Category: News

Nigeria’s former president, Olusegun Obasanjo, has reacted to the attack on his farmland at Hawe in Aliade area of Gwer East local government of Benue state by some suspected hoodlums.

The Punch reports that the former president said the destruction and burning down of his 2,420 hectares of farmland is a bad development.

In a statement issued by his special assistant on media, Kehinde Akinyemi, in Abeokuta, Ogun state, Obasanjo said government at the state and local government level have taken up the matter.

Noting that he is assured that the governments would fish out the perpetrators of the crime, the former president thanked all those who identified with him over the incident.

The statement also said that despite the huge loss caused by the attack, it is gladdening to note that no single life was lost in the incident.

Channels Television had reported that the chairman of the local government where the incident occurred told Benue state governor, Samuel Ortom that the 2,420 hectares of mango plantation belonging to Obasanjo have been razed down

Emmanuel Otserga said over half of the mango farm, covering over 139 hectares of land was razed by some suspected hoodlums.

He added that following the issue, four suspects have been arrested and more were being trailed to ensure they are all brought to justice.

Otserga said:

“From the look of things, the fire was caused by the deliberate act of mischief-makers. The farm is well safeguarded, there is no way fire can cross over from any quarter into the farm”.

Following the death of 13 persons from the deadly Delta variant of COVID19 in Edo state, Governor Godwin Obaseki has threatened to enforce another lockdown if residents don’t take the COVID-19 vaccine.

Incident Manager of the State COVID-19 Task Force, Dr. Andrew Obi, disclosed this after its daily virtual meeting presided over by Governor Godwin Obaseki on Wednesday, September 1.

Obi, who said that all 13 deaths recorded in the third wave of the virus were of unvaccinated persons, restated the need for all residents to get inoculated with the vaccines to remain safe and healthy.

Reacting to the development, the state governor, Godwin Obaseki, in a statement he signed, stressed that the state government might be forced to implement a lockdown due to rising infections and deaths from the Delta variant of the pandemic.

He said this was necessary if the people continue to disobey the directives for vaccination and compliance with the Non-Pharmaceutical Interventions (NPIs) to contain the spread of the Delta variant of COVID19 in the state.

The statement reads;

”The attention of the Edo State Government has been drawn to an order by a High Court sitting in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, directing the Government to maintain the status quo on the purported compulsory vaccination of its citizens with the COVID-19 vaccine.

To the best of our knowledge, the order is at best speculative and pre-emptive as the scheduled date for the commencement of the enforcement of the directive by the state government is the second week of September, 2021.

It must be stated that there is an obvious misconception that the directive issued by government was to make vaccination compulsory for all citizens.

Although the State Governor, in truth, has the power to make such an order under the Gazetted Quarantine Regulations, this directive is actually only a denial of access to public places of persons who chose not to be vaccinated.

We believe government’s overriding concern is the safety and health of its citizens.

We are currently confronted with a situation wherein the Case Positivity Rate (CPR) for COVID-19 hovers between 15 and 25 percent as deaths are consistently being recorded daily from COVID-19, with unvaccinated persons accounting for 100 percent of deaths in the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in the state.

Government, therefore, finds it strange that some persons in purported pursuit of their fundamental human rights would embark on litigation tourism outside of our state, seek to become a source of public health danger and put at risk the safety and health of the larger population.

Government owes a sacred duty to the populace to take all actions necessary to protect the health of the majority of the citizens and in this connection, an even greater quantity of vaccines is being secured for the use of the people of Edo State.

The Edo State Government has, therefore, instructed its Lawyers to vigorously pursue and challenge all such orders in the courts from where they emanate and if necessary, at the appellate level, while affirming its position as a law-abiding government.

It must be made clear that Government shall continue to pursue all legal and administrative options available for the protection of the best interest of the good people of Edo State.

We want to appreciate all leaders in various spheres within the state for their support so far for the vaccination exercise which has resulted in unprecedented uptake of the vaccines by Edo people.

We thank the churches, mosques, hotels, banks, event centres, restaurants and bars, among others, that have volunteered their premises for use as vaccination posts.

We want to reiterate that our directives on vaccination stands and so people who are planning social, religious, political or business events after the second week of September should ensure that both themselves and their guests are not only vaccinated but possess vaccination cards as proof of vaccination, as anyone without this proof will not be granted access to crowded facilities.

We also want to stress that the government is commencing intensive enforcement of use of Non-Pharmaceutical Interventions (NPIs) to curb the current spike in COVID-19 infections and deaths. These measures include compulsory wearing of facemasks, regular washing of hands under running water and/or use of hand sanitisers, and maintenance of recommended social and physical distancing in public places, among others.

Consequent on the rapid rise in infections and death from COVID-19, government may be forced to implement a lockdown if there is a failure to follow the directives for vaccination and compliance with the Non-Pharmaceutical Intervention (NPIs) in order to halt the spread of the Delta variant of COVID-19 which is currently raging within the state.”

In what will come across as a rather startling development, an 84-year-old man, Maxwell Akuwuodor, has allegedly rendered a widow, Mrs Rosena Akuwuodor, and her four children homeless.

A The PUNCH correspondent, who visited the scene of the incident at Umuokoji Umuorii Uratta in the Owerri North Local Government Area of Imo State on Wednesday, saw the woman and her children crying.

The widow alleged that her brother-in-law came with thugs and some men in uniform on Tuesday to evict them from the house.

The 49-year-old woman told our correspondent that her husband, Reginald Akuwuodor, died on September 9, 2020, and was buried on November 20, 2020.

Rosena, who spoke amid tears, said her brother-in-law threw her belongings out of the house with the help of the thugs and locked the gate.

She said, “My husband’s only surviving brother, Maxwell Akuwuodor, evicted me and my four children from my husband’s house on Tuesday. He threw out our loads and locked the house. This was a house built by my husband. He said he had obtained judgment against my husband, which is not true.

“As I speak with you, I am homeless. We have not eaten since yesterday. We have no place to go. We have neither taken our bath nor changed our clothes. The world should come to my rescue. I am a poor widow with three girls and a boy.

“He threw away everything that belongs to us inside a house built by my husband, including the credentials of my children. The house is a five-bedroom bungalow.”

Her brother-in-law, Maxwell, told our correspondent in a telephone conversation that the eviction was carried out by staff of the Owerri High Court.

He explained that he got a judgment against the widow’s husband on a matter of rightful ownership of the ancestral land.

But counsel for the widow, Uche Ubochi, said the court ruling was wrongly executed.

Ubochi said the court didn’t say that the widow and her children should be evicted from her husband’s house.

He noted that the judgment permitted Maxwell to take over another house said to have been built by his father (widow’s father-in-law).

The lawyer said he would file a motion in court against the court bailiff for wrongful execution.

SUPPORTERS of the Peoples Democratic Party, under the aegis of PDP Action 2023, has appealed to the party to avoid repeating the mistake of wasting its Presidential ticket on former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar.

The group made the appeal in a statement titled, “Atiku Should Not Waste PDP Ticket Again,” signed by its National Chairman, Dr. Rufus Omeire, in Abuja, on Wednesday.

Omeire said, “The PDP Action 2023 warns once again, that to give Atiku Abubakar another chance as PDP Presidential Candidate is to ensure a clear defeat for PDP in 2023, and admonishes the former Vice-President of Nigeria not to deceive PDP members a second time.

“In our last Press Statement, we frowned at Atiku for abandoning PDP members by running away to live in Dubai, after the elections, shielding himself from PDP members, only for him to resurface now that the Presidential primaries are at hand.

“In his response, we are surprised Atiku claimed that his absence from Nigeria for so long was to acquire a Degree from Cambridge University.

“On the contrary, the entire country is aware that he relocated to Dubai, where he even had his highly advertised COVID Vaccination even before the vaccine was available to ordinary Nigerians.”

The group further said, “It is disingenuous for Atiku to claim that he was in school in Cambridge, London when he actually lived in Dubai.

“If he enrolled in University of Cambridge, for a part time course, he could have as well done the programme from Nigeria.”

Attempts to get a response from the Media Office of the former Vice President were futile. Calls to the mobile telephone number of the Media Adviser, Mazi Paul Ibe indicated that it was switched off.

A response to a text message sent to him was still being awaited as at the time of filing this report.

Three suspected kidnappers have been remanded by an Edo State High Court for allegedly conspiring to abduct a family.

Justice Oviageli ordered the remand of the suspects: Bright Emumwen, Evans Osariemen and Chukwudi Anyanwu, in Sapele Road Correctional Centre pending when legal advice from the Director of Public Prosecution, Edo State would be received.

In an exparte order marked charge No: B/CD/1495M/2021, it was alleged that the suspects, among other charges, conspired among themselves, to kidnap one Sunday Onofua, his wife, patience Onofua and their son, Samuel Onufua, all of Okpagha Community, off Benin-Auchi Road Benin City, Edo State.

The presiding Judge, after hearing the prosecution, I.E. Ekibade, ordered that the case file be duplicated and sent to the Director of Public Prosecution of Edo State for Legal Advice.

The Judge thereafter adjourned the case to the 13th of September, 2021.

Yemi Kale, the immediate past Statistician-General of the Federal (SGF) said during his time in office, the President Muhammadu Buhari regime pressurised him to publish inaccurate data.

He, however, said he didn’t budge as he was bent on discharging his duties accurately.

Mr Kale who doubled as the Chief Executive Officer of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), said this during an interview with Arise TV, where he spoke on political reactions to the unemployment data published under his watch.

Data published by NBS in March this year indicated that Nigeria’s unemployment rate stood at 33.3 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2020 (Q4 2020), compared to 27.1 per cent in Q2.

The data was faulted by the Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige who accused NBS of inaccuracy and not using the right methodology.

“There has been a little confusion as to the accuracy of data generated by the NBS. So, we want to align everything tomorrow. The World Bank says the NBS methodology doesn’t conform with the global standard, especially the ILO format of arriving at such Employment Index,” Mr Ngige had said.

For Mr Kale his “extreme stubbornness” made him shun the political attacks and opinions as he ensured that the right methodology was adopted in arriving at such data.

“I’m extremely stubborn which a few of my friends have said is a requirement for the job, but on a serious note. When I started this job, I remember mentioning to my key staff that if I must do this job, I must be ready to be fired at a moment’s notice,” he said.

“I’m serving my country and I will serve it correctly and I’m ready to lose my job for doing the right things. I am not ready to keep my job for doing the wrong things. Once I convinced myself that that’s the way it was going to go.

“I didn’t particularly care about any political attacks or any opinions that were not ideal. What I did was to ensure that we followed the correct methodology.”

He challenged officeholders who had problems with the data to defend it “based on evidence they worked with it and we’ll show it to them that this is what we did.”

Mr Kale believes that faulting data provided by the NBS was a norm for any administration that never agrees with accurate statistics.

“But in terms of political interference, I don’t think it’s is new to Nigeria, I remember even in the U.S. the former president Trump will always agree with good data and he’ll say the ones he didn’t believe to have been correct. I wasn’t fazed by different comments made by different people that did not agree with our work. We are not supposed to publish data that is agreed upon by anybody.

“We are supposed to publish data that is correct and accurate in line with what comes out on the field and that’s exactly what we focused on. But I think the most important thing was ensuring that my mind was focused on the mandate of the office which was to produce reliable, accurate data,” he added.

In 2018, Garba Shehu, the special assistant to the president on media and publicity, disagreed with NBS’ method of tracking the unemployment rate in Nigeria.

Mr Shehu accused Mr Kale of publishing inaccurate figures to tarnish the reputation of the Buhari regime.

“So, I think the data collected on the bases of which some of the judgment has been passed is misleading,” the presidential aide said.

“The data has been unfair to this administration; they had ignored job creation in the area of agriculture. If you are talking about job losses, no, we have created at least 12m new jobs in the area of agriculture.”

 

The Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Abdulrasheed Bawa, has threatened to resign from the position, if he is asked to compromise.

Bawa said this when he featured in a NTA interview programme One-on-One on Friday.

His words were posted in a statement on the EFCC’s official Twitter handle.

“We need to change our attitudes in Nigeria,” Bawa was quoted to have said.

“We are in the habit of worshipping people that have money in the society, but never bother to ask questions about their source of income. In winning the fight against corruption, we are engaging all stakeholders including religious leaders, community leaders and others.

“We are going to embark on massive public enlightenment to sensitise people on the need to shun corruption in all its forms.”

The EFCC boss continued, “I will continue to do what is right.