THE Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra has replied the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar, over his recent comment that Nigeria may not survive another civil war.

MASSOB said rather than making reference to the whole country, the Sultan ought to have directed his advice to Fulani herdsmen and Boko Haram insurgents.

The Sultan of Sokoto had, during one of the programmes to mark the Rivers State’s Golden Jubilee celebrations, said Nigeria would not survive another civil war.

He called on all Nigerians to shun acts that might cause war in the country.

Reacting however, the National Director of Information for MASSOB, Sunday Okereafor, said that the group had never shown any act of violence in the struggle for a sovereign state of Biafra.

Okereafor told Punch that the Sultan should rather advise the Fulani herdsmen that had been killing and maiming people in the southern part of the country and the Boko Haram sect, which had been perpetrating similar acts in the North-East.

The spokesman added, “We are not fighting any war this time around. MASSOB will remain non-violent and we will continue with the non-violent approach. This is the 18th year of the struggle by MASSOB. Despite the crackdown, all the killings, all the arrests and provocations, we still remain non-violent.

“The Sultan should direct his statement to Fulani herdsmen and Boko Haram group, who are killing and maiming people in Nigeria. The Igbo are peaceful people.

How can Sultan of Sokoto be talking about civil war? They (North) are the people inciting violence.

“Fulani herdsmen are from the North and they have been killing our people in our bush. They want to provoke us.

“They know that MASSOB is non-violent, but they are using Fulani herdsmen to bring war so that we will react. But we are not interested in that.”

Okoroafor stated that the Igbo people would have been decimated if they were people stealing cows in Nigeria.

“They want to use the herdsmen to conquer us, but we are saying no to war. So, we are telling the Sultan of Sokoto to refer his statement to his brothers, the Fulani herdsmen,” he added.

said1995:
UK available over here

sarrki:


Is buhari the leader of national assembly?

​NIGERIA’S National Assembly, has increased its 2017 budget in this year’s Appropriation Bill to N150 billion from the initial proposal of N120 billion.

The assembly which for years has faced criticism over the lack of transparency and accountability over its budget, increased it owing to rising inflation and the depreciation of the the country’s currency, the Naira.

The 2017 Appropriation Bill to be laid would include details of the appropriated expenditure (expenditure line items and sub-heads) of the National Assembly, in line with the promise made by its leadership to make public the details of its budget.

This is according to a report on Thisday Newspaper.

The paper quoted a source in the upper legislative chamber to have explained that the legislature had to increase its budget to N150 billion, as it could no longer deploy the pooled resources for services provided in the National Assembly.

“We are opening our budget to scrutiny and since we are doing that, there are more exigencies such as services being provided in the National Assembly, they are getting more money.

“More importantly, now that we are opening the budget, it means we have to account for all the activities: the monies used to clean the House and Senate, for instance. We use cleaning agencies for this, as we do not have civil servants who clean the premises. It is done on a contractual agreement. We also have people fuelling the generators and all that.

ALSO READ: I’m Aware Of Ownership Of Seized Vehicle - Saraki

“As against what happened in the past, when we just went into a pool of funds and took the money, now there is need to account for every naira that is spent.

“So they had to get the kind of costing applicable for those things, and in the process of getting the official costing for these things, some of these services have increased due to the foreign exchange rate. These include the cost of diesel; purchase of utility vehicle; etc, which have all increased.

“As such, it is even good that we are now accounting for it,” the source said.

It reports that another source added that it was necessary for Nigerians not to continue to hold on to the impression that the budget of the legislature is for the 109 senators and 360 House members alone.

“The budget is for the National Assembly and its three agencies: National Assembly Service Commission, National Institute for Legislative Studies and the Public Complaints Commission.

ALSO READ: Bill To Establish EFCC Court Passes Second Reading

“The National Assembly alone has at least 3,500 staff and over 5,000 legislative aides. They are all paid from within this budget,” he said.

The source further revealed that consideration of the federal budget would likely start next Tuesday and may last for at least two weeks.

“Consideration may start next week, and this will be in line with the agreement we had and the speech of the Speaker when we resumed from the break, when he said the National Assembly would pass the details of the 2017 budget, not the summary.

“What this means is that it would take more than three legislative days, at least a minimum of two weeks.

“The fact that the 2016 budget would elapse on Friday does not mean government cannot continue spending. The constitution allows the government to go to the Consolidated Revenue Fund and start spending the equivalent of half of the 2017 budget.

“So there will be no shutdown, they would continue to pay the salaries of workers,” he said.

THE Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has denied the allegation by the Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, on Wednesday that there were plots by the Commission to set him up by planting monies and guns in his Enugu residence.
Ekweremadu said that he was tipped off about the purported plot by an “EFCC covert investigative journalist” privy to the design.
He said the agency had secured a warrant and plans to storm his home on May 6, 2017 under the guise that it was working on information provided by a whistle blower regarding huge amount of money in the apartment.
He said going by the script of the plot, he is to be arrested, detained for three weeks and charged to court, while his constituents would be mobilized to protest and seek his recall from the National Assembly.
But the EFCC said there was no truth in the allegation.
It said in a statement: “The Commission wishes to state in very strong terms that it is not aware of any plot to set up Ekweremadu for any arrest. If any agency is plotting to plant monies and guns in Ekweremadu’s residence, it is certainly not the EFCC as such antics are alien to the Commission.
“Nevertheless, the Commission is worried by the alarm and the fact that the highly-regarded Deputy President of the Nigerian senate would go public with such unverified information without first double-checking with the Commission. This is not only very strange but smacks of a scripted propaganda campaign to distract the Commission by putting it on the defensive.
“It must be emphatically stated for the benefit of Senator Ekweremadu and others who share similar misconception and jaundiced views of the EFCC, that the Commission does not need any grand plot to arrest and prosecute him if he is found to have violated any law that EFCC enforces. He does not belong in the category of public officers that enjoy immunity from arrest and prosecution by law enforcement agencies.
“Once again, the alleged plot by EFCC to raid Senator Ekweremadu’s house on May 6 2017, exists only in the very fertile imagination of the Distinguished Deputy Senate President’s questionable ‘source’, whom he claims is ‘close to the EFCC’.
“The Commission’s candid advice to Ekweremadu is to sleep easy if he is not involved in the looting spree that seems to be the pastime of many Nigerians in the corridors of power. Let it be known however, that there will be no amount of scare-mongering that will dissuade the EFCC from vigorously enforcing its mandate to rid Nigeria of corruption.”

Chuksonyeike:
that is not deji's twitter account

ipobarecriminals:
mynd44 u see display one now.

ipobarecriminals:
I don't trade insult with a' kid

ipobarecriminals:
clowns.u established EFCC and still want to strangulation it abi? Akpaibo, Saraki,Ekeremadu, Dino.E nor go better for PDP

THE People Democratic Party (PDP) says the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) was established to fight corruption, not as an entertainment tool.

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who served his two terms under the party, founded the commission in 2003.

Reacting to the monies discovered by the EFCC in an apartment in Ikoyi, Lagos, PDP alleged that under President Muhammadu Buhari, the anti-corruption fight had lost focus.

It said it had become embarrassing for the anti-graft agency to keep finding money in apartments and offices without owners.

The party accused the EFCC of refusing to reveal the “true identity” of owner of the flat where the money was discovered.

It also urged the anti-graft agency to tell Nigerians the owners of the funds discovered at Kaduna airport, Victoria Island and Balogun market in Lagos state.

“The PDP administration established the EFCC to fight corruption effectively & efficiently and not to entertain Nigerians,” the party tweeted.

“The anti-corruption fight under the APC govt has become comedy. The EFCC now discovers funds in apartments and offices that have no owners.”

“It is preposterous to imagine that the last four seizures coincidentally have no known owners. This is most unfortunate and embarrassing,” it tweeted.

“Who are the owners of N49m at Kaduna Airport, N448m at LEGICO Mall, N250m in Balogun Market and $43.4m, N23.2m & £27,000 in Osborne Road?

“The EFCC must also tell Nigerians the total amount they have recovered in the last 2 years & provide verifiable accounts of recovered funds.”

Lalasticlala, mynd44

THE Presidency has hinted why the Weekly Federal Executive Council (FEC) failed to hold, on Wednesday, as usual at the Presidential Villa.

In a quick reaction to the development, the Presidency explained that the meeting was put on hold because the Easter holiday affected work of the secretariat, and not because of any ill-health President Muhammadu Buhari.

President Buhari was absent at last Wednesday’s meeting leaving Vice President Yemi Osinbajo to preside over it.

Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, had said Buhari was attending to other issues of national importance and not because of ill-health that he failed to show up.

State House correspondents who had no prior knowledge of the cancellation of the meeting, got to the Council Chambers, venue of the meeting, only to be told that it would not hold.

When reached for comments, Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, explained that it was canceled because the council secretariat staff had no opportunity to circulate relevant documents for the meeting because of the Easter holiday.

“I think it is because of the Easter holiday. The secretariat had no time to circulate the necessary documents,” he said.

According to him, there is a requirement in the law which states that the documents must be circulated to concerned individuals before the meeting.

When asked why the documents were not circulated before the holiday since the secretariat knew before hand that there would be a holiday, he explained that as human beings, they also needed the break.

When asked if it was not due to the president’s health, the presidential media aide denied that the cancellation was related to his state of health, saying that it would be wrong to make such assumption, adding: “That will not be fair.”

Shehu added, “The staff on the Council secretariat resumed on Tuesday after the Easter. There was no time to prepare and circulate memos to ministers. By practice, the ministers receive council memos two or three days ahead of meetings because they must read them and sometimes undertake research. It is not a rubber stamp council so everyone must prepare themselves well for debates.”

What were you expecting from a propaganda govt.?

Pay you 5k for being jobless? You should ask yourself if they have finished paying workers let alone a jobless ones like you.

Tomorrow when they shout Change, you will still vote for them.

Nigerians are truely animals in-love with their chains.

kogistar2:
why Catholic church, when they depends on "virgin" Mary?

AS part of its efforts to sustain liquidity in the foreign exchange market, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has injected $280 million into the market.



The apex bank has also announced on Tuesday that it would now sell $20,000 twice a week to licensed bureaux de change, a 100 percent increase from the previous $10,000 twice a week.

It also announced the opening of bids for offering $100m wholesale seven to 45 days forwards through the Deposit Money Banks (DMBs).

“A breakdown of the intervention shows that invisibles such as basic travel allowance, personal travel allowance, medical bills and tuition received $80 million, while the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) window received $100 million,” the apex bank said in a statement.

“Together with the wholesale bid auction, the bank sold $280 million into the market on Tuesday.”

Isaac Okorafor, the bank’s spokesman, confirmed the releases, saying the new window for SMEs would boost businesses through the importation of eligible finished and semi-finished items.

Okorafor explained that the CBN introduced the use of FORM X for the SMEs to ease the documentation challenges usually encountered by this category of businesses.

He said SMEs were allowed to purchase $20,000 per quarter on this arrangement.

Okorafor said all SME applicants must fill the form with a supporting application letter as well as beneficiary invoice and bank wire transfer.

He said eligible applicants must have operated their bank accounts for a minimum of six months.

On the sale of forex to BDCs, Okorafor explained that the decision was taken to ensure that the high volume demand by low-end users were met promptly.

He also said the apex bank would not tolerate unscrupulous actions from banks or their staff, and would not hesitate to bring serious sanctions on offenders.

ORJI Uzor Kalu, former governor of Abia State has said the ruling political party in the country, All Progressive Congress, APC, belongs to Everybody.

Kalu stated this on Sunday when he visited the National headquarters of the Assemblies of God Nigeria, in continuation of his tour of churches to disabuse the minds of the people of the South East that the All Progressives Congress is an Islamic party, reassuring that the party is for all.

Kalu, who was received by the General Superintendent of the church, Dr. Chidi Okorafor, in Enugu, noted that since he joined the APC, he has been visiting bishops and other church leaders explaining to them why he joined the party “because our people have been deceived that APC is an Islamic party”.

He argued that one man does not own a party, adding: “It belongs to everybody.

“I am sure that some of your church members are members of this party.

“I want to say that APC does not belong to President Muhammadu Buhari.

“The chairman of the party is Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, a Knight of the Catholic Church, so I have continued to explain to church leaders that APC is one big family.

“That we are not what people think.

“We are a political party that will continue to strive to make Nigeria a better country.

“Rome was not built in a day.

“The economy is very difficult today.

“People are suffering.

“Nigerians are seeing the worst economic situation, but I know it will soon be over.

“President Buhari has been able to address some issues while some are still pending.

“I know there is hunger in the land and we are advising him to address the issue of the economy because it is very important.

“He met a battered economy and is struggling to see what he can do to address that issue.

“The economy when he met it was affected by the fall in oil price and massive looting by people who were supposed to protect the economy.”

Kalu requested the church to continue to pray for the President for good health and the wisdom to move the nation forward.

Okorafor noted that the Assemblies of God is not one of the mushroom churches with a population of over 67 million worldwide.

He identified the church as part and parcel of Nigeria, with the responsibility to pray for the government not minding the party in power.

He said: “It is God that gives power, so if any person finds himself in office, it is just because God has allowed it.

“I am glad that you mentioned God severally as you spoke.

“I pray that all our leaders in the entire nation will give reverence to God.

“As part of the society, we always tell members to play their roles, during voters registration, during elections and other civic obligations.

“Assemblies of God Nigeria cannot be partisan, but we have members who belong to political parties, who are actively involved in politics.

“And our prayer go for them and the entire nation.

“We have been praying for Mr. President and the church will continue to pray for him and the leadership of the country for a better Nigeria, and for a better tomorrow. We believe that God will continue to sustain him.

“Thank you for recognizing the leadership of the church and coming to visit us today.

“We don’t take it for granted.”