Sahara Reporters Latest News Today Sunday 1st August 2021
Sahara Reporters Latest News Today and headlines on some of the happenings and news trend in the Country, today 01/08/21
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Crisis In Kogi APC As LG Chairman Dares Yahaya Bello on Ward Congress
Kogi State Governor, Yahaya Bello.
Crisis is currently rocking the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in the Ijumu Local Government Area of Kogi State as the council boss in the area, Alhaji Taofiq Isa, on Saturday allegedly conducted parallel Ward Congress.
Kogi State Governor, Yahaya Bello.
According to Daily Post, some party stakeholders comprising the state Commissioner of Environment, Chief Victor Omofaiye, member representing Ijumu Constituency, Hon. Kilani Olumo, Deputy Chief of Staff to the Governor, Sunday Faleke, Senior Special Assistant to the Governor on Women and Children Development, Princess Omotayo Adeleye Ishaya, APC Caretaker Chairman, Chief Samuel Abejide among others were present at Iyara, the headquarters of Ijumu Local Government to elect new Ward officials through affirmation but it was allegedly hijacked by the Ijumu council boss to another venue.
Speaking to newsmen, the Kogi State Commissioner for Environment, Chief Victor Omofaiye, who confirmed this on Saturday evening, noted that, the Ijumu Local Government Chairman, Alhaji Taofiq Isa hijacked the forms for the Congress and failed to show up at the agreed venue for the exercise.
Omofaiye described the conduct of Taofiq as an act of disloyalty and gross disrespect to the directive of the State Governor, Alhaji Yahaya Bello that all existing caretaker Executive at the Ward level to be returned as new Executive of the party.
The member representing Ijumu Constituency in the State House of Assembly, Hon. Kilani Olumo, on his part described the incident as unfortunate and an act of insubordination to the the Executive Governor of Kogi State, Alhaji Yahaya Bello.
“It is very unfortunate, the meeting was scheduled by the Chairman to commence at 12noon and he is nowhere to be found. I think it is uneducated and an act of insubordination for the Executive Governor of Kogi State to give you a directive and flaunt it,” he started.
Speaking further, the Deputy Chief of Staff to the Governor, Sunday Faleke, described the congress in Ijumu LGA as concluded, adding that all the party officials, State Government appointees and elected officials amidst party held a peaceful Congress, saying the Council Chairman absconded with electoral materials.
Reacting to the allegation, the Council boss, Alhaji Taofiq Isa denied the conduct of parallel Ward congress in the Local Government, describing his faction of the congress as authentic.
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How Ex-Senate President, Saraki Was Arrested After Wedding Ceremony In Abuja
Bukola Saraki
Former Senate President, Bukola Saraki, on Saturday attended a wedding function in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, after which he was arrested by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.
Saraki attended the wedding ceremony of the daughter of a former Kwara State Governor, Alhaji Shaaba Lafiagi, in Abuja.
Bukola Saraki
According to Daily Post, the event was disclosed in a tweet by one of Saraki’s close aides, Banks Omisore.
“Dr. @bukolasaraki at the wedding celebration of Alhaji Shaaba Lafiagi’s daughter. Today in Abuja Saturday, 31st July 2021,” Omisore tweeted.
SaharaReporters had earlier reported that the EFCC held Saraki in its custody over allegations of theft and money laundering.
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Corruption
Nigeria’s Anti-graft Agency, EFCC Arrests Bukola Saraki Over Fraud Allegations
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SaharaReporters had learnt that Saraki was arrested on Saturday and was being interrogated at the Abuja office of the EFCC.
“Yes, Saraki has been arrested. He is going to be released later tonight and ordered to return again tomorrow. He is being interrogated at the Abuja office,” an authoritative source had told SaharaReporters.
As Senate president between 2015 and 2019, Saraki spent a considerable time facing allegations of corruption and false declaration of assets. He was acquitted by the Supreme Court in June 2018.
However, in his new case with the EFCC, Saraki is to answer questions over alleged theft and laundering of public funds using a network of cronies and proxy companies.
The suspected proxies, who executed purported contracts for Kwara State under Saraki, allegedly made returns, for many years, to the former governor, forming an organised network of dirty money flow.
The funds involved were huge, running into hundreds of millions in naira and hundreds of thousands in foreign currencies at various times, sources said.
Anti-graft investigators have obtained a list of the proxy companies involved and analysed a pattern of suspicious transactions between them and Saraki.
One of them has been reportedly responsible for funding Saraki’s lifestyle, including paying over N100million to settle the bills for rent and renovation of Saraki’s Maitama residence.
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Nigerian Doctors Begin Nationwide Strike Amid COVID-19 Surge
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Members of the Nigerian Association of Resident Doctors, NARD, have unanimously agreed to embark on an indefinite strike from Monday.
According to Daily Post, the doctors reached the decision following their National Executive Council (NEC) meeting by over 50 members across the country.
File photo
NARD noted the Federal Government has failed to honour and implement the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) it signed with them after over 100 days.
Dr Uyilawa Okhuaihesuyi, President of the NARD, who made this known in a statement at the weekend, demanded immediate withdrawal of the circular removing House Officers from the scheme of service, which was not implemented.
The statement read in part, “We are embarking on a total and indefinite strike on August 2, 2021 Monday. You can recall we had a memorandum of action on March 31, 2021, and had an addendum to it on April 9, and since then, we still have had irregularities in the payment of salaries to the house officers.
“We had issues with them being non-regular payment and as part of the memorandum of action, it was said that they should be captured back into the IPPS platform.”
The strike is coming at a very critical period when the nation is currently experiencing a rise in COVID-19 infections amid the third wave of the pandemic.
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E2%80%99t-fake-policeman-%E2%80%93-wife-suspect-arrested EXCLUSIVE: Nigerian Army Lied; My Husband Wasn’t Fake Policeman – Wife Of Suspect Arrested In Borno Shares Video Evidence
Ngozi Ojeh, the wife of Ebenezer Ojeh, the police officer arrested for alleged possession of illegal weapons in Borno State, has dismissed claims that her husband is a fake policeman.
It had been reported last week that troops of the Nigerian Army’s operation Hadin Kai arrested a supposedly fake policeman who was in possession of illegal ammunition.
A military source had alleged that Ojeh was intercepted at a checkpoint by troops from the 154 Task Force battalion, Ngamdu, along Maiduguri-Damaturu Highway on Sunday.
An army officer, DY Chiwar, who is the commander of the battalion, was said to have ordered Ojeh’s arrest, after noticing suspicious movements.
When interrogated by the troops, the suspect was said to have claimed to be a member of the police special weapons tactical team (SWAT) from the mobile police force, 19 unit, Rivers State.
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Military
Nigerian Soldiers Arrest ‘Policeman’ With Ammunition, Grenade In Terror-ravaged Borno
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Speaking with SaharaReporters, the wife, Ngozi, corroborated Ebenezer’s account stating that her husband was truly an officer in Rivers State but had been deployed on special duties to Borno State since January 2021.
According to her, the officer was returning to his family in Edo after several months when he was ‘nabbed’ by the soldiers who suspected him to be a fake officer.
She said, “Though I’m in no position to give a verdict on the authenticity of the ammunition and grenade allegedly seen in his bag, I can confidently debunk the claim made by the army squad at the checkpoint along Maiduguri/Damaturu Expressway, that he’s not a genuine policeman.
“I would want to correct the impression that he’s a suspected fake policeman. Prior to his arrest, he had been complaining to me that some of his colleagues had animosity towards him, for no just reason. This makes me feel that he could have been set up with these items (ammunition and the grenade) placed in his bag unknowingly to him.
“Since his arrest, neither I nor his parents have been able to reach him. And since it’s already in the media that he’s a fake policeman, without any effort to set the records straight, I fear he would be treated as such.
“I have not set my eyes on my husband since January which was when he left Port-Harcourt to Maiduguri in Borno State on special duty. He was returning home to me and his children when he was arrested. He was coming to us in Edo State.
“He should be handed over to the police and granted access to communicate with his family and stop being treated like a common criminal. He has suffered a lot already just for him to come home and rest.
“I don’t know what they have done to him, I don’t know if my husband is still alive or not. He has not killed anyone, he is a suspect. He should be granted access to his family at least. To even feed is a problem for us.”
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E2%80%99s-anti-graft-agency-efcc-arrests-bukola-saraki-over-fraud-allegations Nigeria’s Anti-graft Agency, EFCC Arrests Bukola Saraki Over Fraud Allegations
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has held a former President of the Nigerian Senate, Bukola Saraki, in its custody over allegations of theft and money laundering.
SaharaReporters learnt that Saraki was arrested on Saturday and was being interrogated at the Abuja office of the EFCC.
“Yes, Saraki has been arrested. He is going to be released later tonight and ordered to return again tomorrow. He is being interrogated at the Abuja office,” an authoritative source told SaharaReporters.
As Senate president between 2015 and 2019, Mr Saraki spent a considerable time facing allegations of corruption and false declaration of assets. He was acquitted by the Supreme Court in June 2018.
However, in his new case with the EFCC, Saraki is to answer questions over alleged theft and laundering of public funds using a network of cronies and proxy companies.
The suspected proxies, who executed purported contracts for Kwara State under Saraki, allegedly made returns, for many years, to the former governor, forming an organised network of dirty money flow.
The funds involved were huge, running into hundreds of millions in naira and hundreds of thousands in foreign currencies at various times, sources said.
Anti-graft investigators have obtained a list of the proxy companies involved and analysed a pattern of suspicious transactions between them and Saraki.
One of them has been reportedly responsible for funding Saraki’s lifestyle, including paying over N100million to settle the bills for rent and renovation of Saraki’s Maitama residence.
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Amotekun Kill Two Kidnappers In Oyo
File photo used to illustrate story.
Two kidnappers were reportedly killed by men of the South-West security network codenamed Amotekun in the Iwajowa Local Government Area of Oyo State.
SaharaReporters gathered on Saturday that the two suspects were killed during a failed kidnap attempt by the kidnappers who stormed Iwere-Ile town on Friday.
File photo used to illustrate story.
It was learnt that operatives of Amotekun Corps, who were called when the kidnappers stormed the town, engaged the kidnappers and killed two of them.
Witnesses stated that the kidnappers stormed the community around 3pm on Friday and made an attempt to kidnap some of the residents.
It was gathered that immediately the Amotekun operatives got to the scene at about 3:30pm, they engaged the hoodlums in a gun battle, killing two.
Three other members of the kidnap syndicate escaped with bullet injuries.
The Amotekun Commandant, Olayinka Olayanju confirmed the incident to SaharaReporters on Saturday.
He maintained that weapons were recovered from the suspected kidnappers.
He added that the weapons had been deposited with the police.
Olayanju noted that the operation was carried out in collaboration with local vigilantes and hunters.
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Cracks In Buhari Government As Attorney-General Malami Counters Keyamo Over APC Leadership
The Attorney General Abubakar Malami has countered the call for the chairman of the caretaker committee of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Governor Mai Mala Buni of Yobe, to resign.
The call was made recently by the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo, and some other People Democratic People members, but Malami has countered it in what appeared to be cracks within the Muhammadu Buhari government.
This was conveyed in a statement released on Thursday as Malami, who laid out his argument in a 20-point against the decision reached by the Supreme Court, described the interpretation of the 1999 Constitution as “stretched.”
“Therefore, it is shocking that the interpretation of Section 183 of the 1999 Constitution, in light of the above-quoted decision of the Supreme Court, could be stretched in some quarters to state that chairmanship of an ad-hoc committee duly constituted by the National Executive Committee of a registered political party (by a registered member of the Party) could constitute paid employment or an executive position as envisaged under Section 183 of the Constitution,” Malami wrote.
The Supreme Court judgment in the Ondo State governorship election appeal involving Governor Rotimi Akeredolu and PDP’s Eyitayo Jegede, ended with the judges agreeing that it was illegal for Mr Buni to be the governor of Yobe State and also hold an elective position.
The 4-3 split judgment by the judges dismissed Jegede’s appeal holding that he did not join Buni in the suit where he is centre to.
Malami who dismissed Keyamo’s concerns noted that the draftsmen of the Constitution would not have considered the position Buni holds as an elective position due to its meritless nature.
“To further show the meritless nature of the position under review, assuming without conceding that the argument is right, then, it will equally be contrary to the spirit and intent of Section 183 of the Constitution for any sitting Governor to be Chairman of say the Governors’ Forum, Chairman of the Progressive Governors Forum, or any other similar body. This, in my humble view, can definitely not be the intention of the drafters of the 1999 Constitution.”
The Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Keyamo, had called on Buni to resign immediately, following the apex court’s judgement.
He said the decision reached by judges of the court could be weaponised by persons aggrieved by the APC congresses and could challenge the competence of the Buni-led CECPC to organise the congresses and National Convention.
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Two Dead As Gunmen Bomb Imo Police Station
The Imo State Police Command has said that armed men, in the early hours of Saturday, bombed the Njaba police station, destroying a part of the building.
The attackers are believed to be members of the Indigenous People of Biafra.
However, they said two of the hoodlums were killed and their operational vehicle recovered, while the rest escaped.
The Police Public Relations Officer in the State command, CSP Mike Abattam, in a statement on Saturday, said that on July 31 at about 1.20 am, a convoy of bandits moving towards Njaba town to launch an attack but were intercepted by the Operation Restore Peace team of the Nigeria Police, Imo State Command.
The statement said that, in the ensuing firefight, one of their operational vehicles was demobilised and two of them killed while the remaining ones ran into the bush.
Abattam said, while searching the vehicle, one Ak 47 rifle was recovered with ten rounds of live Ammunition and a locally made double barrel pistol with two expended cartridges.
“They detonated an Improvised Explosive Devices into the parking lots of a nearby Njaba Police Station, causing minimal damage,” the statement added.
He stressed that a cordon and search exercise was ongoing in the area to apprehend the fleeing suspects.
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Hushpuppi Scandal: Abba Kyari Assembles Team Of lawyers, Threatens To Expose Other Police Officers If Extradited
Embattled Deputy Commissioner of Police, Abba Kyari, on Friday assembled a team of lawyers to fight off his looming arrest and extradition by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, United States, which appears to be hell bent in returning with the alleged fraudulent officer.
SaharaReporters learnt that Kyari is also lobbying the Nigeria Police Force starting with the Inspector-General of Police, Usman Baba, and threatening to expose other top police officers who have benefitted from his largesse, should he be handed over to the FBI and extradited.
SaharaReporters gathered that Kyari, whose links with serial internet fraudster, Ramon Olorunwa Abbas, alias Hushpuppi, were becoming too evident to deny, warned that he would expose the “dirty jobs” he had done for past and present Inspector-Generals of Police as well as some political elites in the country, if they did nothing to stop his extradition.
“There was a stormy meeting on Friday at the Inspector-General of Police’s office between the IGP and police authorities and the FBI agents. Kyari on his part is threatening that many senior officers benefited from his ‘generosity’ and if he’s betrayed, he would expose them.
“He’s now got a team of lawyers. Abba Kyari is still being assured by the police hierarchy that he would not be extradited to the US. He has warned that if he is extradited, the current and past IGPs and members of the political elites he provided support for and assisted for dirty jobs will all be exposed,” a top source told SaharaReporters.
SaharaReporters also reported exclusively that Kyari was given till next week to formally respond to the allegations till his extradition to the US would be decided by the police authorities.
SaharaReporters since Thursday in several reports on Kyari exposed how Hushpuppi claimed to have offered bribes to the top police officer, going by court documents that were ordered unsealed.
The United States Attorney’s Office, Central District of California, had also issued an arrest warrant against Kyari for his alleged links to Hushpuppi, who is standing trial for various offences that include internet fraud and money laundering.
The court documents also outlined a dispute among members of the Hushpuppi conspiracy, which allegedly prompted him to arrange to have an individual identified as ‘co-conspirator’ Kelly Chibuzor Vincent, jailed in Nigeria by DCP Kyari.
According to the affidavit, “Kyari is a highly decorated deputy commissioner of the Nigeria Police Force who is alleged to have arranged for Vincent to be arrested and jailed at Abbas’ behest, and then sent Abbas photographs of Vincent after his arrest.
“Kyari also allegedly sent Abbas bank account details for an account into which Abbas could deposit payment for Vincent’s arrest and imprisonment.”
The Inspector-General of Police has ordered an internal review of the United States’ authorities’ allegations against Kyari.
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How Journalists, Fact-Checkers Can Avoid Being Manipulated By Hackers, By Elizabeth Ogunbamowo
According to Fact-check.ni, the spread of misinformation is inherently human. In their report, Lewandowsky et al explained the reasons for the acquisition and persistence of misinformation. One vital reason is that the mere repetition of a claim makes one think it is true.
A study by Pew research in 2017 showed that the internet’s continuous growth and accelerating innovation have the potential to make the problem more dangerous than in the past as it aids the spread of manipulative narratives.
From the foregoing, the concept of fact-checking was necessitated by the need to fight the information disorder encapsulated in misinformation/disinformation (fake news). This probably explains why the New Yorker in a 2020 article described fact-checkers as the hidden heroes of journalism.
Major news outlets have taken up the responsibility to assign journalists and fact-checkers to verify claims and outright lies by politicians and pundits.
But in their quest to fight misinformation, fact-checkers and journalists are increasingly becoming the targets of hackers and malware developers.
A study from Clark School, University of Maryland shows that there is a hacker trying to attack vulnerable computers every 30 seconds. Interestingly, more malware is being launched than ever before and it has been estimated that businesses will spend more than $1 trillion on cybersecurity between 2017 and 2021.
In 2017, a media report showed that Russian hackers tried to access the email inboxes of at least 200 reporters around the world.
Natalia Gevorkyan, a Russian columnist who reviewed the data, said the hackers went after journalists who bothered them.
Gevorkyan, who is also the author of a book on Russian intelligence, said the hacking campaign appeared geared to collecting private emails, “which they can use as leverage for later”.
Also, a political fact-checking site, Verrit was hacked almost immediately after Hillary Clinton invited followers to sign up for the site.
Within an hour of her tweet, a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack prevented the site from loading.
Similarly, cekfakta.com, another fact-checking website in Indonesia was hacked in 2019 two days after the site held a high-profile fact-checking session at Google’s Indonesia headquarters parallel to a presidential debate.
Tools
Having established that journalists and fact-checkers are likely targets, how can you avoid being manipulated by hackers?
Below is a compilation of tools journalists can use to protect their email addresses from hackers and possible solutions to those who are already caught in email breaches.
Top on the list is have I been owned? a website developed by Troy Hunt, a Microsoft Regional Director.
It allows users to ascertain if their email addresses have been compromised. It also identifies if the email has been found in a data breach — an incident where data has been unintentionally exposed to the public.
In the same vein, the website notifies users if any information about them has been “pasted” to a publicly facing website designed to share content.
These publicly facing websites such as ‘pastebin’ are said to be used by hackers due to the ease of anonymously sharing other people’s information.
Another useful tool is mypwd.io. The website, which is similar to haveibeenowned?, describes itself as offering extra by monitoring the deep and dark web. It also gives information regarding which password was leaked and has an estimated nine billion items of data.
The website also includes email alerts for subscribers whenever a new leak associated with the registered email address is detected. These notifications carry important instructions: the leaked password must be changed to avoid financial loss and even identity theft.
DeHashed is another relevant tool to use. The website described itself as a database search engine created for security analysts, journalists, security companies, and everyday people to help secure their accounts and provide insight on database breaches and account leaks. It is said to help prevent account compromise as users can monitor hacker activity in real-time to prevent account takeover attacks using compromised credentials.
The website allows users to search for IP addresses, emails, usernames, names, phone numbers, VIN numbers, addresses; also allows users to reverse search passwords, hashes, and more. To gain access to this website, users have to subscribe first.
BreachAlarm is another website that allows users to check for breaches. It is a service that allows one to check anonymously if one’s password has been posted online, and email notifications about future password hacks.
The services comb the depths of the Internet to find stolen password lists that have been hacked, leaked or compromised, and then goes ahead to spot the email addresses of the users those passwords belong to. Users can check easily whether their email address and password have been included in any of these breaches.
The site also allows for checking multiple hack verification sites just to make sure.
Have I been sold? Another good alternative to the above-mentioned websites for checking email leaks.
Have I Been Sold? is a free service that lets users go through a database of purchased emails and see if someone sold their contact information.
Solutions
If your data is involved in a data breach, what do you do? It has been established that a cybercriminal can take several paths to gain access to personal information, sell the data and fraudulently make use of such data.
Criminals know that many people repeat passwords in various places. For this reason, they can try to break into different websites and systems and steal personal information.
Fact-checkers are advised to change passwords to unique, hard to guess passwords which are likely difficult for hackers.
The list of passwords to avoid, according to a Forbes report, include: personal information, shorter passwords, common words or simple number combinations. The report also advised against not updating passwords regularly.
A study showed that the vast majority of cyber attacks come from relatively unsophisticated hackers using “dictionary scripts,” a type of software that runs through lists of common usernames and passwords attempting to break into a computer.
The researchers found the most common password-guessing ploy was to reenter or try variations of the username.
Fact-checkers are to ensure the use of two-factor authentication as this will prevent a hacker from logging in to their account even if the password is known.
Users can also leverage solutions and tools for such embedded use in some of the websites and services mentioned. For Haveibeenpwned, the 1Password.com is a tool password manager used to store and use strong passwords.
Similarly, for BreachAlarm, fact-checkers can get on to the service’s Email Watchdog which notifies them immediately their email addresses appear in a password breach.
With the above tools, you can operate safely as a journalist and fact-checker without being manipulated by hackers.
The researcher produced this media literacy article per the Dubawa 2021 Kwame Kari Kari Fellowship partnership with SaharaReporters to facilitate the ethos of “truth” in journalism and enhance media literacy in the country.
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