Brazil legend, Ronaldo Nazario has revealed that signing Barcelona striker, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang was a free gift for the team.
Speaking to Barca TV (as quoted by Forbes), Ronaldo said the former Dortmund attacker is a great signing for Barcelona, adding that he has the characteristics of a traditional center-forward.
“I love how he moves, how he finishes. He has the characteristics of a traditional center-forward, but he also has the speed to go into space,” Ronaldo said.
“He is a great striker and a great signing for Barca.”
The Gabon captain has been impressive since joining Xavi Hernandez’s men.
Aubameyang scored a brace in Barcelona’s LaLiga El Clasico 4-0 win over Real Madrid last weekend.
Aubameyang has now scored nine goals in all competitions for Barca so far this season.
The House of Representatives has asked the Central Bank of Nigeria to reinforce the use of coins in the country, as part of efforts to tackle price inflation and stabilise the economy.
The matter was deliberated upon during plenary on Tuesday following a motion moved by a lawmaker, representing Toro Federal Constituency in Bauchi State, Umar Lawal.
It’s been decades since the use of coins was withdrawn in Nigeria.
Three years after a teenage girl left home for an extra-mural lesson in preparation for WAEC and was thereafter reported missing by her parents on March, 2019, the police in Ekiti State have arrested a woman, Mrs Felicia Ademiloye, and her son, Adewumi, in connection with the girl’s abduction, exploitation and rape.
The suspects
The victim’s mother, on March 15, received credible information about her daughter’s whereabouts and the police traced the girl to the house of Mrs Ademiloye and rescued her while arresting Mrs Ademiloye and her son.
The police spokesman in the state, ASP Sunday Abutu, said investigation revealed that the victim was lured by Adewumi into his mother’s house and drugged her on the fateful day she disappeared.
ASP Abutu further said, “The victim said after consuming the drugs given to her by Adewumi, she could not remember to go back home. She said she is now a drug addict due to the amount of drugs consumed within the three years of her enslavement.
“Adewumi had series of sexual intercourse with her and has given her to different men on many occasions each time he did not have money, who had sex with her and paid him between N10,000 and N20,000.”
Abutu added that investigation revealed that the victim was about eight months pregnant.
The police further said during interrogation Adewumi confessed to the crimes and that he and his mother would be charged to court for conspiracy to wit abduction, rape and child exploitation.
The Senate on Tuesday urged the Inspector-General of Police, IGP Usman Baba, to investigate the alleged maltreatment and torture of Nigerians by foreign nationals living in the country.
IGP Usman Baba
This followed a motion by Senator Biobarakuma Degi-Eremienyo (APC, Bayelsa), who said in a bid to get a confession from victims alleged to have stolen iron rods, a Lebanese ordered some of his Nigerian subordinates to gag the mouths of one Anayo Friday Ndubuisi and the late Chadian with rags to stifle any noise from them.
He said they were beaten mercilessly with iron rods, tied to a car, and driven around their premises.
“The Lebanese also set his dog upon the victims and the said dog attacked them”, Biobarakuma said.
He said some suspects had been arrested and paraded by the police. He said the Lebanese had not been apprehended or paraded.
The Senate demanded prosecution of those found culpable in accordance with the provisions of the law to serve as a deterrent to others.
The Federation Accounts Allocation Committee, FAAC has shared N695.033bn to the three tiers of government as allocation for February.
Olajide Oshundun, the Deputy Director,Information, Ministry of Finance, Budget and Planning, in a statement yesterday, said the Federal Government received the highest allocation of N239bn inclusive of Gross Statutory Revenue, Value Added Tax, non-mineral revenues, and excess bank charges.
He said the states received N190.007bn; LGs, N140.612bn; and the oil-producing states, N23.750bn as derivation (13 per cent of Mineral Revenue. He said N23.989bn was set aside as cost of revenue collection; while Transfer/Refunds got N80.498bn.
“The communiqué issued by the FAAC at the end of the meeting indicated that the Gross Revenue available from VAT for February 2022 was N177.873bn. This is against N191.222bn distributed in the preceding month of January.
“This has resulted in a decrease of N13.349bn,” he said.
He, however, said that the Federal Government got the lowest allocation of N24.845bn from VAT compared to the other two tiers of government.
“The states received N82.818bn, Local Governments got N57.972bn, while Cost of Collection to the Federal Inland Revenue Service and the Nigeria Customs Service got N7.115bn and allocation to NEDC project received N5.123bn, ” he said. Oshundun said the distributed Statutory Revenue of N429.681bn, received for February was higher than the N396.432bn received in January by N33.249bn.
He said Petroleum Profit Tax increased significantly, while oil and gas royalties increased marginally.
Amid strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities, the Committee of Vice-Chancellors of Nigerian Universities (CVCNU) has met at the University of Ibadan (UI) in Oyo State to discuss the future of Nigerian universities.
The meeting, which is part of the activities marking the Diamond Jubilee celebration anniversary of the committee, is tagged, “Sixty Years in Sixty Minutes: Exploring Trends in The Nigerian University System.”
Speaking at the event, the Secretary-General of CVCNU, Professor Yakubu Aboki Ochefu, reiterated the resolve of the association to work assiduously towards the promotion of initiatives that would continue to support the growth and development of university education in Nigeria.
The Chairman of CVCNU, Prof. Samuel Gowon Edoumiekumo, commended the premier university for accepting to host the first event marking the Diamond Jubilee which will climax in October.
Edoumiekumo was represented by the Vice-Chancellor of Lead City University, Prof. Kabiru Aderemi Adeyemo.
The opening session of the discussion event code-named ‘soap box’ had one-time Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ibadan, Emeritus Professor O. A Bamiro, who spoke on “Transformation of University Education,” while the current VC, Prof. K.O Adebowale, spoke on “Learning Management Systems (LMS).”
The South-West zone of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, on Tuesday, insisted that Nigeria’s next President should emerge from the southern part of the country.
Governor Aminu Tambuwal
The party, at an extended zonal caucus meeting held at the Oyo State Government House, Agodi, Ibadan, said that it was in support of the position of the Southern Governors’ Forum that the southern part of the country should produce the successor to President Muhammadu Buhari.
The party also reaffirmed its call for Nigeria’s restructuring and said it would support all efforts aimed at national cohesion through equitable distribution of federal positions and appointments among the geopolitical zones.
A communiqué read by the party’s National Vice-Chairman, South-West, Olasoji Adagunodo, stated that the PDP had resolved that the unity of its members in the zone was non-negotiable and that all mechanisms for dispute resolution must be on the front burner.
The party equally resolved to do everything within its powers to lawfully win the forthcoming governorship elections in Osun and Ekiti states.
A statement signed by the Chief Press Secretary to the Oyo State Governor, Taiwo Adisa, said Governor Seyi Makinde, who is the leader of the party in the South-West, was commended by the caucus for his infrastructure development strides and efforts to reposition the PDP across states of the zone.
In his keynote speech, Makinde called on all members of the party to de-emphasise whatever issues they had with individuals and unite in the interest of the party, both at the zonal and national levels, adding that the South-West zone remained critical to the success of the PDP in the country.
He said, “We are in the election season already. The timetable is out and candidates for various positions will emerge within the next eight to nine weeks. And as the PDP South-West zone, what position are we presenting?
“We know that if the South-West and Yorubaland are not peaceful, things will not also be settled nationally. That is just the fact. We have also gone through the path that because of disunity, we were left out in the scheme of things.
“When the founding fathers of this party came together, they spoke about fairness, equity and justice, and they decided that the six major positions nationally must be shared among the six zones of Nigeria. That has always been the case until 2011. Because of the in-fighting and disunity, the South-West did not have a single position out of the six national positions.
“For the avoidance of doubt, I can list those six positions. In 2011, the President did not come from the South-West but from the South-South. The Vice-President did not come from the South-West, but the North-West.
“The Senate President came from the North-Central. The Speaker of the House of Representatives went to the North-West, while the Secretary to the Government of the Federation slot also went to the South-East. The chairman of the party went to the North-East.
“That was how we lost all completely and we don’t want to walk through that path again. It has happened to us before and we don’t want it to happen again.
“But the only way it won’t happen again is for us to unite and de-emphasize whatever issues we have with ourselves individually. We must come together to tell ourselves what we are going to demand nationally.”
Makinde maintained that though the South-West PDP had three opportunities through the off-season elections in Ondo, Ekiti and Osun for the governorship seats, in-fighting had already made it to lose in Ondo State.
He stated, “Ondo State governorship election is coming back in another two years. But before then, we have the Ekiti governorship election coming up. We thank God that we have been able to get everybody together, but there is still a lot of work to be done if Ekiti will not go the way of Ondo.
“I do pray, because I know we have another opportunity to support our candidate in Ekiti State, so that in two months plus, we will have a governor-elect in the state.
“We also have Osun State, which practically is in a difficult situation. They have issues from the governorship primary, which is not supposed to be. The South-West is known as the zone to provide leadership for this country.
“Truth is, we are going to be the ultimate losers and what happened in the past will happen again if we don’t get our acts together.
“I make bold to say that those aspiring for the presidency and are using our people against us, there are only two and a half months left. You can force yourself to win the party’s primary, but can you force yourself on the populace?
“This is an opportunity for us to recalibrate and have a common position, moving forward in the national engagement with the unfolding scenario nationally.”
Reading the communiqué at the end of the meeting, Adagunodo said, “The unity of the PDP, South-West zone, is a non-negotiable issue; to this end, we demand that all dispute resolution mechanisms should be on the front burner.
“The PDP South-West Zone is in support of the Southern Governors’ Forum that the next President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria should come from the South.
“The South-West Zone reaffirms its position on restructuring of Nigeria.”
The meeting had in attendance the former Deputy National Chairman of the PDP, Chief Olabode George; former governors Olagunsoye Oyinlola, Olusegun Mimiko and Ayodele Fayose of Osun, Ondo and Ekiti states, respectively; serving and former National Assembly members and former deputy governors.
Others were the PDP Deputy National Chairman (South), Ambassador Oladejo Arapaja; former governorship candidates of the PDP in Ogun and Ekiti states, Ladi Adebutu and Prof Olusola Kolapo; and other former and serving PDP leaders at the national level.
Tambuwal rejects zoning
Meanwhile, the Sokoto State Governor, Aminu Tambuwal, on Tuesday in Abuja kicked against the idea of zoning of the Presidency and cautioned the PDP to focus on winning elections.
He said the party would have the liberty to share power only after it had successfully won the 2023 elections at the centre and in the states.
Tambuwal said this when he met with former presiding officers of state Houses of Assembly and the House of Representatives in Abuja as part of wide consultation ahead of his official declaration to run for the office of President in 2023.
His position appears to be a clap-back on his Rivers State counterpart, Nyesom Wike, who insists that the main opposition party should zone its presidential ticket to the South-South.
After its 95th National Executive Council meeting last Wednesday, the PDP had constituted a 37-member committee to make recommendations for the zoning of various elective positions ahead of the general elections.
Given only two weeks for the assignment, the committee is expected to submit its report next Wednesday.
But speaking on Tuesday, Tambuwal said, “Now, this is for the PDP. In the South, as of today, the PDP is in eight government houses. The APC is also in eight government houses, leaving one, Anambra. In the North, the APC is in 14 government houses and the PDP is in five government houses. And they (the APC) have the President.
“I’m giving you this analysis so that together, as leaders of our party, we can work towards winning the election, not zoning, not winning tickets. Yes, we can share tickets and everybody can take his piece and go to his zone. But you must plan to win the election. That’s the reality of it. It’s not anybody’s making. I didn’t make myself come from Sokoto. No, it’s God.
“So, we must accept these realities as a party and work with these realities to win the election. After that, we can now say okay, let’s share power. Win the election first. Don’t win zoning! Win the election and then we’ll come and share power.”
The presidential hopeful noted that as the APC did in 2015, the PDP must seek viable candidates with which it could win elections and not narrow its chances through a zoning arrangement.
According to him, had the APC presented a candidate from the South in 2015, it would have lost the presidential election.
The Sokoto governor stated, “The APC took their ticket to Katsina in 2015, where the last PDP President, Umaru Yar’Adua, who died in office in 2010, hailed from. Five years later, the APC, out of strategic thinking with Bola Tinubu and the rest of them, did this. I was part of it. We said we were looking for how to zone, but we must get power before we share it.
“I deliberately took the APC ticket to Katsina to give it to President Muhammadu Buhari. Yes, Atiku contested; Rabiu Musa contested and Sam Nda-Isaiah and Rochas Okorocha contested. But we knew where we were going, because we were determined to win.
“Let me tell you, had the APC given that ticket to someone from the South, in particular the South-South, we couldn’t have won. Go and check the election results of 2007. Buhari had 11 million votes before in 2003. But in 2007, he got seven million votes against Yar’Adua because they are from the same Katsina. For the PDP, I have a question. Are we looking at zoning or winning?”
According to him, the PDP must balance the calibre of candidates it hopes to front in the elections, arguing that the party could not afford to front two candidates from the same region or religion as that would be political suicide.
He said “The President and the Vice-President cannot come from the same zone. They cannot even come from the same religion. Am I right? If you have the President and the Vice-President as Muslims, that’s dead on arrival. In the current Nigerian situation, if you have both of them as Christians, that’s dead on arrival.
“So you must balance the ticket and sit down. We cannot do what the APC has done, especially this second term, because we believe in this country and we know this country. We understand the dynamics and complexities of Nigeria’s condition. Otherwise, how else will you look at the line-up in the Federal Government like Nigeria? President, Vice-President, Senate President, Speaker, Deputy Senate President, Deputy Speaker, SGF, Chief of Staff, even chairman of the party, and no one from the South-East.
“We can’t do that. Where I am involved, that cannot happen. So, what we need is inclusiveness. We can then run the country.”
On his 2023 ambition, Tambuwal said he was the most qualified aspirant to clinch the party’s ticket and to lead the nation.
In his remarks, a former National Publicity Secretary of the PDP, Olisa Metuh, said no opposition party bothers itself with zoning, but it must focus on winning elections.
He also taunted those advocating zoning to begin from their states saying, “Why come to the centre to talk about zoning? Are you interested in winning the centre and losing at home?”
The Federal Government on Tuesday rejected a bill of the House of Representatives seeking free healthcare services for children in the country.
Health Minister, Ehanire
The government also rejected four other bills.
The Minister of Health, Osagie Ehanire, at a public hearing in Abuja by the House Committee on Healthcare Services, said with the current realities of economic challenges, it would be difficult to have free healthcare service for children.
Ehanire, represented by the Director/Head of Department, Complementary and Alternative Medicine, Zainab Shariff, said: “There should be more public enlightenment to get every child enrolled in the National Health Insurance Scheme, the Community Based Health Insurance Scheme, the State Health Insurance Scheme which provides healthcare service at subsidized rates”.
He said the establishment of institutions as contained in some of the other four bills would duplicate functions of existing institutions and increase the cost of governance.
The bills sought the establishment of agencies and some amendments to some existing laws affecting the operational mandates of some agencies under the ministry.
Ehanire said the bill to establish the Public Health Practitioners Council of Nigeria would be in conflict with the Acts establishing the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, the National Primary Healthcare Development Agency and the African Institute of Public Health Practitioners.
On the bill to establish a minimum standard for healthcare facilities, he said the ministry had done much to establish minimum standards for healthcare facilities through various means.
He also said the bill to establish a decontamination centre in each of the 36 states and the FCT would increase the cost of governance.
He said the bill to establish the Nigerian Food Vendors Regulatory Agency would overlap with existing government agencies and other extant laws.
Declaring the hearing open earlier, Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila, represented by the Deputy Chief Whip Nkeiruka Onyejeocha said the bills and motions reflected the importance the House placed on public health and conditions of service of health workers.
He said stakeholders should consider the possibility of achieving the bills’ objectives without imposing additional obligations on public finance
Governors and other key chieftains of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) are plotting against the nomination of persons into key National Working Committee (NWC) positions by President Muhammadu Buhari ahead of the party’s national convention holding on Saturday.
President Buhari
Sources told ABN TV Tuesday evening that critical stakeholders are still locked in horse-trading, which is tearing the echelon of the party apart as the majority of governors and other chieftains kick against the president’s proposal.
ABN TV had on Monday reported that stakeholders were at work as negotiations continued to come up with a consensus list for all positions.
Fresh facts however show that the consensus talk is bugged by resistance from elements in the party to bow to the wish of President Buhari who had handpicked five persons for top NWC positions, in a March 18 letter.
“The leaders are grumbling and find it hard to swallow that the president will just fill five senior positions without consulting them,” a senior member who asked not to be named told Daily Trust.
Daily Trust had previously exclusively reported the president’s endorsement of a former Nasarawa State Governor, Senator Abdullahi Adamu for the chairmanship post.
But with the uproar trailing the revelation, a Presidency spokesman denied the endorsement.
However, ABN TVreliably gathered that in his March 18 letter to the Chairman of Progressives Governors Forum (PGF) and Kebbi State Governor, Senator Atiku Bagudu, where he called for order within the party, President Buhari attached a list of persons he nominated for various posts in the next NWC.
Those reportedly named in the letter were: Senator Abdullahi Adamu (Nasarawa, as National Chairman), former Senate President Ken Nnamani (Enugu, as Deputy Chairman, South), Engr. IfeOluwa Oyedele (Ondo, as National Secretary) while Hon. Farouk Adamu Aliyu (Jigawa) and Arc Waziri Bulama (Borno) were penciled down for Organising Secretary and Deputy Chairman, North.
CPC ‘conspiracy’
ABN TV gathered from reliable sources that the letter to Bagudu was orchestrated by close allies of the president including the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, SAN, and his Education counterpart, Adamu Adamu, who were with the president during his recent medical sojourn in London.
Multiple sources told our reporter that the two ministers and other associates close to Buhari convinced the president that he needed to show interest in the party’s affairs ahead of his exit, by nominating persons into key positions.
“They proposed persons they are comfortable with to key positions in the party, and most of them are from the CPC (defunct Congress for Progressives Change). The president endorsed the list and attached it in the letter to Bagudu,” a Presidency source familiar with the happenings told ABN TV in confidence.
“They made the president understand that if he allowed the governors to have their way, none of his core persons can get anything and that would mean an end to the mainstream Buhari political lineage,” a senior member of the party said last night.
Aside from Adamu and Nnamani who are originally from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) bloc of the APC, the other three are all long-term political associates of the president.
Aliyu, a former member of the House of Representatives, was a notable leader of the CPC under whose platform he contested for the governorship seat of Jigawa State in 2011.
Engineer Oyedele, a serving Executive Director at the Niger Delta Power Holding Company (NDPHC), was a Board of Trustee member of the defunct CPC. Arc Bulama, on the other hand, had served as a member of the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the CPC and briefly served as the National Secretary of the APC until the dissolution of the NWC to form the current caretaker leadership for the party.
The move to draft in top chieftains from the CPC wing of the APC to the NWC was said to have thickened following the endorsement of Senator Adamu for the chairmanship position by the president.
A source familiar with the intrigues said the Adamu’s endorsement, said to be at the instance of a powerful minister from the South with presidential aspiration, awakened Buhari’s men to the possibility of edging them out if they didn’t move in quickly.
Governors, others kick
However, reliable sources in the party said the majority of the 22 governors of the ruling party are opposed to the presidential endorsement with some of them expressing doubt if indeed the list was sanctioned by the president.
The opposition was also informed in certain quarters by choice of the personalities, which some of the stakeholders were uncomfortable with. Nasarawa State Governor, Abdullahi Sule, has variously expressed his support for his predecessor, Umaru Tanko Al-Makura, in spite of the reported preference of Adamu by the Presidency.
In the South West, for example, the five APC governors from the zone have chosen to field Senator Iyiola Omisore for the position of National Secretary as opposed to Oyedele, endorsed by the president.
In an allusion to the move to field the Buhari associate, Ondo State Governor, Rotimi Akeredolu, while announcing the zone’s nominees for the NWC position at the weekend warned against any plot by external forces to truncate the interest of the zonal leaders and stakeholders.
On the northern flank, confusion reigns supreme as leaders from the North West and North East are sharply divided over who takes the positions up for grab.
The major intrigue is around the position of the Deputy National Chairman, which stakeholders have reportedly denied two Buhari associates initially penciled down for the position.
Party leaders in Borno State have kicked against the initial proposal for Arc Bulama to emerge as the deputy chairman. Insiders told our reporter that in place of him political leadership in the state had settled in on a serving senator, Abubakar Kyari (Borno North).
But despite the purported micro-zoning, at least three other persons are said to have bought forms for the position from the North East. They are former House of Representatives Speaker, Yakubu Dogara (Bauchi), Senator Abubakar Girei and Chief Sunny Monidafe (Adamawa).
Meanwhile, party chieftains from Bauchi State petitioned President Buhari rejecting ceding of the Deputy National Chairman position to Borno State and the exclusion of their state from sharing party positions.
However, governors in the North West are reportedly united against another bid to have another Buhari associate, Farouk Adamu Aliyu the deputy chairman of the party.
The governors are said to be opposed to having the position in their area preferring to have the two positions of the Organising Secretary and National Legal Adviser earlier allocated to the area.
Party chieftains disclosed that the position of the North West governors was to block the emergence of Aliyu who is making spirited contacts for the position.
The initial position believed to have been assigned to him in the list of endorsees; National Organising Secretary is also being contested by other persons some of them believed to have governors’ backing.
Buhari, govs meet today
As confusion and horse-trading continue in the party, the 22 governors of the party are due to meet with President Buhari later today (Wednesday) to iron out grey areas.
“They are expressing opposition and doubts about the genuineness of any list from the president, the meeting tomorrow will determine everything as they would get to hear from his own mouths,” a source at the Villa told our reporter.
