There was an uproar in the Senate on Tuesday following the announcement of two minority leaders by Senate President Godswill Akpabio.

The seats of the Senate Minority Leader and Minority Whip became vacant after the Court of Appeal sacked the former occupants, Senator Simon Davou Mwadkwon (PDP, Plateau North) and Darlington Nwokocha (LP, Abia Central) respectively.

The courts nullified the election of Mwadkwon and ordered a rerun while Nwokocha was removed as Augustine Akobundu of the PDP was declared as the authentic winner of the 25 February election in the senatorial district.

The PDP senators had, last week, held an emergency crucial meeting on the replacement for the principal positions of Senate Minority Leader and Minority Whip. Senator Garba Maidoki (PDP, Bauchi), who briefed journalists after the closed-door meeting, had said the opposition lawmakers settled for the North Central geo-political zone to produce the Minority Leader.

During Tuesday’s plenary, Akpabio announced the duo of Abba Moro (PDP, Benue South) as minority leader and Osita Ngwu (PDP, Enugu West) as minority whip.

The Senate President said the new minority leaders had the majority support of their colleagues in the opposition.

He said 41 minority senators signed the document endorsing Moro as minority leader while 30 backed Ngwu for the minority whip seat. The announcement did not sit well with other parties in the minority caucus, especially the Labour Party.

Raising a point of order, Senator Okechukwu Ezea (LP, Enugu North), protested the absence of his party in the minority leadership, describing the arrangement as an injustice against other minority parties.

“How can the PDP take three minority leadership seats? This is unfair, unjust, and unacceptable,” he said.

The Senate after that degenerated into a rowdy session with LP lawmakers rejecting their party’s exclusion in the minority leadership.

Amid the uproar, Senator Tony Nwoyi (LP, Anambra North) accused Akpabio of picking minority leaders for the opposition parties.
“How can you be choosing minority leaders for us? Are we your slaves?” Nwoyi tackled the Senate President. Lawmakers from the ruling party made frantic efforts to pacify their colleagues from LP, some of whom approached Akpabio for consultation.

After about 15 minutes of rowdy session, the Senate President addressed the opposition lawmakers and dismissed the claim of his interfering in the affairs of the opposition.

Akpabio said he only announced the names forwarded to him by the opposition caucus and that it would be unfair not to respect the voice of the majority.

He, therefore, urged the opposition caucus to always put their house in order before forwarding any name to him.

He said, “All we need to produce a leader is a simple majority. What’s the reason for not agreeing with the position of the majority?

“41 minority senators signed for Abah Moro and 30 signed for Osita Ngwu. They have the majority. It will be unfair for me not to announce them after getting a majority of support. My job is not to work with individual opinion but with the majority of positions.

“Efforts by Senator Adamu Aliero (PDP, Kebbi) to convince Akpabio to stay action on the seat of the minority whip failed as the Senate President ruled him out of order.

Aliero explained that the opposition caucus resolved that Abba Moro should be the minority leader but was yet to decide on the position of the minority whip.

But Akpabio referred him to Senate Standing Rule 52(6), which says it shall be out of order for any senator to speak on any issue that has already been decided.

Akpabio, therefore, ruled Aliero out of order.

Godsgift7837:
sent you token.

valentineuwakwe:
Will it last the test of time or they are just pouring black charcoal on a pave road.....

dhesire:


Victory for democracy, right?

garfield1:


He will lose

Maxitomxane:
I also noticed she has 3 different monickers..
Nestreal, justsmiles4, and one other one.

The person is a scammer.
Why open different accounts to ask for help on different sections when you can use one?.

The Court of Appeal, sitting in Abuja, on Monday affirmed the election of Hyacinth Alia as governor of Benue State.

The candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party in the March 18 governorship election, Titus Uba had approached the appellate court to set aside the judgment of the tribunal which upheld Alia’s election.

At the tribunal, Uba among other things alleged that Alia’s deputy, Samuel Ode, presented a forged certificate to the Independent National Electoral Commission contrary to Section 182(1)(j) of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended).

He also claimed that Alia’s name was submitted less than 180 days before the election date, and Ode was also not submitted to INEC after the party conducted a further re-run primary election.

A three-member panel of the tribunal, headed by Justice Ibrahim Karaye, dismissed the petition on the ground that it was a pre-election matter and was statute-barred.

Ruling on the appeal on Monday, the appeal court’s three-member panel led by Justice Onyekachi Aja Otisi held that the Uba failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt the allegations of forgery against Ode.

Patrickker:

If you are a deligent follower of female football, you ll understand how female soccer in Africa and indeed the world has drastically improved. There are no more minows in female football especially Africa See the improvement in South African, Moroccan and Zambian teams as testament.

Far-right libertarian outsider Javier Milei has won Argentina’s presidential run-off poll, according to provisional results.

Milei’s rival, economy minister Sergio Massa, called him to concede.

In his victory speech to supporters in Buenos Aires, Milei said: “Today begins the reconstruction of Argentina. Today begins the end of Argentina’s decline.
“The model of decadence has come to an end. There is no way back.

“Argentina will return to its place in the world that it should never have lost. We are going to work shoulder-to-shoulder with all nations of the free world, to help build a better world.”

After his defeat, Massa said: “Obviously the results are not what we expected. I have contacted Javier Milei to congratulate him.

From tomorrow the responsibility of providing certainty belongs to Milei.”
It was a close race to the very end but the former pundit who at one point wielded a chainsaw on the campaign trail, won out.

The election comes at a difficult time for Argentina with rising inflation and an economy in crisis on people’s minds.

Milei’s proposals, which included detonating the central bank, won the support of voters desperate for change.

Provisional results showed Milei had nearly 56% of the vote compared with 44% for Massa, with almost 90% of votes counted.
A man who has been likened to former US President Donald Trump, and ex-Brazilian leader Jair Bolsonaro, Javier Milei is untested. But that was part of his appeal.

His talk of introducing the US dollar as the country’s official currency was met with applause by his supporters. Many economists though talk of financial disaster.

No matter, in a country where annual inflation is now over 140% and two in five people live in poverty, his win proves that Argentinians are fed up with traditional politics and economic disaster.

His victory means they are willing to try something new in an effort to make their lives better.

Former US President Donald Trump congratulated Milei on his victory, saying he would “Make Argentina Great Again!”.

Trump posted on his Truth Social platform: “The whole world was watching! I am very proud of you.

“You will turn your country around and truly Make Argentina Great Again!”

White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan congratulated Milei on his election “and to the people of Argentina for holding free and fair elections”.

Posting on X, he said the US would “look forward to building on our strong bilateral relationship based on our shared commitment to human rights, democratic values, and transparency”.

thesicilian:

The justices should accept it like that. Because that's how they too came in.

OmoOlomo1:
The bench is being controlled by the Politicians. It's sad but that's the reality.

List of 22 Justices nominated for appointment at Supreme Court

The names of the nominees for appointment as Supreme Court Justices unveiled last Thursday showed that the North-Central has six nominees, while the South-West and South-South have two nominees each. The South-East also has six nominees, and the North-East has two nominees.

The development is coming after the retirement of Justices Amina Augie and Mohammed Datijo which left the Supreme Court with only 10 serving justices.

SOUTH-EAST
1. Hon Justice Nwaoma Uwa (Abia State)-Priority

1A.Hon Justice Onyekachi Otisi (Abia State) -Reserve

2. Hon Justice Obande Ogbuinya (Ebonyi State)-Priority

2A. Hon Justice Theresa Orji-Abadua (Imo State)- Reserve

3. Hon Justice Anthony Ogakwu (Enugu State)-Priority

3A. Hon Justice Chioma Nwosu-lheme (Imo State)-Reserve


SOUTH-SOUTH
1. Hon Justice Moore Adumein (Bayelsa State)-Priority

1A. Hon Justice Biobele Georgewill (Rivers State)-Reserve

SOUTH-WEST
1. Hon Justice Adewale Abiru (Lagos State)-Priority

1A. Hon Justice Olubunmi Oyewole (Osun State)-Reserve

NORTH-CENTRAL
1. Hon Jummai Sankey (Plateau State)-Priority

1A. Hon Justice Muhammad Ibrahim Sirajo (Plateau)-Reserve

2. Hon Justice Stephen Adah (Kogi State)-Priority

2A. Hon Justice Ridman Maiwada Abdullahi (Nassarawa State) -Reserve

3. Hon Justice Baba Idris (Niger State)-Priority

3A. Hon Justice Joseph Ikyegh (Benue State)-Reserve


NORTH-EAST
1. Hon Justice Haruna Simon Tsammani (Bauchi State)-Priority

1A. Hon Justice Abubakar Talba (Adamawa State)

NORTH-WEST
1. Hon Justice Muhammad Lawal Shuaibu (Jigawa State)-Priority

1A. Hon Justice Bello Aliyu (Zamfara State) -Reserve

2. Hon Justice Abubakar Sadiq Umar (Kebbi State)-Priority


2A. Hon Justice Abdullahi Mahmud Bayero (Kano State)-Reserve

The nomination of 22 justices for Supreme Court appointment is raising the dust in the judiciary.

This is because some senior serving and retired justices are at daggers drawn over the list released by the Federal Judicial Service Commission, FJSC, last Thursday.

A senior Justice told Vanguard that President Bola Tinubu may be heading towards direct confrontation with a wider section of senior members of the Nigerian bench, saying that “never in the history of Nigeria has appointment of Supreme Court justices been this politicized.”

Another Justice said the case of North-Central zone where the son of a former Chief Justice of Nigeria, CJN was slated as a priority while a senior jurist with over 15 years experience in the Court of Appeal, is placed as reserve, is controversial.

The Justice added that the strangest of the ongoing process is that “the South-South slot where the person adjudged as the very best is curiously pencilled as reserve.

Sources said that during the processing phase, the Justice placed as priority was not short-listed among the four that were sent to the FJSC.

“The question many in the Judicial circle are asking is: how did someone who did not make the short-list suddenly emerge as priority over and above the person adjudged to be the best,” the source asked.

The source disclosed that for the South-South, the Justice placed as reserve now was the priority candidate in 2019 but was dropped then because he was considered to be too young at 53, adding: “How did he suddenly drop four years after when he has been rated so highly? Anyone who wants to check the quality of the Justices can go to the Law Pavilion, which is the electronic law report and see which Justice of the Court Appeal has the highest ratio. The person placed as reserve has the highest ratio.”

In the North-West, some Justices wondered how Justice AB Gumel was dropped from the list “despite being the number one on the list of jurists from his zone.”

In the South-West, the source said a justice who was a reserve candidate in 2019 is still on the reserve list while a justice who had never made the short-list was placed as priority.

If not urgently addressed, some senior members of the Nigerian Judiciary feared that the low morale and rancour in the Judiciary would worsen.

But a renowned academic and a respected member of the inner bar, Prof Yemi Akinseye George, SAN applauded the FJSC’s list that became a public knowledge last Thursday.

He said it is though possible for human error to have filtered into the list, he nonetheless said he could score the list 99.9%

“When I saw the list of those justices, I felt very proud. I have appeared before many of those justices and I have worked with many of those justices at different committee levels, you know. So, they are excellent names. Most of those names are excellent names. It is possible that one or two may have entered the list, but I dont know, but from what I can see and my interaction with those names, they are excellent justices of the appellate court who merit being in the Supreme Court,” he said.

The silk also said he was comfortable that no candidate from both legal practice and academia made the list, saying any legal practitioner who wants to become a justice of the Supreme Court should start from the high court.

He said Justice Niki Tobi who was a Professor of Law from the academia did not start at the Supreme Court and that he did very well.

He also said many legal practitioners nowadays are party goers with a lot of friends and clients everywhere with love for money, qualities he claimed are antithetical to what should be found in a judge.

Campaign for Bar inclusion hasn’t been rigorous- Prof Erugo, SAN

Law professor, Sam Erugo, SAN in his reaction to the list of nominess, said: “Personally, I am not surprised at the decision by FJSC to consider only the Court of Appeal Justices for nomination to fill the vacant slots at the Supreme Court. We must appreciate that the judiciary is a conservative institution. Change from the usual practice is difficult. I don’t believe the campaign for change has been rigorous and persuasive enough to achieve the desirable social change.

“Again, the bench is more organized for the contestation-the Justices can easily be assessed by the number and particularly the quality of recent judgments delivered. The Justices are already in the bench; it is only natural that hard-working Justices of the Court of Appeal would be elevated to the Supreme Court as a reward for hard work.

“In the current scheme of things, the Bar is not strong enough to insist on any slot in appointment to the apex court. The procedure for such an appointment is not settled, and it may cause more division in the judiciary. At the least, there must be criteria to assess the competence of a practising lawyer or academic as a candidate for direct appointment to the Supreme Court. We do not have such set criteria yet, and the urgency of the present appointment will not permit the rigours of usual committees to set standards.”

In the meantime, impeccable sources at both the Office of the Chief Justice of Nigeria and the National Judicial Council (NJC) told Vanguard on Sunday that there was nothing to worry about regarding the purported complaints of the senior serving and retired justices.

According to the source in the Office of the CJN who preferred anonymity, “the appointment of justices into the Supreme Court is a process.

“While I am not lending any credence to the allegations contained in your question,
Paragraph 13 of Part I of the Third Schedule to the 1999 Constitution provides that the Federal Judicial Service Commission (FJSC) shall have powers to advise the National Judicial Council (NJC) in nominating persons for appointment to the office of the CJN, Justice of the Supreme Court, President of the Court of Appeal, Justice of the Court of Appeal, the Chief Judge of the Federal high Court, a Judge of the Federal High Court and the Chairman and members of the Code of Conduct Tribunal, the provision never said the advice shall be mandatorily upheld by the NJC.

“Having said that, the Commission considers a lot of factors in shortlisting candidates including years of service on the bench and the integrity of individual candidates.

“To properly understand my point, consider this scenario: a person may be on the priority list in 2019 as you said, perhaps based on the factor of seniority on the bench, it may be dropped for a better candidate in 2023.

“This is because four years is a long period of time and it is possible that between 2019 and 2023, a lot of things might have happened. A judge who has unblemished record in 2019 might have had his record soiled one way or the other years after.

“Get me right. I never said that was what happened in the cases you cited but I was only trying to tell you that there could be explanations to the cases you cited,” the source said.

Another impeccable source from the NJC who preferred anonymity reiterated to Vanguard that the list was not final.

“Dont forget, only 11 vacancies were declared by the Chief Justice of Nigeria at the Supreme Court. But the FJSC sent 22 names. The NJC cannot send the same list to the President for the assent of the Senate before the appointment is approved.

“That there were two lists—priority and reserved—shows that the NJC has a job to do.

“I can therefore confirm to you that the practice at the NJC is that all the 22 candidates will be subjected to rigorous interview session while the best 11 amongst them would be picked.

“Sometimes, in exceptional cases, candidates who didnt make the two lists—priority and reserve—may still make the Supreme Court.

“I can categorically confirm to you that there had been few occasions in the past when the NJC replaced names on the priority list by picking from the reserved list after such candidates were interviewed.

“NJC is not under compulsion to adopt the FJSC’s priority list.

“It is a work in progress. I can assure that the best candidates for the job will be forwarded to the President,” the source said.

Candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Taraba have won all the chairmanship positions at the just-concluded local government council election that held in the state on Saturday.

Philip Duwe, chairman of Taraba State Independent Electoral Commission (SIEC), disclosed this on Sunday while declaring the results of the election at the commission’s headquarters in Jalingo.

Duwe said a total of six political parties contested for both chairmanship and councillorship positions across the 16 LGAs of the state, adding that the results of the 165 contested councilorship seats were declared at the various LGAs.

“This election was keenly contested by six political parties and the PDP has won overwhelmingly from the results here declared,” he said.

The results announced at the local government collation centres are legally valid and what we are doing is just to validate what has been announced.

“We are very grateful to the media for the objective coverage from the onset of this journey to this point.

“Despite the hard times, you have shown absolute commitment and resilience. You have served your fatherland excellently and you can hold your shoulders high.”
Duwe added that the commission would study reports of the electoral process from various quarters for a better performance in future.

“To assert credibility, we must get as much observation and criticisms of what we are doing and suggestions of ways we can improve,” he said.

“I led a team of highly respected journalists, election observers and other people to a polling unit and we did not see any election activity happening.

“This should tell you that we did not teleguide anything. Otherwise, I would not have led a team to such a place. So I must admit that this is a process and you can not have absolute control over anything.”
He urged those who lost at the poll to be patient, saying everyone has a duty to sustain the peace in the state.

“Those who have won, this may be your good day but be humble and grateful in victory. If you have lost, it could be a bad day but the bad days will expire. Be prayerful and focused,” he said.

Timipre Sylva, candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the Bayelsa governorship election, says the comments by former President Goodluck Jonathan on the outcome of the poll is “unfortunate”.

On November 13, Douye Diri, governor of Bayelsa and candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), was declared the winner of the November 11 election after he scored 175,196 votes to defeat his close challenger, Sylva.

Sylva, a former minister of state for petroleum resources, polled 110,108 votes.

Diri was reelected for his second term in office.

In his reaction during a visit to Diri after the election, Jonathan said he would have relocated his mother to Abuja, the nation’s capital, if the governor had not been reelected.

The former president, who hails from Bayelsa, said cultism and kidnapping have reduced from the “suffocating level they used to be” during the administration of Diri.

“We should think about the development of the state starting from the issue of peace and security in the state which within this last period, three years plus, there are significant improvements in terms of cultism and kidnapping and so on and so forth,” Jonathan had said.

“I was saying before this election that if Diri loses this election, I would have relocated my mother to Abuja.”

But reacting to Jonathan’s comments, Sylva, in an Instagram post, said he “sincerely” hoped that the former president was misquoted.

“Former President Goodluck Jonathan’s statement is unfortunate,” he wrote.

“I sincerely hope he was misquoted. Let me just quote our respected Wole Soyinka: “you can take the hippopotamus out of the swamp but you cannot take the swamp out of the hippopotamus.”

mariovito:
Good one, they created incontrovertible evidence to convict themselves.

Plus the medical report which she'll procure,

They're getting life imprisonment.

wirinet:

Jonathan's case was an aberration. Goodluck Jonathan was from a minority tribe, he got the position of president by providence and despite opposition from the king makers in Nigeria. Jonathan was not that desperate to retain power as he had declared that his winning does not deserve the spilling of Nigerian blood. He was also a bit naive and was not ready to deploy the full force of the presidency to manipulate the system - both electoral body and the judiciary.
This cannot be said of the present system. Under the present system a governor cannot lose an election not to talk of the president. The executives have the whole system in the pockets including the election body, judiciary and the security forces. The elections are getting less credible and violent. The next set of elections are expected to be even worse.

MONROVIA, Nov 17 (Reuters) - Liberia President George Weah on Friday conceded election defeat to opposition leader Joseph Boakai after a tight race, ending a presidency marred by graft allegations but helping to ensure a smooth transition of power in the once volatile African nation.

Boakai, 78, a former vice president who lost to Weah in the 2017 election, led with 50.9% of the vote over Weah's 49.1%, with nearly all the votes counted, the country's elections commission said on Friday.

The result marks a stark turnaround from 2017, when global soccer legend Weah, buoyed by a wave of hope, trounced Boakai with 62 percent of the vote. Many have since grown disillusioned with the lack of progress: Poverty, unemployment, food insecurity and poor electricity supply persist.

"A few moments ago, I spoke with president elect Joseph Boakai to congratulate him on his victory," Weah said on national radio. "I urge you to follow my example and accept the results of the elections."

Weah's concession paves the way for Liberia's second democratic transfer of power in over seven decades - the first was when Weah swept to power six years ago.

His comments stood out in West and Central Africa where there have been eight military coups in three years, eroding faith in democratic elections. When elections do go ahead in the region, accusations of fraud abound and results are frequently contested in court.

Instead, Boakai supporters in the capital Monrovia danced, shouted and honked car horns in the rain after the near-final results were announced.

"We have a job ahead of us to do and I'm excited that the citizens have given us approval," Boakai told Reuters shortly after the results were announced. "First and foremost, we want to have a message of peace and reconciliation."

Boakai, a softly spoken career politician, emerged neck-and-neck with Weah in the first round of voting in October but below the 50% needed to secure an outright victory, leading to Tuesday's run-off.

Liberia is struggling to recover from two civil wars that killed more than 250,000 people between 1989 and 2003, and from a 2013-16 Ebola epidemic that killed thousands.

Many felt that Weah did not follow through on promises to alleviate poverty and improve the country's crumbling infrastructure.

Arkoi Sarkor, 43, told Reuters she supported Boakai because she was not able to get a job during Weah's term.

"I am very hopeful because I know Boakai is... a man of principles and I know when he gets in here, he is going to bring changes," she said. "Some things that were not done, that were not correct, he will put it in place, I am hopeful of that."

Two suspected sexual offenders in the Lafenwa area of Abeokuta, Ogun State, have allegedly defiled a 16-year-old girl and filmed the act as they took turns on her.

The state Police Command told City Round that the incident, which occurred in Ogunyemi Street, on Tuesday, led to the arrest of one of the suspects identified simply as Kayode, adding that a manhunt to apprehend the other suspect who fled the scene had commenced.

The command, in an interview with our correspondent, said the teenage girl was sent on an errand in the vicinity by her mother and took shelter outside a compound when there was a downpour.

She told the police that her friend, whom she had begged to keep her company, entered the compound and was invited to the sitting room of the suspect, where she sat on a chair.
The police revealed that she was forcefully thrown off guard and pushed on the floor by Kayode, who forcibly removed her underwear and had carnal knowledge of her.

While Kayode was having his way with her, another suspect appeared from nowhere and started filming them.

The police said that when Kayode was done, the other suspect, believed to be one Olamide, who also resides in the area, handed over the phone to him (Kayode) and proceeded to violate her as well.

The police said the two suspects had their way with the teenager thrice and captured the acts on the same phone before finally freeing her.

Confirming the arrest, the state Police Public Relations Officer, Omolola Odutola, disclosed that efforts were ongoing to apprehend the second suspect.

She added, “The victim was issued with medical papers for a medical check-up. A suspect has been arrested, and we have begun a manhunt for the second suspect. The case will be transferred to the State Criminal Investigation Department for further investigation.”

CilicMarin:
details later...

https://dailytrust.com/breaking-appeal-court-sacks-kano-gov/

The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja has sacked Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf of Kano State.

Mynd44 Nlfpmod

thesolutions:
I hope Liberia wins in the end. enough of all these dependence on foreigners.

Liberian opposition leader Joseph Boakai is holding a slight lead in a run-off election with 50.6% of the vote over President George Weah's 49.4% after tallied results from about 87% of polling stations, the West African country's elections commission said on Thursday.

Boakai and Weah emerged neck-and-neck from the first round of voting in October but below the 50% needed to secure an outright victory, leading to a run-off on Nov. 14.

The election has been widely seen as a test of support for former soccer star Weah, 57, who was criticised in his first term by the opposition and Liberia's international partners for not doing enough to tackle corruption.

Boakai, 78, who lost to Weah in the 2017 election, has campaigned on the need to rescue the nation from what he calls mismanagement by Weah's administration.