Nigeria
House of Reps suspends President Buhari’s scheduled appearance
The House of Representatives on Wednesday suspended its earlier plan for a briefing by President Muhammadu Buhari, after it became clear the president would no longer honour the House’s invitation. At plenary Wednesday, the House failed to mention an item on its order paper to admit Mr Buhari into the House chamber. It was the clearest evidence Mr Buhari, who was billed to explain the terrible security situation in the country to lawmakers, had cancelled the plan, confirming a report he would back off. All Progressives Congress (APC) governors had urged Mr Buhari to shelve his scheduled appearance. At a Tuesday night meeting between the governors and the party’s caucus in the National Assembly, those in attendance argued for hours on reasons for and against the appearance of the president ...
Osun monarch declares war on ritualists
The Oluwo of Iwo, Oba Abdulrasheed Akanbi, has declared war against ritual killings in his domain, saying he would confiscate the ritualists’ den that was recently discovered in Iwo. Oba Akanbi, who condemned ritual killings, said no man of conscience would kill fellow human beings for monetary gain. In a statement made available to journalists through his press secretary, Alli Ibraheem, the monarch expressed shock that some elements in his domain engaged in ritual killings despite the regular campaigns against the ills. It described the perpetrators as “bastards” and urged security agencies to conduct full investigation into the development. The statement partly read, “As an ardent campaigner against ritual killings, I condemn in totality the recently discovered ritual den in Iyemoja, Iwo...
Nigerian government wants children’s parliament established in schools
Minister of Women Affairs, Mrs Pauline Tallen has called for the establishment of children’s parliament in schools to aide planning and implementation of programmes affecting children. Tallen made the call on Tuesday in Abuja during an interaction with children in commemoration of the 16 days activism to end Gender Based Violence (GBV). She said establishing children’s parliament in schools would provide a platform for students to express their views, help in implementing programmes affecting them and eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls. “It is my hope that after this event, the school authorities will set up guidelines to establish Children’s Parliament within the schools. “This will provide a platform for harvesting the voices of children in planning and implementing ...
Akwa Ibom Assembly passes N456.25 billion Appropriation Bill
The Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly Tuesday passed into Law the state appropriation bill of N456.25billion for the 2021 fiscal year. The 2021 appropriation bill is broken down to of N164.52billion Recurrent expenditure, N241.45billion Capital Expenditure and N50.3billion for Consolidated Revenue Fund Charges. This is against the N435.65billion proposed by the governor, Mr Udom Emmanuel to the House of Assembly in the month of October. The bill was passed after the adoption of the report of the House Committee on Finance and Appropriation Committee, presented by the Chairman, Mr Uduak Odudoh, during Tuesday plenary. Odudoh explained that Ministries Departments and Agencies (MDAs), Non-Governmental Organisations and other relevant publics participated in the budget process before its passa...
House of Reps summons auditor-general over $36.1 million World Bank loan
The House of Representatives has summoned the acting Auditor General of the Federation, Mr Aghughu Adolphus, over a $36.1m facility under the Fiscal Governance and Institutions Project of the World Bank, to the office. The House Committee on Public Accounts issued the summons at its public hearing in Abuja on Tuesday. Adolphus, who had earlier been invited by the committee, had failed to show up on Tuesday. His representatives led by a Deputy Director, Mr Babalola Olanrewaju, could not explain to the lawmakers the rationale behind taking the loan. Chairman of the committee, Mr Wole Oke, said, “We want to know what the loan was meant for before going to sign for it. What was your procurement plan before arriving at that figure? Or is it a reward? We need to know the programme plan, how you ...
Jigawa Assembly passes 2021 Appropriation Bill
Jigawa State House of Assembly has on Tuesday passed the 2021 Appropriation Bill of N156.588 billion. This followed the adoption of a 2021 appropriation committee’s report led by the House Committee on Appreciation chairman, Hon. Suleiman Kadara, at plenary. Kadara, who is representing Guri Constituency, told the House that the committee had done justice to the appropriation bill presented by Gov. Muhammad Badaru to the house on Nov. 4. Badaru had sought the consideration of the House to appropriate the sum of N156.588 billion for the services of the Jigawa State Government during the period of Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2021. Of the figures, N78.346 billion was earmarked for recurrent expenditures, including provisions for contingency and stabilization funds, while N78.241 was for capital expendi...
NUC: Visitation panels to federal universities to be gazetted
The National Universities Commission (NUC) said the visitation panels to 38 federal universities and four Inter-University Centres recently approved by the President Muhammadu Buhari will be gazetted to enable the exercise to be carried out. The NUC Executive Secretary, Abubakar Rasheed, disclosed this in a statement by Ibrahim Yakasai, Director, Corporate Affairs, NUC in Abuja on Tuesday. The statement quoted the executive secretary as saying that the federal ministry of education was working with the justice ministry to ensure that the gazetting is done expeditiously. He said that as soon as the gazetting was done, the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, would inaugurate the panels after which they would proceed to their respective universities for the assignment. He explained that all f...
APC: PDP pushing Nigeria into one-party state
The All Progressives Congress (APC) has accused the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) of pushing the country into a one-party state. The ruling party said this in a reaction to a statement credited to the opposition party. PDP had asked the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to deregister APC and declare seats of its lawmakers vacant following its decision to dissolve all organs of the party. In a statement on Tuesday, Yekini Nabena, APC deputy spokesman, described PDP’s call as a “beer parlour rant”. “If the PDP assumes this as its standard of opposition politics, then our democracy is in danger. It is now clear that the PDP’s disillusion following their rejection by Nigerians in the 2015 and 2019 general election has degenerated into senility,” Nabena said. “With the PDP as th...
CAFCL: Plateau United threatens protest against Tanzanian side
Nigeria Professional Football League side, Plateau United, have given an indication they would be lodging a protest against Simba SC for the alleged antics they deployed to progress in the CAF Champions League at their expense. Plateau United on their official Twitter handle said they are planning to report the Tanzanian club to the continent’s football ruling body for falsely claiming two of their key players tested positive for COVID-19 and were thus not allowed to play in Saturday’s second leg tie. The club while posting a negative result of one of the players alleged the false-positive results was only meant to weaken the team and give Simba SC an undue advantage. “The management of Plateau United is looking to petition CAF to look into the antics of @SimbaSC_EN who kept out two of our...
NCC to ensure enforcement of copyright laws from 2021 – chief
File Photo The Director General, Nigeria Copyright Commission (NCC), Mr John Asien, says the commission would focus more on the enforcement of copyright laws as from 2021. Asien told newsmen on the sidelines of the just concluded 39th International Convention of the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA) in Ilorin, that it would no longer be business as usual for pirates, as different strategies would be used, both online and in physical space, to ensure that pirates stopped selling pirated books. ”For us at the commission, we are more than committed, by next year we will be focusing more on enforcement and we are going to do that in all nooks and cranny of Nigeria. ”We are going to use different strategies and working on different platforms, both online and the physical space. This is beca...
Police: No #EndSARS protest in FCT
The Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Police Command, Abuja, on Monday dismissed the viral videos and pictures in circulation in the social media suggesting that another #EndSARS protest was staged in the FCT earlier in day describing it as fake news. In a statement made available to newsmen in Abuja by the Command’s spokesperson, ASP Yusuf Mariam, the Police described purported #EndSARS protest as fake news designed to cause tension in the FCT and urged the members of the public to disregard it in its entirety. The statement reads in parts, “The Command wishes to categorically state that there was no ‘EndSARS protest’ in the FCT, hence, members of the public are enjoined to disregard the video which is mischievous and intended to cause tension amongst residents.” “While urging residents to ...
Kaduna screens youths for community policing to curb insecurity
Kaduna state government has started screening youths in its preparation to commence community policing to tackle insecurity in the state. The Acting Governor, Hadiza Balarabe, chaired a meeting which is part of the consultations in the three senatorial districts on how to address insecurity on Monday. The meeting had senators, members of the House of Representatives, state House of Assembly members and chairmen from the 15 local government areas in Kaduna North and Kaduna Central senatorial zones as well as District Heads in attendance. Speaking with journalists after the meeting, the senator representing Kaduna Central zone, Uba Sani, said they came together to look into the security problem facing Kaduna, stressing that insecurity needs to be tackled collectively. “I’m working on a bill ...
