Maiduguri (Nigeria) (AFP) – Suspected Boko Haram Islamists have killed 12 people in Nigeria’s restive northeast, burning homes and stealing cars in an area repeatedly attacked by the insurgent group, police and residents said Saturday. The attack in the Sandiya village happened Thursday in Borno state, Boko Haram’s stronghold, but details were slow to emerge given the communication shutdown in the area. Borno is one of three Nigerian areas where a state of emergency has been imposed and where the military has shut down the mobile phone network in an attempt to block Islamists from coordinating attacks. “Hoodlums invaded the…
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Abuja (AFP) – Nigeria’s President Goodluck Jonathan has been given the all clear to travel after falling ill while on an official visit to London, his spokesman said Saturday. Jonathan was forced to skip a meeting Thursday with an investment advisory group after “the sudden onset of several abdominal pains,” Reuben Abati said in a statement. “After a thorough evaluation of the president’s symptoms, medically referred to as acute abdomen, the doctors concluded that no surgical intervention was required,” Abati said. The leader of Africa’s most populous country will therefore leave Britain Sunday and return to Nigeria’s capital Abuja, added…
YOLA, Nigeria (AP) — Hearing his neighbors’ screams around midnight, a businessman in northeast Nigeria ripped off his pajamas and jumped out a window, hoping his dark skin would not be visible to the people attacking his village.Like many villages in the region in recent weeks, Mbitiku was under attack from Islamic militants competing with the government for support.Before the attack, the insurgents sent threatening letters to the village ordering young men to join their Boko Haram insurgency.”Boko Haram people were going from one house to the other slaughtering people by slicing their throats,” the survivor told The Associated Press…
Nigeria moves away from reliance on oil Friday, 22 Nov 2013 | 1:15 AM ET Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, finance minister of Nigeria, says that the country is look for more equal and “inclusive” growth. Nigeria must work faster to reduce its dependence on oil for its economic growth, the country’s finance minister told CNBC. Nigeria’s oil reserves, production and exports generate around 70 percent of the government’s revenues but Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said the country had many untapped growth opportunities it needed to explore in order to maintain a high growth rate. “Nigeria is one of the fastest growing countries in the…
Lagos (AFP) – Nigeria’s lower house of parliament Thursday voted to probe giant state-run oil firm NNPC over its alleged failure to account for about $13 billion from crude sales this year.The House of Representatives adopted a motion sponsored by one of its members, Haruna Manu, asking the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to account for the volume and value of crude sold in the first eight months of 2013.”NNPC has remained in a dark tunnel. How long will it remain in that tunnel?,” asked lawmaker Samson Osagie during the debate before the motion was adopted.Lagos-based AIT private television showed…
KADUNA, Nigeria, Nov. 21 (UPI) — Nearly 3,000 people have died and thousands wounded in at least 30 pipeline accidents in Nigeria in the last 15 years, says a petroleum industry official. Bafred Enjugu, acting managing director of a subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corp., revealed the numbers during a workshop for company workers, Channel Television reported Wednesday. An October 1998 pipeline fire killed more than 1,000 people in Delta State in the southeastern region of Nigeria, Enjugu said. Since then pipeline disasters have occurred in areas around the port city of Lagos as well as several other states,…
Delta State Government, yesterday, said it has purchased N4.5 billion equity from three private owners that took over from the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, despite its failure to win an outright bid in the deregulated power sector. Briefing newsmen in Asaba, during the presentation of his mid-term report, the State Commissioner for Energy, Mr. Charles Emetulu, explained that the aim was to protect Deltans especially those in the rural areas from neglect. We have invested over N4.5 billion to buy shares from three of the private companies, so we are part of them now. As a Government,…
After the recent setback occasioned by activities of youths of Ibusa community, the installation of the Delta State Government’s integrated waste management facilities are to commence immediately just as the State Commissioner for Environment, Chief Frank Omare said over 2000 Deltans would be employed once the facilities becomes operational. He explained that at completion, the temporal dumpsite along the Benin/Asaba expressway will be closed. Omare ,who added that all is set for the installation of the Warri integrated waste management facilities, blamed the delay in the commencement of Ibusa facilities on the inability of the State Government to prepare the…
Governor Uduaghan has been commended for solving the problem of traffic congestion in Uvwie Local Government area. HRM, Emmanuel Ekemejewan Sideso, the Ovie of Uvwie kingdom, made the commendation when the management of Consolidated Construction Company (CCC), contractors of Effurun roundabout flyover and phase II of Osubi Airport projects, paid him a courtesy visit at his temporary palace, Jakpa Road, Effurun. The traditional ruler noted that the roundabout project is dear to the Governor and Uvwie people, remarking that this was the first time the Governor is embarking in a project of such magnitude in the State. He advised his…
Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan of Delta State has said his administration is obligated to protect the environment and people of the State, especially those that are most vulnerable to the impact and consequences of climate change. Speaking at the official launch of the Delta State Climate Change Policy and Integrated Territorial Climate Plan in Asaba, the Governor said, climate change has become a daunting environmental challenge facing the world today and it can no longer be ignored as its effects are beginning to manifest. Governor Uduaghan who was represented by his deputy, Prof. Amos Utuama (SAN), asserted that the devastating impact…
Distinguished gentlemen of the press, I welcome you all to this briefing. You will recall that on 12th October, 2013, INEC conducted a bye election in Delta Central Senatorial District of Delta State to fill the vacant position which the death of Senator Pius Ewherido created. The result of the said bye election has been released by INEC and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), the greatest and largest party in Delta State, in Nigeria and in Africa, won overwhelmingly. To this end, I want to thank the great people of Delta Central Senatorial District for this massive support given to…
The Delta State free healthcare campaign has yielded positive result as Government has declared tremendous decrease in maternal mortality rate. In accordance with the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) health paradigm for 2013 which is set at maternal mortality of 250 per 100,000 births, the Delta State Government has successfully recorded 224 mortality per 100,000 births beyond the set goal. Speaking to newsmen, the Special Adviser to the Governor on Health Monitoring, Dr. Rukevwe Ugwumba, stated that when the Government started the free health care policy, maternal mortality rate in the State was about 550 but has receded in less than…
The Enugu State Government says it will soon commence demolition of building material shops located in residential areas of the state capital. Mr Ike Ugwuegede, Commissioner for Enugu Capital Territory Development authority, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Enugu on Thursday. Ugwuegede said the action was part of government’s efforts to sanitise the city and make life comfortable for residents. The commissioner also said that such shops posed serious threat to people living in those houses. According to him, all the shops on Nike Lake Road will be demolished as they are all illegal structures. “There are places like…
THE BLIND ON A ROAD WALK TO MARK INTERNATIONAL ‘WHITE CANE’ AND SAFETY DAY IN LAFIA THURSDAY Governor Umaru Al-Makura of Nasarawa state on Thursday directed the Ministry for Women Affair and Social Development to take the census of all physically challenged persons in the state. The governor gave the directive in Lafia, when the state chapter of the Nigeria Association of the Blind paid him Sallah homage. He said the census would enable the state government to have a solid data base capturing all the details of the physically challenged persons in the state. “This would help us to determine the…
Imo Newspapers retirees under the aegis of the National Union of Printing, Publishing and Paper Products Workers (NUPPPPROW) on Wednesday called on Gov. Rochas Okorocha to pay their terminal benefits. The retirees made the appeal in Owerri when their executive members, led by Mr Adolphus Ike, visited the Secretariat of the Imo State Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ). Ike lamented that the retirees had yet to receive their terminal benefits since they retired, adding that this had led to the death of some of them. “We have lost many of our members to death because of hardship, frustration and hunger.…
Chief Charles Nwodo, the National Chairman of the defunct Progressive Action Congress, (PAC), has said that the establishment of an Electoral Offences Tribunal will help to curb electoral malpractices. Nwodo made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja. “The setting up of the tribunal has become imperative. As it would deter those people who take pleasure in fermenting trouble during elections. “The mere fact that those who commit offences during elections are not punished, the perpetrators and their sponsors see it as an avenue to do whatever they like. “Those who find it as…
Delta State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, has urged Nigerians to eschew all forms of political and religious extremism and lay the foundation for sustainable development and national integration. Governor Uduaghan, who gave this charge in Asaba in his goodwill message to Muslim faithfuls to mark the 2013 Eid-el-Kabir celebration, said that Nigerians must imbibe the lessons of the Eid-el-Kabir festival which are spirit of kindness, piety and commitment to duty, including the promotion of religious harmony and peaceful co-existence. He called on Nigerians to embrace peace and religious harmony in their daily activities and show genuine love and respect for…
Following the announcement of the Peoples Democratic Party’s candidate, Chief Emmanuel Edesiri Aguariavwodo, as the winner of the Delta Central Senatorial District bye-election, Delta State Governor, Dr.Emmanuel Uduaghan has attributed the party’s victory at the polls to its strong ward structure. Dr. Uduaghan who made this revelation at a victory party held at his house in Warri, said that the victory had shown that the PDP had built a strong ward structure in the State, urging its members not to go to sleep because of the victory, but rather work towards strengthening their wards. The Governor advised them to remain…
The South African Consul General to Nigeria, Amb. Sam Monaisa has expressed the hope of direct flight from Cape Town and Durban, South Africa to the Asaba International Airport in the nearest future. The Consul General, who was in the State for the official commissioning of the Nelson Mandela Garden project, stated this while speaking to a group of journalists during a visit to some projects done by the Delta State Government around the State capital. According to the Consul General who said he was impressed at the infrastructural development around the State capital especially the Asaba International Airport, described…