₦airaland Forum

gidgiddy:
It depends on two things.

1. Will the elections be credible?

2. Will the North vote for him?


One thing I can tell any Tinubu supporter is that us Igbos are going to vote massively against Tinubu. So if the North doesn't vote Tinubu, he is gone

Of course, if the elections are rigged, none of this will matter

HacheNoire:
Damn!

You found it!

We wanted you to step on it. We will get you next time.

Edygrin:
1.5m sent.
Get a good laptop with 500k
Learn a tech skill with 1m.
Have a good night rest.

RealityKings1:
Thanks this is it

Edygrin:
Send your account number

Paul Martin’s dismissal came a day after his office issued a report critical of the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle the agency, the Washington Post, CNN and others reported.

They cited a two-sentence email from the White House sent on Tuesday to Martin telling him his position was “terminated, effective immediately,” but with no explanation of the reasons for the decision.[/b]

His office’s report had warned that more than $489 million in food assistance was at risk of spoilage or potential diversion after the Trump administration implemented an aid freeze and stop-work order.

The report said it had long “[b]identified significant challenges and offered recommendations to improve Agency programming to prevent fraud, waste, and abuse.”

“However, recent widespread staffing reductions across the Agency… coupled with uncertainty about the scope of foreign assistance waivers and permissible communications with implementers, has degraded USAID’s ability to distribute and safeguard taxpayer-funded humanitarian assistance.”

Trump had already fired 18 inspectors general, who are independent watchdogs of the federal government, but Martin — appointed by Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden — had remained in place.

Trump, who began his second term last month, has launched a crusade led by his top donor Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, to downsize or dismantle swaths of the US government.

The most concentrated fire has been on USAID, the primary organization for distributing US humanitarian aid around the world with health and emergency programs in around 120 countries.

USAID manages a budget of $42.8 billion — representing 42 percent of humanitarian aid disbursed worldwide.

It was seen as a vital source of soft power for the United States in its struggle for influence with rivals including China.

The Trump administration has frozen foreign aid, ordered thousands of internationally based staff to return to the United States, and begun slashing the USAID headcount of 10,000 employees to around only 300.

Labor unions are challenging the legality of the onslaught. A federal judge ordered a pause on Friday to the administration’s plan to put 2,200 USAID workers on paid leave by the weekend.

Democrats say it would be unconstitutional for Trump to shut down government agencies without the legislature’s approval.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who had floated the idea of exchanging occupied land, said the latest strikes showed the Kremlin was not interested in pursuing peace in Ukraine.

Zelensky had suggested exchanging Ukrainian-held chunks of Russia’s region of Kursk for Russian-controlled territory in eastern and southern Ukraine in an interview published late Tuesday. The Kremlin dismissed the proposal outright in response.

“This is impossible,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “Russia has never and will never discuss the topic of exchanging its territory.”

Peskov vowed that Ukrainian forces holding territory inside Russia would either be “destroyed” or pushed out.

Ukrainian forces rushed over the Russian border in August last year to wrest control over swathes of territory it hopes will be key to any future deal to end the grinding conflict.

– Combined missile strike –

The Kremlin’s refusal to discuss land swaps came shortly after Zelensky announced that one person had been killed and at least four others were wounded — including a child — in the attack on Kyiv. It damaged apartment blocks, office buildings, and civilian infrastructure.

AFP journalists heard a volley of explosions ring out over the city and saw the body of one person killed covered in a black plastic sheet on a street littered with debris.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is “not preparing for peace — he continues to kill Ukrainians and destroy cities,” Zelensky wrote on social media after the attack.

“Only strong steps and pressure on Russia can stop this terror. Right now we need the unity and the support of all our partners in the fight for a just end to this war,” he added.

Russia’s defence ministry said it had carried out a “group missile strike” on Ukrainian military-industrial sites that produce drones, and claimed all targets had been hit.

Zelensky’s comments on Russia’s readiness for talks come on the back of weeks of mounting rhetoric from Moscow, Washington, and Kyiv over the possibility of negotiations that could end the nearly three-year Russian invasion.

Zelensky is due to meet US Vice President JD Vance on Friday on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference. That gathering will be dominated by the war, which has cost tens of thousands of lives.

– Flurry of meetings –

US President Donald Trump’s special envoy Keith Kellogg, who is tasked with drawing up a proposal to halt the fighting, is also due to visit Ukraine next week, after the Zelensky-Vance meeting in Munich.

That trip would come just days before the three-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion on February 24.

Trump took office vowing to end the war in Ukraine, possibly by leveraging billions of dollars in US assistance sent under former president Joe Biden, to force Kyiv into territorial concessions.

On Tuesday, Trump welcomed to the White House Marc Fogel, an American jailed in Russia on drug charges since 2021. He was released by Moscow and returned to the United States after US envoy Steve Witkoff secured his release.

The US president said Russia had acted “very nicely” with Fogel’s release and he hoped it would be the “beginning of a relationship where we can end that war”.

Peskov said the two sides had agreed to release Fogel for a Russian citizen in US detention. The identity of the freed Russian would be revealed once they were back in Russia, he added.

But he poured cold water over the idea that the exchange represented any “turning point” in ties, suggesting instead that the swap could help gradually thaw relations currently at their “lowest point”.

– Russia advances on battlefield –

On the ground in Kyiv on Wednesday, emergency services said that some 120 rescue workers had been deployed to three districts of the capital in the aftermath of the attack and that fires sparked by the barrage had been extinguished.

North of Kyiv in the Chernigiv region, governor Vyacheslav Chaus said Russian forces had targeted “critical infrastructure” in the barrage and that two people had been wounded.

Ukraine’s air force said it had shot down six missiles and 71 out of 123 drones, including Iranian-designed Shahed attack vehicles.

The mounting discussions on a possible end to the conflict come at a difficult time for Ukraine on the battlefield. Kyiv’s army has been losing ground to better-resourced Russian forces at strategic points along the sprawling front line.

Previous Thread:
Ukraine Ready To Swap Territory With Russia – Zelensky
https://www.nairaland.com/8340684/ukraine-ready-swap-territory-russia

In a statement published on its Telegram channel, Hamas rejected Trump’s insistence on the US taking control of the Strip and transferring its two million inhabitants to Jordan and Egypt.

“Trump’s statements are racist and a call for ethnic cleansing, aimed at liquidating the Palestinian cause and denying the immutable national rights of our people,[/b]” Hamas said.

Hamas also stated that it remains committed to the ceasefire agreement and again accused Israel of failing to uphold its side of the deal.

“[b]We emphasise that the occupation is the party that has not complied with its commitments and is therefore responsible for any complications or delays,” it added.

This comes after Trump warned that “all hell is going to break out” if Hamas fails to release all hostages being held in Gaza by Saturday afternoon.

Trump issued the threat while addressing journalists from the Oval Office in the White House after signing a series of executive orders.

Hamas had threatened to postpone the next hostage release, scheduled for Saturday, “until further notice,” accusing Israel of breaking the ceasefire agreement.

However, this will only be possible if US President Donald Trump can bring both nations to the negotiating table.

“We will swap one territory for another,” Zelenskyy said in an interview with The Guardian published on Tuesday.

Zelenskyy also revealed that Kyiv would cede part of the Kursk region, which it has held since its surprise incursion into Russia last August.

When asked which Russian-occupied areas Ukraine would demand in return, the Ukrainian leader replied: “I don’t know, we will see.

“But all our territories are important; there is no priority.”

Trump has repeatedly stated that he wants to end Russia’s war against Ukraine soon and claims to have already made progress in conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

According to Trump, Putin “wants people to stop dying in the war.”

However, the American president’s team acknowledges that both sides will have to make concessions to end the conflict.

In a letter to US bishops, he urged Catholics and others “not to give in to narratives that discriminate against and cause unnecessary suffering to our migrant and refugee brothers and sisters”.

The Argentine pontiff, 88, has repeatedly defended the rights of migrants during his 10 years leading the Catholic Church, urging world leaders to be more welcoming to those fleeing poverty or violence.

“I have followed closely the major crisis that is taking place in the United States with the initiation of a program of mass deportations,” he wrote Tuesday.

He acknowledged “the right of a nation to defend itself and keep communities safe from those who have committed violent or serious crimes while in the country or prior to arrival”.

But he wrote that “the act of deporting people who in many cases have left their own land for reasons of extreme poverty, insecurity, exploitation, persecution or serious deterioration of the environment, damages the dignity of many men and women, and of entire families”.

Deportation “places them in a state of particular vulnerability and defencelessness”, he wrote.

Francis had warned as Trump returned to the White House last month that his pledge to carry out the largest deportation campaign in US history, by expelling millions of undocumented immigrants, would be a “calamity”.

“This is not a minor issue — an authentic rule of law is verified precisely in the dignified treatment that all people deserve, especially the poorest and most marginalised,” he wrote in his letter.

He added: “This does not impede the development of a policy that regulates orderly and legal migration. However, this development cannot come about through the privilege of some and the sacrifice of others.

“What is built on the basis of force, and not on the truth about the equal dignity of every human being, begins badly and will end badly.”

He welcomed the work done by Catholic clergy with refugees and migrants.

“I exhort all the faithful of the Catholic Church, and all men and women of good will, not to give in to narratives that discriminate against and cause unnecessary suffering to our migrant and refugee brothers and sisters,” he wrote.

Sani said it’s unfair to keep Kanu in a prolonged detention.

Posting on X, the former Kaduna lawmaker said injustice is not the way to justice.

According to Sani: “Keeping a man in prolong detention and postponing his case indefinitely is totally unfair.

“I know there are sentiments and fears but injustice is not the way to justice.

“A problem can’t be solved by stopping the clock. I have been in prolong prison to know the pains and anguish of isolation.

"Until you experience the cell you will never know the cell. Just my personal view.”

This comes as Justice Binta Nyako of the Abuja Federal High Court adjourned Kanu’s trial “sin die” yesterday.

Last year, Justice Nyako had recused herself from Kanu’s trial after the IPOB leader demanded that she should step down from his case.

But the Chief Justice of the Federal High Court, John Tsoho had refused to reassign Kanu’s case to another judge, while ordering Nyako to continue with the trial.

Kanu is facing terrorism charges leveled against him by the Nigerian government over his push for the actualization of Biafra.

In a Fox News interview aired late Saturday as the premier was wrapping up a visit to Washington, Netanyahu defended Trump’s proposal, which has sparked concern and condemnation across the Middle East and the world.

“I think that President Trump’s proposal is the first fresh idea in years, and it has the potential to change everything in Gaza,” Netanyahu said, adding that it represents a “correct approach” to the future of the Palestinian territory.

“All Trump is saying, ‘I want to open the gate and give them an option to relocate temporarily while we rebuild the place physically’,” Netanyahu said.

Trump “never said he wants American troops to do the job. Guess what? We’ll do the job,” Netanyahu declared.

Israel seized the Gaza Strip in 1967 and maintained a military presence in the territory until 2005, when it pulled out settlers and its troops.

It subsequently imposed a crippling blockade on the Hamas-ruled territory and placed it under siege after the war began in October 2023.

Israel and armed groups in Gaza have fought several wars in recent years, but the latest — sparked by the unprecedented 2023 Hamas attack on Israel — has been the deadliest and most destructive.

Netanyahu said Trump’s plan was a departure from the “same old, same old, same old — we leave, Gaza becomes again occupied by these terrorists who use it as a base to attack Israel… It doesn’t go anywhere.”

“I think we should pursue it,” he added, cautioning that “the real issue” was finding a country that would agree to take in displaced Gazans.

The Israeli leader also said that relocated Palestinians would have to “disavow terrorism” to be allowed to return to Gaza.

For Palestinians, any attempts to force them out of Gaza would evoke dark memories of what the Arab world calls the “Nakba”, or catastrophe — the mass displacement of Palestinians during Israel’s creation in 1948.

“Everybody describes Gaza as the biggest open-air prison in the world,” Netanyahu said.

“Get the population out, allow them to leave. Not forcible eviction, not ethnic cleansing — getting people out of what all these countries and all these do-gooders say is an open-air prison. Why are you keeping them in prison?”

“Portable has never steal before. I have never come out like this to speak, and he hasn’t even posted me despite being his sister. But he is the only one taking care of the family. If not for him, I would have died during my sickness.

“One of our family members, Akeem is the one casting spell on Portable, he is the one spiritually influencing Portable to misbehave and offend Nigerians.”

“The lifting of sanctions requires negotiations, but not within the framework of a ‘maximum pressure’ policy, because it would not be a negotiation but a form of surrender,” said Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in a statement published on Telegram.

The foreign minister’s statement came after Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urged the government not to negotiate with Washington, calling such an approach “reckless”.

Khamenei, who has the final say on all strategic decisions in Iran, referred to Iran’s previous experience negotiating with the United States to justify his position.

In 2015, Iran struck a landmark deal with the United States, France, Germany, Britain, China and Russia to regulate its nuclear programme in return for the easing of international sanctions.

However, in 2018, during his first term, Trump unilaterally withdrew the United States from the agreement and reinstated heavy sanctions on Tehran, despite European opposition.

Trump on Wednesday called for a “verified nuclear peace agreement” with Iran, adding that it “cannot have a nuclear weapon”.

Iran insists its nuclear programme is solely for peaceful purposes and denies any intention to develop atomic weapons.

The US president, however, reinstated on Tuesday his “maximum pressure” policy, with Washington on Thursday announcing financial sanctions on entities and individuals accused of shipping hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of Iranian crude oil to China.

Aragchi said on Saturday that “Iran does not want to negotiate with a country that is simultaneously imposing new sanctions”.

EvilMerodack:
It's transient but if na Nigeria, una go talk day den dey use politics count scores

Hypocrites

BeLookingIDIOT:
Did Joe Biden carry classified documents to his house? Why won't he revoke Trump's access.