US Imposes Travel Restrictions On Nigerians

January 31, 2020

The United States has announced its long awaited travel restrictions on Nigerians. The travel restrictions also affect five other countries.

They are People from Kyrgyzstan, Myanmar, Eritrea, Sudan and Tanzania. They will now be blocked from obtaining certain types of visas though they will still be able to visit the US.

An official said the new measures were the result of failures by the six countries to meet US security and information-sharing standards.

“These countries, for the most part, want to be helpful but for a variety of different reasons simply failed to meet those minimum requirements that we laid out,” acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf told reporters on Friday.

He said officials would work with the countries on bolstering their security requirements to help them get off the list.

The US said it would suspend the issuance of visas that can lead to permanent residency for nationals of Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, Myanmar and Nigeria.

Of the new nationalities facing visa restrictions, Nigerians account for the most immigration to the US.

The US State Department issued about 7,900 immigrant visas to Nigerians in fiscal year 2018, which began in October 2017.

President Donald Trump first introduced a travel ban in 2017. It currently closes US borders to citizens from seven countries, most with Muslim majorities.

Source: BBC.

Aisha Buhari Acknowledges Trail Blazing Roles Of Late Maryam Babangida

Editorial staff

January 31, 2020

Aisha Buhari , wife of President Muhammadu Buhari and Nigeria’s First Lady, has acknowledged the trail blazing roles played by late Maryam Babangida, wife of the former Nigeria’s military President, retired General Ibrahim Babangida and First Lady.

Aisha commended the late First Lady for her particular efforts in the establishment and running of her Better Life Programme for Rural Women.

At an organized event in Abuja, the nation’s capital today, January 31, to mark the 10th anniversary of her death, Aisha Buhari admitted that late Maryam Babangida’s Better Life for Rural Women, served to awaken the consciousness of women.

Aisha Buhari also commended late Maryam Babangida for initiating the National Women Commission as the first institutionalized machinery for women development in the country, which led to the concept of women in development becoming a permanent feature in development planning.

She added that all first ladies that came after her initiated programmes in order to add value to the work of their husbands.

On the Future Assured programme, which she initiated, Aisha Buhari said that it focuses on the challenges of women as captured by the various development goals, including health and well-being of women and children, empowerment of women and youth, equitable quality education for women and girls, as well as protection of women’s rights.

She expressed concerns on the reoccurring challenges of gender-based violence and drug abuse in the Nigerian society and called for concerted effort to find solutions to end the menace.

Muslims Will Make My Cabinet, Imo Gov, Uzodinma, Announces

January 31, 2020

The governor of Imo State, Senator Hope Uzodinma has given a hint that when he constitutes his cabinet shortly, Muslims will be part of it.

He said: “when I announce my cabinet, you will find that some Muslims will make my cabinet, so the issue of national unity and national integration is uppermost in my mind.”

Governor Uzodinma, who was at the presidential villa, Abuja where he was formally presented to President Muhammadu Buhari by the chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Adams Oshiomhole, said that making Muslims commissioners in his government is another way “of ensuring that we are all safe.

“Don’t forget I represent a constituency that comprises Muslim and Christians, so the Muslims in Imo state are my friends and we have been working with them for the past eight years in the senate.”

The governor, in answering reporters’ questions said that the issue of food security is very important to his government, saying that he had directed the permanent secretary in the ministry of agriculture to come up with blueprint on agriculture.

“Before I got into

Imo state, they have already passed the budget which has their own priorities and programmes. Of course, most of them are not consistent with the programmes of my own political party on what I think would be better for our state. So, we are now identifying, for instance, the areas we can grow rice, areas we can farm other produce.”

Governor Uzodinma said that the national policies on agriculture are being collated and that there is already a technical committee in that respect.

“You know my deputy governor is former Vice chancellor, University of Agriculture, Umudike, Umohia. So he is also an agriculturist. He is chairing a committee to come up with a full programme for agriculture to ensure food security for our people.”

The governor said that he understood the challenges in Imo State, saying that even before now, only few days ago when he got to Imo, he discovered that salaries were not being paid in full.

“The reason being that the money coming from Abuja, the federation account is not sufficient. “What I did was to cut down the running cost and forfeited the security vote donated to the governor. I made up the money and we were able to pay salaries 100 percent to all the civil servants. I also directed that the local government funds be sent straight to the local government until such a time the state is ready to release 10 percent of their IGR (Internally Generated Revenue) to the local government then we can begin to do the business of JAC – Joint Allocation Committee.”

Senator Uzodinma said that for 12 years, no governor visited the civil service secretariat, but that he was there two days ago and water has been been available to the secretariat for the past nine years.

“Two days after my visit, water is running there now: they have been connected back to electricity and the generators are being worked on now.

“So, my mandate is about the people and my government will just be about the people and by the grace of God, I will not disappoint their expectations. I am sure they will see good governance from a man with experience, working in consultations with political stakeholders in the state. I think we can do it differently and the narrative will be acceptable to the people.”

He appealed to Imo people to join hands to build a very strong democracy where equity, justice and fair play will be the order of the day.

He said that having campaigned as a candidate of APC, he had his manifesto built on three Rs – Rehabilitation, Reconstruction and Recovery.

“You will agree with me that with what I have just said happened two days ago, is part of the recovery. We are also trying to design an implementation plan for all those promises we made. In less than three, four days, I will bring out my implementation plan with timelines, God willing, with appropriate funding we will follow that implementation plan judiciously and I am sure the Imo people will be better for it and I will bring prosperity to the people.”

The governor promised to quickly address the problem of insecurity, adding that his government would take courageous and bold decision to ensure that every citizen would have a sense of security.

“If that is addressed, then we will now begin to address the infrastructural gaps.

“When you are talking about priorities areas – education, agriculture these are priority areas. “Then government has no business in business, we will try to introduce PPP – Public Private Partnership, bring private sector investors to also help in growing our economy.

“We are interested in reviving our industries that have gone moribund because of lack of electricity, portable water, access road.”

How Courts, INEC Cheated Us And We Bore The Pains – APC Boss, Oshiomhole

Editorial staff

January 31, 2020

Chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Adams Oshiomhole has said that his party has more reasons to stage street protests against the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and courts in the country than opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for daylight cheating the part suffered.

“When I see people protesting, that is my primary constituency, to do protests but I don’t run after mad man when he is naked and I have to join him to run because I want to make a point.

“That is the reason we just allowed them to the sort of thing they were doing.”

The APC chairman, who spoke to newsmen today, January 31 at the presidential villa, Abuja, recalled what happened in Sokoto, saying that there were a lot of issues that INEC cannot defend “but we have to leave with the pain.

“Look at Rivers State. For some technical reasons, we were told we cannot even have candidates, and nobody asked questions. But because we are ruling party, we cannot just begin to go to the streets and begin to protest those things.

“You also know of another state Zamfara, where we won governorship, Senate, House of Representatives and the Supreme Court said our primaries were not perfect, therefore those who were not in the ballot box were declared winner, so we lived with that pain.

“If it is about mobilizing people to attack, we would have mobilized our people against the Supreme Court but that will not be a responsible behaviour in a democracy.

“So, we live with the pain because we understand that, we operate under the principle of separation of powers.”

Oshiomhole advised media not to accept half truths that PDP is parading.

“I think this is important, when I saw Secondus leading that protest, I was tempted to tell him who should be the real protedters: how did Wike, Emmanuel Udom and Dickson becsme governors? Supreme Court ordered the previous leadership, choose to completely dismiss the use of card reader, that is what has brought a lot of mischief now into our electoral system.

“Because, whereas the law recognizes the power of INEC to make bylaws and those bylaws are enforceable in court and there are judicial pronouncements holding those bylaws. when they wanted to allow these PDP states to be returned, their elections having been nulified by elections petition tribunal, nullified by the court of appeal on the basis that they did not comply with INEC guidelines, as regards to using card reader.

“The Supreme Court, looking for escape route for PDP, decided that the use of card reader, yes though in the INEC guidelines, is not in the law. Can everything possibly be in the law? “The same court recognized the power of INEC to make rules and regulations for smooth conduct of elections. We have stomached all of these because as they say, two wrongs don’t make a right.

“If we choose to question, on the streets of Nigeria, all of the impunity we have seen that have affected APC negatively coming from our courts, there will be no peace anywhere. But we have said that somebody must bear the price of peace that is why we choose to keep quiet.

“It doesn’t mean PDP has any valid cases.”

PDP Begs America, UK, Others To Upturn Nigeria’s Supreme Court Judgment On Ihedioha

Editorial staff

January 31, 2020

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has cried out to the United States, United Kingdom, and the European Union to intervene and upturn the judgement of the Supreme Court on Emeka Ihedioha as Governor of Imo State.

Chairman of the party, Uche Seconds and other leaders, who marched on Abuja streets today, January 31 in their continued protest against the judgement of the apex court, begged the international community “to come to the assistance of our dear country.”

Chairman of the part’s National Working Committee (NWC), Secondus, who led the street protest said: “on behalf of the PDP and the masses, we call on the international community to come to the assistance of our dear country.

“The content of our letter is for international community to advise our government to obey the rule of law particularly as it relates to National Assembly and judiciary.”

Secondus noted that President Buhari was overwhelmed with the security challenges in the country.

The protesters started the street march from the party’s national secretariat, and walked through some streets of the nation’s capital to the embassies where they submitted their petitions.

Those who took part in the protest include members of the PDP National Working Committee (NWC), Board of Trustees (BoT), and National Assembly, among others.

The National Organising Secretary, retired Colonel Austin Akobundu, had hinted in a statement yesterday, January 30 that movement during the demonstration would be by individual vehicles in a peaceful and non-violent manner.

He said: “In continuation of our protests as ordered by NEC, the National Chairman has directed that all members of the NWC, BOT, leadership, and members of the National Assembly, and other critical stakeholders of our great party would be presenting our petitions to the embassies of the United States of America, United Kingdom, and the European Union on the State of Affairs in the country.

The apex court had on January 14, 2020 declared Hope Uzodinma of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the duly elected governor of the state, thereby bringing Ihedioha’s reign to an abrupt end.

US Embassy Describes Report Of Denying Oyedepo Visa As False

Editorial staff

January 31, 2020

The United States’ Embassy in Nigeria has denied depriving the founder of Living Faith Church Worldwide, otherwise known as Winners’ Chapel International, David Oyedepo, visa into America.

In a tweet today, January 31, the embassy said:

“#FalseNews Alert! Be advised, the reports making the rounds about a visa being denied to Nigerian Bishop Oyedepo are false. If you have seen this manufactured item in the media, help defeat this #misinformation by communicating to everyone that it is completely false,” the tweet said.

CoronaVirus Enters Britain, 2 Affected

Greenbarge Reporters

January 31, 2020

Two people in England have been diagnosed with the Wuhan coronavirus and are being treated in Newcastle.

The patients are members of the same family and are the first people in England to be diagnosed with it on British soil.

They did not fly back to the UK on the Government’s evacuation flight, which is scheduled to land in Oxfordshire today, January 31.

Until today, at least 161 people had tested negative for the virus in the UK but none had been diagnosed with it.

The infection makes England the 23rd country or territory outside of China to declare cases of the infection. It did, however, confirm that they are not in Wirral, Merseyside, where people being evacuated from the centre of the outbreak will be quarantined later today.

The patients are likely to be at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Newcastle, which is one of only four hospitals in the country equipped to deal with infectious patients like this.

Killing Of Soldier Guarding My Otuoke Home Traumatized Me- Goodluck Jonathan

Greenbarge Reporters

January 31, 2020

Former Nigerian President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, is still in shock over the attack on his residence at Otuoke, Bayelsa State.
In a statement yesterday, January 30 by his former media aide, Dr. Ikechukwu Eze, the former president emphasized that he was traumatised with the killing of a soldier guarding his residence during the attack.
Dr. Jonathan, who spoke during a visit on him by executive members of the National Association of Nigerian Students, who paid him a solidarity visit over the December 24, 2019 attack by yet-to-be-identified gunmen: said, “The fact that a soldier lost his life in that attack traumatises me. That young man wouldn’t have died, the way he did if he was not protecting me.
“Whenever people come to me, just as you people have come, to talk about that attack, I feel worried about the general society. Whenever I consider that people could do that to a former President who has reasonable security guarding him, my mind reaches out to the rest of Nigerians who do not have that level of protection.
“I am worried that so many people are becoming victims of sporadic shootings, kidnappings and so on. I believe that the country will get over the kind of insecurity it currently faces.”
Jonathan advised the students to be serious with their studies, adding that it is only when people are educated that the country would be able to manage governance and developmental issues better.
“For you young people, I urge you to believe in yourselves and believe in your country. Surely we will get to our destination.
Speaking earlier, the NANS President, Danielson Akpan, commended the ex-President for his legacies in the education sector, adding that many students that enrolled in the 12 new federal universities that were established during Jonathan’s tenure had successfully graduated.
He commended Jonathan for conceding defeat and handing over to his successor, the President, Muhammadu Buhari.
“The student that enrolled when you created those universities are now graduates. Some are gainfully employed; some are already employers of labour while some that have left the shores of our country are doing excellently well abroad.
“Your Excellency, Nigerians believe in you and what you stand for; that elections should be freely conducted as you did in 2015. That particular call you placed to your successor on March 31, 2015 is a notable achievement for which history will continue to hold you very dearly till eternity.”
Source: The Punch

Current Cost Of Performing Muslim Hajj Too High, I Will Reduce It – New Hajj Commission Boss

Greenbarge Reporters

January 31, 2020

The new Chairman of the National Hajj Commission of Nigeria (NAHCON), Barrister Zikrullahi Hassan has disagreed with the current high cost of hajj performance by Muslims in the country, promising to bring it down in no distant future.
Hassan, who has just been confirmed by the Senate of the Federal Republic, also promised to reduce the number of days the pilgrims stay in Saudi Arabia.
He emphasized that the current Hajj fares is “unaffordable” and needed to be reviewed downward, especially in the interest of the masses who wish to perform holy pilgrimage.
To assist more willing Nigerians in performing the annual ritual, he said a savings scheme would be put in place to make the payment of the fares easier for intending pilgrims, pointing out that this “will be the answer to the unaffordable Hajj fares.”
According to him, this is achievable since the same thing is happening in Malaysia and Indonesia, maintaining that “Nigeria cannot only do it, but do so immediately.”
“I will sustain the achievements of the outgoing chairman, but also look at the areas that require improvement. Present Act in abeyance will be enforced to the letter.
“One of the key demands that will be looked into is to ensure that Hajj fares are reduced to affordable rates, because as it is today, not many Nigerians can afford it,” he stressed.
Besides looking at the ways of making the fares affordable, the chairman promised to ensure that the number of days being spent in Saudi Arabia by Nigerians during pilgrimage are reduced, saying they used to stay too long in the holy land as against the distance between the two countries.
Hassan explained that Hajj has become a profession because it affects millions of people across the world, adding that Nigeria, being the 5th country with the largest number of pilgrims in the world, would also have an international training institute on Hajj matters, under his leadership.
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs, Senator Adamu Bulkachuwa (APC Bauchi North) had promised that the committee would be carrying out thorough oversight of NAHCON with a view to assisting the Commission in effective discharge of its duties.
President Muhammadu Buhari had last December appointed and forwarded the name of Hassan, from Osun State to the Senate for confirmation as the new chairman along with 18 others as members of NAHCON.

Presidency Not Happy With Media Slant Of Buhari’s Comments On Security Challenges

Editorial staff

January 30, 2020

The presidency has expressed disasatisfaction with traditional and social media for what it called “a mischievous slant being given to the comments of President Muhammadu Buhari on the security challenges in some parts of the country.

In a statement today January 30, special adviser to the president on media and publicity, Fami Adesina recalled that on Monday, while hosting Eminent and Respected Citizens of Niger State at State House, Abuja, the President had said:”I was taken aback by what is happening in the North West and other parts of the country. During our campaigns, we knew about the Boko Haram. What is coming now is surprising. It is not ethnicity or religion, rather it is one evil plan against the country.
“We have to be harder on them. One of the responsibilities of government is to provide security. If we don’t secure the country, we will not be able to manage the economy properly.”
Femi Adesina regretted that the reportage of the President’s statement was slanted to mean that President Buhari said he was unaware of the security challenges in some parts of the country.
“Far from it, except to the mischievous mind. The President is fully aware and fully in charge of all that is going on.”
The spokesman stressed that the statement by the President was clear enough, “and these are the salient points:
·In 2015, we knew there was Boko Haram insurgency, particularly in the North-east, and we mentioned it in our campaigns. There are clear economic and cultural factors behind the clashes that sadly rocked many of our communities, be they the Fulani-Tiv or Fulani-Berom conflict, the Tiv versus Jukun and so on. By now, these conflicts are fairly under control.
· By 2019, banditry had surfaced in the North-West. It was surprising, as the area is almost homogeneous, made up of Hausa-Fulanis. The combatants are largely Muslim. This is what the President said he was surprised about.
· The point he made was that what is happening in the country is not about ethnicity or religion, it is plainly an evil plan against the nation.”
He said that it is disingenuous that the earlier and latter parts of the statement were downplayed, and the middle part misinterpreted to mean that President Buhari was unaware or surprised by the security situation in the country.
“The traditional media, and commentators on social media, are encouraged to keep fidelity to the truth, and not concoct narratives to suit some sinister motives.
“It is all about our country, and deliberately misrepresenting the President hurts not just the country, but the mischief makers themselves, ultimately.”

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