₦airaland Forum

Kobojunkie:
How could it have escaped the stomach? Do eels have iron teeth or something?

Nigeria Police Elite Squad In 2025 .....May God help us as a nation.

Simon Mann, mercenary who was jailed for leading an attempted coup in Equatorial Guinea

Old schoolmates recalled that at Eton he was always planning African coups at the back of the class

Simon Mann, who has died aged 72, was an Old Etonian, former SAS officer and soldier of fortune who made millions from providing mercenaries to protect diamond mines and oil refineries in Africa; in 2004, however, he bit off more than he could chew when he became involved in an alleged plot to overthrow the government of Equatorial Guinea.


The plot went disastrously wrong when Mann and 67 fellow mercenaries – mostly old sweats from Apartheid-era South Africa’s bush wars – were arrested by Zimbabwean security forces at Harare airport, where they had touched down in order to take on a consignment of arms. Mann claimed that they were on their way to protect diamond interests in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo. But they were accused of setting out to overthrow Equatorial Guinea’s tyrannical president Teodoro Obiang Nguema.

The story of the alleged coup contained more implausible characters and plot twists than an airport paperback thriller. There was an African dictator who allegedly enjoyed feasting on human testicles, there was the promise of liquid gold – offshore oil reserves that promised to make millions for those daring enough to seize them; there were walk-on roles for mercenaries, business tycoons, the disgraced peer Jeffrey Archer, exiled politicians and Baroness Thatcher’s son, Mark.

At the centre of everything was Mann, maverick scion of the Watney’s brewing empire who seemed to be a throwback to the days of Cecil Rhodes, when white buccaneers toppled governments and ran private fiefdoms. The adventures on which Mann embarked would lead him, eventually, to a foetid cell in Harare’s notorious Chikurubi prison, from which he was extradited in secret in February 2008 to Equatorial Guinea, where he was incarcerated in the infamous Black Beach jail.

Mann with fellow defendants during their trial at a conference centre in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, in 2008

Simon Mann was born on June 26 1952. His father, George Mann, was a former Guards officer who captained the England cricket team on their 1948-49 tour of the Cape (Simon’s grandfather had also been England cricket captain). Described by the cricketer’s bible Wisden as a “forceful batsman, prone to hitting hard”, he later became chairman of Watney’s.

Simon followed his father and grandfather to Eton, where he bucked the family trend by preferring rowing to cricket and, according to one friend, was always planning African coups at the back of the class; he was always known as “Maps Mann” because he always had maps in his hand.

Lacking academic ability, he sought an outlet for his daredevil instincts in the Army. After training as an officer at Sandhurst he took a commission in the Scots Guards and did a three-year stint as a troop commander in G Squadron of 22 SAS. Returning to the regular Army, he completed a tour of Northern Ireland and had postings in Cyprus, Germany, Norway, Canada and central America.

In the mid-1980s Mann left the Army to go into “business”, the precise nature of which remained a mystery even to some of his closest relatives. After a stint selling computer software he moved into the security business, providing bodyguards to wealthy Arabs to protect their Scottish estates from poachers, before briefly getting back into uniform in 1990 to serve on British Gulf war commander Sir Peter de la Billière’s staff in Riyadh.


In 1993 he set up Executive Outcomes with the entrepreneur Tony Buckingham. A mercenary outfit, it made a fortune protecting oil installations from rebels in Angola’s civil war and training Angolan government troops. Two years later he established an offshoot, Sandline International, with a fellow former Guardsman, Lt-Col Tim Spicer, and shipped arms to Sierra Leone in apparent contravention of a UN embargo.

With an estimated £10 million in the bank, Mann bought Inchmery, a former residence of the Rothschild family on the banks of the river Beaulieu in Hampshire, together with a Cape Dutch gabled house in Constantia, a secluded suburb of Cape Town whose inhabitants at one time included Earl Spencer and Sir Mark Thatcher.

There, he and his third wife, Amanda, became well-known figures on the Cape social scene. As well as meeting Baroness Thatcher at a party thrown by Mark, in a rare foray into the public domain Mann agreed to play the part of Colonel Derek Wilford, commander of the paratroopers who fired on marchers in Derry, in a 2001 television reconstruction of Bloody Sunday.

The story of the alleged coup plot emerged from “confessions” made in prison by Mann and his alleged co-conspirator Nick du Toit, a former South African special officer and member of Executive Outcomes, who had been arrested a day after Mann in the Equatorial Guinea capital Malabo.

In his testimony Mann said that he had been approached in 2003 by the Chelsea-based Lebanese oil tycoon, Ely Calil, who had made his fortune trading oil in Nigeria and was a friend of Severo Moto Nsá, self-styled president of the Equatorial Guinean government-in-exile. Moto had long sought the overthrow of President Obiang, and at a subsequent secret meeting in Spain the three men allegedly hatched a plot to bring about the tyrant’s downfall.

It was claimed that the three men struck a deal under which Calil and Mann would arrange to put Moto in power in return for a lump-sum payment of $16 million. Mann would also get the rights to supply Guinea’s future security needs and Calil would become the country’s chief oil broker.

With the deal concluded, Mann and Calil were alleged to have set about raising the money needed to pay for the operation. The basic deal was that 10 investors would each contribute £100,000. In return they would share £15 million between them on the coup’s completion, with the hope of further dividends as the oil began to flow.

Du Toit was tasked with recruiting the 80 or so mercenaries needed and, from these, he would take a small advance guard to Guinea in the guise of being involved in a tourist business. Once they were installed, Mann would fly in under cover of darkness with the rest of the men. The president would be seized in his bed and Moto installed.

All began according to the alleged plan, and on March 7, with du Toit in Malabo, 64 mercenaries boarded an old Boeing 727 which Mann had bought for $400,000, and took off for Harare from Wonderboom airport near Pretoria.

When the aircraft touched down at Harare airport, it taxied to the military sector, where those on board were expecting to link up with Mann and pick up their weaponry. Instead, Mann, the three flight crew and all 64 mercenaries on board were arrested and their weapons seized. The next day, du Toit and his 14-strong group were arrested in Malabo.

All those named by Mann and du Toit in their testimonies denied any involvement in the plot and claimed that the men had been tortured to make false statements, and Mann later claimed that his initial statements had been made under duress. Relatives of those arrested in Harare maintained that they had been on their way to Congo to guard diamond mines. It was noted that the small-scale and rather amateurish nature of the operation hardly suggested planning for a military coup.

But other evidence seemed to lend weight to the coup-plot theory. A South African telecoms tycoon, Gianfranco Cicogna, recalled being approached by Mann to invest $120,000 in a “project” in Equatorial Guinea (he declined). Documentary evidence from one of Mann’s offshore companies, Logo Logistics, showed that a person by the name of JH Archer transferred £74,000 to the company just four days before the alleged coup attempt. “JH” are the initials of Lord Archer, a friend of Ely Calil. Archer’s lawyers denied that he had sent money and both he and Calil denied knowing of any coup plot.

The biggest fish to become entangled in the scandal was Baroness Thatcher’s son, Mark, who was alleged to have paid for a helicopter to fly Moto into Guinea on the night of the coup. His name entered the fray after an explosive but hilarious letter from Mann to his wife was intercepted by prison guards.

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In the letter, written shortly after his arrest, Mann asked her to elicit the help of chums on the alleged plot’s “wonga list” of financial supporters: “Our situation is not good and it is very URGENT,” Mann wrote. “They [the lawyers] get no reply from Smelly [thought to be Ely Calil] and Scratcher [the nickname Mann used for Thatcher, on account of the acne he suffered while at school]...”

But Mann then went on to suggest that Scratcher’s involvement amounted to more than using his contacts to lobby for their release. “It may be that getting us out comes down to a large splodge of wonga!” he wrote. “Of course investors did not think this would happen. Do they think they can be part of something like this with only upside potential – no hardship or risk of this going wrong? Anyone and everyone in this is in it – good times or bad. Now it’s bad times and everyone has to f---ing well pull their full weight… Once we get into a real trial scenario we are f---ed.”

He ended the letter with the words: “Anyway [another contact] was expecting project funds inwards to Logo from Scratcher… If there is not enough, then present investors must come up with more.”

On July 22 2004 Mann was convicted in Zimbabwe on two counts of attempting to buy firearms illegally. He was sentenced to seven years, later reduced to four. Sir Mark Thatcher was arrested in August 2004 and given a four-year suspended prison term and a hefty fine after pleading guilty to breaking anti-mercenary legislation in South Africa by agreeing to finance the chartering of a helicopter, though he denied knowledge of the coup plot and maintained that his involvement had been unwitting.

Kept in solitary confinement at his own request, Mann was said to have endured torture and privation. In April 2007 he was said to be suffering multiple organ failure and had a life-threatening intestinal condition caused by poor diet. Hopes that the Zimbabwean courts would turn down any request for his extradition to Equatorial Guinea were dashed in May 2007 when, shortly after his release from jail, he was rearrested following a decision by a Harare court to reject defence arguments that he would not be given a fair trial in Guinea and was likely to be tortured.

After his extradition, in March 2008 he was allowed, or possibly encouraged, to give an interview to Channel 4 News in which he again fingered Ely Calil as the mastermind behind the “f***-up”, said that Sir Mark Thatcher was “part of the team”, but dismissed suggestions that Lord Archer or Peter Mandelson were involved.

Urbane, charming and apparently relaxed, despite the shackles and years of solitary confinement, Mann claimed not to have been put under pressure by the Equatorial Guinean authorities, though there were suspicions that he might have agreed to “spill the beans” in return for being spared the death penalty.

Simon Mann was married three times. His first two marriages were dissolved and he married thirdly, in 1995, Amanda Freedman, with whom he had four children. They survive him with three children of his earlier marriages.

Simon Mann, born June 26 1952, death announced May 9 2025

babyfaceafrica:
I thought na fraud he dey do, he dey grab land too

lapintoz:
And the man is now a born again Christian. Infact, he now preaches in churches. Money na water ...........don run dry.

I hope Justice Dada will have mercy on the old papa fraudster.

Bobloco:
Fred Ajudua. Alusi-ego (Onwa n'etiri ora of Ibusa)

geoworldedu:
How could Africa have originated from Israel. Be like say religion have scammed you

Alleged $1.04m Scam: Supreme Court revokes Ajudua’s bail, orders his remand


ABUJA – The Supreme Court, on Friday, revoked the bail that was granted to Lagos socialite, Fred Ajudua, who is facing trial over his alleged complicity in a $1.43m fraud.

In a unanimous decision, a five-member panel of the apex court ordered that he should be returned back to prison custody.

It equally ordered the resumption of hearing on the criminal charge the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, preferred against him.

The judgement followed an appeal marked: SC/CR/51/2019, which the EFCC filed in the name of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, FRN.

Ajudua was listed as the sole respondent in the appeal.

In the lead judgment that was delivered by Justice Chioma Nwosu-Iheme, the apex court invalidated the bail that was granted to the respondent on December 10, 2018, by the Lagos Division of the Court of Appeal.

Justice Nwosu-Iheme faulted the appellate court, stressing that it had no jurisdiction to grant the respondent after it had already declared as incompetent, a brief of argument Ajudua filed in support of his appeal for bail.

Ajudua in the said appeal, challenged the July 5, 2018 ruling of trial Justice Mojisola Dada of the HIgh of Lagos State, Ikeja, which rejected his request for pre-trial bail.

According to the Supreme Court, having found that Ajudua’s brief of argument was incompetent and struck out same, the appellate court was wrong to still rely on it to accede to the Appellant’s prayer for bail.

“It is crystal clear that the lower court was on all fours with the law when it declared the appellant’s brief of argument incompetent and struck it out.


“At that point, the appellant’s (Ajudua’s) appeal was extinguished. There was therefore, nothing more to consider in that appeal. The lower court, at that point, had no jurisdiction to proceed further. It had become functus officio,” Justice Nwosu-Iheme held.

She held that the appellate court, in proceeding to consider the arguments canvassed in the brief of argument it earlier found to be incompetent, engaged in an exercise in futility.

“Since the lower court had no jurisdiction to consider other issues canvassed in the brief of argument, which it had declared incompetent and struck out, it would amount to an academic exercise to delve into any other issue in the appeal.

“This appeal, having been determined on the issue of jurisdiction alone, the issue of bail is inseparable from the appeal itself.

“This appeal succeeds and it is hereby allowed. The decision of the trial court dated the 5th day of July 2018 refusing bail to the respondent (Ajudua) is hereby restored.

“The respondent is to be remanded in prison custody. Accordingly, this case is remitted back to the Chief Judge of Lagos State to be assigned to the same trial judge, M. A. Dada J for the continuation of speedy trial and determination within the shortest possible time,” the Supreme Court held.

It will be recalled that the Embassy of the State of Palestine had in a letter dated August 26, 1993, which was addressed to the then Minister of Foreign Affairs and copied the Inspector General of Police, alleged that Ajudua obtained about $1.43m by false pretence from a Palestinian, Ziad Abu Zalaf , who was based in Germany.

Upon the completion of investigation, the EFCC filed a 12-count charge against Ajudua before the HIgh Court of Lagos State in Ikeja.

In the charge, the EFCC, among other things, alleged that Ajudua conspired with one Joseph Ochunor, who is still at large, to obtain money by false pretences from Ziad Abu Zalaf of Technical International Ltd., a division of Mystic Company Ltd., a German-based company.

It also alleged that, with intent to defraud, Ajudua and Ochunor obtained $268,000 on April 2, 1993 from Zalaf and on May 12, 1993 again obtained the sum of $225,000 from Zalaf.

The EFCC equally claimed that Ajudua and Ochunor, in a bid to give credence to the alleged scam, forged Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, and Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, receipts and presented same to the foreigner as genuine.

Shortly after Ajudua was arraigned, his lawyer, Olalekan Ojo, filed an application for him to be released on bail, pending the determination of the case.

Ojo claimed that his client had serious health challenge.

The application was refused by trial Justice Dada who ordered the defendant to submit himself for prosecution.

Dissatisfied with the decision, Ajudua lodged an appeal and secured a favourable ruling.

A three-member panel of the Court of Appeal reversed Justice Dada’s decision and granted him bail.

In its lead verdict that was delivered by Justice Mohammed Garba, the appellate court held that bail was the Appellant’s constitutional right.

Not happy with the judgement, the EFCC persuaded the Supreme Court to set it aside.

No Black smoke...Only white smoke

Anna Maria von Stockhausen: A Victim of Witch-Hunts in the 18th Century

This is the corpse of Anna Maria Von Stockhausen, bound to prevent her from rising from the dead. She was accused of being a witch and a vampire during the Middle Ages, in the time of the Black Plague.

It is said that she returned from the dead six times. First, she was hanged—only to claw her way out of the grave. The townspeople captured her in a nearby village and quickly drowned her in a lake, tying her to a plank. Her lifeless body was retrieved multiple times from the water and reburied, only for the grave to be found empty two days later.

They say her decomposing body was seen moving around her old home, dripping with worms, dirt, and water. She was dragged out again, a stake driven through her heart, and buried once more.

A guard was posted at her grave, and it seemed she was finally gone. But when the guard didn’t return to the village for four days, a local priest went looking and found his rotting corpse near the post, his throat torn out and chewed.

Anna had vanished again.

She was finally tracked and captured near the edge of town. A furious crowd burned her at the stake, tying her to a scarecrow in a cornfield. But a sudden storm extinguished the flames, burning only her lower half.

The tale caught the attention of a vampire hunter and religious fanatic. He approached this tormented woman, witnessed the storm, and said, “God must have other plans for you.” Unlike the others, he bowed and asked: “Woman, why won’t you go to your death?” A shrill, raspy voice answered — she had cursed the villagers for accusing her.

Anna begged to be buried elsewhere, far from where the villagers kept laying her to rest. It was a simple request, but she warned that if they didn’t honor it, she would keep returning… and no man or force could stop her from spilling the blood of everyone in the village.

So, they did as she asked — and the rest is history.

REDshouse:
No be brewery wey someone dey proud to build in 8 yrs....i no mention name...

How many marks do you have?

RISQUE:
Who calculated the 4000 years?

Enormous desert structure built by insects is 4,000 years old and can be seen from space

On the scrub‑covered plains of northeastern Brazil, millions of brown cones rise just high enough to catch the late‑day sun. They look like random piles left by passing farmers and, until recently, they fooled researchers too.

Satellite images finally revealed their true extent: an earthen metropolis spread over roughly 88,000 square miles – about the size of Great Britain – and built grain by grain by termites no longer than a fingernail.

Most ecosystems show traces of the animals that shape them, yet few match this scale. The Syntermes dirus termites have pushed more than 2.4 cubic miles of soil to the surface, assembling around 200 million mounds without a single blueprint.

Only when scientists from the University of Salford and the Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana (UEFS) began pairing drone flights with ground surveys did the pattern emerge.

Tiny, silent architects of the caatinga
The caatinga – a seasonally dry forest shot through with thorny shrubs – offers slim pickings.

Rain arrives in bursts, leaves fall fast, and food appears in scattered pockets. That scarcity has pushed S. dirus to become subterranean engineers.

While foraging, they carve tunnels just beneath the surface, shoving spoil upward through temporary shafts. Each shaft becomes a cone about 8.2 feet high and 29.5 feet wide; over time those cones harden into permanent landmarks.

Unlike the tower‑like nests seen in Africa or Australia, these Brazilian mounds hold no royal chamber or nursery.

They are solid waste dumps – the visible residue of an underground traffic system optimized for hauling leaf litter home.

The termites stay hidden by day, sealing narrow access tubes until darkness brings cooler air and fewer predators.

Very, very old termite mounds
To work out when the first heaps appeared, researchers drilled cores from mound centers and dated mineral grains with optically stimulated luminescence.

Some cones formed 3,820 years ago; others are as ‘young’ as 690 years old. That makes them among the oldest termite structures on Earth, older than many stone monuments humans celebrate.

Every termite mound cone holds roughly 65 cubic yards of packed clay. Multiply that by 200 million, and the displaced soil rivals about 4,000 Great Pyramids of Giza – a statistic the team highlighted to put insect power in perspective.

Field crews could visit only a fraction of the cones, so the study turned to a modeling tool called MAXENT. By feeding confirmed mound locations into the algorithm, the scientists projected where similar terrain likely hosts more cones.

Follow‑up hikes backed the prediction: the grid stretches for hundreds of miles, yet human activity barely nicks it because the acidic clay is poor farmland.

Decoding the perfect spacing
Stand atop one termite mound, and another sits about 65 feet away in any direction – a pattern called ‘over‑dispersed’.

To discover whether rival colonies enforced such order, the team introduced termites from neighboring heaps to one another.

No hostility surfaced unless the insects came from sites roughly 31 miles apart, implying that spacing is not a product of territorial squabbles.

Over centuries, the termites created a lattice with an average density of 4,660 mounds per square mile. Chemical signals probably keep the lattice intact; pheromone trails guide workers through labyrinthine tunnels to food, to waste cones, and back again without traffic jams.

Life underground in a termite mound
Beneath each cone lies a central artery that branches like a tree root. The network lets colonies reach new leaf drops without surfacing midday in brutal heat.

By night, workers nibble dry leaves, ferry them below, and seal the entrance behind them. The cones themselves do nothing more than hold discarded clay, yet they mark the tunnel map for generations.

Parallels pop up across harsh landscapes. Naked mole‑rats in East Africa build similar subterranean webs to chase tubers.

North American gophers leave spoil piles comparable in form, though smaller in scale. In every case, sparse resources push small creatures to redesign the very ground they inhabit.

Understanding termites – the basics
Termites might be tiny, but they play a massive role in shaping ecosystems. These insects live in highly organized colonies, sometimes numbering in the millions, and they divide their tasks among workers, soldiers, and queens.

You’ll often find them in warm, humid environments where they chew through wood, dead plants, and even dung.

While we tend to associate termites with destruction – especially when they invade homes – they actually help recycle nutrients back into the soil, keeping forests and grasslands healthy.

What’s fascinating is how they build and communicate. Termites use chemical signals to coordinate everything, from feeding to defending their nest.

Some species even construct towering mounds that regulate temperature and humidity through intricate tunnel systems – essentially natural air-conditioning.

So yes, while they might give homeowners nightmares, termites are more than just pests. They’re nature’s quiet architects, shaping the world one bite at a time.

Lessons from a living city
The Brazilian grid shows that big construction does not require big bodies or even central planning.

Simple rules – dig, dump, move on – run through countless termite lifetimes and shape an entire biome. When food is scattered and rain unreliable, efficiency wins.

The cones stand as silent mile‑markers of that principle, reminding visitors that the world’s grandest civil engineers sometimes weigh less than a paperclip.

Check Out This Wedding Outfit Of The Bride And the Groom That Got People Talking

mrvitalis:
Click on the person it takes you to the profile yhe scrow down u would see block this user

mrvitalis:
Blocked

This block option is the best thing to happen
to nairaland... Wow so sweet

EFCC prevented us from giving VDM food – Friends

Friends and associates of popular Nigerian social media personality and influencer, Martins Vincent Otse, widely known as VeryDarkMan (VDM), have voiced concern over the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission’s (EFCC) refusal to allow them to provide him with food.


Recall that VDM’s legal representative, activist-lawyer Deji Adeyanju, in a statement, alleged that VDM was arrested by EFCC operatives on Friday.

The arrest has sparked outrage online and raised questions about a certain bank’s alleged complicity in what critics describe as a targeted crackdown.

In a five-minute video released by Koko Pee, one of VDM’s close friends, he revealed that the EFCC denied him the opportunity to bring food to VDM, stating that the Commission would provide food themselves to him.

“We are here at the EFCC headquarters, trying to take food and go and see VDM. The body that took the beating needs to eat,” Koko Pee said.

A few minutes later, he released another video while returning from the EFCC headquarters, saying, “There is a standing order for no one to see him or give him food until Monday.”

At the time of filing this report, EFCC spokesman Dele Oyewale was unavailable for comment or call. As all number attached to the EFCC social handles proved abortive.

Meet Angel/Zeke, a Rare 2-Headed Snake Surviving Against the Odds

Meet Angel. Also, meet Zeke. They're two of a kind. Angel and Zeke are the two heads of a single California kingsnake living at the East Bay Vivarium, a reptile store in Berkeley, California.

Angel/Zeke (named after two store employees) is around seven months old, a remarkable age for a snake with its rare mutation. Bicephalic (two-headed) snakes typically don't live long. The Vivarium's unusual reptile doesn't move as quickly or as gracefully as a one-headed kingsnake.

Mostly white kingsnake with two heads, the right one being a little larger.

Reptile lovers know the animals can have a lot of personality. Most kingsnakes are quick to poop on you or run, the Vivarium's Alex Blanchard told CNET.

He described the two-headed snake as "chill."

"They're not shy. They're not bitey," he said. "They're pretty calm for a kingsnake."

The kingsnake's right head appears to be dominant. It's the only one accepting food, but that could change as the snake matures. For now, Angel/Zeke is eating every week.

"It'd eat more if we let it, but it's doing pretty well," Blanchard said.

California kingsnakes aren't venomous. They're native to California and can be found in urban areas as well as in grasslands and desert or forest landscapes. Kingsnake coloration can vary, but they typically have dark and light bands. Angel/Zeke is what's known as a "morph," a snake with a distinctive pattern.

Angel/Zeke is not currently for sale, though Blanchard said there have been some casual inquiries. Visitors to the East Bay Vivarium can see the snake in person, but it has access to a hideaway area for when it's not feeling social.

The East Bay Vivarium shared photos of the snake on Instagram in late March. Vivarium staff were surprised at the attention the snake has generated.

"We're hoping that people coming to see the snake will learn about other animals and other species and it'll open their eyes to a wider view of reptiles in both captivity and in the wild," Blanchard said.

Passengers aboard a recent Air Peace flight received an unexpected mid-air gift as the Nigerian airline, in partnership with Tecno Mobile, handed out brand new Camon 40 smartphones during the journey—prompting a wave of excitement and admiration across social media.

The surprise giveaway, which took place on one of the airline’s regional routes, involved a lucky dip conducted during the flight. Selected passengers were each presented with the newly launched Tecno Camon 40 device, a gesture that has since gone viral, earning accolades for both brands.

A widely shared post on X (formerly Twitter) captured the mood on board: “Omo I was on an Air Peace flight today and they legit did a lucky dip mid-air — winners got brand new Tecno Camon 40 phones! No long talk, just vibes and surprises. Big ups to @flyairpeace and @tecnomobileng — this is how you treat passengers!”

The response online has been overwhelmingly positive, with many Nigerians lauding the initiative as a refreshing departure from the norm. The campaign is being hailed as a creative approach to customer appreciation, and one that strengthens brand loyalty through shared experiences.

Another social media user remarked with humour: “Na only Air Peace dey do airline like family. Next time I go wear fine cloth enter flight—opportunity fit jam destiny. God bless @flyairpeace and @tecnomobileng! Nigeria to the world!”

The partnership between Air Peace and Tecno Mobile—both of which enjoy strong consumer followings—has been described by some as a ‘match made in innovation’, reflective of a growing trend in experiential marketing across Nigeria’s aviation and tech industries.

Air Peace, which has built a reputation for bold moves in the local and regional aviation space, continues to reinforce its brand not only through expanded routes but also through customer-centric initiatives such as this. Meanwhile, Tecno’s involvement further cements its position as a mobile brand deeply attuned to the African market.

As the campaign continues to trend online, many Nigerians are now viewing Air Peace not just as a commercial airline, but a cultural symbol of national pride—pushing boundaries in customer service and redefining the flying experience.

Archaeologists find 2,000-year-old Roman military sandals in Germany with nails for traction

To march legionaries across the vast Roman Empire, solid footwear was required.


Archaeologists have discovered a 2,000-year-old Roman sandal near an ancient military fort in Oberstimm, Germany. The highly rare find provides a unique glimpse into the military equipment used by the famous legionaries.

The only remnants of the leather shoe were its sole and some well-preserved nails. Researchers analyzed the footwear fragments using X-rays, which revealed the shoe to be a caligae — Roman military boots. This type of heavy-duty, hobnailed sandal was part of the standard uniform issued to Roman legionary soldiers and auxiliaries around that time. The nails in the sole provided traction for marching soldiers.

Researchers unearthed the ancient military-style footwear during an excavation at a civilian settlement on the outskirts of the Roman military fort. The settlement dates back to between A.D. 60 and 130, according to the Bavarian State Office for Monument Preservation (BLfD).

Ancient Roman Footwear
Caligae were designed to protect soldiers from blisters and trench foot. This footwear typically had a thick sole consisting of several layers of goat, sheep, or cow skin. It was also studded with iron or copper studs (clavi caligarii). This solid sole guaranteed the stability and durability of the footwear. Straps covering the instep and the lower leg secured the sandals in place on the feet.

Interestingly, the third Roman emperor, Caligula, got his nickname from the small caligae he wore as a boy among his father’s soldiers. Caligula (born Gaius Caesar) literally means “little boot”, a rather benign nickname for the infamous leader. Even today, the name Caligula serves as the personification of cruelty and erratic behavior — although the ‘mad emperor’ never made his horse a consul; that’s a myth.

“So-called caligae were mainly worn by Roman soldiers during the Roman Empire,” Amira Adaileh, a consultant at the BLfD, said in the statement. “The find makes it clear that the practices, lifestyles and clothing that the Romans brought with them to Bavaria were adopted by the local people.”

In addition to the sandal, excavations at Oberstimm revealed food scraps, pottery, a sickle, and various costume components. These artifacts collectively provide a richer understanding of daily life in this ancient community.

By the end of the first century A.D., the Roman army began transitioning to enclosed boots known as calcei. You can think of caligae as sandals and calcei as shoes. This shift was driven by the need for greater protection and durability in diverse and harsher climates as the empire expanded across the continent’s varied terrains.

At the edge of the Roman Empire, near Hadrian’s Wall in what is now northern England, the Vindolanda archaeological site has yielded a remarkable collection of Roman shoes—over 7,000 of them. These shoes, preserved in the oxygen-free mud of Vindolanda’s fort ditches, offer a rare window into daily life nearly two millennia ago.

Founded around AD 85 during the Roman conquest of Britain, Vindolanda served as a military outpost and played a crucial role in the defence and administration of the northern frontier of the Roman Empire. The fort was strategically situated along the Roman road known as the Stanegate, which linked the forts of Corbridge and Carlisle.

Unlike the uniform sandals often associated with Roman soldiers, the Vindolanda shoes reveal surprising diversity: children’s booties, fashionable women’s slippers, rugged military calcei, and sturdy work shoes. The variety of styles reflects influences from across the Empire, with soil conditions helping to preserve the leather and materials.

The shoes show advanced techniques such as intricate lacing, stitching, and the use of hobnails for reinforcement, especially in the soldiers’ boots, designed for long marches across rugged terrain. Many of these shoes bear striking similarities to modern footwear, with clear attention to functionality, style, and durability.

Besides shoes, some of the most extraordinary discoveries at Vindolanda are the collection of “Vindolanda tablets,” which are thin pieces of wood inscribed with ink and serve as some of the oldest surviving handwritten documents in Britain. These tablets include letters, orders, and personal messages that reveal details about military campaigns, the relationships between soldiers and locals, and the challenges of life on the frontier.

Vindolanda was home to somewhere between 500 to 1,000 Roman soldiers at any given time of occupation. This is an example of a Roman marching boot from the site. Credit: Vindolanda Charitable Trust.

By the end of the 4th century, however, Vindolanda fell into decline, and the fort was eventually abandoned. Today, Vindolanda is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and is part of the larger Hadrian’s Wall complex, which was constructed later in the Roman occupation.

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