…says N500m ransom was paid •Ebikeme: I never acted my abduction Militant group, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND, has alleged fraud in the recent kidnap of Ebikeme Clark, son of prominent Ijaw leader, Chief Edwin Clark. It said the kidnap was an orchestrated plot by Ebikeme himself, even as it…
WITH clear unanimity, delegates, yesterday, decried the increasing rate of insecurity and corruption in the country, noting that unless these two problems were adequately tackled, the country’s search for peace might remain elusive. Almost all the delegates who spoke at the first session of the resumed debate on President Goodluck Jonathan’s inaugural speech toed this…
NKECHI was full of life and in high spirits. She was nine months pregnant and was already feeling the contractions of labour at well-spaced intervals. She had no expectation of problems and was hopeful of a normal delivery. She woke very early on the D-Day, dressed up and packed her bags. The hospital was over…
Borno State Governor, Kashim Shettima, yesterday described as unfair the linking of armed forces to Boko Haram He said it was unhealthy and unhelpful, alleging that the army was supporting the terrorist group. Shettima added that the development was bad for counter insurgency operations and dangerous to the survival of the nation. The governor was…
The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar, led Jama’atu Nasril Islam on Monday in Kaduna raised the alarm that the Nigerian Army was out to wipe out the entire Muslims in the name of fighting terrorism in the land. The JNI insisted that the Nigerian Muslims, especially in some Northern parts of the country, were…
Wife of the President, Mrs. Patience Jonathan, on Monday said she was solidly behind the Supervising Minister of Education, Chief Nyesom Wike, to take over from the Rivers State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi, in 2015. Wike, who was at a time Amaechi’s Chief of Staff, has been at loggerheads with the governor since he (Amaechi) started…
The World Bank, yesterday, reacted to the $510 billion Gross Domestic Product, GDP,
WASHINGTON — A Nigerian soldier says he has witnessed incidents that suggest some Nigerian military commanders are working with Boko Haram, an Islamist militant group blamed for thousands of deaths since 2009. In an exclusive interview with VOA’s Hausa service, he described how his military unit, based in the northeastern Borno State region, was ambushed…
Nigeria’s nominal Gross Domestic Product, GDP, now stands at $509.9 billion, making the nation’s economy the largest in Africa and the 26th in the world, according to the preliminary results of the rebasing exercise of the federal government. The Coordinating Minister for the Economy and Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, announced this at a…
The Defence Headquarters (DHQ) denied yesterday that some commanders in the Northeast and Boko Haram insurgents were working together – as alleged by a “soldier”. The DHQ said impersonation could not be ruled out to create wrong impressions for the public. The Director of Defence Information, Maj-Gen. Chris Olukolade, who spoke with our correspondent in…