Newborn Baby Found Dead In Students’ Hostel Soak-Away

Occupants of a private school hostel located near the main gate of a tertiary institution in Imo State known for its relocation crisis woke up on Wednesday morning to behold the sight of a new born tucked inside a soak-away in the hostel.

Eye witnesses told LEADERSHIP WEEKEND that some occupants of the hostel heard the cry of the baby on that fateful day but could not decipher where the sound was coming from.

Their curiosity, according to the witness, spurred some of them to organise a search party. “Fortunately, as we further gathered, the cry of the baby was traced to the soak-away inside the hostel,” a student said.

The search party, comprising mainly male students, allegedly found the baby with a rope tied to a computer. But unfortunately, the baby died before it was brought out of the soak-away. According to a witness, the baby was suspected to be a day-old as its placenta was found dangling from his neck.

The rescue team, it was learnt, subsequently searched all the rooms occupied by female students but could not trace the baby’s mother. The matter was reported to the police in Owerri, who have intensified investigation.

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Private Jet: Christian Leaders Back Ayo Oritsejafor, Blast Tunde Bakare

 Christian leaders have started reacting to Pastor Tunde Bakare’s comments that a revolution would consume religious leaders in the country, and the way he condemned the acquisition of jets by renowned Christian leaders in Nigeria.

 

One of those who reacted to Bakare’s comments is the chairman of the Northern Christian Elders Forum, Evangelist Matthew Owojaiye, who said Bakare’s comments should be ignored. Also, Apostle Isa El-Buba, the General Overseer of Evangelical Bible Outreach Ministries International, Jos, Plateau State, defended preachers who own jets, concluding that Bakare’s condemnation of these men of God was blasphemous.

According to El-Buba, “There is nothing wrong for a preacher to own a jet. If people in the secular world can acquire jets for chief executive officers of big private enterprises, there is nothing wrong in giving gifts to a man of God of Pastor Oritsejafor’s standing. This is a man of God that travels across the whole world. He deserves what he has been given.”

Similarly, the General Secretary of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Reverend Musa Asake, flayed Bakare, saying: “What is wrong with giving a gift to Pastor Oritsejafor? Did Pastor Oritsejafor embezzle church money? Did he collect somebody’s money? Some people came together and bought it for him so as to ease his work. This is to help him to continue with the work of the gospel.

 Oritsejafor is a man of God. He is doing everything for the work of God… It is a welcome idea. I support people who help ministers of the gospel in their work. He did not go out to lobby for it. It was a surprise for him. I was at that occasion. I saw things myself,” he argued.

Yet another Christian leader, Reverend Gideon Oyibo, President of the Delta State Baptist Conference, exonerated Pastor Oritsejafor, saying there was nothing wrong with such gesture.

 According to Oyibo, “The environment influences the way people talk. If you come from a family background of poverty and a member of the family is rich, people will conclude that he is a ritualist. They will conclude that he has stolen money, because in that family, the members do not expect anybody to be rich…

 In Nigeria, we have a traditional environment in which a pastor is expected to operate by our own evaluation. Whenever a pastor is living above our own evaluation, then we can say anything about that person… The question we should ask is that: did Pastor Oritsejafor ask for the jet? Did he beg for it? Or was it that certain people gathered together under the leading of God and decided to buy it and present it to him as a gift?”

Culled from the Tribune

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Grandfather Graduates First Class From UI

 Do you feel like you are too old to acquire education? This story should motivate you to achieve your goals, not only in education but every endeavour of life you set out to achieve.

Mr. Aderemi Alli, a grandfather, was the oldest among the 21 First Class degree graduands of the University of Ibadan (UI) when it held its convocation Thursday, in the ancient south west city of Ibadan. The university graduated a total of 1,582 students for the 2011/2012 academic session with 243 graduating in Second Class (Upper Division) and 920, Second Class (Lower Division). A total of 135 of the students graduated with Third Class and 203 earned a Pass.

Alli, 57, was among the three first class graduates produced by the institution’s Faculty of Law.Alli, who had a first degree in economics education 31 years ago and whose last child is studying electrical engineering in UI, told journalists at the ceremony that many of his schoolmates who had become Senior Advocates of Nigeria were his motivation to go back to school to study law.

“I feel I can still participate in the society in spite of my age. I am using this medium to advise others that they can do it, If I can do it,” he said.

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Man Uses GPS to Trace His Wife to a Place Where She was Having S*x with a 16-year-old Boy

 A suspicious husband has made use of the GPS capability on his wife’s cellphone to trace her, only to find the 38-year-old teacher having sex with a 16-year-old boy. The wife, Amie Neely, now faces a felony sexual assault charge after being arrested by Port St. Lucie, Fla. police early Sunday morning, according to TC Palm.

Reports have it that the boy was an exchange student living with Neely and her husband at the time of the alleged assault. There is also another exchange student still taking up residence there. There is no indication, however, that Neely, who teaches at Community Christian Academy, ever taught the student she’s accused of assaulting.

The boy told the police that he drove Neely to an area near St. Lucie West Centennial High School. He said he got in the back seat with Neely and, as the two were having s*x, the teacher’s husband walked up to the car and discovered them.

Meanwhile, Neely has blamed “midlife crisis” feelings for her behavior when questioned by police, according to TC Palm. She also said the boy kept asking for sex and she hoped he would stop asking if she went along with his requests, according to police. The boy also told the police he and Neely had sex on multiple occasions, including inside the teacher’s home.

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$1bn Abacha loot lying in Swiss bank when I left office -OBJ •US reveals how Halliburton money was shared

 THERE is at least one billion dollar Abacha loot still lying in Swiss accounts, former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo has stated, just as he blamed the World Bank for contributing to the problems of Nigeria.

Obasanjo made this startling revelation on Tuesday in Warri, Delta State, while making remarks on leadership as the major factor affecting the growth of the nation. The former president was chairman at a lecture organised in honour of Chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, as part of the series of programmes organised to mark his 40th year in ministry, which was held at the basement of the  international auditorium of Word of Life Bible Church, Ajamimogha Street, Warri.

While responding to a question posed on corruption, Obasanjo derided the World Bank for only being able to blackmail countries like Nigeria as corrupt, but doing little to give away names of the corrupt individuals, the amount stolen and where the monies are kept in foreign accounts. 

He blamed the bank for making Nigeria poorer by misleading her into introducing the Structural Adjustment Programme during the General Ibrahim Babangida regime even when it knew it would spell doom for the country.

“When I was president, I called the World Bank. I said, please, give me the list of the amount that has been stolen, where is it kept and who the beneficiaries are. I never got anything from the World Bank thereafter. We have on our own decided that we will investigate and get from one family, Abacha family alone,” he revealed.

 “From the Abacha family alone, we recovered millions of dollars.  I got 1.25 billion dollars (100m pounds);  and the lawyer in Swizerland (he is still there), who was doing it for us, said, when I was leaving, that if we worked harder, there was still, at least, one billion dollars that we can get from that family alone,” he maintained, adding that only an insincere and mad person will not acknowledge that there is corruption in Nigeria.

Taking a swipe at the World Bank, the former president said: “It is the same World Bank who came to us and said ‘Structural Adjustment Programme was good.’ Of course, it only made us poorer. We said SAP would make us poorer, they said ‘No.’ We went for it and we are poorer today. And then they came to tell us that we did not do it the way they wanted us to do it. Many years later, they accepted that we were right and they were wrong.”

He querried the inability of antigraft bodies in the country to bite as it happened during his regime. “I am not saying we are not corrupt. As a nation, we are corrupt, but are we doing something about it? I once heard people, during my regime, saying that the fear of Ribadu was the beginning of wisdom but today, there is no longer any wisdom,” he averred.

Guest Speaker of the lecture entitled “The Nigeria of my Dreams: Towards the Consolidation of National Unity,” Professor Bolaji Akinyemi, former Minister of Foreign Affairs, during his presentation, took participants through the labyrinth of the evolution of the Nigerian state, the undoings of its early leaders and their attendant effects on subsequent leaders as well as various forms of manifestations of failures of leadership in the country, among others.

Professor Akinyemi also flayed the political elite, who held sway in early post-Independent era, blaming them for not making efforts to “reach a broad consensus on the fundamental values that should be the overriding principles of governance, in order to make life more abundant for all, cater for the poor, increase opportunities for all, provide safety net for the widow and the orphan and reduce the gap between the rich and the poor, between the South and the North and between the haves and the have nots.,

According to the diplomat, leaders had refused to learn from the mistakes of their predecessors, thereby trivialising public offices, adding that the principles of zoning and federal character, especially as it affected Justice Jombo-Ofo, who was denied being sworn in at the Court of Appeal, based on being appointed on the quota of Abia State because of marriage, was not only rididulous but absurd.

Professor Akinyemi stressed on the need for the elite to seek a consensus that would emphasise policies and values and engender unity, protection of the poor, orphans and widows.

He also sought values that would de-emphasis religious bigotry, greed and indecent flaunting of wealth. Dignitaries at the lecture included Chief Ebenezer Obey-Fabiyi, Deacon Gamaliel Onosode and Professor Jim Omatseye.

Meanwhile, as the United States government mounts pressure on the Federal Government to prosecute all those indicted in the Halliburton bribery scandal, it has equally released further information that could assist the government.

Informed sources exclusively disclosed to the Nigerian Tribune that the US government had further threatened to sanction the Federal Government if all those involved in the scandal were not brought to book.

The United States listed the names of the beneficiaries of the bribery scandal and the banks in the country where the money was kept.According to the source, the United States government was insisting that if it could try Halliburton officials and convict them, there was nothing stopping Nigeria from doing same.

It further added that this was a singular test for the Federal Government to know if it was sincere in its fight against corruption.

The source revealed that a former Chief of Air Staff collected a total sum of $70 million through his company, Tri-star in trains one and two, while $40 million was collected in trains three and four and paid to the cronies of a former head of state.

Also, $35 million was collected on trains five and six by the cronies of a former president.

Furthermore, Malabo Oil, belonging to a former petroleum minister, got a share of $2 million.

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Meet the ‘Ultimate Wonder Aeroplane Winner’ Ebube Essien-Garricks

 Yesterday, a 27 year-old student Miss Ebube Essien-Garricks was announced as the winner of the much publicized ‘Ultimate Wonder Aeroplane’ promo run by telecommunication company MTN.

She has opted for the money equivalent which means she will be receiving the sum of N64m.

Essien-Garricks is currently based in Port Hacourt where she studying at a school of science. She is unmarried.

We’re told the picture above was taken yesterday, at MTN’s Port Harcourt office shortly after she received the phone call that delivered the great news.

Miss Garricks’ phone was initially switched off, NET reliably gathered, and it took sometime before she could be reached.

‘I am short of words, there is no word to describe what I feel right now, it is almost as if it is a dream but I know that nothing can be more real than what I am feeling right now. This must be the best Christmas gift ever. It is truly wonderful’ an excited Essien-Garricks said yesterday.

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Second hand clothes cause candidiasis, hepatitis —expert

 Second hand clothes users risk contracting candidiasis and hepatitis, a medical expert, Dr Elizabeth Uzorji, has saidUzorji told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Jos on Tuesday that such diseases were air borne and could be contracted easily through the constant use of second hand clothes.

“Those that patronise second clothes do not have the slightest idea of who the first user was.

“Those selling the wares also do not take their time to wash these clothes very well before marketing them.“So the lack of adequate information about the negative effects of these second hand clothes among our people has placed users at high risk and a major cause of concern to public health experts,’’ she said.

The medical expert decried the situation where some women buy inner wears from the second hand clothes dealers warning that such women were at the risk of contracting vaginal infections.

She advised the people to ensure that the items were washed before being used, stressing that such step would go a long way in reducing the chances of such infections.

Uzorji specifically advised that such second hand clothes be washed with hot water and detergent before being used so as to reduce the chances of any infection.

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NCC Bans Telecommunication Operators From Lotteries, Promotions

With ridiculous promotions like ‘winning an airplane’ ruling the airwaves, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) on Monday warned telecommunications operators against running lotteries and promotions.

This is contained in a statement issued by Mr Tony Ojobo, the Director, Public Affairs of the commission in Abuja.The ban covered approved promotions and lotteries in which the NCC signed a Memorandum of understanding with the National Lottery Regulatory Commission.

The statement said the ban would be in place until such a time as might be determined by the commission.

The commission had in recent times been inundated with several complaints from consumers and stakeholders against the various promotions offered by the operators.

It said the commission had evaluated the complaints received against the backdrop of sustaining the integrity of the networks and the general interest of the consumers.

The statement further said that the commission was mindful of one of its statutory responsibilities; to protect and promote the interest of consumers against unfair practices.

It said the promotions had increased the number of minutes available to subscribers for use within a limited period of time, thereby, creating congestion in the networks.

It also said that on-net calls were now being offered by operators at tariffs well below the prevailing inter-connect rates, thereby, introducing anti-competitive practices and behaviour.

It further said the termination of calls was becoming difficult between networks, making it extremely hard for subscribers to make calls successfully.It listed the Telecom Operators affected by the ban as: GLOBACOM, MTN, INTERCELLULAR,VISAFONE, ETISALAT, AIRTEL and MULTILINKS.

The commission said it was determined to ensure that the quality of service offered by the networks were such that delivered value to the consumers. [NAN]

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Elections 2012, Barack Obama smash Twitter records

Election day in the United States became the most tweeted about event in US political history Tuesday with enthusiastic netizens firing off 20 million poll-related tweets, the social network said.

With his re-election all-but-confirmed, President Barack Obama took to Twitter to thank his supporters in a series of tweets. First with a "This happened because of you. Thank you.", "We're all in this together. That's how we campaigned, and that's who we are. Thank you. -bo" and then simply a "Four more years." with a picture of the first couple hugging.

The last tweet quickly became the most retweeted ever, with over 300,000 retweets in less than 40 minutes.Earlier, Americans flocked to Twitter and other platforms all day in a massive social media burst, posting photographic proof they had cast their ballots, cheering their favorite candidates along and analyzing the latest polls.

"With 20 million tweets, Election Day just became the most tweeted about event in US political history," Twitter announced on its official government and politics account @gov.

The number far surpassed the 10.3 million tweets sent during the first presidential debate last month - an event the popular social network had at the time billed a record in US political history.

In an indication of the importance of social networks in the presidential race, both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney took to Twitter, Facebook and Reddit just hours ahead of polls closing to make last-ditch pushes for votes.

The campaigns have used social media extensively over the past few months to push people to vote and even try and beat the record 2008 turnout, when two-thirds of US voters cast a ballot.

(With inputs from AFP)

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