A section of the World Trade Centre in Abuja was on Monday morning gutted by fire.

Reports say the fire started during the early hours of the morning from the top of the skyscraper, emitting thick, dark smoke.

At the time of filing this report, the cause of the fire was not known. But, the Federal Fire Service in a tweet announced that its men were on ground to address the situation.

The $1 billion Abuja World Trade Centre with 37 storeys undertaken by the ChurchGate Group is expected to be the tallest building in Nigeria.

In 2011, Vinay Mahtani, Managing Director of ChurchGate Group, said the first phase of the project would be completed in June 2013.

Sitting on a 6.102 hectares of land in the Central Business District of Abuja, on the Constitution Avenue along the city’s main airport road, and adjacent to the main railway station, the multibillion naira project is being executed through the Public Private Partnership (PPP) arrangement between First Continental Properties Limited, a subsidiary of the Churchgate Group and the Abuja Investments Company Limited, an agency under the Federal Capital Territory Administration.

Read more: https://www.icirnigeria.org/fire-outbreak-at-1b-world-trade-centre-building-in-abuja/

JOY Nunieh, former acting Managing Director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), on Monday recalled how she slapped Godswill Akpabio, Minister of Niger Delta affairs, for sexually harassing her.

Speaking during an interview on Arise News Morning Show, Nunieh disclosed that the incident happened at the minister’s guest house in Apo, Abuja.

In a video clip of the interview, the former NDDC managing director stressed that she was the only woman that slapped the minister because he thought he could come upon her.

“Why did he not tell Nigerians that I slapped him in his guest house at Apo? I am the only woman that slapped Akpabio. He thought he could come up on me. He tried to harass me sexually,” Nunieh said.

“I slapped him. He tried to come on me. I am an Ogoni woman and nobody jokes with us. I showed Akpabio that Rivers women do not tolerate nonsense.”

She also accused Akpabio of trying to inflate the NDDC budget by instructing her to include some projects from the refugee commission in the budget of the NDDC.

“Akpabio wrote me to put a list of projects from the refugee... Read more: https://www.icirnigeria.org/i-slapped-akpabio-he-tried-to-come-on-me-says-nunieh-ex-nddc-md/

OPERATIVES of the Nigeria Police Cybercrime Unit, INTERPOL National Central Bureau, Abuja have arrested three suspects; Samson Inegbenesun, 30; Blessed Junior, 32; and Muhammed Zakari, 36, all male from Uromi in Edo State for cyber-related offences, including advance fee fraud, money laundering and romance scam.

The Police confirmed this in a statement released on Twitter on Sunday.

The suspects were arrested in Uromi following investigations into suspected fraudulent online procurement and supply of COVID-19 protective mask, received through the INTERPOL NCB Wiesbaden, Germany, the statement revealed.

Samson Inegbenosun, according to police investigations is an internet fraudster and a member of a Turkey-based online scamming syndicate.

He was supplying foreign and local bank accounts to receive fraudulent funds and used same as conduit to other feeder accounts.

The Police have recovered from him, a building apartment worth N20 million, a Toyota RAV-4 2015 model worth N6.5 million and a Toyota Matrix 2002 model valued at N2 million, which he procured with the proceeds of the crime.

Read more: https://www.icirnigeria.org/interpol-arrests-three-over-cybercrime-rescues-american-lady-held-hostage-for-16-months/

TWENTY-FOUR hours after Nnamdi Azikwe International Airport Abuja re-opened for domestic operations three months after it was shut due to COVID-19 pandemic, business activities are yet to pick up.

When The ICIR visited the airport on Thursday, there were few passengers at the ticketing and checking lounge of the airport.

Domestic flight operations were suspended in the country late March as cases of COVID-19 were growing after the index case was recorded on February 27.

At about 9 am when this reporter arrived at the airport, it was observed that life was yet to return to the ever-bubbling airport, as it witnessed low passengers’ patronage.

Read more: https://www.icirnigeria.org/low-patronage-hiked-ticket-fares-strict-protocols-as-abuja-airport-reopens/

A REPORT by the Presidential Investigation Committee probing corruption allegations against Ibrahim Magu, the suspended acting chairman of the Economic Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), has indicted him of acquiring a property worth N573 million in Dubai, United Arab Emirates through an unknown pastor.

The Committee which produced the report, according to The PUNCH was different from the one headed by Justice Ayo Salami, former President of Court of Appeal which is currently investigating Magu.

It was titled “Final Report of the Presidential Investigation Committee on the EFCC Federal Government Recovered Assets and Finances from May 2015 to May 2020,” published by the Federal Government-owned News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), The PUNCH reported.

The Committee was headed by Abdullahi Ibrahim, a former Minister of Justice.

According to the report, Magu was also accused of failing to properly account for a recovered N551 billion by the Commission under his watch.

Read more: https://www.icirnigeria.org/magu-acquired-n573m-property-in-dubai-through-unknown-pastor-recovered-n551b-unaccounted-for-report/

THE National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), is considering 21 herbal products for the treatment of Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) symptoms.

The agency confirmed this development through its official Twitter handle on Saturday but did not name the herbal products or their manufacturers.

Mojisola Adeyeye, Director-General of the agency in the statement also said the reports circulating on social media that the agency had approved Paxherbal for treating COVID-19 symptoms as “wrong and inaccurate.”

This consideration is coming at a time Nigeria and indeed the world contend with increasing cases of confirmed COVID-19 and attendant deaths without any cure at the moment.

Read more: https://www.icirnigeria.org/nafdac-considers-21-herbal-products-for-covid-19-treatment/

MONDAY June 15 was a dark day for Habiba Auwalu (not real name) who hawks awara (a local cake produced from soya beans) at the Staff Quarters of the Federal Medical Centre Azare, in the North Eastern State of Bauchi. Habiba, 13, abandoned school for hawking in order to help raise money in support of her mother who lost her husband in March. On the morning of that faithful Monday, the teenager was lured into her predator's den through the exigencies of her trade and got raped, by Umaru Yahaya, the CMD's cook.

"He placed an order for Awara, while taking it to him, a friend accompanied me. Upon arrival, I could see some frustration in his face, so he angrily asked me why I came with a friend. He said I should have come alone. " He then withheld the money and asked me to return later so I would have it.

"He warned that if I come back with my friend again, he will not pay for the cake, so I decided to go back alone in order to have my money.

"When I went back, he dragged me into a room where he defiled me; warning that if I dare let it out, he would chuck me with knife till I die and then I will be dismembered completely and nothing would happen to him", Habiba narrates her predicament with shaking voice and teary face.

Habiba was defiled by a cook of the Chief Medical Director Federal Medical Centre Azare, Dr. Abdullahi Ibrahim Bichi, at his residence.

What is more appalling is the dismissal of a security guard who exposed Habiba's predator.

READ MORE: https://www.icirnigeria.org/covid-19-weak-laws-poverty-worsen-gender-based-violence-in-bauchi-during-lockdown-part-1/

THE military authorities said it has once again neutralized some armed bandit leaders and several of their fighters in Zamfara state.

John Enenche, the General Coordinator Defence Media Operations Defence Headquarters, in a statement on Friday disclosed that the bandits were neutralized in air strikes executed by the Air Component of Operation HADARIN DAJI in the Zamfara State section of the Kagara forest.

He stated that the success of the operation was achieved through human intelligence reports on July 9, indicating that some armed bandits had relocated with a large number of rustled livestock from the Sokoto State side of the forest and set up camp in the Zamfara State portion of the forest.

Enenche said intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance missions also later confirmed the exact location of the camp.

The Air Component dispatched Nigerian Air Force (NAF) fighter jets, helicopter gunships had engaged the location, and as the attack aircraft approached the camp, some of the bandits and their leaders were seen fleeing towards the surrounding bushes.

Consequently the attack aircraft struck the area of vegetation taking out several of the bandits.



Read more: https://www.icirnigeria.org/armed-bandits-neutralised-by-troops-in-zamfara-says-nigerian-army/

With the havoc caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent shutdown that left the world at a standstill, GRACE OBIKE, with support from the International Budget Partnership (IBP), had a chat with smallholder women farmers in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) on how the situation affected them.

IMAGINE a farmer braving the lockdown that commenced in March, trekking back and forth to her farm for lack of transportation, labouring for weeks to cultivate her farmland, which is her only means of livelihood and finally planting maize.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3GE4JkRE9E

She tends it like a baby since she cannot purchase the much-needed fertiliser that this type of crop thrives on, then watches it grow to waist length as the weeks go by only to return on a fateful day to discover that all she had planted had been eaten up by herds of cattle.

The above scenario is the plight of many small-scale farmers in different parts of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

Recalling her sad story, Asibi Gade, a small-scale woman farmer who resides in Small Shada, opposite the Mathematical Centre in Kwali Area Council, rents farmlands for N10, 000 per season on which to grow cassava which she will process into fufu in large quantity for sale, corn and rice.

The widow and mother of two who resides in a tiny two-bedroom bungalow with her unemployed graduate son explained to The Nation how last year, she and a group of women contributed resources and rented hectares of land for N10, 000 per hectare, cultivated corn and soybeans with the aim of sharing the profit. But when some of them went to harvest the produce, they found cattle on the farm having a field day.

“The herdsmen surrounded our women, uprooted the produce and fed them to their cattle. We lost everything. We arrested the herdsmen and took them to the police, but they advised us to accept the N20, 000 compensation they offered us if we don’t want to lose everything,” she said.

In Jiwa community of the Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC), the experience of the farmers is similar.

Comfort Sunday just began a fish farm about two weeks ago to supplement her income from crops. She is just one of the hundreds of women in the community that farm in a large expanse of land divided into small plots without any form of demarcation among over 500 women who cultivate various vegetables such as waterleaf, garden-eggs and other crops. She plants rice, beans, corn and groundnut.

Last year, her group, the Smallholder Women Farmers’ of Nigeria (SWOFON) applied to the Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA) for fertiliser, which they eventually got at a subsidised rate. She used the fertiliser on her beans crop and applied sufficient herbicides to ensure a good yield. Her bean crops were almost ready for harvest when herdsmen came to her farm and she lost everything as they cattle destroyed everything.

When she spoke with our reporter at her farm, she said during the lockdown, a couple in the community was returning from the farm when they came across herdsmen feeding their cattle with a neighbour’s crop. They confronted the herdsmen who attacked them with sticks and cutlasses and were eventually rescued by youths who got wind of the incident.

Why smallholder women farmers

According to a research conducted by Bashir Babura and published in the Scholarly Journal of Agricultural Science, Vol. 7 (1) in 2017, more than 80 per cent of farmers in Nigeria are smallholder farmers who produce an estimated 98 per cent of the food consumed in Nigeria apart from wheat. Many of the farmers are women. In the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) alone, the Programme Coordinator SWOFON, Ogechi Okebugwu said at least 13,000 small-scale farmers are women.

Their farming is, however, constantly disrupted by incidents of clashes with herders in search of food for their cattle. To stem these incidents, the Federal Government attempted to introduce the Rural Grazing Area (RUGA) policy, which was developed by the National Livestock Transformation Plan under the Nigerian Economic Council, but the move was faulted and has been adopted only by some states.

In pursuit of its diversification toward agriculture, the Federal Government’s budgetary allocations have continued to increase from 1.25 per cent in 2016 to 1.82 per cent in 2017 and 2.23 per cent in 2018.

Apart from launch of the programmes such as the N150 billion credit relief package by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) for agriculture food chain businesses, FarmerMoni loans which have a three-month repayment period and the presidential fertiliser initiative for the 2020 farming season, the Federal Government recently announced that it intends to secure 995million Euro-worth of agricultural equipment for Nigerian farmers.

The FCT Authority also has the Agriculture Development Project (ADP), which delivers to women extension services towards ensuring that they are coordinated to key into agriculture development programmes.

READ MORE: https://www.icirnigeria.org/fct-women-farmers-worry-about-insecurity-resources/