Jonathan accepts U.S. offer to join girls rescue battle

The world is joining  forces with Nigeria to rescue the school girls abducted by Boko Haram gunmen.
President Goodluck Jonathan accepted yesterday America’s offer to send in men and equipment to join the battle to rescue the girls who were snatched away from their hostels in Chibok, Borno State on April 15.
Besides, the United Nation (UN) warned that no harm must befall the girls.
Britain said it would help.
Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity Dr. Reuben Abati said Jonathan accepted the offer during a telephone conversation with United States Secretary of State Mr. John Kerry.
Abati issued a statement, which reads: “President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan Tuesday welcomed and accepted a definite offer of help from the United States of America in the ongoing effort to locate and rescue the girls abducted from the Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok three weeks ago.”
“The offer from President Barack Obama, which was conveyed to President Jonathan by the United States Secretary of State, Mr. John Kerry, in a telephone conversation which began at 15.30 hours today, includes the deployment of U.S. security personnel and assets to work with their Nigerian counterparts in the search and rescue operation.”

Eight More Girls Abducted

Suspected Boko Haram gunmen kidnapped eight girls from a village near one of their strongholds in the North overnight, police and residents said yesterday.
The abduction of the girls, aged 12 to 15, follows the kidnapping of more than 200 other schoolgirls by the Islamist militant group last month in Chibok, Borno State.
Lazarus Musa, a resident of the village of Warabe, told Reuters that armed men had opened fire during the raid.
“They were many, and all of them carried guns. They came in two vehicles painted in army colour. They started shooting in our village,” Musa said by telephone from the village in the hilly Gwoza area, Boko Haram’s main base.
A police source, who could not be named, said the girls were taken away on trucks, along with looted livestock and food.
Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau threatened in a video released to the media on Monday to sell the girls abducted from a secondary school on April 14 “on the market”.
“Many people tried to run behind the mountain but when they heard gun shots, they came back,” Musa said. “The Boko Haram men were entering houses, ordering people out of their houses.”

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“There is God o!”: This is the Patience Jonathan video everyone’s talking about (WATCH)

First Lady, Dame Patience Jonathan has expressed her grief at the fate of the missing Chibok schoolgirls who were kidnapped by men suspected to be members of the Boko Haram Islamic sect 20 days ago.
Patience Jonathan who yesterday vowed to lead a protest to Chibok if they are not released on time called on the perpetrators of the evil act to desist from their evil act saying there is blood on their hands.
“We women are agents of peace, the children are ours and we cannot fold our hands while our children are missing.
The first lady apparently got agitated when she realised that the principal of the affected school came to Abuja alone unaccompanied by any teacher or parent.
“Principal… na only you waka come okay, when the first lady is calling you, come I want to help you, I want to help you find your missing child, will you keep quiet? Chai, chai, there is God o, the blood we’re shedding, there is God o, there is God o…!” she said, bursting into tears.

Eko Disco secures $150m for network expansion

Eko Electricity Distribution Company (EKEDC) has secured a $150 million facility to expand its network.
Its  Managing Director, Oladele Amoda, disclosed this to the House Committee on Commercialisation and Privatisation,  when the committee visited him.
The company, he said, plans to invest N42 billion in the next five years in network improvement to reduce aggregate technical, commercial and collection losses and enhance service delivery.
A  statement  by the Head of Public Communications of the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE),  Chigbo Anichebe,   said as part of its digitalisation programme, customers could pay their bills on-line and through banks in any part of the country.
He said beside EKEDC, no other firm has achieved the feat.

Security agents shun court order to seize Sanusi’s passport

Despite being shown a court order, security men at the weekend prevented  suspended Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Sanusi Lamido Sanusi from traveling abroad.
A Federal High Court sitting in Lagos had described as illegal and unconstitutional, Sanusi’s arrest at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport (MMIA) Lagos, after he was suspended from office by President Goodluck Jonathan. It ordered the return of his passport, which the security again seized at the weekend.
He was stopped at the Malam Aminu Kano International Airport, in Kano on his way to France enroute Mecca, Saudi Arabia to perform the lesser Hajj.
Sanusi’s passport was also reportedly seized by the men who said they were acting on instructions.
Former FCT Minister Nasir El-Rufai criticised the Federal Government for the  seizure.
El-Rufai said he was angry, helpless and ashamed of the government’s “sheer brainlessness”.

First Lady weeps as stakeholders shun meeting

First Lady Dame Patience Jonathan was all tears yesterday at a meeting she convened in Abuja over the abduction of school girls in Chibok, Borno State.
Her first meeting on Friday set up a committee headed by the Borno State governor’s wife to ensure attendance at yesterday’s meeting. But the governor’s wife did not attend.
Mrs Jonathan was said to have wept when she learnt that the school had no stand-by power generator.
Besides, no extra security was provided at the school, she was told.
She was devastated that the governor’s wife did not show up for the meeting on Friday and yesterday .
The First Lady  insisted that the state government and the Commissioner for Education should be blamed for the abduction of the girls as they allegedly failed to act on the letter from the Minister of Education for relocation of West African School Certificate Examination (WASCE) candidates to Maiduguri or safer places.

Oputa dies at 90

Tributes for ‘Nigeria’s Lord Denning’
A LEGAL giant departed yesterday, setting off a rain of tributes.
Former Supreme Court Justice Chukwudifu Oputa, revered by many as Nigeria’s Lord Denning for the philosophical depth of his  decisions, died “peacefully” after recovering from a brief illness.
Lawyers described the late justice as a legal colossus who would not only be missed by the judiciary but by the country.
A statement by his son, the singer Charles Oputa (Charley Boy), said: “The family of Justice Chukwudifu Oputa wishes to announce the passing to glory of the eminent jurist and retired justice of the Supreme Court of Nigeria at the age of 90 years.
“He passed on peacefully on Sunday afternoon 4th May 2014 after recovering from a brief illness. Funeral arrangements will soon be released by the family.”
Imo State Governor Rochas Okorocha, his deputy Eze Madumere and other prominent Imo State indigenes lamented the exit of the foremost jurist.

Chibok: CAN releases abducted students’ names

The Christian As­sociation of Nigeria (CAN) has released names of 165 Chris­tian female students and 15 Muslim females abducted by Boko Haram insurgents almost two weeks ago.
In a statement issued yesterday, in Abuja by the body and signed by Evan­gelist Matthew Owojaiye, President/Founder of Old Time Revival Hour, Ka­duna and immediate-past chairman of Northern States Christian and Elders Forum (NOCSEF), an af­filiate of CAN, the body said majority of the ab­ducted girls are Christians.
It further alleged that the girls taken captive would be treated as slaves and sold into marriage to ‘unclean’ people.

US to help Nigeria rescue abducted girls

The United States of America (USA) is prepared to help Nigeria in searching for the more than 200 girls abducted by the Islamist sect, Boko Haram, from Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State.

“We have been engaged with the Nigerian government in discussions on what we might do to help support their efforts to find and free these young women,” State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf told reporters on Thursday.

“We will continue to have those discussions and help in any way we can.”

The terrorists stormed the school on April 14, packed the teenagers onto trucks and motorcycles before disappearing into a remote area along the border with Cameroon.

102 Islamists get 10-year sentence in Egypt

More than 100 supporters of Egypt’s deposed Islamist President Mohamed Mursi were sentenced to ten years in jail on Saturday on charges of killing and inciting violence, judicial sources said.
The verdicts for the 102 defendants, handed down ahead of a May 26-27 presidential election, relate to deaths that occurred during clashes in Cairo last July between supporters of Mursi’s Muslim Brotherhood and security forces.
Two other Brotherhood supporters who were defendants in the case received seven-year jail sentences, the sources said. Only 35 defendants were present in court, the others were tried in absentia.
Militant violence has spiralled since last July, when the army toppled Mursi and the authorities launched a crackdown on his supporters in the Brotherhood. Thousands of the movement’s supporters have been arrested and hundreds killed, and its leaders are on trial.
Another Egyptian court sentenced the leader of the Brotherhood and 682 supporters to death earlier this week, intensifying the crackdown and drawing Western criticism.
Reuters reports that former army chief Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who led the ousting of Mursi, is expected to win the presidential election.
Egypt has declared the Brotherhood a terrorist group, but Egypt’s oldest Islamist movement said it is committed to peaceful activism.

Man kills 7-year-old daughter over plate of rice (PICTURED)

A father in Rivers has been arrested by the police after reports that he took the life of his young daughter.
29-year-old Kingsley Ekerete is said to have killed his child, Favour, after she ate a plate of rice that he had kept for himself.
The commercial driver had returned home hungry only to find the pot of rice emptied by his 7-year-old daughter.
He then proceeded to beat the child, who was already ill at the time, and this allegedly compounded the situation leading to Favour’s death a few hours later.
The Tribune reports:

He placed the corpse at a corner of his one-room apartment, an apartment that also housed his two other children aged two and three, not even giving a thought to the implications of keeping the dead child with her frightened siblings.

Sabo, Falana, 24 others on Jonathan’s rescue committee

Towards unraveling the circumstances surrounding the reported abduction of 234 secondary school girls in Chibok, Borno State, Brig. General Ibrahim A. Sabo (Rtd.)has been named as the Chairman of a fact finding Presidential Committee set up by President Goodluck Jonathan.
Other members of the committee are Barrister Femi Falana, SAN, Hajia Hawa Ibrahim, and Hajia Fatima Kwaku.
This is contained in a statement issued last night by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Anyim Pius Anyim.
According to him, the Committee will be inaugurated at the State House, Abuja on Tuesday, 6th May, 2014 by 12 noon.
The statement reads: “As part of efforts to ensure successful rescue of the abducted female students of Government Secondary School CHIBOK, the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, GCFR, has approved the constitution of a Presidential Committee on the rescue efforts for the missing female students.”