Sahara Reporters Latest News Today Friday 21st February 2020
Sahara Reporters Latest News Today and headlines on some of the happenings and news trend in the Country, today 21/02/20
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Adamawa Polytechnic To Dismiss Four Lecturers For Altering Results, Awarding Fake Marks
Four academic staff of Adamawa State Polytechnic are to be dismissed for fabricating results, SaharaReporters can report.
Management of the institution approved and recommended them for dismissal, according to a statement on Thursday signed by Information and Public Relations Officer, Albert Matilah.
The affected staff were said to have allegedly pleaded guilty to altering over 800 results and awarding fake marks.
They are Abubakar Babale, Paul Wache, Usman Hammarwabi and Isa Ribadu.
It was revealed that Babale, who is Head of Department, Mass Communication, altered over 700 results in 21 courses while Wache of Geography Department, tempered with 83 results in 12 courses.
The statement reads in part, “Abubakar Babale tempered with 727 candidates’ results in 21 courses and also gave fake results to some students who did not write the examination.
“Paul Wache altered 83 results in 12 courses which he claimed to be human error.
“In addition, he gave fake results to students who did not write the paper as testified by the course lecturer.
“Usman Hammarwabi was involved in forgery, numerous alterations, allocation of fake results and other unprofessional acts.
“Isa Ribadu’s case was numerous alteration of results and allocation of fake marks.
“It is evidently clear that the lecturers were given the opportunity to defend themselves and pleaded guilty to the offences.”
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Five Years After Being Exposed By SaharaReporters For Forging Academic Credentials To Contest, Win Election, Kogi House Of Representatives Member, Lawal Idris, Charged To Court
A member of the House of Representatives from Kogi State, Lawal Mohammed Idris, who was in 2018 exposed by SaharaReporters for presenting forged academic certificates to the Independent National Electoral Commission to contest the 2015 and 2019 National Assembly elections, has been finally charged to court over the offence.
In a Federal Capital Territory High Court document dated February 4, 2020 sighted by SaharaReporters on Thursday, Idris was accused of presenting a fake National Diploma certificate purportedly obtained from Yaba College of Technology in 1987 to the electoral commission in order to run for the Ajaokuta Federal Constituency in Kogi under the platform of the All Progressives Congress.
To smuggle himself into public office and live fat on tax payers money, Idris also forged a West African Examinations Council certificate in 1984, which he presented to be eligible for election.
In a six-count charge, the police is accusing Idris of forgery and making false declaration to deceive the public.
The charge sheet seen by SaharaReporters reads in part, “That you Hon. Lawal Mohammed Idris, 59, of Federal House of Representatives, Abuja, and Adekoya Oluwasheun now at large, sometimes in 2015 within the jurisdiction of this court did conspire among yourselves to commit an office to wit forgery and thereby committed an offence contrary to section 97 and punishable under section 364 of the Penal code Act. FLASH: A member of @HouseNGR from Kogi State, Lawal Mohammed Idris, who was exposed by SaharaReporters in 2018 for presenting forged academic certificates to @inecnigeria to contest the 2015 and 2019 National Assembly elections, has been finally charged to court over the offence. pic.twitter.com/sjSQvYTYGr— Sahara Reporters (@SaharaReporters) February 20, 2020
“That you Hon. Lawal Mohammed Idris, 59, of Federal House of Representatives, Abuja, sometimes in 2015 in declaration made by you in INEC Form CF001, before the Commissioner of Oath, made a false statement that you attended Yaba College of Technology and obtained National Diploma from Yaba College of Technology dated June 26, 1987, which you know or have reason to believe to be false to wit seeking election in the Federal House of Representatives, Ajaokuta, under the platform of the All Progressives Congress in 2015 and thereby committed an offence contrary to section 164 and punishable under section 364 of the Penal code Act.
“That you Hon. Lawal Mohammed Idris, 59, of Federal House of Representatives, Abuja, between 2014 and 2015 forged West African Examination Council certificate dated June 1984 with certificate No: PO.0503292 purported to have been signed and issued by WAEC and you submitted same to INEC Headquarters in satisfaction of your requirement to seek election in the Federal House of Representatives, Ajaokuta, under the platform of the All Progressives Congress in 2015 and thereby committed an offence contrary to section 164 and punishable under section 364 of the Penal code Act.”
If found guilty, Idris could spend 14 years in prison with the option of fine or both.
Recall that in 2018, SaharaReporters had exposed how Idris, through the help of one Seun Adekoya, a former staff of Yabatech’s Department of Exams and Records, obtained the forged National Diploma certificate after paying N10m.
After the matter became public and a huge scandal, the management of Yabatech equally came out to deny ever having Idris as a student of the institution at any time in history.
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EXCLUSIVE: How Lawmaker Lawal Idris Forged YabaTech Certificate To Win House Of Reps Seat
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Adenuga Adijat on behalf of Registrar of the institution at the time had while responding to an enquiry from the Commissioner of Police, General Investigation Section, Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department of the Police at Alagbon, Lagos, said, “Please be informed that Lawal Mohammed Idris was not a registered student of the college and the attached certificate which was said to have been issued to him did not emanate from Yaba college of Technology.
“Kindly discountenance his claim. Thank you.”
Charles Oni, Director of Public Relations and Media of Yabatech at the time, confirmed that Adekoya was involved in sale of certificate to the serving federal lawmaker.
He revealed that when his house was searched by operatives of the SCID, blank Yabatech certificates, statement of results, stamp pad and other college items were found.
Oni said, “After he was released on bail, he resigned his appointment but the college rejected it and dismissed him.”
Adekoya has since jumped bail and been on the road despite efforts by police authorities to arrest him and make him answer to his offence.
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Alex Ogbu And Chima Ikwunado’s Murders: A Metaphor By Kunle Wizeman Ajayi
My comrade, Alex Ogbu; a hard worker who combines journalism and labour organizing, was shot dead by security Operatives at Berger, Abuja. Far away in Port Harcourt, Chima Ikwunado; a notable mechanic worker, was tortured to death by the police officers attached to E-Crack command.
While Alex was killed at the protests of the Shiites where he was felled, he was not at Berger mainly to cover the protests. He must have tried to cover when the police started shooting at the armless protesting Shiites. Eyewitness report said he was shot directly at, but Mohammed, a Vehicle Inspection Service (VIS) operative had to beg that he was a government worker to get spared from being shot in the head like Alex at the same period at Berger. Meanwhile, Mohammed has been shot in the leg already. That the police has turned the Shiites to “games” for their protests demanding the release of El-Zakzaky must be questioned by all people of conscience. We must demand frankly that the police must stop firing live bullets at protesters!
Chima’s sin alongside his friends was doing their job of testing a repaired car. He alongside the #Ikoku4 were unlawfully arrested and detained by the police with an unfounded allegation of being robbers. Even after Chima’s death and the fact that the owner of the car had retrieved his car by December 30, 2019 stating clearly that his car was never stolen; the police still charged the #Ikoku4 for armed robbery by 9th January, 2020. One of the police officers, one Sergeant Rose was said to have sexually assaulted Chima before his death by horribly “pressing his blucus” while others were torturing.
In both cases, the police has lied even after committing the crime. They said Chima was a robber and had died of diabetes. The police also lied that Alex Ogbu was not shot and that he had hit his head on a stone during the violence. They even deposited Ogbu’s corpse at the morgue as an accident victim.
Now that the lies of the police in the murders of Alex Ogbu and Chima Ikwunado has been exposed, there is a dire need to make salient metaphorical points.
Alex and Chima are workers with organized labour in the informal sector. Alex Ogbu does not have the luxury of working with the terrestrial media nor with the mainstream labour. He was the administrative secretary of National Automobile Technicians Association (NATA). Chima Ikwunado also belongs to NATA by his being a mechanic. Informal workers are worse victims of state brutality and madness. The system keep killing its talents and splitting blood and mud around the nooks and corners of the country. The neo-liberal economic tendencies of the Buhari/APC regime is a continuation of the decimation of formal work and the campaign that people should be self-employed through self-development of skills and talents. Alex and Chima sort for themselves by being so hardworking, instead of the state to protect them and even bless their hustles, they were brutally murdered. This is just a metaphor to the hundreds and thousands that get killed through same similar trajectories.
Government fail to provide jobs nor care about the welfare of citizens. Same government also viciously kills its citizens, after doing same indirectly through the pro-few economic policies that have thrown the millions into deep and deeper jeopardies. The audacity of failure reinforces itself through forceful practical demonstrations of the same audacity. The war against the masses keeps getting messier without even the slightest of democratic pretence of judicial mercy. After all, the majority poor has been physically and psychologically pressured to believe that primitive accumulation comes with honours.
But the backlashes and the fight backs on the #Justice4AlexOgbu and #JusticeforChima has shown that the cancer of state lies cannot anymore hold its fake waters. Millions are behind these campaigns and we must use that chance to show the world that we can continue to open our eyes and allow dirt to prey in. Alex has a wide and daughter. Chima’s wife is heavy with pregnancy. We must campaign to make sure they get compensated. We must also make sure the killer police officials and their commanders are brought to book. We must as well stop the flagrant disobedience of the constitution by demanding that police stop torture and also stop attacking protests and rallies with live firearms.
Meanwhile, we demand immediate justice for the #Ikoku4, who were also almost incapacitated during the horrible torture. Just as we must all unite and demand justice for the millions who are under physical, economic, psychological and political torture and brutalities.
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E2%80%93british-airways Factors Beyond Our Control Responsible For Flight Delays, Diversions –British Airways
British Airways has apologised to its Nigerian passengers abandoned in Accra, Ghana, following last week’s flight diversion and delays that characterised the country’s airspace.
The airline stated that the inclement weather condition and “a number of factors outside of our immediate control, led to the delays, diversions and eventual abandonment”.
A statement by Mr Kola Olayinka, General Manager, West Africa, British Airways said that the delays and diversions were regretted.
He however, said that the airline made arrangements to curtail the effect of the unpleasant situation by chartering a Boeing 767 aircraft from Euro Atlantic to convey passengers from Accra to Lagos.
Olayinka noted that a number of passengers had opted to make personal arrangements for their return.
Olayinka directed the affected passengers to send receipts of expenses incurred during this period to its customer relations team to process the reimbursements and also attend to queries.
The statement read in part, “The situation has been as a result of recent delays and diversions of flights occasioned by the inclement weather causing very poor visibility at the Lagos Airport, coupled with a number of factors outside of our immediate control.
“In these unique cases, the decision to delay or divert flights was made carefully by our pilots who are well trained to handle situations like this, especially in consideration of the safety and security of our passengers and crew.
“Regrettably, in this unique case, most hotels were taken up by passengers of airlines that were earlier diverted to Abuja. The direct result was the inadequacy of accommodation.
“To resolve this, we booked all 157 available rooms and accommodated 157 Passengers, we also ensured the safety of the remaining passengers by accommodating them in a dedicated area provided by Sheraton where we provided meals and drinks.”
Recall that some Nigerian passengers of the airline had accused it of abandoning them in Accra and told them to make personal arrangements to travel to their various destinations in Nigeria.
The airline reportedly claimed it was “overwhelmed” by the situation.
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UPDATE: Bill To Create Agency For Repentant Boko Haram Members Pass First Reading In Nigerian Senate
A bill seeking to deradicalise and integrate repentant Boko Haram terrorists into the Nigerian society has passed first reading in the Senate.
The bill, which was read for the first time on Thursday on the floor of the Senate, was titled, ‘National Agency for the Education, Rehabilitation, De-radicalisation and Integration of Repentant Insurgents in Nigeria’.
It was sponsored by All Progressives Congress member representing Yobe East Senatorial District, Ibrahim Gaidam.
The proposed agency, according to Gaidam, would provide education for insurgents. BREAKING: Bill To Create Agency For Repentant Boko Haram Members Introduced In @NGRSenate | Sahara Reporters The Nigerian Senate has heard a bill calling for the creation of an agency to deradicalise and reintegrate repentant terrorists into…READ MORE: pic.twitter.com/704kHYC7gg— Sahara Reporters (@SaharaReporters) February 20, 2020
The bill is coming after reports that the Nigerian military was currently rehabilitating over 1,000 insurgents in various parts of the North-East, a controversial programme it started in 2016.
The Nigerian Government since 2018 had released more than 1,400 self-confessed Boko Haram terrorist back into the society.
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E2%80%93can Nigeria Getting To Point Of Anarchy, Boko Haram Rehabilitation Suspicious –CAN
The Christian Association of Nigeria has said that the rehabilitation and de-radicalisation of Boko Haram suspects was a pointer that the nation was nearing anarchy.
The group made its position know in a speech by Samson Ayokunle, CAN President, in commemoration of the abduction of Leah Sharibu in Abuja.
He said, “The setting free of so-called ex-Boko Haram terrorists under de-radicalisation, rehabilitation, empowerment of the arrested terrorists by the Federal Government is rather troubling and suspicious.
“What is the guarantee that the freed ex-terrorists would not return to Sambisa Forest and pick up arms against innocent Nigerians?
“The development is a shame and there is a cloud of confusion that hangs over the nation and the people that are governing this nation are not doing the right thing.
“We are sure of one thing. We cannot doubt that the government knows what is happening. Looking at the fact that we are a nation, we have the air force, the navy, we have the soldiers, we have the weapons, but what is happening in this nation?
“We call on the Federal Government again that we are getting to a point of anarchy.
“We have every reason to be suspicious and to speak passionately to government again that Christians in this nation are Nigerians and must not be killed.
“We want the world to know the evil that is happening in the country under the watch of this government. More blood is being shed. The killing is religious. Boko Haram sect wants to establish an Islamic state. We must stop this killings.”
Leah Sharibu was abducted alongside other girls from Girls Technical College, Dapchi, Yobe State, on February 19, 2018.
The Nigerian Government failed to negotiate and secure her release after she refused to renounce her faith.
She remains in Boko Haram captivity.
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Police Arrest Robbers After Killing OPC Member In Ondo
Two armed robbery suspects fingered to have killed a member of the Oodua Peoples Congress, Samson Adefisoye, in Ondo State, have been arrested.
The robbers, Oluwatobiloba Olawoye, 34, and Ojo Bola David, 24, were nabbed by a team of detectives from Ondo State Police Command.
The two men had killed Adefisoye during a robbery incident that happened at No. 1 Oke Igbala Street in Ondo town.
The hoodlums operating on a motorcycle, had earlier attacked a woman, Olamiposi Awosika, and robbed her of the sum of N150,000 and a smart phone.
But while Adefisoye was trying to rescue the woman, he was shot dead by the robbers in their bid to escape from the crime scene.
Spokesperson for the police in Ondo State, Femi Joseph, confirmed the arrest of the armed robbers in a statement on Thursday.
Joseph said the suspects confessed to the crime after they were thoroughly drilled by the police.
He said, “The robbers shot and killed Adefisoye, an OPC member, who wanted to rescue the woman.
“But effort is ongoing to arrest the other fleeing members of the gang. The suspects will be charged to court as soon as our investigation is completed.”
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Normalised Insanity By Dele Farotimi
Before I came to Lagos in 1985, I had lived my entire life in Ibadan, Oyo State. I went to primary school in the ancient city, and for my secondary school education, it was to my mother’s hometown, Fiditi: the home of fruits. The unsuccessful attempt at A’ Levels was in Oyo town, and the last gasp effort to pass WAEC and thereby avoid my father’s threat of a mechanic workshop apprenticeship, was made in Ile-Ife. I was your archetypal “Arokean bogey”.
I found the Okokomaiko of 1985 not too much of a culture shock. But the madness that I had to negotiate from the drop off point at Ojota, were harrowing experiences for me. At least it was, until I began to embrace the lunacy myself. The love affair with insanity did not come by accident. Yet it did happen by accident. It was at Oyingbo Bus Stop.
The Coaster buses to Okokmaiko had their own dedicated lane at the stop, but it was at the peak hours of the day, and must have been around 7PM. There were at least 20 people for every available seat on the buses. I came from a culture of polite orderliness, and Ibadan buses were rarely ever full. We never rushed like the war that I daily witnessed with perplexity in the badlands into which I had been dispatched in coming to a university in Lagos. I must have missed untold number of buses because of my reluctance to join the melees to enter them, until desperation enabled my factory fitted, and uniquely Nigerian madness.
I was all of 17 years old, and I was seeing aged men, less agile, women, young and old, securing seats in the buses as they filled up and left, and I determined to get with the program as well. A couple of failed tries later, and I was at the door and on the ramp, blocking my path was a wee young babe, I was still busy admiring her elvish beauty, when she shoved me aside, I landed on the concrete tarmac with a few bruises, and a lesson learnt: insanity is the normalcy in this town. Toughen up, or die.
I went back to Ibadan at the end of the semester, a true Lagos boy. Or I had at the least began my journey to becoming one. Everyone and everything seemed too slow when I returned home on holiday. I was convinced that they were all fed something that worked to slow down the day, the people, and just about everything else. The genteel courtesy of the Ibadan road users became extremely irritating, seemingly unnecessary, and time wasting in my view, and I had little patience with the patient courtesies that are part and parcel of the Ibadan way of life. I had become estranged from the land of my youth. Lagos had adopted me, and I had been orphaned by Ibadan.
The normalized insanity that I embraced in my acculturation to Lagos and the frenzied existence that masquerades as “living” in Lagos, has overtaken Nigeria itself. We have become a post apocalyptic society, insanity has been completely normalized to the point where to be sane in Nigeria, is to be truly insane. We have inverted normalcies beyond the point of recognition.
Nigerians are “fantastically corrupt” said David Cameron. The howls of derision and protests that followed his knowledgeable declaration, served to obscure the true intent and meaning of his words in the consideration of the plebes, but those cursed with the capacity for thought, were able to decipher his words: what he was seeing in Nigeria, with the benefit of his access to classified and privileged information, did not qualify as corruption, because he couldn’t even find the benefit derived by those that were doing the stealing, and he could see how long that it had been going on, and he couldn’t wrap his mind around the fact of our very humanity, in the face of the evidence that he beheld. He was charitable.
We are not corrupt. There is nothing about us that is fantastic either. We are not fantastically corrupt. We have been fantastically perverted. For a Nigerian to feel at home in a foreign land, is to end up in jail, our normalcy is their own insanity, our order, the very meaning of chaos. We are a land untouched by sanity.
Perversion is an abuse of purpose. We are not corrupt, we are perverted. The many years in which corruption have become normalized, have served to have the effect of rendering several generations of Nigerians perverted, with a schizophrenic mindset that recognizes the validity of law and order, outside Nigerian territory, but instinctively and as a matter of reflexes, discards the very same laws and order, to embrace the pervasive, and endemic insanity, of the Nigerian state, once within its territory. A failure to embrace the insanity, might endanger your very lives.
We are getting to an inflection point in the history of the Nigerian state: we are going to be deciding soon, whether we are crazy enough to birth the Nigerian nation of our dreams, or if we are mad enough, to allow our collective insanity, to become the normalcy we bequeath to the coming generations.
Engage your brain, the evening tide cometh.
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Copy And Paste Inventor, Larry Tesler, Dies At 74
Larry Tesler, the man who invented “cut”, “copy” and “paste” to early computing, has died at the age of 74.Tesler started working in Silicon Valley in the early 1960s, at a time when computers were inaccessible to the vast majority of people, the BBC reports.It was thanks to his innovations – which included the “cut”, “copy” and “paste” commands – that the personal computer became simple to learn and use.Tesler was born in Bronx, New York, in 1945, and studied at Stanford University in California.After graduating, he specialised in user interface design – that is, making computer systems more user-friendly.He worked for a number of major tech firms during his long career. He started at Xerox Palo Alto Research Center before Steve Jobs poached him for Apple where he spent 17 years and rose to chief scientist.After leaving Apple, he set up an education start-up and worked for brief periods at Amazon and Yahoo.
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E2%80%94borno-governor Nigerian Military Does Not Have Manpower, Technology To Defeat Boko Haram —Borno Governor, Zulum
Babagana Zulum, governor of Borno State, has expressed concern over the lack of manpower, equipment and technology by the Nigerian Government to fight Boko Haram terrorists. Zulum expressed his worry on Wednesday when he hosted members of the House of Reps committee on Defence in the state. He said, “Nigerians almost celebrated the demise of Boko Haram in 2016 and 2017. “I have always admitted that the Federal Government has done well under the watch of President Muhammadu Buhari. At a time, about 20 local government areas were displaced but after May 29, 2015, almost all the roads were opened and the local government retrieved.“But notwithstanding the gains that we had, between March 2019 till date, we have experienced horrific and simultaneous attacks throughout the state.“I therefore, plead with Mr President and as well as the Nigerian military to revisit the strategy used during 2016/2017 that we were almost celebrating the demise of Boko Haram so that we can deal with the insurgents once and for all.“Take my words, the military doesn’t have the manpower; they don’t have the equipment, they don’t have the technology. Kindly advise the Speaker and the Senate President to tell Mr President to approve the massive recruitment of soldiers.“We need about 100,000 more to be recruited into the Nigerian Army. They should come and employ the locals whether they have western education or not.“We have to tell each other the truth, you cannot fight this war without manpower, technology, and proper funding.“One important thing that we have to do is to take the fight into their enclaves. The whereabouts of the Boko Haram are known to all of us. It is known to the people of Borno State. It is known to the military. It is known to all of us.”
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