₦airaland Forum

Have you thought of what could be the reason for the deputy governor’s resignation; well i’ll keep my thoughts to myself at least for now while we share what reporters gathered. Akwa Ibom State Deputy Governor, Mr. Nsima Ekere, Wednesday resigned from office over some irreconcilable differences with Governor Godswill Akpabio.
Though Ekere did not give any reason for his resignation, Reports gathered that it may not be unconnected with the way Akpabio is running the state.
The former deputy governor in his resignation letter dated October 31 and addressed to Akpabio said: “Pursuant to Section 306 (5) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended) I kindly notify you of my resignation from the office of the Deputy Governor of Akwa Ibom State forthwith on personal grounds.”
But Reports gathered that before his resignation, Ekere was first given the option to either resign or face impeachment.
Investigation revealed that the resignation was as a result of a disagreement which erupted during a heated debate at a stakeholders’ meeting convened by the governor.
Others who attended the meeting were the Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Hon. Sam Ikon, the Secretary to the State Government, Umana Okon Uman other.
Sources said that the meeting, which started on Monday, ended in a stalemate due to the inability of the governor and others to reconcile their differences.
The meeting rescheduled for Tuesday, was said to have forced the deputy governor to open up and express his mind against the position of the governor on issue bordering on the governance of the state.
At the meeting, sources said the Speaker of the state House of Assembly was directed by the governor to resign which the Speaker challenged.
After many of those at the meeting had spoken, the deputy governor was said to have vehemently challenged the governor on why the Speaker should be removed.
The position of the Deputy Speaker was said to have been very embarrassing to the stakeholders and on the spot, Ekere was given the option to either resign or be impeached.
A statement issued by the Chief Press Secretary (CPS) to the governor, Mr. Inem Ina, confirmed the resignation of the deputy governor, saying: “The Deputy Governor of Akwa Ibom State, Mr. Nsima Ekere, has resigned from office.”
“In a letter of resignation dated Wednesday, October 31, 2012, Mr. Ekere said he was resigning on personal grounds.
“He thanked the governor and the good people of the state for the opportunity given to him to serve the state in the last 17 months.
“Mr. Ekere wished the governor and the people of the state well in the remaining years of the administration,” Ina said.


http://www.rosemarynkblog.com/why-akwa-ibom-deputy-governor-resigned/

South Africa’s Reserve Bank has announced that new banknotes bearing the face of SA’s former president, Nelson Mandela, will come into circulation next Tuesday, November 6, 2012. The new banknotes feature an image of Mandela on the front with images of the “Big Five” animals on the back.
“Our currency is a unique symbol of our nationhood, with many of us handling banknotes every day. The Reserve Bank is proud to be able to honour South Africa’s struggle icon and first democratically elected President in this way, and we thank all our stakeholders for their hard work in making this process possible,” Reserve Bank Governor, Gill Marcus said.
The new note series will have the same R10; R20; R50; R100 and R200 denominations and sizes with the engraving of the former President’s face appearing on the different coloured currency. The reverse sides of the notes will carry an image of one of the country’s big five.
While urging the public to familiarize themselves with the security features of the new banknotes in order to be able to identify their authenticity by utilising the look, feel and tilt method; the Bank says the current and new bank notes will co-circulate and both remain legal tender. Public awareness campaign with advertisements aired on television, radio, newspapers and magazines,as well as social media platforms have been used to educate the public.

Road shows and public outreach events were also held nationwide including common monetary areas (CMA) such as Swaziland, Namibia, Lesotho, Mozambique, Botswana and Zimbabwe also included in these awareness efforts.
The introduction of the Mandela banknotes was made public in February by South Africa’s President, Jacob Zuma.The announcement falls on the day that Mandela was released from prison in 1990.
Mandela will become the first person to appear on the country’s banknotes since the dawn of democracy, he said.
Security features of bank notes are upgraded every seven to 10 years in South Africa to assist in preventing counterfeiting. Its current note series was upgraded in 2005.

http://www.rosemarynkblog.com/mandela-to-appear-on-sa-banknotes/

Hell hath no furry like a woman cheated on scorned.
According to Peacefmonline
Ghanaian actor Eddy Nartey has been stabbed by his girlfriend at his residence in Accra.
According to a close source, Eddy Nartey who was present with the said girlfriend at the premiere of the his new movie “Testing the Waters” at Silver bird cinema on Friday, October 26, 2012, had some misunderstanding with his lover during the movie premiere leading to both going their separate ways after the premiere.
The source told Peacefmonline.com that actor Eddy went home with another lady to spend the night with her, but his girlfriend somehow got wind of that.
Nartey’s girlfriend, who is believed to be a Nigerian, allegedly went to the boyfriend’s house unannounced in the early hours of Saturday.


Peacefmonline.com is reliably informed that the Nigerian lady on reaching Eddy’s place of residence did not knock and stealthily entered the room through the window by removing the louvre blades.
Lo and behold, her
more after the jump
worst fears were confirmed when she chanced upon Eddy in bed with another woman, obviously warming him.
Love knows no fury like a woman betrayed and Eddy’s girlfriend is said to have destroyed virtually every valuable item in the room including his shoes, a 42 inch Television set and a Home Theatre. She is also reported to have ripped apart all clothes belonging to the Ghanaian actor she could laid her hands on.
The source disclosed to peacefmonline that the anger of Eddy’s girlfriend knew no bounds as she allegedly picked up a piece of the broken louvre blade and stabbed the budding Ghanaian actor who bled profusely whiles being rushed to a hospital for medical attention.
The case has since been reported to the Mamprobi Police who have placed the Nigerian lady under custody.
Eddy, according to sources, is still hospitalised.

source: http://www.rosemarynkblog.com/ghanaian-actor-stabbed-by-his-nigerian-girlfriend/

Keri Hilson tweets how she’s listening to Ashewo by Flavour Nabania. She admits loving the song.

http://www.rosemarynkblog.com/keri-hilosn-playing-ashewo-by-flavour/

South Africa’s tech scene is bursting with success stories of tech start-ups. Last month, a new enterprise accelerator programme dubbed the South African Business Link to Experts (SABLE) was launched in US tech hub, Silicon Valley to assist local entrepreneurs in South Africa grow their business and execute their ideas flawlessly. One of the seemingly underplayed successes is 2go, a mobile social network spreading across Africa. Growing rapidly with up to 50,000 sign ups daily, the company has more than 20 million active users in Nigeria, South Africa and Kenya.
Ventures- Africa chats with the co-founders Alan Wolff and Ashley Peters, on the success of the mobile app, which is said to have over 9 million active users – several million more than Facebook in Nigeria.

Let’s go to the very beginning. What prompted the creation of 2go? MXit had been doing impressively well in the South African market. Why another mobile app?
We were Computer Science students who were hungry to use our software development knowledge to make something, which people would actually use. We thought we could offer something fresh with a few compelling features (text colour changing, profile pictures, a good user interface). It sounded like a fun idea and we thought it had potential, so we began working hard on it.
How much was the initial investment to set up 2go in the beginning ?
We spent hardly anything on getting the project off the ground. We worked out of our (parents’) houses and we did all the programming ourselves. We hosted our server on our friend’s Internet line.
And it began with how many staff ?
There were four of us in total initially. Two of the other team members decided to focus on academics and left the company in 2008. Ashley and Alan continued working aggressively on it while studying at the same time.
What is the company’s current workforce strength?
The company has less than 10 people in total but we are trying hard to expand our technical team. We are proud of having a small team supporting one of the largest networks in Africa with over 20 million users.
One of the major challenges stifling the emergence of innovative tech start-ups has been undercapitalization, but 2go has grown without sourcing for a penny from venture capital funds. How was this achieved?
In 2008/2009 we spoke to venture capitalists and potential investors but they were unresponsive. We planned on spending the capital we wanted on building a good technical team. Since we couldn’t raise capital we had to learn how to rapidly develop the product, make the company profitable and scale the technical infrastructure ourselves.
It is interesting that 2go, a South African product, really took off in Nigeria. Your team strategically targeted the market, carrying out surveys, research and tailoring the App to feedbacks from Nigeria. Why the Nigerian market?
We had Nigeria as a viable market in our minds since 2009. The telecommunications market in Nigeria was growing massively and it was obvious to us that if we could provide them with a cheap and effective way to communicate and socialise online, we would succeed. Feature phones are also very popular in Nigeria and we had gained expertise at developing a great user experience on such handsets. We therefore decided to try and grow the product in Nigeria.
2go solicits feedbacks from users and applies some of the resulting suggestions. Which idea or suggestion from the 2go community would you say has helped the platform most?
Users giving feedback on technical issues that they experience have been invaluable. There hasn’t been one single idea which has helped the platform the most. We’ve implemented many ideas and collectively they have contributed to the application’s user experience.



CONTINUE AT http://www.rosemarynkblog.com/meet-the-co-founders-of-africas-hottest-mobile-app-2go/

The man known as the “Bill Gates of Ghana” believes there are three factors to achieving African economic growth: mobile technology, internet, and good African minds.
Herman Chinery-Hesse is the founder and chairman of SOFTtribe, Ghana’s leading software development agency. Having been born in Ireland, educated in the US, and having gone on to work in the UK, Chinery-Hesse moved to Ghana in 1990 determined to be part of the wave of Africans taking control of the continent’s future.
In Chinery-Hesse’s opinion, the only way to develop the continent is through clever Africans seizing upon and effectively using the mobile and internet technologies that are spreading across Africa.
The first important premise necessary for growth, Chinery-Hesse says, is that Africans become empowered and take over the reins. He explains: “Only Africans can develop Africa. I don’t know of any country in the world, once again, where a bunch of foreigners came and developed the country… I don’t know where that formula is coming from; there’s no precedent… We have to sink or swim ourselves. And Africa can!”
He laments the fact that the African population lacks the insight to understand that while infrastructure on the continent may be lacking, the human resources for excellence are present. Henotes: “Technology is the only way for Africa to get rich. We don’t have proper infrastructure and we can’t compete in manufacturing. But if you put me behind a PC and tell me to write software for a Chinese customer, then I can compete brain for brain with anyone trying to do the same thing in the US.”
Next, Africans must harness the networking power that mobile technologies have presented to the continent. In a location which has a 1 billion population spread across a 31.2 million square kilometre area – often without good transport connections – the consumer demand is abundant. With the advent of mobile communications, entrepreneurs are placed in an ideal position to reach out and respond to demands.
“Our rural populations were in a black hole…You couldn’t speak to them. You had to go on a screwed-up road and cross a river and so on but today they all have mobile phones. Suddenly they’re part of a mobile community and that’s 50% of our population. It’s boom time, you can sell them all kinds of things from shoes to cement to building materials… it’s made things efficient. Even if you have to drive to the village, you don’t go there blind; you make sure Kofi is home first,” the “Bill Gates of Ghana” comments.
And finally, he extols the importance of internet in the development process – a theme that is being increasingly taken up by businesses and politicians alike, as the continent pushes to expand internet penetration. He notes of the population in Africa: “some have internet and suddenly people are getting educated online, trading online, and this is the future.”
Fiercely dedicated to the African continent, Chinery-Hesse came to Ghana in 1990 and began developing software relevant to the African market on his personal computer, from his parents’ home. Soon out-growing the bedroom, he moved to the house’s garage to continue developing his programs while growing his reputation and customer base.
Before he knew it, SOFTtribe became the leading business management software developer in the country, and was providing services to over 250 highly-reputed customers, including Guinness, Nestle, Unilever and the Ford Foundation, to name but a few. SOFTtribe is also a Microsoft development partner.
Chinery-Hesse has earned himself a global reputation, and aside from being dubbed “Ghana’s Bill Gates”, has received global recognition through a number of awards. In 2005, he received a Millennium Excellence Award for IT (his second nomination for the award); and has also been recognised as an Outstanding Ghanaian Professional by UK-based GPA Awards, as well as being bestowed with the Distinguished Alumnus Award from the Texas State Alumni Association and Texas State University-San Marcos (USA), making him the first and currently only African to receive the award.
Humble and renowned for his sense of humour, Chinery-Hesse believes in patience and honesty in all aspects of life – including business.


http://www.rosemarynkblog.com/meet-the-bill-gates-of-ghana-herman-chinery-hesse/

There has been palpable anxiety in the government circles of Nigeria’s Oyo State over the alleged arrest of Mrs. Florence Ajimobi, wife of the governor, in the United Kingdom for alleged money laundering.
Reports on the web and some blogs claimed that the woman was arrested two weeks ago by the London Metropolitan Police on her 52nd trip to the UK since her husband became governor 17 months ago. She was allegedly found to be in possession of 400,000 pounds and thousands of dollars, with a combined value of N500million.

London Met Police has not issued any statement about her alleged arrest. And her name drew blank in a search of the Met Police website by P.M.NEWS.
The unconfirmed reports claimed that Governor Abiola Ajimobi has had to fly to the UK to get her bailed. Mrs. Ajimobi has a North London address in Golders Green and ordinarily visits the UK.
So far, the Oyo state government has kept mute over this story. And the disappearance of Governor Ajimobi from Ibadan, the capital for some two days has further given some ammunition to the purveyors of the news about his wife, styled The First Lady of Oyo state.
Governor Ajimobi was in office today, but bearers of the tale about the wife, have been unrelenting.
Mrs. Ajimobi’s personal staff at Agodi have also not issued denials of any sort.
Miss Yemisi Dada, Special Assistant on Media to Chief Mrs. Ajimobi on a phone interaction at exactly 8:11am claimed that she was not in Ibadan at the time of the telephone conversation adding that she was not aware of such development.
“I cannot talk about that. I am not aware of what you are talking about and besides, I am not in Ibadan right now. Meanwhile, I will find out the correct situation and get back to you as soon as possible. Thanks”.

source: http://www.rosemarynkblog.com/oyo-state-governors-wife-arrested-in-london-with-400000-in-her-possession/