Mass Housing department to address the housing needs and reduce the springing up of slums in the Territory.

According to him, the ever influx of people from all walks of lives into the FCT have necessitated the Administration to take this proactive

step of establishing the department.

Chukwu noted that though, the increasing deficit of decent and affordable housing in Nigeria’s urban and rural areas poses major challenges to economic growth, healthy living and development of the entire country, the administration would continue to strengthen the department to achieve the set goals.

He added that the FCTA has complimented the establishment of the department with opening up and expanding of district infrastructure in the Federal Capital City using the

private sector.

He further stressed that the FCT Administration will work assiduously to provide serviced land to investors in the housing sector in order to make housing delivery easy and accessible.

Chukwu also assured that the FCT Administration would continue to encourage stakeholders to take additional steps by liaising with relevant public and the organized private bodies in the provision of affordable housing for the FCT residents and other Nigerians as a whole.

2015 Hajj: FCT-MPWB unveils approved fare for intending pilgrims

By Stanley Onyekwere

T

he Federal Capital Territory Muslim Pilgrims Welfare Board (FCT-MPWB) has released its approved hajj fare for this year’s pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia.

A statement from the Public Relations Officer of the Board, Muhammad Aliyu, disclosed that the minimum fare this year is Seven Hundred and eighty five thousand, one hundred and seventy eight Naira, forty Kobo (N785,178.40), while the medium seat goes for eight hundred

and twenty five thousand, one hundred and seventy eight Naira, forty Kobo (N825,178.40).

The statement said this year, the board has no maximum category in its hajj fare, adding that intending Pilgrims from the FCT for this year’s hajj have up toFriday 17th July 2015, to balance their fare or loose the allotted seat.

The spokesperson explained that the measure has become necessary to enable the board meet up with the deadline for the balance of hajj fare payment to the National Hajj Commission of

Nigeria (NAHCON).

Similarly, the statement warned intending pilgrims who are yet to submit their completed application forms and e-passports to do so before the deadline or have themselves to blame, as the board would soon commence the process of acquiring visa from the Saudi Arabian embassy in Abuja.

While noting that the board has set machinery in motion towards successful hajj operation, the Spokesperson said it has since acquired accommodation in Makkah very close to the holy mosque to enable the pilgrims

from the territory perform their five daily prayers in Haram with less stress.

According to him: “In order to enable the intending pilgrims get value for their money, the board would conduct the 3rd phase of its education and orientation exercise on 25th and 26th of this month at the hajj camp.”

He therefore, advised intending pilgrims to avail themselves with the opportunity as new polices on the exercise as well as arrangements for the spiritual journey would be taught during the orientation exercise.

Photo: Justin Imo-Owo

Pastor admonishes Christians to rely on God as ‘babies’

T

he District Overseer, Foursquare Gospel Church, Wuse-Abuja, Pastor Babatunde Idowu, has enjoined Christians to trust God in their everyday affairs.

Idowu told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday, in Abuja that depending on the strength of God was crucial to attaining one’s set objectives.

“The youth’s strength can fail and disappoint but not God’s strength. We need to wait on God just as children wait on their parents.

“Some of the reasons children wait on their parents include honouring them, receiving food and guidance from them.

“Likewise, believers must wait on God for these reasons and many more,’’ he said.

The cleric urged Christians to look beyond their challenges and depend on God to help them.

He said trusting God depicts period of inaction, but it is usually a time of refreshing recouping for those who know how best to utilise such period.

Idowu also admonished Christians to cultivate the habit of meditating on the word of God as its builds their spiritual discipline which all believers should practice.

“We live in busy world but we must create time not just to read the bible but to meditate on the word of God daily.

“Believers are therefore urged not to major in noise, hurry and crowd but to delight in the word of God and meditate on its daily order to be successful in all their ways. (NAN)

PAGE 34

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Money Sense

Lacking capital, talent or connections?

That’s just the fear talking W

hen my colleagues and I launched our business, we were quickly reminded of how easy it is to fail.

We were trying to launch a remote-server-admin service, and though our idea originally attracted a lot of attention, working on the project soon became similar to wading through knee-deep mud.

Ninety days later, the service had yet to take off, and we were having a hard time marketing it.

All the technology in the world couldn’t change the cultural disconnect we were up against.

Although it was painful at first, dropping this idea was by far the best decision for the company.

That specific project was simply a bad fit. Luckily, we’d chosen to develop a minimum viable product a scaled-down version of the offering with only the most essential features so we suffered only a minor loss.

MVPs are fantastic because they allow entrepreneurs to take risks without needing substantial capital or manpower to bring a concept to market. They allow for mistakes and remove the pressure to produce a perfect product the first time.

So why doesn’t every entrepreneur launch an MVP? The likely culprit is fear.

Fear is the biggest barrier to entrepreneurial success, and it can manifest itself in a variety of ways. For example, many entrepreneurs get hung up on building the perfect team to launch their MVP, but this isn’t crucial to its development. Getting a concept to market only requires a few trustworthy people who can

get the job done.

Entrepreneurs also worry about raising enough capital and getting their product in front of the right people, but there’s no need for significant capital when launching an MVP. In fact, having too much funding can be a detriment because it can complicate simple processes and increase internal pressure to avoid failure. Likewise, networking is important, but it’s better for entrepreneurs to focus on seeing an MVP through to completion and testing it on the market.

These so-called barriers are

often just fear in disguise, and its fear that can suffocate and even kill a start-up. Here are a few ways to keep these fears from taking over: 1. Accept the possibility of failure: An MVP helps the entrepreneur prepare for failure especially since a product won’t damage the company if it doesn’t work out.

Embracing failure as a possibility and even a learning tool can help ease the fear of it.

2. Establish clear goals for the MVP: An MVP is essentially a way

to test a hypothesis, so it’s best to have clear goals for what the company hopes to gain from the test. Ask questions such as, “What can this teach us about the market, potential customers and the supply chain?

3. Accept that you don’t need everything you want: It’s not necessary to have highprofile contacts, investors or top talent to launch an MVP. Instead, start with current customers, and build a prototype that speaks to those needs. Everything else will fall into place.

4. Take action:

Simply doing the work is hands down the best way to conquer inhibitions. Break an idea into actionable steps, and focus on how the idea can make a difference.

We admit it: Our initial idea was a failure. But because it was an MVP, this small misstep didn’t cripple our company. In fact, it served as a powerful learning opportunity.

When you think the worst thing that can happen to you is failure, then that fear isn’t very powerful.

Failure happens to everyone, and it’s a necessary part of the innovation process.

...Validate your business idea with these 5 steps

D

o you have a business idea?

Of course you do. Why else would you be reading this article?

If you are like most aspiring entrepreneurs, however, the problem comes in the immediate stage following your “ah-ha” moment, when the idea lingers as a passing thought or a series of sticky notes in a journal until the enthusiasm passes. Then, a few months later, you see your idea on the shelf at a local retail store or in the iTunes App Store.

We have all been there.

Ideas stall because the process of getting them to market can seem overwhelming. In reality, if you validate your idea prove it has worth beyond the bar napkin on which it is scribbled the process thereafter actually gets much easier.

Here are few things to consider the next time you have your next big business idea.

1. Look for it: When I hear that someone has the next big business idea, I pull out my iPhone and within minutes can often find an existing product or service with a search on

Google or YouTube. Before you even get wrapped up in an idea, save yourself the time and do a thorough search to find out if it already exists.

If you find it does, do not give up on your inspiration too hastily. Perhaps there are ways to improve on the existing product? Can you offer value to the business already producing it? Could the market be satisfied better? If you answered “yes,” move to the next step.

2. Seek feedback: Talk to others about your idea, especially people you trust. At this stage, what you want is brutally honest feedback. Entrepreneurs have a tendency to get stuck in “idea lock,” when they are hellbent that their idea is a winner, regardless of what others say. If you are the only person who truly thinks the idea is good, then it is time to reassess.

3. Build an MVP: If your idea has support, then consider developing an MVP, or minimum viable product, to determine if it is a product you and others would really use. Channel your inner “MacGyver” and build a working

prototype, or look to a resource that has the ability to leverage newer technologies, such as 3D printing, to help.

If you have a technology idea, such as a smartphone app, look to crowd sourcing or a StartupWeekend event to find the assistance you need. Once you have the MVP, use and test it and have others test it as well.

If it turns out to be a product that you and your friends would never really use, scrap the idea.

4. Start building your identity: If your testing goes well and you feel that you might have a winning idea, start building a brand around it now. In today’s fast moving and innovating business environment, an idea that is validated today may be knocked off or even obsolete tomorrow, so do not linger.

More importantly, unless your idea is founded in a groundbreaking and proprietary new technology, more than likely it is already being conceived by someone else already. It is off to the races.

At this point, some fear that “exposing” their idea may lead

to someone stealing it. This is a completely valid concern, but these days, you should go on the assumption that someone will steal it or develop a newer and better iteration eventually, so the key to success will be to be first to market.

Also, while patenting is a great way to protect your idea, it is also a very expensive process that is not guaranteed to protect you. If you have the resources, engage a patent attorney and pursue the protection, but if you do not, then turn your focus on building your brand.

Start by choosing a great name and securing the website domain to create, at a minimum, a sharp business landing page.

Next, secure your business name with every social-media site you can. Even if you do not use them, it protects you from others securing and using them, and it will ultimately improve your search-engine optimization. Then start leveraging these resources to build a fan base.

5. Hash a customer acquisition plan: Before you dive into a lengthy business plan, which

more than likely will be obsolete before you even launch, focus on two questions: “How do I get my first customer?”

“How do I get my n-th customer?”

You may have the best business plan in the world, but without customers, your business is nothing. Create a thoughtful customer-acquisition plan and marketing strategy and be prepared to explain it to investors, partners and stakeholders, as this will undoubtedly be the first questions they ask.

I was fortunate to recently be selected as part of the inaugural cohort inStartup.SC, a business incubator that focuses on scalable business ideas in South Carolina.

All of the ideas are all in varying stages of development, but the primary criterion for the incubator was idea validation.

Once validated through the steps above, it is much easier to proceed to the next steps.

Just remember, it is much easier to build a business around a demand than to build a demand around a business.

Page 35

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

International Failing Farkhunda means failing Afghan women international_peoplesdailyng@yahoo.com

ANALYSIS

By Kimberley Motley

F

arkhunda’s mishandled case adds to an already long list of cases corrupted by Afghanistan’s judiciary.

On March 19, a mob of male attackers viciously attacked 27-yearold Farkhunda. They beat her, set her body ablaze, and tossed her into the shallow waters of Kabul river.

Promises of a transparent legal process were once again shattered by the Afghan judiciary. This week, its precipitous decision regarding the Farkhunda case was leaked from a “secret” hearing in the Appellate Court. Blatantly disregarding the law, the court decided that the men convicted of having a primary role in Farkhunda’s horrific death were entitled to a reduction in their sentence. This occurred without the presence of Farkhunda’s family and presumably the prosecutor to argue against the reduction.

Major due process violations occurred when Farkhunda’s family and the prosecutors were not notified of the hearing. They, and the public, were also subsequently barred from, and denied access to, participating in the court’s proceedings.

During this secret and unlawful hearing, the Appellate Court overturned three death sentences and converted the sentences to 20 years in prison, one death sentence was reduced to 10 years, and the court allowed for the acquittal of another of the main actors in Farkhunda’s attack.

Legal atrocities The written rationale for its decision, which is required from the court by law, has yet to be released - adding to the growing list of laws ignored during these proceedings.

Assertions of corruption mean absolutely nothing if those that are in power - like the Appellate Court judges - are allowed to continue to perpetrate such legal atrocities.

The primary court hearing, which was extremely transparent and televised on virtually every Afghan television network, was a remarkable step forward in allowing the public to indirectly participate in the legal process for the first time.

However, for the Appellate Court to hold its hearings in such a secretive manner screams corruption.

Farkhunda’s mishandled case is just one more to add to an already long list of cases corrupted by Afghanistan’s judiciary.

A 12-year-old Afghan girl named Sahar Gul was forced into an illegal marriage, tied up, beaten, burned and kept captive in a basement for months. In this case, the Appellate Court quietly overturned the decision of the primary court in which the perpetrators of this torture received sentences of 20 years in prison.

The inability of the judiciary to handle Farkhunda’s case in a fair and equal manner simply reinforces questions about its commitment to progress the status of women in Afghanistan.

Just like with Farkhunda’s case, the Appellate Court had a secret hearing, did not inform the prosecutors, and has yet to share its written rationale for its decision with the public. A public which is

Promises of a transparent legal process were once again shattered by the Afghan judiciary, writes Motley.

The court overturned three death sentences for defendants in Farkhunda’s case. entitled to an explanation by law.

Simply ridiculous Thankfully, a Supreme Court appeal to the Appellate Court’s decision was successful and overturned, but it was simply ridiculous that the case needed to rise to that level in the judiciary system in the first place.

The best way forward for Farkhunda’s case is for the prosecutor and the family to appeal the decision of the Appellate Court and push the case to the Supreme Court.

Farkhunda’s case can also be used to promote some real change in the reliability and accountability of Afghanistan’s tainted judiciary system. There must be an internal investigation launched against the Appellate Court judges who have, so blatantly, disregarded the law through their violations of the basic due process rights of the public, the victims, and their families by conducting these secret and unsubstantiated hearings.

It is appalling that the judiciary - an institution created with the sole purpose of upholding Afghanistan’s

legal principles and protecting its citizens’ rights - should fail so astoundingly in doing so.

How many marches and protests is it going to take? How many laws need to be blatantly broken? And how many innocent victims and women like Farkhunda will be hurt or taken advantage of before the courts make a concerted effort to follow the rule of law? How much suffering and pain must be endured before the judiciary system of Afghanistan chooses to uphold the rights of its women?

Afghanistan’s government must see that it is simply ignoring the rights of 50 percent of its population - its women - who are legally and morally entitled to equal protection and treatment.

By highlighting this corruption and the court’s numerous failings, I do not mean to promote the execution of Farkhunda’s attackers, but rather, to tirelessly advocate for the preservation of due process and the rule of law.

Afghanistan’s courts cannot sweep what happened to Farkhunda under the rug and a clear line in the

sand needs to be drawn in the way it handles this case.

Afghan citizens, men and women alike, deserve a country that respects their rights and protects their safety. They deserve a country which holds itself accountable to its moral and legal obligations. The vapid promises of improvement in women’s rights mean nothing if the actions of the government continue to show otherwise.

Women’s rights Unfortunately, advocating for women’s rights in Afghanistan is a never-ending battle with a bottomless pit of problems. The inability of the judiciary to handle Farkhunda’s case in a fair and equal manner simply reinforces questions about its commitment to progress the status of women in Afghanistan.

How can Afghan society’s regard for women be expected to change when its government institutions fail to lead by example?

How can Afghan society’s regard for women be expected to change when its government institutions fail to lead by example?

In this way, justice for Farkhunda

means a small sense of justice for all Afghan women.

Amazingly, women’s rights in Afghanistan have been praised as one of the only great successes of the US’ longest war. But the reality is very different; true justice and progress for Afghan women - in legal, public, and private realms remains painfully elusive.

During my seven years of working in Afghanistan, I have witnessed how the abysmal justice system in Afghanistan remains weighted against women. It continues to be grossly calibrated against women culturally, procedurally, and often times legislatively.

If Afghanistan insists on being a signatory to International Conventions of upholding human rights, then they need to be held accountable for protecting the rights of their women.

At every level of the Afghan justice system, there must be changes and mechanisms put into place that allow women to receive justice, report crimes, and prosecute cases - with confidence and without the fear of retaliation.

It is time that persons in Afghanistan and beyond take the country to task and demand that holding those accountable for murdering Farkhunda act to honour its laws both international and domestic. It is time for the Afghan government to work towards bringing confidence back in the rule of law and uphold its obligations to women’s rights starting with Farkhunda’s case.

Kimberley Motley is the former lawyer for Farkhunda’s family and founder of Motley Legal. She is the first and only foreigner to litigate in Afghanistan’s courts and has been working in the country since 2008.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial policy.

Source: Al Jazeera

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Page 36

International

At least 14 killed in Kenyan attack

Tunisia attack: Injured Britons flown home

by RAF

F

rench special forces have killed a militant Islamist in Mali who was said to have been freed in exchange for the release of Frenchman Serge Lazarevic.

Ali Ag Wadossene, a senior member of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), was killed in northern Kidal city, a French army statement said.

Two other militants were captured in the operation, it added.

France sent troops to Mali in January 2013 to prevent the militants from over-running the capital, Bamako.

Latest African news updates Mr Lazarevic was abducted

by AQIM in 2011 and freed last December.

Mr Wadossene and another militant, Heiba Ag Acherif, were jailed in Mali for allegedly being involved in his abduction.

Mali’s government confirmed at the time that Mr Wadossene was one of four militants who had been freed in return for Mr Lazarevic’s release.

Mr Lazarevic said he had been abducted in Mali while on a business trip.

Mali is a former French colony, and is a major producer of cotton and gold.

N

o fewer than 14 people were killed and 12 others injured on Tuesday in a suspected Al-Shabaab terror attack in Mandera County, close to Kenya’s border with Somali.

Mandera County Commissioner Alex Ole Nkoyo, confirmed the early morning attack; saying that unknown gunmen hurled grenades into a residential building located

U

incident. ``The deceased were caught unaware; the attackers shot in the air several times and even used petrol bombs to carry out the attack. ``Most people were sleeping in tents outside their houses because the weather condition in Mandera is very hot,’’ Nkoyo told newsmen.

Sources said suspected Al-

Shabaab militants first hurled several improvised explosive devices (IEDs) before opening fire on the quarry workers who were sleeping at that time.

The government late 2014 ordered quarry workers to leave the quarries and move to town for security reasons after 36 of them were killed in December. (Xinhua/ NAN)

Tanzania jails ex-ministers Mramba and Yona over graft

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Tanzanian court has se n ten ce d two f orme r ministers to three years in jail over corruption charges.

It was related to issuing illegal tax exemptions and “arbitrarily” awarding a contract to audit gold, according to court documents seen

by Reuters news agency.

They are the highest-profile convictions in the government’s anti-graft drive.

Lawyers said the ex-ministers would appeal.

Former Finance Minister Basil Mramba and former Energy and Minerals Minister Daniel Yona were accused of abusing their authority in 2002 when they were in government for the ruling CCM party.

The tax exemptions cost the government millions of dollars in lost revenues.

Tanzania is Africa’s fourth-largest gold producer

Burundi coup general threatens force to oust president

L

eonard Ngendakumana threatens to launch armed uprising after Pierre Nkurunziza refuses to abandon

Zambian writer Namwali Serpell to share Caine prize money

S-based Zambian writer Namwali Serpell has promised to share her winnings in the Caine Prize for African Writing with the runners up.

She received the £10,000 ($15,600) prize for her short story The Sack.

The judges described it as “innovative, stylistically stunning, haunting and enigmatic”.

Ms Serpell was among five writers short-listed for the prize, regarded as Africa’s leading literary award.

Two South Africans and two Nigerians were also shortlisted for the prize - Masande Ntshanga for Space, FT Kola for A Party for the Colonel, Elnathan John for Flying and Segun Afolabi for The Folded Leaf.

Ms Serpell told BBC Newsday that the promise to share the winnings was “an act of mutiny”.

about 2 kilometres from Mandera town. ``Thirteen males and one female, mostly construction workers, were killed in the dawn attack, while 12 have been evacuated and rushed to a hospital. ``We still do not know those behind the attack, but we have launched a manhunt for the killers who escaped immediately after the

“I wanted to change the structure of the prize.

“It is very awkward to be placed into this position of competition with other writers that you respect immensely and you feel yourself put into a sort of American idol or race-horse situation when actually, you all want to support each other.”

The chair of judges, Zoe Wicomb, awarded the prize at a dinner held at the Bodleian Library at Oxford University in the UK. The short story “yields fresh meaning with every reading,” she said.

In The Sack, two men who live together their whole lives love one woman but don’t know which one of them she loves.

“One of the men has a series of backwards moving dreams about his own death and he becomes very paranoid about the other man,” Ms Serpell said.

bid for re-election.

In an effort to ease tensions, African leaders have called for the July 15 Burundi presidential polls to be delayed to July 30 [AP] In an effort to ease tensions, African leaders have called for the July 15 Burundi presidential polls to be delayed to July 30 [AP] A Burundian general who backed a failed coup in May has threatened to launch an armed uprising after President Pierre Nkurunziza refused to bow to opposition and international demands to abandon his bid for a third term.

General Leonard Ngendakumana, a deputy to the leader of the aborted coup, accused Nkurunziza of dragging the central African country back into civil war, comments that have alarmed a region with a long history of ethnic conflict.

“The next [step] is to organise ourselves just to resist, to make Pierre Nkurunziza understand that he must leave and then that we are prepared to do it by force, by organising a military force,”

Ngendakumana told Kenya’s KTN television, adding that coup leader General Godefroid Niyombare was still in Burundi.

The government told the Reuters news agency that any such move would be confronted.

“Anybody threatening the security of Burundi, either inside or outside, will meet the full force of our defence and security forces,” presidential spokesman Gervais Abayeho said.

Ngendakumana said Burundi’s government wanted “to engage the region in that civil war, based on ethnic [issues]”.

The general’s interview was recorded on Sunday in an undisclosed location outside Burundi before Monday’s meeting in Tanzania of east African states, plus South Africa, who are seeking to end the crisis.

At the meeting in the capital Dar es Salaam, the nations called for the July 15 Burundi presidential election to be delayed to July 30, to allow mediation between opposing factions.

The government has dismissed previous calls for delays.

Violation of deal

Opponents argue Nkurunziza’s bid for a third term - which triggered weeks of violent clashes between protesters and police in Burundi’s capital - violates the constitution and a peace deal that ended an ethnically charged civil conflict in 2005.

Nkurunziza says a court ruling allows him to stand again.

As well as calling for an election delay, the African nations said it was appointing veteran Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni to establish a dialogue between opposing sides.

The Arusha peace accords ended a 12-year conflict that pitted rebel groups of the majority Hutus, including one led by Nkurunziza, against minority Tutsis, which commanded the army at the time.

The army and other institutions are now mixed.

Ngendakumana said followers of the coup leaders were behind a spate of grenade attacks, which often targeted police, in the run-up to parliamentary elections held on June 26.

“We are behind them, and our intent is to intensify,” he said when asked about the incidents.

Page 37

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

International

India woman ‘set on fire by police’ in Uttar Pradesh

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woman in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh has died after alleging that she was set on fire by two policemen inside a police station after she refused to pay a bribe.

Neetu Dwivedi, 40, told a magistrate before her death that the policemen asked her for 100,000 rupees ($1,578).

She had gone to the police

station to free her husband, who had been detained for questioning in a crime.

The accused policemen deny the charge and say she tried to immolate herself.

The policemen have been suspended and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has ordered an inquiry into the case.

The incident took place on

Monday in Barabanki town, senior police official Abdul Hameed told BBC Hindi.

Mrs Dwivedi, who sustained 80% burns, was admitted to hospital in the state capital, Lucknow, where she died on Tuesday morning.

In her dying declaration before a magistrate and reporters, she alleged that she was abused and humiliated by her attackers when

she refused to pay the bribe.

Mrs Dwivedi’s son, who is a journalist with a Hindi newspaper, has said he wants justice as his “mother will only rest in peace when the guilty are punished”.

The incident comes barely a month after journalist Jagendra Singh was set on fire allegedly by some policemen in the state’s Shahjahanpur district.

Asia & Middle East

UN tribunal to begin South China Sea deliberation

China professor arrested for A selling drugs in UK and US Customs officers found parcels bound for abroad containing white powder

A

chemistry professor has been arrested in China accused of making psychoactive drugs that were sold to the UK, Canada, the United States and Australia.

Police said he sold at least 193kg (30 stone) of methylone last year after discovering a gap in the market when he went to Australia as a visiting professor, Xinhua news agency reported.

Seven others were arrested

in connection with the raid in Wuhan.

It follows the arrest of a Xian professor for making illegal drugs.

Xinhua reported in May that that professor, with the surname Lu, had been arrested and dubbed China’s real-life Walter White after the Breaking Bad character.

It is not clear whether the cases are linked.

The professor arrested in Wuhan, whose surname is Zhang,

started a company in 2005 which ostensibly produced medical coating and solvent, Xinhua reported.

Police said he “found while acting as a visiting academic in Australia that some psychoactive drugs were in heavy demand, but hard to find there. He decided to make those drugs when he got back to China for profit”.

He recruited people to produce “hundreds of kilograms” of drugs

and sold them overseas through mail order, police said.

In November last year, customs officers found at least nine parcels bound for abroad which contained the stimulant methylone, commonly used as a substitute for MDMA, or ecstasy.

On 17 June customs and police raided Mr Zhang’s lab in the Jiangxia district of Wuhan. About 20kg (3 stone) of drugs were seized.

Turkish Airlines plane grounded in Delhi after bomb threat

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olice have searched an airliner at India’s Delhi airport after a bomb threat, officials say.

Reports say the Turkish Airlines flight, flying from Bangkok to Istanbul, made an emergency landing after crew

spotted a message on a toilet mirror written in lipstick.

The message reportedly warned that there was a bomb in the cargo hold.

The plane landed safely at the Indira Gandhi International airport and

all the 148 passengers were evacuated.

“There was a bomb threat to the Turkish Airlines flight and therefore they decided to land it in New Delhi,” an official from the federal Central Industrial Security Forces told

the Reuters news agency.

The plane was moved to an isolation bay where it was checked thoroughly.

Authorities later said they did not find anything on it and the plane had been cleared for take off.

Afghan conflict: Two suicide attacks hit Kabul hours apart

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Nato convoy and an Afghan intelligence agency office have been targeted in two suicide attacks hours apart in the Afghan capital Kabul.

In the first attack a car bomb hit a land cruiser carrying foreign forces. Nato said there were no fatalities.

In the second attack, two people tried to storm an intelligence office in the Eighth

Precinct after a third man blew himself up on a bomb-laden motorbike.

A guard was killed and another person injured. Two gunmen were also killed.

The Taliban and another militant group, Hezb-e-Islami, have said they carried out the first attack, in the Shah Shahid area of the city.

The violence comes as

diplomatic sources confirmed the presence of Afghanistan’s deputy foreign minister for political affairs, Hikmat Karzai, in the Pakistani capital Islamabad at the same time as a Taliban delegation from Qatar.

If a meeting takes place, it would be a pre-talk discussion similar to those already held in Beijing, Urumqi and Oslo, says BBC Kabul bureau chief Waheed

Massoud.

The Taliban has stepped up its campaign of violence in recent months, taking advantage of the warmer weather of spring and summer. It has been making military gains, especially in northern Afghanistan.

Last week, a suicide bomber struck a convoy of Nato troops close to the US embassy, killing one civilian and injuring 22.

United Nations tribunal is to begin deliberations on whether it can hear a legal challenge over territorial claims in the South China Sea. In 2013, the Philippines asked the Permanent Court of Arbitration to declare invalid most of China’s maritime claims in the disputed area.

China claims almost the whole of the South China Sea angering several Asian neighbours.

It says the tribunal does not have the jurisdiction to hear the challenge.

If the tribunal decides it can rule on the case, the legal hearings will get under way.

The Philippines has sent a high-profile legal team to the proceedings by the fivemember tribunal which will continue till 13 July. China is not participating in the arbitration.

Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia, Brunei and Indonesia also have claims in the 3.5 million-sq-km (1.4 million-sq-mile) area said to be rich in resources.

The Philippines has had diplomatic spats with China over the Scarborough Shoal and Spratlys in particular.

It say China’s “nine-dash line”, which China uses to demarcate its territorial claims, is unlawful under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, which both countries have signed, and wants the tribunal to declare it invalid.

It’s a David and Goliath struggle at a United Nations tribunal in The Hague on Tuesday. Or it would be if Goliath had turned up.

In 2010, China’s then foreign minister, Yang Jiechi, told uneasy neighbours: “China is a big country, other countries are small countries, and that’s just a fact.”

But size is not legal currency when it comes to competing claims in the South China Sea. The five judges in the Court of Arbitration will decide the case of the Philippines versus the People’s Republic of China, according to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) to which both countries are signatories.

Legal challenges are cheaper than military build-up, and a more level playing field for the tiny Philippines against its giant neighbour.

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Page 38

International

TTIP talks: Transparency call for EU-US trade disputes A

proposed EU-US free trade deal must not give big firms the power to sue governments in private, secretive courts, the European Parliament says.

Investor-state disputes must be settled publicly and transparently, the parliament’s new recommendations say.

The recommendations were redrafted after MEPs put forward more than 100 amendments.

Fierce arguments continue over the trade deal, known as TTIP. MEPs will vote on TTIP on Wednesday. A final deal could be reached next year.

The TTIP - which stands for Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership - is

being negotiated by the European Commission - the EU’s top regulator - but parliamentary approval will be required to make the deal law.

The Commission estimates that by 2027 it could boost the size of the EU economy by €120bn (£85bn; $132bn) - equal to 0.5% of GDP. The EU Trade Commissioner, Cecilia Malmstroem, voiced support for the parliament’s recommendations, calling the document “a vital basis for that negotiation”.

One of the thorniest TTIP issues is investor protection.

There is widespread opposition to commercial arbitration panels, called Investor-State Dispute

Settlement (ISDS).

Critics say that even the threat of a legal case from a powerful corporation could have a “chilling” effect on national legislators as they try to regulate public services, such as healthcare and transport.

Many anti-TTIP protesters in Europe fear that such a deal could fuel a “race to the bottom”, watering down hard-won EU standards in areas like food safety and workers’ rights.

The MEPs’ recommendations reject ISDS as a model for settling trade disputes. Instead, they call for treatment of cases “in a transparent manner by publicly appointed, independent professional judges in public

hearings”.

TTIP should also “trust the courts of the EU and of the member states and of the United States to provide effective legal protection”.

Supporters of ISDS say it was designed to protect Western firms from abuses, such as arbitrary expropriation, in states with inadequate judicial systems.

But opponents argue that courts in the EU and US have high legal standards, and that businesses should seek redress there, not in separate tribunals.

“Now it is clear that ISDS has to be replaced by a public court,” said the parliament’s lead negotiator on TTIP, German Socialist Bernd Lange.

“Democracy is not for trading!” - anti-TTIP protest outside the US embassy in Berlin

Obama says US intensifying anti-ISIL campaign in Syria

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S president says ISIL will be defeated as USled coalition bombs 19 positions in Syria and Iraq in last US President Barack Obama has said that the US-led coalition battling fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) was “intensifying” its campaign against the armed group’s base in Syria.

Speaking at the Pentagon on Monday, Obama said that recent territory losses by the ISIL group show that the armed group will be defeated, but added that the fight

will be long.

The US-led coalition has stepped up its efforts in Iraq and Syria, with some of the heaviest bombing since it began its strikes in September last year. At least 19 US-led coalition air strikes have been carried out in the last 24 hours.

Air raids have been carried out in 11 locations in Iraq: they are the oil town of Beiji, the cities of Fallujah, Haditha, Kirkuk, Makhmur, Ramadi and Sinjar. Coalition strikes have also targeted eight ISIL positions in Syria: near Hasakah, Raqqa, Kobane and Aleppo.

The US president says he is determined to destroy the group, and says regional players in the Middle East are united in their fight against ISIL. Kurdish Peshmerga forces, who are helping on the ground, say they have killed 40 ISIL fighters not far from the northern city of Kirkuk.

The Kurdish soldiers claim to have prevented ISIL from attacking several of their positions and entering Kirkuk. Peshmerga forces are stationed north, east and west of Iraq’s second largest

city Mosul, which is now under ISIL control.

The US Secretary of Defence Ash Carter has praised the efforts of the Peshmerga in the fight against ISIL. “Well, we are doing more in Syria from the air. I think you saw some of that in recent days.

And the opportunity to do that effectively is provided in the case of the last few days by the effective action on the ground of Kurdish forces, which gives us the opportunity to support them tactically,” he said.

Europe and Americas Russia launches ‘safe selfie’ guide in light of deaths

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olice urge people to take safer selfies after about 100 were injured and dozens died this year in gruesome accidents.

The interior ministry warns that ‘racing after a high number of ‘likes’ by taking a selfie could lead to a ‘journey to death’ Russian police have launched a campaign urging people to take safer selfies after about 100 were injured and dozens died this year in gruesome accidents while striking high-risk poses.

Tuesday’s warning comes after a 21-year-old woman in Moscow accidentally shot herself in the head in May while taking a selfie while holding a pistol.

She suffered head injuries but survived.

That was just one in a string of recent selfie-related accidents.

“A cool selfie could cost you your life,” the interior ministry warned in a new leaflet packed with tips such as “a selfie with a weapon kills”.

In January, two young men blew themselves up in the Ural Mountains while taking a selfie holding a hand grenade with the pin pulled out. The mobile phone with the selfie survived as a record.

In May, a teenager in the Ryazan region died while attempting to take a selfie as he climbed on a railway bridge and accidentally came into contact with live wires.

“Unfortunately we have noted recently that the number of accidents caused by lovers of self-photography is constantly increasing,” said Yelena Alexeyeva, an aide to the interior minister.

“Since the beginning of the year we are talking about some hundred cases of injuries for sure.”

Selfies have also led to “dozens of deadly accidents,” Alexeyeva added.

“The problem really exists and leads to very unfortunate consequences.”

The new campaign includes leaflets, a video and online advice on the ministry’s website.

“Before taking a selfie, everyone should think about the fact that racing after a high number of ‘likes’ could lead him on a journey to death and his last extreme photo could turn out to be posthumous,” Alexeyeva warned.

Greece debt crisis: ‘No concrete plan’ before summit

T

he eurozone group says that Greece has submitted “no concrete proposals” for a new bailout, at a key meeting of finance ministers in Brussels.

The eurozone had urged Greece to submit fresh plans after its people rejected a new draft bailout in a referendum.

Eurogroup head Jeroen Dijsselbloem said Greece planned to make an immediate bid for cash

from a eurozone bailout fund and then set out steps for a deal.

This would not come before Tuesday evening’s eurozone leaders’ summit.

Separately, Greek PM Alexis Tsipras is set to address the European Parliament on Wednesday, a Greek government source said.

The Greek side gave a presentation at the finance

ministers’ meeting on Tuesday.

However, there was no new written plan.

Mr Dijsselbloem said the new Greek Finance Minister Euclid Tsakalotos would “first of all now send us, quite quickly, a new letter requesting for European Stability Mechanism (ESM) support and following that he will present proposals from the Greek side on what the substance would look

like on which we could reach an agreement”.

The ESM fund was set up in 2012 to help eurozone members in financial difficulties.

The lack of a new written plan was criticised by some in the eurozone.

Spanish Economy Minister Luis de Guindos told a Spanish reporter: “There was no proposal.

We only talked about general

things. And we don’t have time to waste.”

Malta’s PM Joseph Muscat tweeted that this “doesn’t help this evening’s eurozone leaders’ meeting”.

Reflecting the level of difficulty at the meeting, another eurozone official said: “If they really plan to present something formal tomorrow, they may not find anyone to read it.”

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Page 39

Strange World

Man claims evil violent poltergeist is haunting his home and beating wife as she sleeps

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COUPLE fear they are being stalked by evil spirits despite a psychic medium claiming to have slain “two demons” upstairs in their home while they cowered downstairs.

Keiron and Tracey Fry fear an “incubus demon” attacks every night, covering the latter in bruises at their home in New Tredegar, Wales, for the past two years.

According to myth and legend, an incubus demon is the most evil type and targets sleeping people - mainly women.

The pair claim the demonic spirit continues to haunt them even after a vicar tried to help by blessing the home and paranormal investigator medium Robert Amour claimed to have rid their house of the evil manifestation.

The family believe the demon was summoned using a Ouija board and it now also troubles their three children.

They contacted professional ghostbuster Mr Amour, 43, who

came armed with a Bible and crucifix.

Mrs Fry said: “We were told by the paranormal investigator that we have an incubus demon - the worst type of demon you can get.

“He told us we have three demons in total, the other two helped the main demon pin me down.

“She said he banned them all from going upstairs after shouting he could ‘feel the evilness in the room’”.

But after about 20 minutes the psychic returned saying he had “slain two small demons”, they claimed.

He said: “We are being molested by demons.

“My wife goes to bed fine, doesn’t feel anything in the night but when she wakes up she’s in agony.

“I wake up the next day and said: ‘I didn’t do that’. I would never beat my wife.”

Mrs Fry , a full-time carer, added: “It’s getting worse and worse and there’s nothing we can do.

“I wake up every morning in

Robert Amour at a promotional event

agony because of the demon.

“My husband rubs cream into my bruised back every day but the pain doesn’t go away.

“It has affected our marriage because we have been rowing and fighting all the time about the demon.

It has been feeding off all the negative energy.”

Mr Amour insisted on Facebook he believed he had rid their home of evil.

He said: “When the clearance was finished, I advised this couple that the spirits that were troubling them had been cleansed.

“To the best of my knowledge and further to confirmation from the couple themselves in that same week, there were no further worries or concerns after my visit.

“I would like to continue to wish them well in their home and to know that if there is another need for me

to support them for them to get in touch.”

The couple also asked Church of Wales Vicar Johnathan Widdess to help.

He said: “(They) invited us there and we spoke about what was going on. We said a prayer to try and help him.”

Despite this the pair claim the family is still suffering and their nightmare continues.

Worst Footie Team Ever? Micronesia Lose 46-0

M Robert Amour conducting a séance during a separate investigation to the Frys

The scene during a different investigation carried out by Amour posted on his Facebook page.

icronesia’s coach admits it was “boys against men” after his team suffered their third hiding in a row at the Pacific Games.

A football team have been beaten 46-0 in one of the most lopsided games ever seen in international football.

Micronesia’s drubbing by Vanuatu followed a 38-0 loss to Fiji and a 30-0 score line against Tahiti at the Pacific Games in Papua New Guinea.

It meant the Federated States of Micronesia conceded a total of 114 goals in their three group matches.

Their Australian coach Stan Foster admitted it was “boys against men” and called for help from FIFA, football’s world governing body.

“I’m hoping that FIFA will be coming (to Micronesia) next week for inspections and to hopefully affiliate us with Asia,” he said.

“If they do, that will lead to us

having technical assistance and everything else that brings. That would be a huge boost.”

The half-time score was 24-0 but Vanuatu, ranked 200 in the world, showed their opponents no mercy, almost doubling their tally in the second half.

Vanuatu striker Jean Kaltack helped himself to 16 goals, making him the tournament’s top scorer.

“They’re boys, not men,” Foster said of his team. “And they’ve been playing against well-seasoned men.

I’m hoping the majority of our boys will be here for at least eight years.”

Organisers said it was the biggest win in the history of international football, although it is unlikely to go in the record books as Micronesia is not a member of FIFA and it was an under-23 game.

The previous biggest defeat in a senior international was American Samoa’s 31-0 loss to Australia in 2001.

Journalist Kevin Darling, reporting from the tournament, told Sky News the team were trying their best.

“The problem is it’s not a squad of footballers, it’s just a squad of normal blokes,” he said.

“The goalkeeper told me he went in goal for the first time ever three weeks ago. And it showed, to be fair.

“Hopefully in 10 years or so they’ll have a proper team and this would have all been worth it.”

There was some good news for Micronesia as they were told they would be welcomed back when the event is next held in four years.

“That was big relief for me, because I was really worried the organisers would take us out of the competition,” said Foster.

“I’ve been assured that we’ll be allowed to come back and that they’re aware that this is a development squad.”

Page 40

Digest

By Pat Hagan

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daily glass of grapefruit juice keeps blood vessels healthy and could protect against heart disease, a new study shows.

Just half a pint a day was enough to improve circulation.

Scientists have identified that health-boosting chemicals, called flavanones, that are naturally found in citrus fruits are responsible for the benefits.

The findings, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, suggest regular grapefruit juice consumption could play a vital part in warding off heart disease – Britain’s biggest killer.

Around 73,000 people a year in the UK die from heart-related

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Daily glass of grapefruit juice ‘protects against heart disease’ illnesses.

They kill one in six of all men and one in ten women.

Eating a diet rich in fruit has long been known to have a protective effect.

But there has been less research on precisely what it is in citrus fruits like grapefruit that helps to sustain a healthy heart.

Researchers at the French National Institute for Agricultural Research at Clermont-Ferrand, France,

Half a pint of grapefruit a day was found to improve heart health, a team of French scientists revealed.

The study revealed that flavanones found in the citrus fruit help improve the elasticity of blood vessels, making it easier for blood to reach the heart

recruited 48 healthy women aged between 50 and 65 – one of the highest risk groups for heart disease.

Half the group was given a daily quota of 340 millilitres – roughly half a pint – of grapefruit juice packed with flavanones

and the rest an identical-looking drink but with no flavanones.

After a few months the two groups then swapped over.

The results from the six-month trial showed that after regular consumption of flavanonecontaining juice, there was a

significant improvement in the health of the volunteers’ blood vessels.

But there was little or no change when they drank the flavanone-free version.

Researchers measured this with a test called flow-mediated dilation, which is designed to show how ‘stretchy’ and flexible artery walls are.

The more elastic they are the better as it allows blood to flow more freely to the heart.

In a report on their findings the researchers said: ‘Regular grapefruit juice consumption by middle-aged, healthy postmenopausal women is beneficial for arterial stiffness.

‘This effect may be related to flavanones present in grapefruit.’

The study was part-funded by a grant from the Florida Department of Citrus.

However, patients with existing heart disease should be careful about drinking grapefruit juice as it can interfere with medication.

Levels of drugs used to treat raised cholesterol or high blood pressure can increase significantly after just one glass of the juice, exposing patients to a greater risk of side-effects.

Source: Dailymail.co.uk

Malaria breakthrough: Targeting key protein ‘kills the parasite and stops the disease’

By Madlen Davies

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scientific breakthrough could pave the way for new treatments for malaria, scientists said today.

Researchers have discovered new ways in which the malaria parasite survives in the blood stream of its victims.

They say their discovery could result in new treatments being developed to eradicate the disease.

The researchers at the Medical Research Council’s (MRC) Toxicology Unit, based at Leicester University and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, have

identified a key protein - called a kinase - that if targeted stops the disease.

Malaria is caused by a parasite that lives inside an infected mosquito and is transferred into humans through a bite.

Once inside the body, parasites use a complex process to enter red blood cells and survive within them.

By identifying one of the key proteins needed for the parasite to survive in the red blood cells, the researchers prevented the protein from working, killing the parasite.

The researchers used state-ofthe-art methods to dissect the pathways involved in keeping

Scientists have found new ways in which the malaria parasite survives in the blood stream, which could pave the way for new treatments for the disease. Pictured is the malaria parasite entering the blood

Malaria is caused by a parasite that lives inside an infected mosquito and is transferred into humans through bites. Pictured is a female mosquito engorged with human blood.

the malaria parasite alive.

They used an approach called chemical genetics, where synthetic chemicals are used in combination with introducing genetic changes to the DNA of the parasite.

This is a real breakthrough in our understanding of how malaria survives in the blood stream and invades red blood cells Professor Andrew Tobin They found that one protein kinase, PfPKG, plays a central role in various pathways that allow the parasite to survive in the blood.

They explained that understanding the pathways

the parasite uses means that future drugs could be precisely designed to kill the parasite.

This could be done with limited toxicity, making them safe enough to be used by children and pregnant women.

Study co-lead author Professor Andrew Tobin, from the MRC Toxicology Unit at Leicester University, said: ‘This is a real breakthrough in our understanding of how malaria survives in the blood stream and invades red blood cells.

‘We’ve revealed a process that allows this to happen and if it can be targeted by drugs we could see something that stops malaria in its tracks without

causing toxic side-effects.’

Professor David Baker, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said: ‘It is a great advantage in drug discovery research if you know the identity of the molecular target of a particular drug and the consequences of blocking its function.

‘It helps in designing the most effective combination treatments and also helps to avoid drug resistance which is a major problem in the control of malaria worldwide.’

Malaria currently infects more than 200 million people worldwide and accounts for more than 500,000 deaths per year, according to the World Health Organisation.

Professor Patrick Maxwell, chair of the MRC’s Molecular and Cellular Medicine Board, said: ‘Tackling malaria is a global challenge, with the parasite continually working to find ways to survive our drug treatments.

‘By combining a number of techniques to piece together how the malaria parasite survives, this study opens the door on potential new treatments that could find and exploit the disease’s weak spots but with limited side-effects for patients.’

Source: Dailymail.co.uk

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

>>>Pg 43

Chelsea offer £11m a year to use Wembley Stadium - report

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AFCON qualifiers: NFF may reconsider Kaduna stadium over bomb

Football pundit warns against appointing foreign coach for Eagles

Brown Ideye and John Mikel Obi

By Albert Akota with agency report

A

1980 Africa Cup of Nations winner, Segun Odegbami has kicked against the hiring of a foreign coach for the Super Eagles following the dismissal of Stephen Keshi.

Keshi was relieved of his duties by the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) on Saturday night, for allegedly applying to coach African champions Cote d’Ívoire.

Technical Director of the NFF, Shuaibu Amodu has been

mandated to handle the team on an interim basis before a substantive coach; preferably a foreigner is named by the Amaju Pinnick-led NFF Executive Committee.

But speaking in an interview with Sports Vanguard yesterday, Odegbami warned that he would lead Nigerians to resist the hiring of an foreigner for the Eagles, insisting that our ‘foreign coach is a Nigerian living in Nigeria’.

Odegbami, while raising the alarm of an hidden agenda behind the hiring of a foreign coach, said that the NFF does not need to go outside the shores of the country to

get a coach for the Eagles as there was one in Nigeria, in the person of former Eagles captain, Sunday Oliseh, who he backed to do better than the foreigner the NFF was shopping for.

“We don’t need a foreign coach for the Eagles. If the NFF has plans to hire a foreign coach, it does not need to go abroad as we have a technical qualified, intellectually sound and world-acclaimed pundit in Sunday Oliseh.

“The world recognises the immense knowledge of Oliseh on football matters. He has the education and knows about tactical

formations.

He has worked with academies in Europe and has a deep knowledge of the game and knows how to manage players. Super Sports recognises him. He has distinguished himself amongst his peers.

We have gone beyond the level of going overseas to look for coaches for our national team as Nigeria has its own foreign coach in Oliseh.

“There would be a hidden agenda behind the hiring of a foreign coach. So the best option for us is to make use of Oliseh as he possesses all the requirements

to succeed on the job. Oliseh is the right candidate, so they should give the job to him’’, added Odegbami.

While frowning at Amodu’s appointment as the temporary coach of the Eagles, Odegbami said that the recent appointment was in direct conflict with his job as the technical director of the NFF. “I really have issues with his appointment as he is the technical director of the NFF, with its clear mandate and responsibilities. Now he is being saddled with additional job. It looks untidy”, added the former Shooting Stars of Ibadan striker.

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

PAGE 42

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PAGE 43

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

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PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

Sport

Kukuruku Dragons vow to beat Enugu Rangers

By Albert Akota

E

do State giant-killers, Kukuruku Dragons are back on the road as the Round of 32 matches of this year’s men’s Federation Cup competition kick off today.

The wave-making side defeated BJ Foundation in the final of the Edo State competition, and then prevailed 3-2 over God’s Time FC from Delta State in the play-off round. In the Round of 64, the Dragons saw off Nigeria Professional Football League side, Giwa FC 7-6 on penalties after both teams drew 2-2 in regulation time.

Today, the attention of most lovers of the Federation Cup will be called to the Kwara State Sports Complex, Ilorin where Kukuruku

will take on five –time winners Enugu Rangers for a spot in the Round of 16.

At the UJ Esuene Stadium, Calabar, Heartland FC and Sharks FC will slug it out in one of only two all-Professional Football League clashes, the other being the fireworks between FC IfeanyiUbah and Bayelsa United at Oleh Township Stadium. A total of 13 matches will be played on Wednesday in the men’s competition, with the other three coming up on Thursday.

In the women’s competition, COD Ladies coached by former Super Falcons goalkeeper and Captain Ann Chiejine combat Cup holders Rivers Angels in Abuja, while Nasarawa Amazons go to battle against Delta Queens in Ibadan.

Okonkwo positive against Bayelsa United today

AFCON qualifiers: NFF may reconsider Kaduna stadium over bomb

Eagles

I

n the space of two weeks after the Nigerian government issued an order dismantling military check points across the country, more than two hundred lives have been lost to bomb attacks by members of the notorious Boko Haram jihadist group.

These attacks have all happened in the north of the country with major cities Maiduguri, Kano, Jos and Zaria being hit.

Yesterday, a bomb attack in Zaria left at least 25 people dead.

Zaria is about 78km from Kaduna, venue of the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations qualification match between Nigeria and Egypt.

Security came into the news last month when Super Eagles captain Vincent Enyeama voiced concerns about the safety of players and fans ahead of the opening qualifier against Chad in Kaduna, a city that had been attacked in the past.

However, the Nigeria Football

Federation insisted that the city was safe and that everything would be made to secure players and fans at the stadium.

That game ended without an incident except for a few unruly fans who invaded the pitch during goal celebrations as Nigeria won 2-0.

Afterwards, the NFF queried Enyeama and asked the goalkeeper to appear before a disciplinary committee hearing for the “uncomplimentary remarks with regards to safety and security” he made.

In a later release, the NFF refused to address the security concerns, insisting that the Super Eagles would take on the Pharaohs in Kaduna on March 23, 2016, after their next game away to Tanzania in September.

However, with the recent return of violence to the North during the holy month of Ramadan, a lot of questions are being asked of the

NFF. It seems that the organization is yet to have a discussion about the possibility of shifting the game to a safer part of the country as Goal tried to reach officials on Tuesday afternoon.

“No, no, no I will not talk on that one, I will not talk on that one,” said NFF general secretary Dr. Mohammed Sanusi, before hanging up the line when Goal called him for the federation’s decision.

A text message to NFF president Amaju Pinnick did not get a response by the time of publishing this report.

Neither did NFF spokesman Ademola Olajire pick the calls made to his mobile phone.

It is not yet known what the response of the Egyptian team as well as the Confederation of African Football would be to these recent attacks.

Falconets depart for Liberia today with 18 players

By Albert Akota

N

igeria U-20 women team are expected to depart the shores of the country today with a 27-person delegation for Liberia.

They will fly through Accra and Abidjan before setting out to Monrovia.

The delegation includes 18 players and nine officials as the team will face the Liberia female

Chibuzor Okonkwo

F

C Ifeanyiubah defender Chibuzor Okonkwo is relishing the Federation Cup clash against Bayelsa United in Oleh today.

Both Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL) sides will be out to secure a place in the round-of-16 stage of the cup competition.

Okonkwo was confident that his team can overcome the familiar opponent.

“Bayelsa United are familiar opponents, they forced us to a goalless draw in the NPFL match day 6 clash right there at their home,” Okonkwo said.

“The Federation Cup round-

of-32 clash though a different ball game with a neutral venue, Oleh appears a perfect platform for us to prove our superiority.

“We just need to calm down and play our normal game, I’m confident we will beat them for the round-of-16 ticket.

“We won our last league game heading into the Cup clash against 3SC it will act as morale boost for us to go all out to achieve victory.

“Bayelsa United, too won their last league game against neighbours, Warri Wolves and equally boosted to challenge for the round of 16 ticket but we are determined to deny them the luxury.”

team for a place at the 2016 Fifa U20 Women’s World Cup billed for Papua New Guinea.

Despite reports of a fresh outbreak of Ebola virus disease in the West African country, the Confederation of African Football has opted not to move the match to a neutral venue.

Caf has appointed Aissatou Inter Keita of the Republic of Guinea as referee for the match billed for the Antoinette Tubman

Falconets

Stadium on Sunday.

She will be assisted by compatriots Fantagbe Kaba, Manty Keita and Isatou Touray as assistant referee1, assistant referee 2 and reserve referee respectively.

The match commissioner is Fatou Camara from Mali.

The winner of the fixture will proceed to the third round of qualifiers, to play the winner of the Namibia/DR Congo fixture.

Sport Chelsea offer £11m a year to use Wembley Stadium - report

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

PAGE 45

C

helsea are ready to pay £11 million a year to use Wembley Stadium for three seasons if the planned Stamford Bridge expansion goes ahead, The Times has reported.

The newspaper says Chelsea, who is likely to need a temporary home from the 2017-18 season, made the offer to Wembley Stadium’s board and now lead the race to occupy the ground.

Tottenham, who will need to relocate during a similar period while their new stadium is built, are said to have offered just £8 million a year to use Wembley.

The Times says the Wembley board has yet to decide whether to rent the national stadium to a

Jose Mourinho

Liverpool signs Adekanye from Barcelona

L

Bobby Adekanye

LOSS OF DOCUMENTS

This is to inform the general public that the ORIGINAL LAND DOCUMENT IN RESPECT OF PLOT 576 WITH FILE NO. BZTP/LA/KB/363 OF ABOUT 1,200SQM,AND PLOT NO.3456 WITH FILE NO BN.62484 IN OROZO LAYOUT OF ABOUT 1,250SQM AND PLOT 2775 AT APO RESETTLEMENT LAYOUT AT CADASTRAL ZONE E27 WITH ORIGINAL INTERNATIONAL PASSPORT BELONGING TO FRANCIS JOHN AMEH WIT PASSP NO. A04058978 were missing at gawrimpa when my car was vandalized on the 1/07/2015 and all effort made to trace document proves abortive and found take it to the nearest police station or contact us on this 08034500049,08036441485,08027833354

CHANGE OF NAME I FORMERLY KNOWN AS miss okoyeocha josephine NOW WISH TO BE KNOWN AS mrs. okeke josephine.ALL FORMER DOCUMENTS REMAIN VALID. diamond bank and the GENERAL PUBLIC TAKE NOTE. CHANGE OF NAME

I FORMERLY KNOWN AS MISS tani mairabo NOW WISH TO BE KNOWN AS MRS tani mary samson albert. ALL FORMER DOCUMENTS REMAIN VALID,GENERAL PUBLIC TAKE NOTE.

iverpool has completed the signing of teenager Bobby Adekanye from Barcelona.

The 16-year-old announced the move on his Instagram page, where he posted a photo of himself at Liverpool.

Adekanye has been on loan at PSV Eindhoven and was one of five transfers to Barcelona’s youth system that were banned from playing for the club in a clampdown by FIFA last summer over claims they had been signed illegally.

Born in Nigeria, Adekanye moved to Holland when he was four to live in Amsterdam with his family.

He arrived in Barcelona in 2011 after spending time with Ajax.

Now 16, he would have been able to begin playing for Barcelona in January.

Adekanye played for Holland in February earlier this year at the Under 16 UEFA development tournament.

team, given that it also generates substantial funds from other events, including NFL games and music concerts.

Chelsea could also look to move to Twickenham, the national rugby union stadium, should they fail to secure a deal for Wembley.

The Premier League champions are set to hold a public consultation on their Stamford Bridge redevelopment plans in September and to lodge a planning application with the local council in December.

Swiss architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron has already unveiled its plans for the new-look Stamford Bridge, which is set to see capacity increase from 42,000 to 60,000.

Sterling to join Man City’s pre -season tour as £50m deal closer

Liverpool allow Balotelli to leave after adoptive father’s death

M

ario Balotelli was given compassionate leave to miss Liverpool’s first days of preseason training following the death of his adoptive father.

Balotelli returned to Italy to attend the funeral of Francesco Balotelli, who died following a long illness.

Liverpool began preseason training on Monday, but the former Manchester City forward has been allowed time off following the bereavement.

He is expected to return to the club in time to play a part in their preseason tour of the Far East and Australia, for which they will fly out on Sunday.

Balotelli, 24, left a message on Twitter following Francesco’s death, which read: “Thanks everyone for the support. I really wanna thank everybody. My family thanks all of you too.”

The Italy international was born to Ghanaian immigrants in Palermo in August 1990, but was placed in foster care at the age of three.

He was adopted by Silvia and Francesco Balotelli, growing up in the town of Concesio, in the northern Italian province of Brescia.

Raheem Sterling

M

anchester City is closing in on a £50m deal for Raheem Sterling that will see him included in their pre-season tour of Australia.

Etihad bosses are confident of striking a deal with Liverpool for the England winger before the end of next week.

It is doubtful an agreement will be reached before Manuel Pellegrini’s squad leave on Thursday, but the Chilean remains hopeful Sterling will link-up with his men midway through the tour.

City has seen two bids of up to £40m rejected, with the Reds holding out for £50m.

Starsport understands City chairman Khaldoon Al-Mubarak is willing to meet the asking price and knows agreeing personal terms with Sterling will be a formality.

City is convinced the Reds will accept £45m in cash - plus an extra £5m depending on Sterling’s success at the Etihad.

The deal would smash City’s transfer record and make Sterling the most expensive Englishman in history.

Sterling returned to pre-season training with Brendan Rodgers’s men yesterday, but has made it clear he wants to leave Anfield after rejecting a new deal worth £100,000-a-week.

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

PAGE 46

LOSS OF DOCUMENTS

This is to notify the general public of the Loss of Original Certificate of Occupancy (Customary)No.MZTP/LA/MISC/95/735, and Acknowledgement Certificate of FCTA Regularization of Land titles and Documents of FCTA Area Council belonging to CHURCH OF CHRIST, NYANYA Abuja, issued by Federal Capital Territory Administration Abuja. All efforts made to trace the said document proved abortive. If found please return to the nearest police station

CHANGE OF NAME

CHANGE OF NAME

I, formerly known as Miss. Abigail Gadimoh now wish to be known and addressed as Mrs. Abigail Abraham. All former documents remain valid. General public should please take note.

CHANGE OF NAME I formerly known as Muhammed Nura Wakaso now wish to be addressed as muhammed Nura Kawo. All former document remain valid the general public should please take note.

PROVISIONS AND ALLIED COMMODITIES DEALERS ASSOCIATION RUMUWOJI MILE ONE MARKET DIOBU, PORTHARCOURT

DUCHESSUGO WEIGHTLOSS INITIATIVE

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990 THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Miss Ugonnaya Onyinyechi Okpara JP. 2. Dr. Oji Ogbonnaya Oji 3. Arc. Mrs. Victoria Onu 4. Barr. Mrs. Joy Chiori 5. Mrs. Ijeoma Josephine Okpara THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES: (1) To provide care, support and education to Orphans and Vulnerable Children and Succour to persons afflicted by HIV/ AIDS (2) To provide aid for disabled and physically challenged persons (3) To collaborate with government and international agencies in the areas of support for the elderly and maternal child health.

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: SECRETARY

PUBLIC NOTICE

YAHAYA KWANDE FOUNDATION

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

LOSS OF DOCUMENTS This is to inform the general public of the loss of original certificate of occupancy (customary )with file No. FCT/GAC/KG/906 and plot No. 390 cadastral zone 04 - 07 old KAIDA ROAD LAYOUT GWAGWALADA ABUJA. Bearing Hon. Justice Stephen Sado Idajili. All efforts to trace the said Documents proved abortive. If found, Kindly return to the nearest police station. General public should please take note.

CHANGE OF NAME

I formerly know and called Olanipekun Esther Oluyemi and now wish to be know and address as Ade Ayo Esther Oluyemi of NO 2 Joseph Adeyemi Esther off- Ife Sowapo Estate, Akure Ogun State all former documents remain valid, general Public should take note.

I FORMERLY ADDRESSED AS ayitogo onyashama sa’adatu NOW WISHES TO BE KNOWN AND ADDRESS AS yahya onyashama sa’adatu, ALL FORMER DOCUMENTS REMAIN VALID, itf and the GENERAL PUBLIC TAKE NOTE.

PUBLIC NOTICE

LOSS OF DOCUMENTS This is to inform the general public of the LOSS OF ORIGINAL C OF O DOCUMENT OF PLOT NO. 834 WITH FILE NO. 60885 CADASTRAL ZONE E23 KYAMI DISTRICT GRANTED TO DANIEL EMIEDERIKUMO AND HOUSE DOCUMENT OF NO. 72 FEDERAL HOUSING 21C ROAD LUGBE ABUJA IN THE SAME ENVELOPE ON 27/06/2015. ALL EFFORT MADE TO TRACE THE SAID DOCUMENT PROVE ABORTIVE. If found please return to the nearest police station.General public take note.

CHANGE OF NAME I FORMERLY KNOWN AND ADDRESSED AS OLUSHOLA REBECCA YUSUF,NOW WISH TO BE KNOWN AND ADDRESSED AS DANIEL REBECCA OLUWASEUN. ALL FORMER DOCUMENTs REMAIN VALID.GENERAL PUBLIC TAKE NOTE.

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Yahaya Kwande -Chairman 2. JamilaTijjaniAbdullahi 3. Yusuf Yahaya-Kwande -Secretary 4. Halima Yahaya-Kwande 5. WaziriYahaya-Kwande 6. KabiruYahaya-Kwande 7. Barr. Danjuma Maina 8. AVM. Umaru Abba 9. Godfrey Bawa 10. Hon. Jock Alamba 11. Mrs. Monica Idris THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES: 1. To cater for the less privileged.

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: SECRETARY

LOSS OF DOCUMENTS

This is to inform the general public of the LOSS OF ORIGINAL CERTIFICATE OF OCCUPANCY WITH RESPECT TO A LAND LOCATED AT GBOKO, BENUE STATE, PLOT NO. BNB 7956, ON LAYOUT TPS 042, BEARING PIUS APEE HUL. All efforts made to trace it has proved abortive.

If found, please report to the nearest police station if found. The general public to please take note.

PUBLIC NOTICE

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. STANLEY ALIA 2. IFEANYI ARALU 3. IFEANYI EMEGHARA 4. EUGINIA NWOKORO 5. OLIVER DURU

- CHAIRMAN

THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES:

1. TO PROTECT THE INTEREST OF MEMBERS. Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: SECRETARY

PUBLIC NOTICE BETHEL WONDER & SOLUTION MINISTRY

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Adekeye Stephen Adedoyin 2. AdegboyeAdeyemi 3. Ajayi Adebayo Tope 4. Iwarere Babatunde Peter 5. Owolabi Omotosho 6. Adekeye Hannah Bolanle 7. Omomeji Adebayo David THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES:

1. To promote the kingdom of God here on earth.

2. To preach the undiluted gospel of Jesus Christ.

3. To liberate people from bondage and oppression of the devil through prayers salvations of soul.

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: SECRETARY

PUBLIC NOTICE

IFESOWAFO 2012 COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT INITIATIVE

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Saka Mohammed 2. Segun Kolawole 3. Owa Oluwadunsin 4. Kehinde Abiodun

- Chairman - Secretary - Treasurer - Auditor

THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES:

1. To compliment government effort in providing quality education and good health care services to community dwellers and organise enlightenment programmes on aids awareness.

2. To bring about positive change and transformation in the community.

3. To create opportunity for empowerment and skill acquisition for the community at large.

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: E. E. OKENE; 08065336084

PAGE 47

PEOPLES DAILY, WEDNESday, JULY 8, 2015

PUBLIC NOTICE

ATMOSPHERE OF LOVE CHAPLAINCY ASSOCIATION

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. H. R. H. EzeIhezie Felix Ononuju 2. Rev. David Olagunju Bamidele 3. Prince Desmond O. M. Ononuju 4. Dr. Ma’d Jagafa 5. Cecilia Imaji Ogar 6. Paul Edoka Sani 7. Olufemi Audu 8. Mallam Ansabe Ashama 9. Kingsley Idowu Ajayi 10. Anyakudo Geoffrey THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES:

1. To propagate love and peaceful co-existence in the society.

2. To see for the welfare of their members.

3. To foster friendship and welfare amongst the membership.

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: SECRETARY

PUBLIC NOTICE

FORUM FOR EVOLUTION AND PROGRESSIVE DEVELOPMENT

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990 THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Olushoga Sadiku - Chairman 2. Miss Ngozi Ike - Treasurer 3. Comrade Uchenna Uzoije - Secretary 4. Barrister Uzor Okafor 5. Mr. Olufemi Olajide - Vice Chairman 6. Mr. Chinedu Igbo THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES: 1. To foster unity among members.

PUBLIC NOTICE

FOUNDATION FOR DEVELOPMENT OF WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990 THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Mahmood Sadiq Rafia 2. KofoworolaO yeleye THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES: 1. To empower female business owners with leadership, management and entrepreneurial skills.

2. To link female entrepreneurs with opportunities for business growth.

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: BARR. JIBRIN A. SANI 08035097705

PUBLIC NOTICE

THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES: 1. To assist women and less privileged.

PUBLIC NOTICE GILGAL REVIVAL AND PROPHETIC MINISTRY

THE GIRLS APOSTOLICE MINISTRY OF ALL NATIONS

PUBLIC NOTICE

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

The general public is hereby notified that the above named has applied to the corporate affairs commission abuja for registration under part c of the companies and allied matters act no. 1 Of 1990.

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Hon. Ete Keke 2. Evang. Bukola Soretire 3. Bro. Timothy Soretire 4. Miss Kofoworola Soretire

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Temilolu Oluwakemi Okeowo 2. Pastor Wole Oladiyun 3. Dr. Oludotun Akinde 4. Pastor Olorunleke Timothy

THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES:

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES 1.

To re-orientate girls all over the world and divert their attention tot he kingdom of God. 2.

To raise girls who would thirst for righteousness and positively influence the female folk.

3.

To assist girls in discovery their stars and thereby become global icon/leaders.

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the registrar general, corperate affairs commission, plot 420 tigris crescent, off aguiyiironsi street, maitama, abuja within 28 days from the date of this publication.

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. MR EPHRAIM NWAKA 2. MR JOSEPH NWANJOKA 3. MR BENNETH ONAH 4. MR EMEKA NWACHUKWU 5. CHIEF EMMANUEL UKATU 6. SIR,CHIKA NWABUGO 7. MR ONUH ALOYSIUS 8. PRINCE EZEALA HYACINTH U. 9. CHIEF ALOYSIUS EWULUM 10. MR OGONNA CHUKWU THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES:

1. TO PROMOTE AND PROTECT THE SOCIAL AND MORAL WELFARE OF THE MEMBERS Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: SECRETARY

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: UZOCHUKWU ARINZE JOHNSON 08038466838

PUBLIC NOTICE

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Johnbull Osarumen Amayaevbo- President 2. Odusina Olatunji Olusanya - Vice President 3. Isieza Keluro Elijah Caesar Secretary

SIGNED: SECRETARY

PUBLIC NOTICE NNEWI/ONITSHA BROTHERS UNION OF NIGERIA

THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES: 1. To teach the truth about the gospel of Jesus that will preserve generations (John 8:31-32).

2. To teach character as the foundation accompanied by skills (2 Tim. 2:19, 1Cor 3:10-11) 3. To raise godly leaders out of today’s child (2 Tim. 3:1314)

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. His Royal Highness IgweIcs Chibuoke (F.N.I.A) 2. Chief ChukwuemekaO gbute Paul 3. ChicheluJustina Obi-Agu 4. Enoch Chiedu Chiezina 5. Adeora Ogochukwu Obi-Agu

SIGNED: SECRETARY

SIGNED: SECRETARY

THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Reverened (Mrs.) Adun Akinyemiju 2. Pastor Daniel Oluwaseun 3. Hon. Joseph Shimadoo Tarka 4. Pastor (Mrs.) Modupe Olubajo 5. Pastor (Mrs.) Vivienne Seember Tarka

COLLEGE OF ESTATE MANAGEMENT READING ALUMNI ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

JUSTINA WILBERFORCE WIDOWS AND LESS PRIVILEGE FOUNDATION This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990

Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

1. To preach the gospel of Jesus Christ in every part of Nigeria and around the world for the salvation of souls to God free of charge.

2. To teach the gospel of Jesus Christ to all who are willing freely in Nigeria and across the world.

PUBLIC NOTICE TRUE HERITAGE EVANGELICAL MINISTRY

- Chairman - Secretary

THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES: 1. To protect the interest of its members Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: SECRETARY

PUBLIC NOTICE

ECOWAS NETWORK OF ELECTORAL COMMISSIONS ECONEC

This is to inform the general public that the above named has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under Part C of the Companies and Allied Matters Act, 1990 THE TRUSTEES ARE: 1. Gen. Siaka Sangare 2. Mr. Emmanuel Miranda 3. Mrs. Lea Hounkpe 4. Mr. Bakary Fofana 5. Mr. Francis Gabriel Oke

- President - Vice President - Treasurer - Deputy Treasurer

THE AIM AND OBJECTIVES: 1. To empower and enrich lives.

2. To improve access to education for the less privileged 3. To improve the quality of education 4. To empower women through capacity building and by providing access to funds Any objection to this registration should be forwarded to the Registrar-General, Corporate Affairs Commission, Plot 420, Tigris Crescent, Off AguiyiIronsi Street, Abuja within 28 days of this publication.

SIGNED: SECRETARY

SIGNED: BARR. BLESSING EKWUNIFE 07038948697

PUBLIC NOTICE PRAYER TOWER MINISTRY

PUBLIC NOTICE CHIEF CHRISTOPHER EKEOBA FOUNDATION

The general public is hereby notified that the above named ministry has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under part “C” of the company and Allied Act 1990.

The general public is hereby notified that the above named foundation has applied to the Corporate Affairs Commission for registration under part “C” of the company and Allied Act 1990.

The Trustees are; 1. Popoola Joseph Olutunde chairman 2.popoola Susan Fumilayo Secratry 3.Olubanjo Kehinde Adedeji 4.Popoola Oluwafemi Emmanuel

The Trustees are; 1). HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS WILLIAM OKOEGUALE MOMODU 2). BARR. JOHNSON EREWELE - CHAIRMAN 3). CHIEF CHRISTOPHER EKEOBA 4). BARR. DANIEL AKHIDENOR - SECRETARY 5). CHIEF DANIEL OSARA.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES 1. To co-ordinate and organize prayer sessions.

2. To organize and engage members in prayer felloship Any objection (S) to the registration should be forwarded to the registrar general Corporate Affairs Commission plot 240 Tigris crescent off Aguiyi Ironsi street maitama garki Abuja within twenty eight (28) days from the date of this publication Signed:secretary

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES 1). TO CARE FOR THE LESS PRIVILEGE PERSONS IN THE SOCIETY. Any objection (S) to the registration should be forwarded to the registrar general Corporate Affairs Commission plot 240 Tigris crescent off Aguiyi Ironsi street maitama garki Abuja within twenty eight (28) days from the date of this publication Signed: BARR. LAWRENCE EREWELE ( 08033679234 ).

www.peoplesdailyng.com

QUOTABLE QUOTE I am gutted. I am saddened. I am heartbroken by the murder of scores of innocent souls in Jos

Wednesday, july 8, 2015

SPORTS latest

Floyd Mayweather stripped of WBO title

F

ive-weight world champion Floyd Mayweather has been stripped of the WBO welterweight belt won from Manny Pacquiao in May. The 38-year-old failed to pay the WBO a $200,000 (£128,000) fee to administer the fight by the 3 July deadline.

Mayweather had been expected to relinquish the title by now, saying he planned to do so following his point’s victory over Pacquiao.

Fellow American Timothy Bradley will now become the full belt holder.

After Mayweather defeated Pacquiao, he had declared he would vacate all his titles in order to give younger fighters the chance to win belts.

“The WBO World Championship Committee is allowed no other alternative but to cease to recognize Mr Floyd Mayweather Jr as the WBO welterweight champion of the world and vacate his title.” said a statement on wboboxing.com.

Alonso tips Gerrard for Galaxy glory

S

teven Gerrard may be synonymous with Liverpool, but the former England skipper will be a huge success in MLS following his move to LA Galaxy.

That is the view of Gerrard’s former team-mate Xabi Alonso, who is in no doubt that Gerrard will inspire those in the StubHub Center dressing room in the same way he did across 17 years in the first-team squad at Anfield.

Alonso played with Gerrard for five seasons between 2004 and 2009, the midfielders dovetailing to great effect in a period where Liverpool competed in two UEFA Champions League finals famously winning in 2005 - one semi-final and one quarter-final, as well as lifting the FA Cup and finishing second in the Premier League.

Advert: 0806 business: 0704 news: 0814 lagos: 0805 0803

. . . putting the people first

– Former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar

What is wrong with hunting witches?

“To repay the civilities and little friendships of hospitality by robbing the house where you have received them, is to be the basest and meanest of thieves.”

Henry Fielding, 1707-1754, in TOM JONES. (Vanguard Book Of Quotations p 244).

Wednesday Column Biola Sobowale

S

uddenly, the possibility that we might be having probes conducted is already inducing many politicians and their associates from speaking from the two sides of their mouths at once. President Buhari, APC, announces that he will probe former government, PDP, and some people call if a witch-hunt. I partly agree if the probe instituted does not start from 1999. From that era, we have $13-16 billion spent on power supply improvement which failed to occur. The newlyelected Governor Wike, PDP, of Rivers State announced he will probe former Governor Amechi, APC, and somebody calls it witchhunt. The most bizarre one is from Ekiti State where Governor Fayose, PDP, said he would institute a probe concerning N4 billion allegedly embezzled by former Governor Fayemi, APC. Instead of Fayemi answering for himself, it was the APC, which will not be a party to the proceedings, which calls it a witch-hunt. The Fayemi I know is quite capable of defending himself and needs no busy-bodies to do it for him.

I will be personally mortified if Fayemi’s tenure cannot withstand the severest scrutiny – if the inquiry is conducted openly and fairly.

That said; let me declare my support for witch-hunting if by witches we mean every single official who had made public funds to develop wings under cover of darkness cast on the people by not running transparent governments. Let’s hunt all the witches, whoever they may be and whatever their political affiliations might be.

Indeed, if there is one major reason the Federal Government of Nigeria and most states of Nigeria are heavily indebted and cannot pay salaries and provide services to the people, it is because we had always allowed “witches” to devour us in more ways than we can count.

But, before that, let me make another point about the witches.

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Femi-Fani Kayode Right in front of our eyes some individuals have transformed from “good guys” to “bad guys”, or “bad guys” to “good guys”, depending on the party label they now carry. Chapter 8 of my book, PDP: CORRUPTION INCORPORATED was devoted to the atrocities committed by a former card-carrying PDP member now in APC, who now wants to probe his predecessor.

Two more examples will do.

In 2013, when Femi FaniKayode was blasting former President Jonathan at will, he was embraced by the APC. If he had continued that way till today, he would be a “good guy” to APC and “bad guy” to PDP. His case pending with the EFCC would have been judged in advance accordingly – witchhunt or deserved punishment.

Some would have pointed out that the offence was committed ten years ago; so why continue?

Some time around 2010, a former PDP Governor had the office of the ACN in Portharcourt closed.

PDP applauded, ACN called it a rape of democracy. Today, the Governor is a “good guy” to APC. If Wike closes the APC office now, he will be tyrant. Readers can easily see how our politicians

expect us to alter our views about people depending on which party card they carry. The party card has become a powerful detergent which washes away all previous atrocities or a stain which sticks.

That by itself is good reason why we must hunt all the witches.

As the saying goes in America, you can’t cheat an honest man.

No probe can establish that somebody stole a kobo if the books of account don’t say so.

At this point, please follow me down the history of Nigeria.

Both Chief Obafemi Awolowo and Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe were the subjects of “witch-hunts” or probes – if you like. Zik was hammered first by the British because the NCNC, which he led, was a thorn in the flesh of the colonial masters. The Foster Sutton Inquiry, looking into the financial affairs of the Eastern Region, where Zik was Premier, indicted his government for “mismanagement” of funds in the African Continental Bank, ACB. To NCNC members, including my father, who loved Zik next to God, it was a witch-hunt. To the Action Group members, it was a fair inquiry. The WEST AFRICAN PILOT owned by Zik and the

TRIBUNE owned by Awolowo were obviously covering different events from the editorials they wrote when the report was released.

Years after, Awolowo was in jail for treason because Justice Sowemimo said “my hands are tied”. (We have again heard about hands being tied recently, proving that nothing really changes in Nigeria). With Awo in jail and his political antagonists in power in the Western Region and Federal, a Coker Inquiry was instituted into the affairs of the Western Regional Government under Awolowo. Even a dunce can guess the outcome of the probe. Awo was indicted; but since he was already serving a life sentence, he could not be jailed again. Predictably, the NPC/NNA Alliance and their media houses called it a fair and impartial probe. The TRIBUNE called it (do you need me to tell you?) – a witch-hunt; naturally.

Obviously, in Nigeria one is guilty or not depending on the party affiliation of the person reacting to it. If beauty is universally only in the eye of the observer, then in Nigeria guilt is also in the mind of the person listening to the verdict. So, we might as well have the “witchhunts” of 2015 for us and posterity to argue about.

To be continued…..

NEXT WEEK: Apart from embezzlement of funds, how about lives snuffed out in political murders, since 1999, still unsolved? (biolasobowale@yahoo.com)

DAN GAYE

Robbers rape female doctors in Calabar –News

They are very stupid !

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