Chinese President Xi Jinping is set to bring decision-making of the financial system further under his control with the likely revival of a powerful committee to coordinate financial policy and the possible appointment of a key ally in a top position at the central bank. Authorities are considering reviving the long-disbanded Central Financial Work Commission to allow the ruling Communist Party to assert more control over financial policy, according to sources. Ding Xuexiang, Xi’s chief of staff, is set to become the head of the entity. He Lifeng — who is expected to replace Liu He as China’s vice premier…
Author: Ifeanyi N.
Activist, Reno Omokri has lauded the Labour Party and its presidential candidate, Peter Obi for the possibility of an Okada rider, Donatus Mathew to be elected as the representative of the Kaura Federal constituency of Southern Kaduna. Recall that the Labour Party candidate was declared the winner of the election after garnering 10,466 votes to defeat the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC which scored 9,828 votes. Reacting to the development, Omokri, a staunch supporter of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP candidate in the just concluded election, Atiku Abubakar described the election of Mathew as true democracy. In a post on…
The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, has said they have learnt lessons from the conduct of the 2023 presidential elections last week. INEC chairman, Yakubu Mahmood, stated this on Saturday while addressing a press conference. Mahmood admitted they faced logistics and technical issues during the Saturday, February 25 polls. “The issues of logistics, election technology, the behaviour of some election personnel at different levels, the attitude of some party agents and supporters added to the extremely challenging environment in which elections are usually held in Nigeria,” Mahmood said. He added that “a lot of lessons have been learnt.” Mahmood promised…
The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, today released the breakdown of results for the National Assembly elections conducted on Saturday, February 25. Winners have been declared for 423 National Assembly seats. However, supplementary elections will be held in 46 constituencies. INEC chairman, Yakubu Mahmood, noted that 98 out of 109 Senate seats have been declared. In the House of Representatives, 325 out of 360 seats have been decided. In the Senate, the All Progressives Congress, APC, controls 57 seats. The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, now has 28, and Labour Party, LP, has six. APC also dominates the House of Representatives…
Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi, the governorship candidate of the New Nigeria Peoples Party in Kaduna State, has advised residents of the state to reject voting for any politician that will try to buy their conscience in the forthcoming governorship election. Speaking to newsmen in Kaduna on Saturday on what he termed, “dire political miscarriage” ahead of the March 11 governorship poll in the state, Hunkuyi advised residents to be careful not to sell their consciences for another four years of leadership that cares less about their welfare. He warned against issues that may include the pre-election matter pending in court that…
Pakistan’s former Prime Minister and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan said that he is ready to talk with Army Chief General Syed Asim Munir for the betterment of the country, ARY News reported on Friday. While talking to media persons at his Zaman Park residence, Imran Khan said that he will not surrender before anyone and he is not fighting with the establishment but he can do nothing if someone is not ready to talk. He challenged his political rivals to prove a single corruption charge against him and his wife. He asked the army chief to find any…
Famous Nigerian social critic, Aisha Yesufu, has claimed that many of the polling unit results in last Saturday’s Presidential election were changed. Yesufu, who was a guest on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Thursday night, said that even Lagos State, where the Labour Party (LP) won, was rigged. She claimed that the All Progressives Congress (APC) got lower votes than was officially allocated to them by the INEC. Yesufu said, “What we are saying is that even the Lagos State [figure] was rigged, the number that APC got is much lower than what we finally have. And one of the…
Some members of the Presidential Campaign Council of the All Progressives Congress in Rivers State have attributed the victory of the APC in the state to the effort of Governor Nyesom Wike. However, members of the APC PCC loyal to Tony Okocha, the former Chief of Staff to former Governor Rotimi Amaechi, have insisted that Wike is still a member of the Peoples Democratic Party. Okocha who was the State Chairman, Local Organizing Committee of the APC PCC, in a press briefing in Port Harcourt, said they are ready to reciprocate the gesture of Governor Wike in the March 11th…
Lagos State Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, candidates in the just-concluded National Assembly election on Thursday called on the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to audit and review all collated results with Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) in the Lagos West and Lagos Central Senatorial Districts. Addressing a news conference in Lagos, the candidates jointly pointed out that they did not lose the elections going by the results obtained by their agents from each of their polling units in their districts as contained in INEC Form EC8A used to record votes. According to them, INEC must use the window of seven…
Former presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress, ADC, Kingsley , has criticised the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, over its conduct of the February 25 presidential election. Moghalu, a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank, also insisted that the INEC needs a complete overhaul. His statement was made available in a post on his verified Twitter handle on Friday. Moghalu also questioned the 28% turnout recorded for the election, insisting that it must be interrogated to know why it happened when about 87 million voters collected their Permanent Voters Cards, PVCs. He said, “Without prejudice to whoever…
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Friday said that Moscow has never engaged in playing one country against another but it is “being tried by some other outside players” in the context of so-called Indo- Pacific strategy. “We never engage in playing any country against any other country but this is, unfortunately, being tried by some other outside players in the context of so-called Indo- Pacific strategy, using Quad, not for economical purpose but trying to militarise it,” Lavrov said. It is pertinent to mention that the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, known as the Quad, is a strategic security dialogue between…
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Ogun State has vowed that it would not allow the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to rig again during the governorship election. On Friday, the PDP formed an alliance with nine other political parties to unseat the ruling party at the March 11 gubernatorial and State House of Assembly elections. The PDP admitted only an alignment between it and other political parties could defeat the APC. The PDP is joining forces with Accord Party (AP), Allied People’s Movement (APM), Because Of Our Tomorrow (BOOT party), Action Alliance (AA), Action Democratic Party (ADP), All Peoples…
Ekene Enefe, a chieftain of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), has given reasons why the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) didn’t transmit election results electronically during last Saturday’s Presidential and National Assembly elections. Enefe said some political parties brought in hackers from Israel and Russia to manipulate the result of the 2023 general elections. He spoke on Arise Television’s The Morning Show on Friday. Enefe said, “Each party has a situation room, they have known the results. They knew they were losing and they wanted to cling to something and what they wanted to cling on is the transmission…
The gubernatorial candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP in Kano State, Sadiq Wali has alleged that the ongoing campaign of calumny against Mallam Ibrahim Shekarau is a ploy to create friction within the party and weaken it ahead of next weekend’s gubernatorial elections. Shekarau defected to PDP from the New Nigeria Peoples Party, NNPP in the build-up to the 2023 elections late last year. Speaking during a media parley in Kano on Thursday night, Wali said there is no iota of truth in the rumour that Shekarau is working against the PDP candidate in the March 11 governorship election…
Chief Stanley Osifo, a former APC presidential aspirant, on Friday appealed to Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and Mr Peter Obi to support the President-elect, Bola Tinubu, to move Nigeria forward. Abubakar and Obi, the presidential candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party and Labour Party, respectively, had vowed to challenge the outcome of the Feb. 25 presidential poll in court. Tinubu was on Wednesday declared the winner of the election by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). Osifo, in a statement in Lagos, said that Tinubu won the election as declared by INEC. He said: “Tinubu is willing to accommodate everyone that…
The absence of a US Ambassador to India for more than two years now is an embarrassment, a top Democratic Senator said Thursday, floating the idea of an “equally qualified” candidate if the current nominee Eric Garcetti is not able to get enough votes for a Senatorial confirmation. Garcetti, 52, a former Mayor of Los Angeles, was nominated by President Joe Biden for US Ambassador to India in July 2021. His nomination was not brought to the Senate floor for a vote as the ruling Democratic Party did not have enough support to get him through. “It is an embarrassment…
Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), has explained why his Labour Party counterpart, Peter Obi, dumped the main opposition party in the build-up to the PDP’s presidential primary election in 2022. Speaking at a press conference on the outcome of the February 25 Presidential election in Abuja on Thursday, Atiku claimed Obi left the PDP because he was afraid of the demands of the party’s governors, adding that he was in a “rush”. Atiku said, “I think Peter [Obi] was in a rush. When the campaign started, and our PDP governors sat down and said…
The president-elect, Bola Tinubu has reacted to the statement made by the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, LP, Mr Peter Obi. Obi, during a press conference on Thursday, argued that he won the just concluded presidential election. In a statement signed by the Director of Public Affairs and Chief Spokesperson, Tinubu/Shettima Presidential Campaign Council, Festus Keyamo advised the former governor of Anambra State to stop misleading the gullible, noting that Tinubu won the election and not him. According to him: ”We make this brief statement in reaction to the Press briefing held earlier today by the defeated candidate of…
Dissatisfied with the polls of February 25, the Social Democratic Party (SDP) on Thursday said it will challenge the results of the parliamentary elections in court. The party said it will approach the court to seek redress on results declared for the Senate and House of Representatives, but not the presidential election. Speaking at a press conference on Thursday, the chairman of SDP, Alhaji Shehu Gabam, claimed that the party won many seats but was denied, insisting that the results would be challenged in court. Gabam however, congratulated the President-elect, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who was declared the winner by the…
Ahead of the March 11 governorship election, a spokesperson for the Labour Party Obi-Datti Presidential Campaign Council, Mr Kenneth Okonkwo has charged party supporters to come out en masse to vote LP. In a statement he issued on Thursday, the famous Nollywood actor allayed fears of being attacked and killed during the election, stating that it is irresponsible to fear death. Contrary to insinuations that the governorship election may also be rigged as allegedly done during the presidential poll, Okonkwo assured the supporters of the Labour Party, known as Obidients that their votes will count. The statement reads partly: “This…