₦airaland Forum

It’s just one full week of business at the Nigerian Stock Exchange and stocks are already 9.51% up, one of the best performers in the world today. Investors, of course, are lapping it up. Just a week ago, stocks closed the year with a negative return of 14.6% in back to back losses closing the decade with a paltry return of just 28.9%.

It appears we are all set for a blistering new decade, going by the bullish return we have experienced this week. But are we?

Before we allow our scepticism get the better of us, let’s step back to understand just how good stocks have been in 2020. Year to date about 57 stocks are positive out of which 26 are up 10% and above. Only 34 stocks posted positive returns last year most of which are penny stocks.

Out of the 26 stocks with positive returns are our darling FUGAZ (acronym for FBNH, UBA, GT Bank, Access Bank and Zenith Bank), all of which have returned double-digit returns. First Bank’s parent company, FBNH has returned 24.4%, the highest from Nigeria’s top 5 banks. Zenith Bank and UBA have also both returned 18.7% and 16.8% respectively, this year so far.

You need not think too far to discover the driving force for these impressive returns. Firstly, these stocks have been relatively cheap for months trading as low as 2x their earnings per share with an indicative double-digit dividend yield. Also, investors are quickly taking positions ahead of the earnings season, which is when banks start to release their full-year results. With share price at low valuation, multiples dividend yields are in double digits and if priced appropriately could be higher than the inflation rate. It’s hard to pass this one over.

Another major reason is the central bank’s recent decision to ban investors from the Open Market Operations (OMO) window. The decision has sent everyone running towards treasury bills, driving yields to multi-year lows of 5.6%. Even at such lows, Treasury bills are now crowded and from what we gather, some banks have started turning investors back.

With nowhere to go, it appears the stock market is now the logical destination of any discerning investor. Once in that market, stocks that are readily available to buy are banking stocks and look no further than the FUGAZ.

Incidentally, we also observe the bandwagon effect. Not only are FUGAZ stocks up, but other banking stocks are also up. Tier 2 banks (in fact, all banking stocks) are positive this year. Fidelity, Ecobank and even Unity Bank are up double digits.

The wave of green is not restricted to banking stocks. Industry leaders across the broader stock exchange have also experienced significant gains. For instance, Dangote Cement, MTN, Presco, Flour Mills, and Julius Berger are also posting positive returns YTD. Pension Fund Managers are obviously in the play and we understand it’s all about forced portfolio diversification

Nigerian stockmarket is hugely unpredictable and colonialist, as it relies heavily on foreign dominance to maintain momentum. Since 2013, stocks have depended heavily on foreign investment inflows to sustain valuations. Thus, it matters not how cheap stocks are or how much return they post in the interim.

Dead Cat bounces are cyclical and we won’t bet against a revert to status quo. All it takes is for those who have taken positions this week to take some profit and offload next week. It could even be a new CBN circular that’s just enough to torpedo the gains we are currently seeing.

If you’re about to get into this game then brace up as you cherry-pick fervently. Keep your portfolio close to your chest and watch out for the bears. If you prefer to remain on the sidelines then Godspeed managing single-digit returns or taking a punt on high risk, high yielding investments like forex trading or cryptocurrency.

Someone somewhere has to make money and FUGAZ appears to be the way.

SOURCE (abridged): https://nairametrics.com/2020/01/10/analysis-fugaz-are-back-and-investors-are-lapping-it-up/

To build up your investment knowledge is a difficult task, however, if you have a clear plan, develop the right habits and stick to them over a long period of time you will become a better person.

Below are steps to help build your investment knowledge:

1. READ
-- Regular daily/weekly reading of market updates from sensible websites and blogs.
-- Reading of quarterly/annual reports of companies and industries.
-- Reading of business magazines and financial publications. There are lots of reports that can be downloaded from the websites of some financial institutions for free.
-- Read more of source data (primary data) than secondary data.
-- Listen to podcasts that focus on finance and investments.
-- Read books and study the history of investing. Study market bubbles, why markets rise and crash, recessions and depressions and understand the features of those moments. Whatever has happened before will happen again, and whatever is happening now has happened before. History helps you notice patterns that will protect you from catastrophes as long as you aren’t affected by herd mentality.
-- Study biographies of the greatest investors of all time. Read about Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger, Ray Dalio etc. After you’re done studying them list out the things that make sense to you.

Some people naturally have a business/money mind, however, reading right will help you build the appropriate intellectual framework to help you decipher things like how to value a business, know when the competitive advantage of a company is durable or fleeting, amongst other things.

In summary, read & listen to everything you can and discard what doesn’t resonate with you. The investment landscape is broad and no individual is vast in every area. If you are humble, open-minded and willing to learn nothing can stop you from success.

2. ASK QUESTIONS
We all know someone or someone who knows someone who works in financial institutions/manages money. Bury your ego and ask for help. You would be surprised at who would be willing to help you. Some experts can easily be reached through their social media accounts or via email. Do not hesitate to send an email.

One of the most important decisions you can make is being honest with yourself about what you don’t know and getting the right people to ask questions.

3. DO
After reading, asking questions and making necessary research, you will have to test the waters by yourself. You also have to be realistic about where you are financially. There are different asset classes and each requires varying amounts of money to invest in, so you may decide to save first before you venture, or invest based on what you can afford.

The fastest way to learn is to start early and build a sizable investment portfolio by making regular investments. This will help you benefit from the magic of compounding.

SOURCE (abridged): https://nairametrics.com/2020/01/09/how-to-build-up-your-investment-knowledge/

Nigeria’s Mines and Steel Development Industry has received a boost with a six hundred million dollars investment located in Kagarko area of Kaduna state. Managing Director of African Industries Group Company(AIGC), Mr. Alok Gupta, on 4th January 2020 said the company’s $600million integrated steel plant would be Nigeria’s biggest non-oil Foreign Direct Investment (FDI).

He said the new plant would boost the nation’s economy and lead to the mining of 5.4 mn tons of iron ore in the country. He also said about 36 MW Power Plant will be constructed from the waste heat recovered from the plant, which will be partly used for captive consumption.

Gupta made the disclosures when the Minister of Mines and Steel Development, Mr Olamilekan Adegbite, visited the project site in Kagarko, Kaduna State. He said the firm would inaugurate Phase 1 of the plant by December 2020.

He said: “We expect to commission the Phase I of the project by end December 2020. We will be mining 5.4 million tons of iron ore, beneficiate the ore to produce high-grade concentrate followed by making into pellets and then finally into Directly Reduced Iron (DRI). The DRI will be used to make steel billets and will avoid our need to import the same. We are also building a 36 MW Power Plant from the waste heat recovered in the process, which will be partly used for captive consumption.

“Let me also highlight the key benefits of the project at this stage: About $600 million investment will be Nigeria’s biggest non-oil FDI, will serve as a catalyst for the development of solid minerals sector by attracting other serious investors following our example in downstream processing. The project will eliminate the need to import steel billets thereby saving scarce foreign exchange.

“Currently 100% of steel production in Nigeria is from scrap route, which is a diminishing resource. Producing steel from locally available iron ore will lead to sustainable economic development, considering the abundance of iron ore reserves in the country.

“The project will also contribute significantly to the Nigerian GDP by way of royalties and direct & indirect taxes.” Gupta also highlighted other benefits of the project, including a power plant.
Read: AB InBev to invest up to $400m in its Sagamu Plant
Read: Nigeria’s Global HIV Ranking Drops to Fourth Position – Isaac Adewole Speaks

He added: “With the completion of the first phase of the project, there will be significant economic and industrial development in the area by means of creation of several allied industries and social infrastructure.

“The surplus power generated will further assist in developing other industries and residences and will help in the urbanization of the local area. “Our project is not only important for Nigeria or for Nigeria in the African context but for Nigeria in the World context. It complements Nigeria’s desire to be self-sustaining and become an independent steel producer not dependent on imports.

“This Integrated Steel Plant will surely put Nigeria on the world map of crude steel producers of the world”. “This is just the start of our long journey and I would like to thank all the people who trusted in us and supported us so far and we hope that you will keep supporting us in setting up of this Integrated Steel Plant.”

SOURCE: https://brandspurng.com/2020/01/05/foreign-investor-establishes-600m-steel-plant-in-kaduna/

You’ve figured out that one or more of your parents are narcissists. They may be hardcore, with Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD); they may have narcissistic traits, or they may be a complex collection of parents, stepparents, and/or caregivers who fall in various places along the narcissism continuum.

Whatever the reality is in your family of origin and however old you are, you need to move forward with your own life. It’s never too late or too early to set boundaries, process your feelings, and work on healing. Even if you are a minor still living at home, there are many ways you can help yourself. If you were raised by a narcissist, here are steps you can take right now on your healing path.

1. EDUCATE YOURSELF ABOUT NARCISSISM
If you’re new to the realization that one or more of your parents is a narcissist, you need to keep learning about what you’re dealing with. Scour the Internet for good resources. Read, join chat forums, watch movies and shows with narcissistic characters, find a therapist who understands narcissism. The more you educate yourself and find support, the more you will understand what you’ve been through and what you need to do to move beyond the toxic influence of your family.

2. ACCEPT THAT YOUR NARCISSISTIC PARENT WON'T CHANGE
One of the most difficult challenges you face is accepting that your narcissist parent in all likelihood will never change. If the narcissist in your life finds a way to make personal progress toward a healthier state of being, great, but you should assume he won’t. Narcissists rarely change, and if they are acting nicer it is most likely a manipulative maneuver. Holding out hope that your parent will finally give you the unconditional love you have craved your whole life is natural, but it is a false dream that makes you vulnerable to further abuse and keeps you from moving on.

3. RECOGNIZE YOUR ENABLING PARENT
If you have a narcissist parent, chances are you also have an enabling one. What does that really mean? By going along with and/or excusing the narcissist’s abusive behavior, enablers essentially “normalize” and sustain it. Sometimes enablers also act as “flying monkeys” by assisting the narcissist in her dirty work, condoning and perpetuating her abuse. By not naming the abuse and not protecting their kids from it, enablers become complicit, even if they are also victimized by it.

Sometimes forgiving the enabling parent can be as hard or harder than forgiving the narcissist parent. People with NPD have a personality disorder formed in early childhood by a devastating deprivation. Although the narcissist may behave monstrously, you may find yourself feeling worse about the more functional enabling parent. You may wonder why that parent excused the narcissist and didn’t protect you from abuse, and you may feel terribly betrayed by his/her complicity.

4. RECOGNIZE THE ROLES IN YOUR FAMILY
Were you a scapegoat or the golden child? Have you acted at times as a flying monkey? Roles are often fluid in the narcissistic family, depending on the narcissist’s agenda. Perhaps you have been the golden child and also scapegoated. Because the narcissist maintains control by creating divisions (divide and conquer) among family members, you may feel alienated from your other parent and siblings. Perhaps you feel betrayed by them. It is important to remember that all of you have been part of a warped system orchestrated by the dominant narcissist in the family singularly to serve his needs at the expense of others. On some level you have all been fighting to survive with the roles you have been cast in.

The most powerful defense against the narcissist is a unified front against her. If you can find mutual understanding and unity with your other family members, that can be an empowering way to shut down the narcissist’s abuse, as well as a profound source of validation for what you have been through. However, if your other parent or siblings are not trustworthy or open to talking about the narcissism in your family, you need above all to protect yourself and limit contact with them.

5. ASSERT BOUNDARIES
Narcissists constantly violate boundaries. They see others, particularly their children, as extensions of themselves to control and manipulate. As the golden child your job is to reflect what the narcissist wishes to see in himself and wishes to project to the world. As the scapegoat, your job is to take the blame for the family’s problems, endure the narcissist’s worst abuse, and handle unreasonable responsibilities. Either way, as the narcissist’s child you are objectified, not respected as a person with your own identity. The narcissist tells you what you think and feel and insists on your compliance with his version of “reality” no matter how absurd, false, or harmful.

One of the most difficult and important things you must do for yourself as a survivor is to establish healthy boundaries. Understanding what that means and getting comfortable doing it can take considerable time and practice for the child of a narcissist. The first place to start is with the narcissist parent and possibly other family members.

6. ATTUNE WITH YOUR FEELINGS
As the child of a narcissist parent, you have been systematically trained to ignore your feelings, even to fear and hate them. Your feelings are a direct threat to the narcissist parent because they are likely to conflict with what she needs, believes, and demands. In the narcissistic family, only the narcissist’s feelings matter, and everyone else’s must be sublimated or outright crushed through ridicule, shame, rage, and other forms of attack.

Perhaps the most important thing to do for yourself toward healing is to reconnect with your feelings. They are there, and they always have been. Let them in, listen to them, carry them with respect. In your feelings you will locate yourself and your way through and out of the narcissist’s “alternative facts” world. Since you have been violated in innumerable ways by your parent(s), you will have to navigate through intense hurt and anger.

Most narcissists constantly project their own bankrupt motives and emotions onto others and blame others for or even accuse them of their own abusive behavior, so at first you may not know what you really feel versus what you have been brainwashed to believe. As you learn to attune to your feelings, be patient. Try not to judge yourself. Feelings are feelings are feelings. They deserve, and in the scheme of things insist upon, recognition and respect.

7. DON'T BLAME YOURSELF
Especially if you’ve been scapegoated in your family, you are likely to automatically blame yourself and feel guilt for things beyond your control or responsibility. Narcissists are experts at deflecting and projecting blame onto others. If they raged at you and you stood up for yourself, you attacked them. If they punched you, you drove them to it. One of the best ways to break your unhealthy family dynamics is to stop blaming yourself for what was never your responsibility or fault to begin with.

8. STOP HURTING YOURSELF
Along with not blaming yourself, chances are you need to stop patterns of self-abuse. As someone raised in a narcissistic family, you are prone to risky, self-punishing, and self-soothing but destructive behaviors, such as substance abuse and addictions, self-harm, and thrill-seeking.

Your self-destructive behavior is an internalization of the narcissistic abuse you grew up with, which is the opposite of the narcissist’s externalization of her pain. By engaging in such behavior you continue to give the narcissist power over you. You also exacerbate the emotional and physiological trauma you have already endured. Patterns of addiction and self-harm can be extremely hard to break, so seek help and support from people who understand the dynamics of narcissism.

9. BE AWARE OF YOUR ATTRACTIONS WITH NARCISSISTS
To add further injury to injury, many adult children of narcissists are vulnerable to being drawn into relationships with narcissists beyond their family of origin, including partners, friends, and bosses. It sucks, but there is no shame in this: Repeating the past until we learn from it is the mind-body’s way of healing. So pay attention. Learn. Keep educating yourself about narcissism. Develop a fine-tuned narcissist radar, or “nardar.” If you get tripped up in unhealthy relationships, forgive yourself and move on. Only about 6% of people have NPD. There are a lot of nonnarcissists out there, so go find them!

10. HONOR YOUR FEELINGS ABOUT YOUR NARCISSISTIC PARENT
Most of us love our parents, no matter what, and we cling to our need for love and validation from them. Your narcissistic parent cannot love you unconditionally the way we all deserve to be loved within our families, and for that matter is capable of no more than fleeting empathy. Yet you may still love that parent. Mixed with grief and anger, you may also sympathize with your parent’s NPD. It is also possible that you are numb to your parent or too used up to feel love anymore.

Whatever you feel, try not to judge yourself for it. Honor your feelings and let them be your guide in how you choose to interact with your family. Go no contact if that feels like the safest choice. Or operate with firm boundaries and lowered expectations. Narcissist parents, unless they are true sadists, are usually capable of affection for their children, at least sometimes. Some may be able to give in ways that you find nurturing or helpful. With a healthy dose of skepticism, take the good when it comes, as limited as it may be.

11. TREAT YOURSELF FOR NARCISSISTIC “FLEAS ”
Children raised by a narcissist are likely to pick up at least some narcissistic traits or tics, also known as “narcissist fleas.” Some become full-blown narcissists themselves, but many merely perpetuate a few behaviors that can be overcome with mindfulness and practice.

Take a look at yourself. What triggers you? What do you do that reminds you of your narcissist mother or father? Are you quick to anger? Do you seek attention or control through guilt or manipulation? Could you be more sensitive to other’s feelings and perspectives?

FINALLY
The best revenge is a life well-lived. Work on mindfulness and peace in your own life. You can’t help how you were raised, but you can work to control how you act now and how you raise your own children.

Julie L. Hall’s articles on narcissism regularly appear in her blog The Narcissist Family Files, as well as The Huffington Post and PsychCentral.

SOURCE: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/raised-by-a-narcissist-11-healing-things-to-do-for_b_58f2f864e4b015669722502e

A fierce debate swirls on its legality; and on whether it will be good for America.

It was, according to David Petraeus, a former American army general and director of the CIA, “more consequential” than the killing of Osama bin Laden or of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Few bemoaned the demise of the jihadist leaders of al-Qaeda and Islamic State. But the killing on January 3rd by drone strike of Qassem Suleimani, head of Iran’s Quds Force, the foreign-operations branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), has sparked a furore over the legality and the impact of his assassination.

The American authorities dislike the word “assassination”, because it implies a flouting of international and humanitarian law. Indeed, some human-rights lawyers see the use of drones to kill people as almost always unlawful. Agnès Callamard, the UN’s special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, has argued that “outside the context of active hostilities, the use of drones for targeted killing is almost never likely to be legal....lethal force can only be used where strictly necessary to protect against an imminent threat.” She has deplored the “kill lists” of what the Americans call “specially designated global terrorists” since they have no way of proving their innocence, and in effect face a sentence of death without due process of law. She has criticised the Trump administration for killing General Suleimani.

The Trump administration has argued that General Suleimani indeed posed an “imminent threat” but will find it hard to present evidence that satisfies its critics. It can also point as precedents to the activities of its predecessors. At the end of 2016, just before he left office, Barack Obama issued a report on the legal framework guiding the United States’ use of force (which had included a raid on Pakistani territory in 2011 without the local authorities’ knowledge to kill bin Laden). It says: “Using targeted lethal force against an enemy consistent with the law of armed conflict does not constitute an ‘assassination’.” Assassinations, it notes, are unlawful under an executive order signed by Ronald Reagan in 1981 (which updated those by Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter). But today there is “a new and different kind of conflict against enemies who do not wear uniforms or respect geographic boundaries and who disregard the legal principles of warfare.” For the Trump administration, even though General Suleimani was an official of the Iranian state, the Shia militias that he oversaw and cheered on in Iraq and elsewhere fall in the terrorist category; in April the Trump administration formally designated the IRGC a “foreign terrorist organisation”.

The campaign against international terrorism falls in the grey area between policing at home and waging war abroad, with few of the well-established laws and norms that attempt to govern them. In the Pentagon’s latest rulebook, it lets armed forces operate as they do in conventional war zones and hit terrorist targets at will in places designated “areas of active hostilities”, including parts of Yemen, Pakistan and Niger, and all of Somalia. The Americans have unleashed hundreds of drone strikes, air strikes and ground raids.

In many ways, America is following the precedent set by Israel, the state that over the past half-century has surely most actively pursued a policy of hunting down and killing foes abroad—not least when it sought to exact retribution against those responsible for the killing of 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics in 1972. According to Ronen Bergman, an Israeli journalist whose history of the subject, “Rise and Kill First”, was published in 2018, Israel’s security services have carried out some 2,700 assassinations. The killing of Palestinians suspected of planning or perpetrating violence against Israelis has been relentlessly conducted also in the West Bank and Gaza, territories controlled by Israel that seek to become an independent Palestinian state.

The Israelis were at first criticised by Western governments for violating international and humanitarian law. But after al-Qaeda’s attacks on America in September, 2001, the American administrations of both George Bush and Mr Obama, and more recently the British and French governments, followed their example in tracking down and killing enemies abroad, sometimes including their own citizens, by using drones.

Particularly in the past decade or so, the Americans (and their Israeli allies) have sought to apply more elastic rules, while broadly invoking the principle of “self-defence against non-State actors on the territory of another State.” Due process, it is argued, cannot be applied when responding to an imminent attack or when the capture or extradition of a suspected enemy is not feasible.

Definitions of “self-defence”, “active hostilities” and “imminent” are endlessly argued over. Philippe Sands, a human-rights lawyer who has charged both the American and British governments with violations of the laws of war, has argued that it all hinges on whether a situation of armed conflict (war) exists. “If it doesn’t, extrajudicial executions are a total no-no in all circumstances. If armed conflict exists, then every case turns on the facts.” So each case must be judged on its merits. The snag here, in the Israelis’ view, is that they are locked in “an armed conflict short of war”, that their survival as a nation cannot depend on the niceties of the law, and that in any case the situation in Gaza and the West Bank in legal terms “falls somewhere in the middle”. The Americans may apply a similar fuzziness to the state of animosity between the US and Iran, seeing that General Suleimani’s men—including elite units sent abroad, undercover agents and proxies—have been held responsible for numerous attacks on Western and Israeli targets, as far afield as Argentina and Bulgaria.

But does it work?
If the legality of assassinations is endlessly debated, so is the question of their effectiveness. Clearly a successful assassination works in one sense, of doling out retribution and punishment. But, to use General Petraeus’s term, how “consequential” is it in deterring and defeating the enemy? In the long and varied history of assassination, the results have often been disputed, and the consequences unintended. It is generally accepted, for instance, that a bullet fired by a Serbian nationalist started the first world war and even paved the way towards the second, though the bonfire which this ignited in 1914 was ready to be lit.

The killing in 1961 of Patrice Lumumba, the Congo’s first prime minister, often blamed on the CIA, helped set that country on its post-colonial path to mayhem. The murder in 1966 of Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, Nigeria’s first prime minister, led to a dreadful civil war. And the killing in 1994 of Rwanda’s president, Juvénal Habyarimana, set off Africa’s worst genocide.

In the Middle East, similarly, assassinations have also changed the course of history. The killing of Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat in 1981 chilled the peace that he had negotiated with Israel. The murder of Israel’s prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin, by a Jewish fanatic in 1995, severely dimmed the prospect of peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

More recently the Saudis and the Iranians have both made clear that they will kill perceived enemies of the state at home or abroad: witness the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, a journalist who was killed and dismembered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul because of his criticism of the country’s crown prince, Prince Muhammad bin Salman.

Israeli governments remain wedded to the idea that assassinating their enemies keeps them on the defensive and disrupts their plans. That, too, must be the understanding of Mr Trump. But the result has not always been what was desired. Israel’s botched assassination on Jordanian soil in 1997 of Khaled Mashal, who went on to become leader of Hamas, a Palestinian Islamist group that has carried out myriad suicide attacks, was a costly fiasco. The killing of other Hamas figures, including the movement’s founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, has had little obvious impact on the movement’s popularity or capabilities.

After the Israelis assassinated Abbas al-Musawi, leader of Hizbullah, the Lebanese Shia movement in 1992, he was succeeded by the cleverer Hassan Nasrallah, who has been even more of a thorn in Israel’s flesh—with the encouragement and close-co-operation of General Suleimani.

Yet the idea of organisational decapitation remains seductive to would-be strategic assassins: cut off the leader and watch the body twitch through its death throes. In a book published last November, Jenna Jordan of the Georgia Institute of Technology examines more than 1,000 cases involving the killing or capture of leaders of terrorist or insurgent groups. She says three factors contribute to a group’s resilience afterwards: its degree of bureaucracy, ability to draw on local resources and ideological zeal. These qualities ensure that its mission does not depend on a single leader.

The death last October of Baghdadi, the self-proclaimed caliph of Islamic State, who blew up himself (and two of his children) to avoid capture by American forces in Syria, has disrupted IS, but perhaps not in a lasting manner. IS ranks highly on all three of Ms Jordan’s factors. It has kept meticulous records and exported its procedures to international franchises that can apply them independently. Though it no longer pulls in $1m a day, as it once did, it still has deep pockets, and is likely to benefit from local Sunni disaffection in Syria. Its ideological purity resonates independently of Baghdadi, to whom a successor was named within days. It has proved its resilience before. It is notable that Mr Baghdadi rose to the top because two predecessors were killed in American strikes in 2006 and 2010.

General Suleimani will no doubt be hard to replace. He was the right-hand man to the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, and no obvious candidate can take that role. But like Baghdadi, he had created something much bigger than himself that does not depend on him alone. His network will still have much the same capabilities as when he was alive. And because it has been so active across the Middle East, says John Raine of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London-based think-tank, the Quds Force has “a pool of talent...a battle-hardened cadre” of people used to waging asymmetric campaigns. And for a while at least, outrage in Iran at the assassination is fuelling a thirst for revenge and has drowned out anti-regime protests.

Then there is the impact on Iraq. The killing of General Suleimani at the country’s international airport plainly flouted that country’s sovereignty, enraging many Iraqis who had previously welcomed American troops on their soil. If, as some fear, the jihadists of Islamic State revive in Iraq in the absence of American forces that had previously beaten them down, the new balance could tilt against America. And if the Iraqis do kick the Americans out, summarily or under a more sedate timetable, his assassination will have produced just the result that General Suleimani would have hoped for.

SOURCE: https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/2020/01/07/was-americas-assassination-of-qassem-suleimani-justified?cid1=cust/dailypicks1/n/bl/n/2020017n/owned/n/n/dailypicks1/n/n/A/373711/n

An ardent tech enthusiast, Moyinoluwa Adeyemi obtained a degree in Computer Science with Mathematics from the Obafemi Awolowo University in Osun state, Nigeria.

After gathering experience in her early days, mentoring junior developers and planning tech events and conferences as the Admissions Manager of the Google Developers Group in OAU, she went on to work with Swifta Systems and Services as a software engineer. She joined Zola Electric in April 2017 and became a senior android developer in April 2019.

Adeyemi is also a public speaker. She has given talks at local and international conferences, where she shares her knowledge of android development.

She is credited with co-organising a number of Lagos Google Developers Group conferences and events. In keeping with her firm believe in getting more tech exposure, she is constantly on the lookout for events that will add to her skill and knowledge.

As tech companies create more learning and accelerator opportunities for women in tech, the tech ecosystem has seen more participation and contribution from women. Recently, we reported that Microsoft onboarded 10 female developers into its Microsoft LEAP program with prospective employment for the ladies.

Last year, Omowale David-Ashiru became the first female Andela Nigeria Country Director.

With the increasing number of opportunities and resources being made available to women in tech, and the dedication shown by these women, more progressive strides like Adeyemi’s certification are just the beginning.

SOURCE (abridged): https://technext.ng/2019/11/08/meet-moyinoluwa-adeyemi-nigerias-first-google-certified-developer-expert-for-android/

You did the right thing when your girlfriend came to you with the news she was pregnant—you signed an admission of paternity (conveniently provided to you by your local district attorney) and started making the obligatory monthly child support payments.

Now, your girlfriend wants to break up and wants nothing to do with you. And oh, by the way, she has a news flash for you. You know the child you've been supporting? The little girl who's been calling you daddy and snuggling on your lap? The child you've been buying birthday and Christmas gifts for over the last 6 years? Guess what, sucker, you're not the baby's daddy after all!

What now? What about the over $20,000 {N7.25m} in child support payments you've made over the past 6 years? It sure adds up fast, doesn't it? Are you entitled to get that money back?

The answer, unfortunately in today's legal environment, is no! In fact, under the laws of most states, even if you find out the child you've been supporting is not your biological child, you will still be on the hook for child support until the child reaches 18.

More often than is widely known, a paternity case may turn out to be the kind of situation where nice guys actually finish last. Mothers who are receiving state aid are required to provide the district attorney (DA) with the name of the child's father so that the county can recover a portion of that aid through child support payments. Mothers who are not receiving state aid can also go to the district attorney for assistance in collecting child support payments.

Unfortunately, studies have shown that, for a variety of reasons, including fear, wishful thinking, or not wanting to be joined for life to the jerk who is the baby's daddy, single moms may provide the DA with the wrong name in connection with a child support claim. And many men, having absolutely no reason to doubt that the child belongs to them, do the right thing and start making those monthly payments, no questions asked.

Under the laws of most states, once a man has signed an acknowledgment of paternity and a judgment of paternity has been entered by the Court, it's a done deal and there's no turning back. In the eyes of the law, a father-child relationship has been established.

For obvious reasons, legal movers and shakers have no reason to want to change that. They are interested in collecting child support payments from a father. Unfortunately, in some instances, any father will do. Once you're on the hook, they have no reason to want to let you go.

But, paternity has been voided in some cases where there is strong evidence that the man in question is not the father. The men involved were able to obtain scientific evidence through DNA testing that the child truly was not theirs and they were able to convince the DA or the courts to make an exception.

THE LESSON: All men faced with a claim of paternity should request DNA testing before admitting paternity or signing anything. This is your legal right. And, it holds true no matter how much you trust the mother of your child. Trust has little to do with it. It is an obligation you owe not only to yourself and to the child's mother, but to the child as well. Paternity has implications that reach far beyond an obligation to make monthly child support payments. The father-child relationship carries with it strong emotional and psychological bonds.

Beyond this, once a man is legally adjudged to be a child's father, he can have his wages garnished for child support and can be court-ordered to seek employment. He can also be criminally prosecuted and do jail time if he fails to make child support payments. Also, under the laws of most states, the child will be obligated to support the father if he becomes incapacitated. And, unless specifically excluded by will, the child will be entitled to share in the father's estate after he dies. Thus, as one court noted, the implications of a father-child relationship "reach beyond the grave."

So start things off on the right foot and get the paternity issue settled at the outset. Once you're on the hook for child support, it may very well be too late to turn back the clock. If at some point down the road evidence surfaces that the child may not be yours, good luck trying to get your local district attorney to agree to a DNA test at that point. It ain't gonna happen!

BOTTOM LINE: Will you be entitled to a refund of child support later on, if it comes to light you are not the child's father after all? No! Can you undo the emotional damage to you and to the child? Probably not. Your child deserves to have you go into this with your whole heart. So, take care of the legal stuff now, put it behind you, and get on with the business of raising your child.

SOURCE: https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/can-you-get-a-refund-if-the-child-you-support-isnt-really-yours

AfriFone Limited has unveiled locally made smartphone called ‘Cygnus X’ into the Nigerian market. The new device offers upgrades to essential features and made even more powerful with more value for the new smartphone generation.

According to the Managing Director of AfriFone, Sahir Berry, Cygnus X is made to perfection with a waterdrop notch and a design that offers users enlightening experience and wider design. He said that the phone made its debut into the Nigerian market in December 2019 and has been accepted as a durable and exciting mobile phone that will serve and satisfy its users in many ways.

Berry said: “This top of the edge phone comes with 20mp front camera, 20mp+2mp rear camera, 4GB/64GB and up to256GB expandable storage, 4000mah battery, 6.3” HD+ screen as well as many other exciting features.”

He said AfriFone was committed to providing meaningful innovations to its consumers, adding that the phone was developed for young Nigerians and Africans, who are looking for a great display, superior camera, long-lasting battery and fingerprint scanner.

According to him, “AfriOne as a pioneer entity has the vision and opportunity to localise and promote the use of cutting-edge technology for manufacturing in Nigeria. Our initiative is to provide employment opportunities, develop skills, empower Nigerian youths and develop the Nigerian economy. Presently, we assemble smartphones, feature phones and tablets. The brand has a partnership with the Federal Government of Nigeria under the N-power umbrella. Our two in one transformer tablets are the preferred tablets in N-Power project today.

“Customer satisfaction remains our key focus while maintaining upgraded technology, quality and after-sale service across the nation through our Service Centres. We have expanded our product portfolio with a new brand known as “AfriOne Beats” which is a young, contemporary range of music gadget – wireless ear pods, Bluetooth speakers, Headsets, Earphones and accessories like Power Bank targeted at the youths.”

In addition to the production of contemporary ICT devices and accessories, AfriOne said it was also dedicated to corporate social responsibility with particular regard to the Berry family’s passion for youth empowerment as the firm facilitates education and training programmes and encourages entrepreneurship in Nigeria, recognizing it as a means of contributing to national economic growth.

SOURCE: https://brandspurng.com/2020/01/03/afrifone-unveils-cygnus-x-made-in-nigeria-smartphone/

Parents and students on Friday 3rd January 2020 decried the alleged extortion of money from those seeking to enrol on the National Identity Number in the Alimosho Local Government Area and Igando Ikotun Local Council Development Area of Lagos State.

They claimed some officials of the National Identity Management Commission in the areas had been demanding bribes ranging from N2,000 to N10,000 for enrollment. Sunday PUNCH reported on December 29, 2019, that the NIMC dismissed 6 of its workers for extortion.

It was learnt that the enrolment process became cumbersome after the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board announced in September that the NIN would be compulsory for the 2020 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination. Investigations by Saturday PUNCH on Friday revealed that some parents who also wanted to obtain their national ID cards had spent more than one week trying to complete the process without success.

A parent, Mr Gabriel Ugbesia, who went to the registration centre on the premises of Alimosho LGA, claimed he parted with N7, 000 to get his daughter registered. He said, “I could not do mine because I could not afford to pay N14,000 for the two of us. My daughter needed it to complete her registration process in the university. I had to give a bribe after I had been frustrated for over one week. This country is getting worse by the day. Some people come to this centre as early as 4am and there would have been more than 50 people already on the list.”

A student at the same centre, Kemi Audu, said, “I got here around 6am today and there were 147 names on the list. “Someone told me not to bother about the list because they do not work with it. They said they would only attend to 50 people in a day, and from my findings, they only attend to those who give bribes. This is highly frustrating and I believe that it was caused by the Federal Government’s decision to make the national ID compulsory. Some will even give you fake forms that are being sold for N2,000.”

Another parent, Mrs Winifred Mark, said she faced difficulties at the NIMC centre on the premises of the Nigeria Immigration Service in Ikeja. She said, “I have tried it in Ikorodu and Ikeja. They collect between N5,000 and N7,000. I also went to Alimosho Local Government Area, the situation was worse. The names on the list as of 6.15am were about 250 and I was told by one of the council workers that the list was just for formality. They should not have attached JAMB to this thing. Even in Ikeja where they have 8 machines, they still have issues.”

A council worker, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said, “It is done for N5,000 and it is because of you; any person that cannot pay N7,000 or N10,000 I do not get myself involved.”

SOURCE: https://punchng.com/students-parents-protest-national-id-racketeering-extortion-in-lagos/

Bode George, former deputy national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), has indicated interest to contest as president in 2023. The Pathfinder Consortium, a group led by Uthman Shodipe-Dosunmu, George’s special adviser, made the announcement in a statement.

It is, however, unclear under which party the former PDP stalwart will be contesting but last week, Walid Jibrin, chairman of the board of trustees (BoT) of PDP, said the party will soon commence the search for its 2019 presidential candidate. Shodipe-Dosunm said the group will soon unveil George whom he described as a pathfinder and “big masquerade” who will bring a new beginning to the country.

“We will engage, inform without derogatory withdrawal. We will challenge, debate, instruct without angry, expletive crudity. We will sustain and affirm in deliberate Churchillian supremacy,” Shodipe-Dosunmu said.

“Pretenders and the perennial time-servers shall disappear from the fray. Only the robust and the lucid patriotic band shall endure. And the dark, disruptive uncertainties shall cease, giving way to a renewal and a rebirth of democratic contention. It is settled!!! Our vision is stripped of ethnic or sectarian articulations. It is about rebuilding the broken walls, rectifying the festering wrongs, healing the persisting wounds.”

President Muhammadu Buhari will end his second tenure in 2023.

SOURCE: https://www.thecable.ng/bode-george-will-contest-presidency-in-2023-says-aide

Perhaps one of the most universal signs of affection, kissing exists in nearly every culture. The act of kissing can range from a quick peck to a long, intimate smooch. Kissing on the lips, though, is usually reserved for more intimate relationships — and it’s no wonder why.

An intimate 10-second kiss can transfer over 80 million bacteria. Though this might help some long-term couples by diversifying their oral bacteria (and thus boosting their resistance to other microorganisms), exchanging saliva can often transfer illnesses.

Unfortunately, no one is exempt from the disease-spreading dangers of kissing. Though people in long-term relationships may fare slightly better, anyone can get sick this way. HealthGrove used data from the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control to find nine diseases that are transmitted through saliva.

With Valentine’s Day coming up, you might want to be careful who you kiss.

1. MONONUCLEOSIS
This disease, usually caused by the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), spreads through saliva and is often referred to as “mono” or “the kissing disease.” Symptoms are very similar to those of the flu and include a fever, sore throat, fatigue, muscle weakness and swollen lymph glands.

The infection and related symptoms usually last anywhere from one to two months. Young people between the ages of 15 and 30 and those who regularly come into contact with a lot of people are the most at risk. While no treatment for mononucleosis exists, resting, staying hydrated and taking over-the-counter pain medications often help.

2. CYTOMEGALOVIRUS
Cytomegalovirus (CMV) is a virus in the herpes family. This disease spreads through saliva, as well as through blood, urine, semen and breast milk. Like all herpes viruses, CMV can remain dormant in the body for long periods of time, especially if you’re healthy.

Though this virus can infect almost anyone, symptoms usually appear in those with compromised immune systems. Symptoms can include fatigue, fever, muscle aches and, in more serious cases, pneumonia, encephalitis, seizures and visual impairment. While there’s no cure for CMV, treatment for the virus generally isn’t needed in healthy children and adults.

3. GUM DISEASE
Bacteria, mucus and other particles constantly live in our mouths and can build up to form plaque. Brushing and flossing helps get rid of plaque, though if not cleaned thoroughly, plaque can build up under the gum line and cause gum disease.

Though gum disease (also known as periodontitis and gingivitis) does not spread through kissing, the bad bacteria that cause it can. Brushing and flossing your teeth regularly is your best defense.

4. HERPES
Oral herpes is most commonly referred to as “cold sores” or “fever blisters.” It’s transmitted through direct contact between an infected area and broken skin or a mucous membrane. More than 50 percent of the U.S. adult population has oral herpes, but symptoms aren’t always visible.

Unfortunately, once you contract the virus, it stays with you forever. Additionally, oral herpes, caused by the herpes simplex type 1 strain, can cause genital herpes. Experts estimate that over 20% of new genital herpes cases are caused by herpes simplex type 1 transmitted through MouthAction. Outbreaks of oral herpes, however, are usually few and far between. During an outbreak, symptoms usually last between 8-10 days on average and the cold sores heal on their own.

5. MENINGITIS
Many types of viruses can cause viral meningitis, which is serious but less severe than bacterial meningitis. This disease can be spread from one person to another via respiratory secretions. Symptoms include fever, headache, stiff neck, nausea and vomiting. Though there are no medications for viral meningitis, people with healthy immune systems usually get better on their own.

6. POLIO
Polio is a highly infectious viral disease that primarily affects young children. The virus spreads from oral contact or through contaminated food and water. Once in the intestine, it can invade the nervous system and cause paralysis. Symptoms include fever, limb pain, fatigue, headache and stiffness in the neck. While there is no cure for polio, it has been largely eradicated in the U.S. and is a routine immunization given at childhood.

7. MUMPS
Mumps is a viral infection that affects the salivary glands, causing them to swell. It usually spreads via airborne droplets from the nose or throat of an infected person. Easily preventable by vaccine, this disease is no longer as common as it once was, though outbreaks in unvaccinated groups still sporadically occur. Symptoms typically include fever, headache, muscle aches, fatigue and loss of appetite. Recovering from mumps takes about two weeks, and treatment usually focuses on relieving the symptoms.

8. RUBELLA
Also known as the German measles, rubella is a contagious disease caused by a virus transmitted through an infected person's sneeze or cough. Symptoms only show up in half of people who get rubella and are usually mild. They include a fever and rash and clear up in two to three days. The rubella vaccine can prevent this disease.

9. INFLUENZA
Influenza is spread from person to person, usually via droplets made when people with the flu cough, sneeze or talk. People can infect others with the flu virus one day before they have symptoms and up seven days after becoming sick. Symptoms include fever, cough, sore throat, body aches and fatigue. Most people recover on their own in less than two weeks. The flu is a highly seasonal disease that can often be prevented by getting an annual flu vaccine.

This article was contributed to KSAT.com by Sabrina Perry, Associated Editor at Graphiq, Inc.

SOURCE: https://www.ksat.com/health/2016/02/12/nine-diseases-you-can-get-from-kissing/

If becoming debt-free tops your list of priorities, you might need to get serious about what you would be willing to give up in order to reach your goal. “People need to think ‘long game,’” Douglas Boneparth, president and founder of Bone Fide Wealth, tells CNBC Make It. “This is a marathon that’s won through discipline and consistency.”

Below, check out 5 expenses experts say may be worth cutting in order to pay off your bills and eliminate your debt in 2020.

1. EATING OUT CONSTANTLY
If you spend $10 on breakfast and $15 on lunch, that’s $125 per week. By the end of the year, that’s over $6,000 spent eating out. “If you were to brown bag your lunch and cut down your spending by half, that would be a total of $3,000 saved annually,” says Ryan Marshall, a certified financial planner at Ela Financial Group.

For those who dine out for dinner and on weekends as well, “the problem only becomes worse,” Marshall says.

2. MONTHLY SUBSCRIPTIONS
When it comes to saving money, a good place to start is by reviewing how many monthly subscriptions you have going at a time. “Everyone talks about subscriptions, but it’s true. When was the last time you looked at recurring expenses?” says Priya Malani, founder and CEO of Stash Wealth.

Services, such as gym memberships, cable TV and online streaming subscriptions, can add up quickly. While a few dollars here and there might not seem like a lot, you’ll feel the weight of that money’s absence by year’s end. A standard Netflix subscription costs $12.99 per month, which adds up to more than $150 over 12 months.

Additionally, you may be paying for recurring monthly subscriptions that you no longer use. In a piece for the Wall Street Journal, journalist Joanna Stern detailed how she paid $15 a month for 3 years for an electronic fax service she used just twice. “That’s $240,” she writes. “For the same amount, I could have bought 20 rolls of fax paper or 10 real working fax machines.”

If cancelling your subscriptions altogether feels too drastic, you can also seek out more affordable alternatives to your current memberships. Sharing a Netflix account with friends or getting daily or monthly passes to your gym, rather than signing up for a year-long contract, could help relieve you financially.

3. BUYING IN BULK
Buying household items in bulk is another area where many think they’re saving, but a lot of times aren’t.

That’s because people who shop in bulk are often buying more than they need in order to earn savings. “That short-term savings that you think is beneficial isn’t always,” Malani says. “Instead of buying the 12-pack of batteries for $25 when you need just two AA batteries, buy the 2-pack that costs $5 and put the other $20 toward your debt. It’s a mindset thing.”

Rather than buying everything in large quantities, think about the amount you actually need of a given product first. If you’re hosting a large gathering, it’s probably fine to go ahead and buy the 500-pack of party plates. But should you run across a 20-pack of avocados for just $3.99 at your local warehouse-style grocer, it doesn’t mean you need to buy the whole bag only for half of it to spoil once you bring it home.

4. NAME BRAND PRODUCTS
While it may be tempting to purchase all name brand products, switching from premium to generic when shopping for food, medications, office supplies, cosmetics and more is another way to save money little by little. In fact, buying generic could save you more than $1,500 annually, Mic reports.

Since earning a few dollars or cents here and there by shopping off-brand products can be easy to miss when reviewing your finances, Malani recommends keeping track of how much you’ve saved over time. Otherwise, “it’s likely you won’t feel the change means anything and might revert back to those name brands,” Malani says.

5. SPENDING FOR THE SAKE OF SOCIAL MEDIA
The world of social media is filled with people posting about their fancy new home or exclusive tropical vacation. And as a result, Americans feel pressure to spend in order to keep up. In fact, 90% of millennials who responded to a 2018 survey from Allianz say that social media “creates a tendency for them to compare their own wealth or lifestyle to that of their peers,” CNBC reports.

It’s essential to know your goals — your real goals — not the ones dictated by society or your peer. This can be a problem for people who participate in social media while trying to get out of debt, says Samuel Deane, a financial planner at Deane Financial Partners, Inc.

“I often see people with debt spending on luxury cars, vacations and exclusive experiences either for instant gratification or to impress people on social media,” Deane says.

To avoid falling victim to peer pressure and any potential overspending that can result from scrolling through social media, “it’s essential to know your goals — your real goals — not the ones dictated by society or your peers,” Deane explains. Know them and stick to them.

WHERE TO SACRIFICE AND WHERE TO SPEND
However, remember that you don’t need to sacrifice everything for the sake of paying off your debt. In order to determine where it makes most sense for you to cut back, you should first “figure out what matters to you and then prioritize and plan for it,” Malani says.

“If you feel better or healthier buying organic, go for it,” Malani explains. “This isn’t about sacrificing everywhere, it’s just about sacrificing in a few select areas.”

One way to see where you might be overspending is to track your expenses for a month. Over the course of 30 days, write down everything you earn and spend. At the end of that period, review your financial activity and if there are any expenses that feel unnecessary, start there.

“Having an understanding of where you spend your money first will help you understand where you can cut and what you are willing to cut,” Boneparth says.

SOURCE (abridged): https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/31/5-things-to-give-up-if-you-want-to-become-debt-free-in-2020.html

HERE IS WHAT YOU NEED TO LET GO OF IF YOU WANT TO BE SUCCESSFUL
Somebody once told me the definition of hell: “On your last day on earth, the person you became will meet the person you could have become.”  — Anonymous

Sometimes, to become successful and get closer to the person we can become, we don’t need to add more things — we need to give up on some of them. There are certain things that are universal, which will make you successful if you give up on them, even though each one of us could have a different definition of success.

You can give up on some of them today, while it might take a bit longer to give up on others.

1. GIVE UP ON THE UNHEALTHY LIFESTYLE
“Take care of your body. It’s the only place you have to live.”  — Jim Rohn

If you want to achieve anything in life, everything starts here. First you have to take care of your health, and there are only two things you need to keep in mind:
-- Healthy Diet.
-- Physical Activity.
Small steps, but you will thank yourself one day.

2. GIVE UP THE SHORT-TERM MINDSET
“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”  — Mae West

Successful people set long-term goals, and they know that these aims are merely the result of short-term habits that they need to do every day. These healthy habits shouldn’t be something you do; they should be something you embody. There is a difference between: “Working out to get a summer body” and “Working out because that’s who you are.”

3. GIVE UP ON PLAYING SMALL
“Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people will not feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone, and as we let our light shine, we unconsciously give others permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
— Marianne Williamson

If you never try and take great opportunities, or allow your dreams to become realities, you will never unleash your true potential. And the world will never benefit from what you could have achieved. So voice your ideas, don’t be afraid to fail, and certainly don’t be afraid to succeed.

4. GIVE UP YOUR EXCUSES
“It’s not about the cards you’re dealt, but how you play the hand.” ―Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture

Successful people know that they are responsible for their life, no matter their starting point, weaknesses, and past failures. Realizing that you are responsible for what happens next in your life is both frightening and exciting. And when you do, that becomes the only way you can become successful, because excuses limit and prevent us from growing personally and professionally. Own your life; no one else will.

5. GIVE UP THE FIXED MINDSET
“The future belongs to those who learn more skills and combine them in creative ways.” ―Robert Greene, Mastery

People with a fixed mindset believe their intelligence or talents are simply fixed traits, and that talent alone creates success  —  without effort. They’re wrong. Successful people know this. They invest an immense amount of time on a daily basis to develop a growth mindset, acquire new knowledge, learn new skills and change their perception so that it can benefit their lives. Remember, who you are today, it’s not who you have to be tomorrow.

6. GIVE UP BELIEVING IN THE “MAGIC BULLET”
“Every day, in every way, I’m getting better and better.”  — Émile Coué

Overnight success is a myth. Successful people know that making small continual improvement every day will be compounded over time, and give them desired results. That is why you should plan for the future, but focus on the day that’s ahead of you, and improve just 1% every day.

7. GIVE UP YOUR PERFECTIONISM
“Shipping beats perfection.”  — Kahn Academy’s Development Mantra

Nothing will ever be perfect, no matter how much we try. Fear of failure (or even fear of success) often prevents us from taking an action and putting our creation out there in the world. But a lot of opportunities will be lost if we wait for the things to be right. So “ship,” and then improve (that 1%).

8. GIVE UP MULTI-TASKING
“You will never reach your destination if you stop and throw stones at every dog that barks.” ―Winston S. Churchill

Successful people know this. That’s why they choose one thing and then beat it into submission. No matter what it is  —  a business idea, a conversation, or a workout. Being fully present and committed to one task, is indispensable.

9. GIVE UP YOUR NEED TO CONTROL EVERYTHING
“Some things are up to us, and some things are not up to us.”  — Epictetus, Stoic philosopher

Differentiating these two is important. Detach from the things you cannot control, and focus on the ones you can, and know that sometimes, the only thing you will be able to control is your attitude towards something. Remember, nobody can be frustrated while saying “Bubbles” in an angry voice.

10. GIVE UP ON SAYING YES TO THINGS THAT DON'T SUPPORT YOUR GOALS
“He who would accomplish little must sacrifice little; he who would achieve much must sacrifice much; he who would attain highly must sacrifice greatly.”  — James Allen

Successful people know that in order to accomplish their goals, they will have to say NO to certain tasks, activities, and demands from their friends, family, and colleagues. In the short-term, you might sacrifice a bit of instant gratification, but when your goals come to fruition, it will all be worth it.

11. GIVE UP ON TOXIC PEOPLE
“You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” ―Jim Rohn

People we spend the most time with, add up to who we become. There are people who are less accomplished in their personal and professional life, and there are people who are more accomplished than us. If you spend time with those who are behind you, your average will go down, and with it, your success.

But if you spend time with people who are more accomplished than you, no matter how challenging that might be, you will become more successful. Take a look at around you, and see if you need to make any changes.

12. GIVE UP YOUR NEED TO BE LIKED
“The only way to avoid pissing people off is to do nothing important.”  — Oliver Emberton

Think of yourself as a market niche. There will be a lot of people who like that niche, and there will be individuals who don’t. And no matter what you do, you won’t be able to make the entire market like you. This is entirely natural, and there’s no need to justify yourself.

The only thing you can do is remain authentic, improve and provide value every day, and know that the growing number of “haters” means that you are doing important things.

13. GIVE UP YOUR DEPENDENCY ON SOCIAL MEDIA AND TELEVISION
“The trouble is, you think you have time.”  — Jack Kornfield

Impulsive web browsing and television watching are diseases of today’s society. These two should never be an escape from your life or your goals. Unless your goals depend on either, you should minimize (or even eliminate) your dependency on them, and direct that time towards things that can enrich your life.

This commentary originally ran on Medium.com.

Zdravko Cvijetic is an educator, and an entrepreneur, with a B.A. in Adult Education & Lifelong Learning. He is the founder of Zero To Skill, a platform which provides useful content on how to become a top-performer in life by mastering your habits and productivity and use it to build a personal brand. If you enjoyed his article, don’t forget to get his free e-book: “The Ultimate Productivity Cheat Sheet.”

SOURCE: https://www.cnbc.com/2016/12/30/13-things-you-should-give-up-if-you-want-to-be-successful.html

Ikeja Electricity Distribution Company Plc on Thursday 02 January 2020 announced a 10-day interruption of power supply. This will take effect around Onilekere, Sodeke, Onipetesi and its environs.

Their full statement below...

''Dear Esteemed Customer,
This is to notify you that there will be an interruption of power supply to your area between Monday, 6th and Thursday, 16th of January 2020, to enable us install new 11KV panels at Mangoro Injection Substation to boost power supply to your area.

''The outage will affect Onilekere, Sodeke, Onipetesi, Valley View, Santos Layout, Sunday Farm, parts of Dopemu Road, Oniwaya Road and Aluminium Village, Capitol Road, Sule, Arigidi and parts of Sebiotimo Streets. 'Others include Adegbola, Ajakaiye, Ikuomola, Ni Olagoke, Abimbola, Oseni, Markez, Akinjobi, Taiwo Dada, Owo, Ogunwo, Awori, Abeje, Yekinni and Olagoke Streets.

''We plead for your understanding and assure you that power will be fully restored as soon as the work is completed. All inconveniences are regretted.''

SOURCE: https://www.ladunliadinews.com/2020/01/ikeja-electricity-distribution-company.html#more

In order to create employment opportunities and address the challenge of poverty among Nigerians, President Muhammadu Buhari has assured that his administration would focus on reviving different sectors of the economy in 2020. This was stated by the President in a letter released by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, NAN reported.

Buhari disclosed that economic opportunities would be created in areas such as agriculture, manufacturing and so on. He said that increased value would be realised from the oil and gas industry in 2020. The sector, according to him, would be more competitive, attractive and profitable as it operates on commercial principles with no political interference whatsoever.

Buhari’s words: “Just last week, we were able to approve a fair framework for the $10 bn expansion of Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas, which will increase exports by 35%, restore our position as a world leader in the sector and create thousands of jobs.

“The Amendment of the Deep Offshore Act in October signalled our intention to create a modern, forward-looking industry in Nigeria. I am confident that in 2020 we will be able to present a radical programme of reform for oil and gas that will excite investors, improve governance and strengthen protection for host communities and the environment.

“We can expect the pace of change in technology only to accelerate in the decade ahead. Coupled with our young and vibrant population, this offers huge opportunities if we are able to harness the most productive trends and tame some of the wilder elements.

“This is a delicate balance with which many countries are struggling. We are seeking an informed and mature debate that reflects our rights and responsibilities as citizens in shaping the boundaries of how best to allow technology to benefit Nigeria.”

DETAILS
Speaking on the economy, the President noted the changes the administration had put in place to enhance the ease of doing business in the country.

He said that the government had made significant progress in terms of improving transportation. Key roads such as the Second Niger Bridge, Lagos–Ibadan Expressway and the Abuja–Kano highway have all been rehabilitated. Also, he made known that in 2020, tangible progress would be made on the Lagos to Kano rail line.

According to Buhari, alternative funding programmes in collaboration with private sector partners have been made to fix strategic roads such as the Apapa-Oworonshoki Expressway

SOURCE: https://nairametrics.com/2020/01/02/buhari-to-create-new-economic-opportunities-in-agric-other-neglected-sectors/

International Breweries started year 2018 (2 years ago) on a bounce, hitting a high of N52.26 and about 2 weeks later hit an all-time high of N58.69. Shareholders who still own the stock will remember this was in January 2018.

It’s been downhill since then, closing 2018 at N27.97 a 46.4% negative return and one of the worst performers that year. As if things couldn’t get any worse, shareholders faced another tumultuous 2019 with the stock closing 2019 at N9.4 and a negative return of 69%.

With that, Nigeria’s second-largest brewer by revenue, International Breweries has ended 2019 with the unenviable record as worst-performing stock of the year.

MERGER BLUES
The company’s challenges appear to have started following its 2018 merger with Intafact Beverages Ltd and Pabod Breweries Ltd. The first sign of merger blues was an immediate spike in operating costs.

POOR RESULTS
Perhaps a major reason for the company’s poor performances has been its string of poor results particularly in its bottom line. As of 9 months results for 2019, losses had ballooned to N16.4 bn from N3.8 bn at end of 2018. Despite notable rise in revenue (helping knock off Guinness from the number 2 spot), its rising cost of marketing and administrative expenses continued to eat into gross profits.

Another cause for worry is its debt profile. External debts were now N243 bn, over 13x its net assets. This is why it announced plans for a rights issue at an offer price of N9 per share back in October 2019. The company did not reveal further details on the rights issue, especially how much it seeks to raise.

SO MANY BOARD CHANGES
Intl. Breweries have also rung out a string of board changes since the merger in 2018. Firstly, in 2018 it announced the composition of a new board of directors a sequel to the merger of Intafact Beverages Limited and Pabod Breweries. The new board chaired by Igwe Naemeka Alfred Achebe replacing Mr. Sunday Omole, who stepped down as chairman of the company.

Shareholders also approved the appointment of Annabelle Degroot as the new Managing Director. Degroot was the Managing Director of Zambian Breweries Plc prior to joining IB Plc. Zuber Momoniat was also appointed Finance Director of the company. He was the Finance Manager at PABOD Breweries Limited (Subsidiary of ABInbev) from where he was appointed as Finance Director for International Breweries Plc. Later that year it welcomed Mr. Andrew Scott Murray into its fold in the capacity of a Non-Executive Director.

By early 2019 it appointed Richard Rivett-Carnac as a Non-Executive Director. Rivett-Carnac replacing Phillip Redman who resigned his appointment as a Non-Executive Director of the company. In May 2019 it appointed Olutoyin Modupe Odulate as its Non-Executive Director. In September 2019, the Board of Directors announced the appointment of Tolulope Adedeji as a Director replacing Godwin Oche.

By December 2019, it again announced the resignation of two of its directors – the Managing Director, Annabelle Degroot and the Finance Director, Zuber Momoniat both of whom were appointed in 2018. In came Hugo Dias Rocha and Bruno Sambrano Arana. While Rocha will be replacing Degroot as Managing Director, Arana will replace Momoniat as Finance Director. All these board changes may have also contributed to the performance of the company and its share price.

Nigeria’s Brewery sector is a very challenging space and could only get worse in the coming months and years. The next decade could be defining for beer makers, following change in social behaviour and tastes of Millenials and post-millenials.

Beer wars are a race for market share but could well end up being a race to the bottom.

SOURCE (abridged): https://nairametrics.com/2020/01/02/international-breweries-end-2019-as-worst-performing-stock/

Hon Pally Iriase, a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress APC, on Monday 30 December said lacklustre performance is the bane of Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki and not former Governor, Adams Oshiomhole. The former House of Representatives, Deputy Majority Whip made this disclosure to journalists at the Abuja Airport.

Iriase said the superlative performance of Oshiomhole which Obaseki would have levered on has been eroded due to an unnecessary face-off created by him.

“His performance in Edo State in the last three and half years has been lacklustre and I say this with the deepest responsibility because before we voted for him he had everything laid out for him to excel because of Oshiomhole’s superlative performance.

“We voted for him because he was the chairman of the economic team while I was the pioneer SSG of that government. Everything was laid out for him to perform but he has missed this opportunity to excel as Oshiomhole laid a solid foundation for him,” Iriase stressed.

“These projects he is bandying around the place under SEEFOR projects are World Bank funded with which he is working on narrow roads and other projects by NDDC in the state. The first 4 years of Oshiomhole was superlative throughout his first tenure and the then Oba of Bini of blessed memory virtually adopted Oshiomhole as his son though he is not from Benin.

“He had no problem winning after his first term because of his performance which endeared him to all Edo citizens despite the paucity of funds. All you hear is Obaseki vs Oshiomhole and the narrative is wrongly skewed as if Oshiomhole is running for governorship.

“Let Obaseki name the major projects in each of the 18 local governments that he has executed. Certainly we need to have the fear of God because giving awards for landmarks in education is something else because teachers are not paid.

“On Health, Oshiomhole performed and he started a hospital and I used my zonal Constituency funds to complete the hospital from cradle to grave, the labour room, maternity and motuary. X-ray and scanning machines have been installed but he refused to take ownership. All that was required of Obaseki was to take over the hospital to stop people from dying endlessly.

“All these rabble-rousing by Obaseki is to cover up his lacklustre performance in the state, me I cannot be fooled.

SOURCE: https://www.pmnewsnigeria.com/2019/12/30/edo-crisis-unimpressive-performance-the-bane-of-obaseki-not-oshiomhole-iriase/

Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) says the N50 being collected on POS transaction by merchants is illegal. It said the N50 being charged Nigerians who use Point of Sale (POS) machines for transactions, is a misinterpretation of its directive by rogue merchants.

CBN Director of Payment System Management, Musa Jimoh said that no one should pay extra on goods and services. He was speaking on Channels Television’s Business Morning programme on Friday 20 December 2019. Owners of Petrol stations have been the only merchants asking consumers who pay with cards to pay the extra N50.

Jimoh explained that the N50 stamp duty is a fee regulated by an act that directs merchants to pay all necessary taxes as regulated by government agencies.

“Stamp duty has been misinterpreted. Our circular that talks about merchants paying stamp duties according to the law does not say that the stamp duty should be paid by the consumer; that is a misrepresentation of CBN directive. What our directive says is that merchants should pay all necessary tax as regulated by government agencies including stamp duty.

“What we told the merchants is that we would like the banks to ensure that the merchants comply with this directive by ensuring that every single payment that customers make to them, the merchants pay the regulated stamp duty of N50. What has happened is that they have actually transferred this fee blatantly and openly to the consumers; this is very wrong. No single individual should pay N50 in addition to the cost of the goods.

“Stamp duty is not to be paid by individuals that are consuming the goods and services of the merchants, the merchants who are receiving the money are the ones who are supposed to pay.”

Mr. Jimoh explained that because the stamp duty is not regulated by the CBN, there are no plans to stop stamp duties.

“Stamp duty is not a CBN regulated fee, it is a fee regulated by an act, and so we can’t change or push anything in that direction.

“The stamp duty remains and cannot be changed by the CBN, what we are doing is to ensure that the institutions we regulate (the banks) become more responsible to ensure that these fees are collected and given to the government”, he said.

SOURCE: https://www.pmnewsnigeria.com/2019/12/23/n50-surcharge-on-pos-transaction-illegal-cbn/

Lagos State Government says it will be closing down Adejobi axis of Agege Motor road on the 4th of January, 2020 for the Sub Grade activities at the Level Cross construction of the rail tracks. The closure will be from 6:00pm to 12:00pm the next day, a statement from the State Ministry of Transportation on Tuesday said.

The closure is in line with the Nigerian Railway Modernization Project (Lagos-Ibadan section) with extension to Lagos Port at Apapa.

“Lagos State Government is hereby appealing to residents of the state, especially motorists that ply the corridor to bear the pains, noting that the project is aimed at achieving a seamless multi modal transport system in the state.

“Alternative routes have been provided for road users to utilize during the course of construction, including Ashade Underpass and Fagba crossing to ensure motorists reach their various destinations with ease. The closure has been slated at this time, to ensure smooth and uninterrupted flow of work on the rail tracks.

“The Lagos State Government hereby appeals to road users to bear with the government as it takes steps to create proper road infrastructure that will ultimately improve the traffic situation of the state,” the statement said.

SOURCE: https://www.pmnewsnigeria.com/2019/12/31/gridlock-imminent-as-lagos-shuts-road-in-agege-for-railway-project/

Visa applicant jailed for filing false document with US Embassy

A Nigerian Visa Applicant, Lukman Owolabi Ogunsuada, 38, has been sentenced to jail for presenting forged letter of invitation to the officials at the United States Embassy in Lagos to secure B1 and B2 Visa categories.

The convict was jailed by Chief Magistrate N. A. Layeni of Apapa Magistrates Court after he found him guilty of the 2-count charges of forgery preferred against him by the police at the special fraud unit, PSFU, Ikoyi, Lagos during the trial spanning about 3 years.

Magistrate Layeni sentenced the convict in count one of the charge to one year imprisonment or alternatively to a fine of N100, 000 and 200 hours community service or to a fine of N20, 000 in count two of the charges. Layeni said the sentence would run concurrently.

Police prosecuting counsel, ASP Wewe Adegbayi had informed the court that the journey to jail started for the convict on 11 October, 2017 when he went to submit a letter of invitation to the officials at the American Embassy in Lagos to process B1 and B2 Visa categories.

Adegbayi said that when the Embassy officials scanned the document, they discovered that it was forged and they held the convict and sent a distress call to the Commissioner of Police in charge of the Special Fraud Unit, Lagos. The CP dispatched his team led by DSP Lawal Audu to the Embassy to arrest the convict.

According to him, during investigation, the convict confessed to the crime and said that he used his phone to edit original letter of invitation and inserted his name and submitted it to the Embassy officials thinking they would not be able to detect that the letter of invitation was forged.

Adegbayi said the offences, the convict committed were punishable under sections 365 and 366 of the Criminal Laws of Lagos State, 2015.

SOURCE: https://www.pmnewsnigeria.com/2019/12/31/visa-applicant-jailed-for-filing-false-document-with-us-embassy/

The Lagos State Government has handed over a woman, Funmilayo Samson, to the police for allegedly maltreating her stepchildren on Ebuwawa Road in the Ikorodu area of the state. Officials of the Directorate for Citizens’ Rights had on Friday rescued the children and arrested Funmilayo after a post about her alleged maltreatment of the victims went viral on social media.

In a post by the Nigerian Women Blog on Facebook, it was alleged that Funmilayo was in the habit of locking the children, aged 12, 9 and 3, outside the house without food and beating them, which left bruises on their bodies. It was gathered that the father of the children, who comes home on weekends, got married to Funmilayo after the death of their mother.

When PUNCH Metro visited the area on Saturday, it was learnt that Funmilayo had earlier been apprehended when concerned neighbours reported her at the Owutu Police Station, but she was released after about 2 hours and she reportedly boasted that nothing could be done to her.

Funmilayo’s neighbour, Mr Olushola Oyinlola, and his wife, Lola, who narrated the ordeal of the children to our correspondent, stated that when not much changed after reporting her at the police station, a petition was written to the Lagos State Office of the Public Defender and a Facebook post was made about the alleged maltreatment of the children.

Olushola noted that everyone in the neighbourhood knew about the maltreatment of the children but no one could challenge Funmilayo due to her troublesome nature. Narrating the children’s ordeal, Olushola said, “There is a lot of maltreatment and abuse that one cannot explain; when you see the children, you will know that they are being maltreated and there are a lot of bruises all over their bodies.

“Funmilayo is stony-hearted and no one can correct or challenge her, because she believes that she can face anybody. She would not give the children food, but whenever the husband asked the children if they had eaten, they were too scared to talk; and if they dared say that they had not eaten, she would say that they were lying.

“There was a time the couple went for a wedding in Ibadan and spent 4 days, leaving the children behind. They ate on the first day, but I noticed that they had not eaten on the second day and I asked the female one to go and cook for the rest, but she said she could not, because they had been warned not to touch the gas cooker or stove in the house except the electric cooker and there was no power; so, I asked them how they would cope and she said since there was no electricity, they could not eat.

“My wife and I gave them money to go and buy food and we went out, but when we came back, the eldest child told us that one of his younger ones had been running temperature and had headache since we went out; so, we gave them money to go and buy drugs. We could not give them from the ones we had at home, because their stepmother had taken us as enemies and we did not want a situation where she would say that we poisoned them or she poison the children and tell people that we did.

“The parents travelled without making provisions for them for the days they would spend; we were the ones taking care of them and when they came back, the stepmother questioned the youngest child, whom she knew would talk.

“Immediately she knew that they collected something from us, she started shouting, cursing and said that she preferred that the kids would die than for them to collect anything from anybody and she used to lock them out of the house for more than a month anytime she was leaving the house in the morning till evening; she would come back without food just because they collected something from us.

“There was a time we heard a noise from their flat but we could not come out because she would create a scene, but when I saw the female child the following day, she had a deep cut on her face and when I asked her what happened, she said the stepmother used a razor blade to cut her.

“There was a day she alleged that the kids ate from the soup inside the refrigerator and she poured grounded pepper in their eyes and locked them in the house and went out till the following day; and when she came back, she asked the female child to bring out the gas cooker, but unfortunately for the girl, she did not know that the pot of soup was on it because she could not see well and the pot fell and Funmilayo packed the stew and poured it on the girl’s face.

“When we reported the case at the Owutu Police Station, nothing came out of it; she was arrested and within two hours, she came back boasting that there was nothing anybody could do to her. So, when I saw that all efforts to rescue the children had proved abortive, I resorted to writing about their ordeal on my Facebook wall for people to see and render help.”

The Director of Public Affairs, Lagos State Ministry of Justice, Kayode Oyekanmi, confirmed the rescue of the children to our correspondent and the arrest of the stepmother, adding that the children had been put in protective custody.

“The children were rescued by the Directorate of Citizens’ Right and they are already in protective custody and the stepmother has been arrested and detained at the Owutu Police Station and she will be arraigned on Monday (today),” he stated.

Also, the state Police Public Relations Officer, Bala Elkana, confirmed the arrest of Funmilayo and the rescue of the children.

“We have rescued the kids, while the woman has been arrested and will be charged,” he told PUNCH Metro.

SOURCE: https://punchng.com/lagos-woman-arrested-for-maltreating-stepchildren/

WHAT IS A GENOTYPE?
A genotype is the entire genetic constitution of an individual, i.e. genetic makeup of an organism or group of organisms with reference to a single trait, set of traits, or an entire complex of traits. In a nutshell: your genotype is your complete heritable genetic identity; the sum total of genes transmitted from parent to offspring.

There are 4 hemoglobin genotypes (hemoglobin pairs/formations) in humans: AA, AS, SS and AC (uncommon). SS and AC are the abnormal genotypes or the "sickle cells". We all have a specific pair of these hemoglobin in our blood which we inherited from both parents.

WHY IT'S IMPORTANT TO KNOW YOUR GENOTYPE
Knowing one's hemoglobin genotype before choosing a life partner is important because there may be compatibility issues which could have devastating effects when it comes to conception.

Individuals with sickle cells experience severe pains in body parts where oxygen flow is compromised due to blockage in the blood vessels.

-- AA can marry anybody
-- AS is better off with AA
-- AS and AS, AS and AC are too risky
-- Two sickle cells = avoid conception!

WHAT IS A BLOOD GROUP AND TYPE?
To classify blood, antibodies and inherited antigenic substances on the surface are evaluated.
There are 4 blood GROUPS:
-- Type A (marker A)
-- Type B (marker B)
-- Type AB (blood cells have both A and B markers)
-- Type O (blood cells have neither A or B markers)

AN ADDITIONAL MARKER IN BLOOD: RHESUS FACTOR
This is simply a protein that may be present on the surface of red blood cells. Some people have it and others don’t. If you have it, your blood type is further classified as positive; if you don’t, your blood type is further classified as negative. It is just a genetic difference (e.g. blue VS green eyes) and nothing to worry about. Therefore present Rhesus factor = Positive. No Rhesus factor = Negative.

BLOOD TYPES
O- = No A or B Marker
O+ = No A or B Marker + Rhesus factor (One of the Two Most Common Types)
A- = A Marker Only
A+ = A Marker but No B Marker + Rhesus factor (One of the Two Most Common Types)
B- = B Marker Only
B+ = B Marker but No A maker + Rhesus factor
AB- = A and B Markers Only
AB+ = All 3 Types of Markers: A, B and Rhesus factor

WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO KNOW YOUR BLOOD GROUP COMPATIBILITY
It is important to know your blood type if you need a blood transfusion or want to donate blood. It also plays a role in determining paternity. Before a blood transfusion takes place it must be established that the donor’s blood type is compatible with the recipient’s. Combination of certain antibodies (proteins protecting the body) can be harmful or even lead to fatal symptoms if antibodies perceive foreign cells as a threat. It is our immune systems’ way of protecting us.

TYPES OF BLOOD TEST
-- Complete Blood Count (CBC)
-- Blood Chemistry Tests
-- Blood Enzyme Tests
-- Blood Tests to Assess Heart Disease Risk.

SOURCE (abridged): https://www.thebridgeclinic.com/blog/why-is-it-important-to-know-your-genotype-and-blood-group-compatibility

Yusuf Abubakar, a district head in Birnin Gwari local government area of Kaduna state who was abducted by kidnappers, has reportedly escaped from captivity. Abubakar was abducted at gunpoint alongside, Ibrahim Musa, a former education secretary of the LGA, along the Kaduna-Birnin-Gwari highway on December 18. A total of N3.5 million was said to have been paid as ransom of the duo but only the former education secretary was released. The bandits reportedly refused to release the district head and demanded more money.

In a statement on Friday, Ibrahim Nagwari, chairman of the Birnin Gwari Vanguard for Security and Good Governance, said the district head escaped from his captors on Thursday night. He said the traditional ruler escaped two days after the former education secretary was released.

“The district head escaped in the night yesterday (Thursday) at Sabon Birni village behind Kaduna International Airport around 5.30am and sent an urgent message to a close associate to pick him,” Nagwari said.

“In the last 48 hours after the release of the former education secretary and Wakilin Makaranta of Birnin-Gwari, Alhaji Ibrahim Musa, the fate of the district head was doubtful after a payment of N3.5m was made to the kidnappers which they tagged part payment.

“After long hours of uncertainty and threat to the life of the district head, he miraculously escaped to freedom after the kidnappers led by Dogo Gide went asleep. We the people of Birnin-Gwari are grateful to Allah for his freedom and others that were abducted and regained their freedom after ransom was paid.

“Those who lost their lives in the hands of these criminals, we pray for Allah’s forgiveness and may Allah reward them with comfortable home in Aljannah. Finally, while commending efforts of our security volunteers and security forces stationed in our area, we are calling on all citizens and residents of Birnin-Gwari local area to be extra vigilant and expose those informants that connive with kidnappers in our respective communities.”

Nagwari also condemned what he described as “the Kangaroo peace accord” with armed bandits championed by the Birnin-Gwari local government administration, saying “enough is enough”.

Three brothers: Jonathan Obi, Joakin Obi and Benjamin Obi, who were also abducted on December 19, were also released following the payment of a ransom. According to sources, the three bothers were said to have been released on December 21 after the payment of N12m.

SOURCE (abridged): https://www.thecable.ng/kaduna-district-head-escapes-from-kidnappers-den

About 300 hundred motorcycle riders from 32 countries and different continents of the world have participated in the 2019 Biker’s festival.

Flagging off the bikers parade festival at the millennium park popularly referred to as eleven, eleven round along Murtala Mohammed Highway Calabar on Friday 27 December 2019, Governor Ben Ayade of Cross River State urged the people to expect something spectacular from the usual bikers parade.

The parade which also featured hundreds of porsche cars and power bikes along the carnival route, had the bikers led by Governor Ben Ayade, former Governor of the state Governor Donald Duke and several eminent personalities taking part in the parade.

The bikers parade had 4 bikers clubs participating in the carnival, including Tinapa Motorcycle Club, Red Scorpion King, Metallic Knights Motorcycle Club and Aviators Motorcycle Club.

As at the time of filing this report, Calabar, the capital city of Cross River state was agog with spectators lining both sides of the streets and vehicular movement coming to a halt in the city.

SOURCE (abridged): https://dailypost.ng/2019/12/27/300-power-bikers-storm-2019-calabar-carnival/

Emir of Kano, Alhaji Muhammadu Sanusi II, has implored Muslims to give birth to only the number of children they can cater for. Sanusi gave this advice while speaking at the opening of the 108th edition of Islamic Vocation Course (IVC) organized by the Muslim Students’ Society of Nigeria (MSSN) Zone B, with the theme “The Unification”

Sanusi while speaking on the array of social problems bedeviling the country, insisted that the issue of Almajiri syndrome in the north is not a religious issue, but a social issue that needs urgent attention. While maintaining that there is a need to get all out of school children back to school, Sanusi asked men to imbibe the habit of marrying the number of women they can provide for. He urged Nigerians, especially Muslims to give birth to only children they can cater for.

Sanusi said, “If we continued this way, about 40% extremely poor people will be in Nigeria. Poverty in the South West is 20%, in the North, it is 80%, Lagos is 8 per cent and Zamfara, it is 91%. We have been talking about Almajiri for over 30 years. Why are people having families they cannot maintain? Why are people marrying wives that they cannot maintain? The condition is that you are able to provide for your family.

“Instead of having many children, why not have the ones you can cater for? These are the fundamental questions we should ask ourselves. Most of these children roaming about the streets will be adult in the next twenty years and they will be the ones recruited as political thugs by the politicians in the next twenty years, if we don’t take good care of them now. This is my own advice that we must look at. These are not religious issues, they are social issues that need to be addressed”.

The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar while speaking, urged Muslims not to be provoked by any utterances from either any political or religious leaders but continue to be law abiding. He urged Muslims to work for the unity of the country. He said, “We will not work to divide Nigeria. We should not take arm, don’t be provoked by any utterances. Be law abiding wherever you are”.

Professor AbdurRazzak AbdulMajeed Alaro of the Department of Islamic Law,University of Ilorin who is the guest Speaker while speaking on the topic “The Unification”, maintained that unity among Muslims is not an option but an obligation to all Muslims. “Unity as a concept is very essential in the religion of Islam. God instructed Muslims to unite and work toward unity. Muslims are expected to be united and not disunited. Unity is not a matter of option but obligation. We must be courageous enough to call a space a spade. MSSN has a role to play in unifying Nigerian Muslims”.

Dignitaries who graced the occassion include; the Deputy Governor of Oyo state, Engineer Rauf Olaniyan, Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, Resident Electoral Commissioners in Oyo and Ogun States, Barrister Mutiu Agboke and Professor Abdulganiy Raji, former and Present Executive Secretary of Muslim Ummah of South West Nigeria (MUSWEN), Professor Daud Noibi and Professor Muslih Yahya among a host of others.

SOURCE: https://dailypost.ng/2019/12/26/give-birth-to-only-children-you-can-cater-for-emir-of-kano-sanusi-cautions-muslims/

Motorists and other users of the Berger/Kara Bridge section of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway may have to brace for another round of gridlock as reconstruction work will resume by Monday, January 6, in the area, The PUNCH has learnt.

The barricade on that section of the road was removed on Sunday, December 1, 2019 to enable motorists move freely during the festive period. The Federal Controller of Works, Lagos, Mr Adedamola Kuti, told our correspondent on Thursday 26 December that workers were expected to return to the site by January 6 and speedily complete the remaining part of the section.

Before the road was opened in early December, vehicles, both inbound and outbound Lagos, were diverted to the outbound lane up to Isheri Junction, before redistributing to the normal lanes and was a major challenge to motorists due to gridlock. The gridlock on the busy corridor, especially whenever there was an accident or a breakdown of articulated vehicle forced many commuters to drive against traffic, further compounding the problem.

He stated that work had been completed on the inbound Lagos section, adding that during the break, palliative construction work continued on the outbound part of the road.

Kuti said, “When we return to site, work is expected to be faster at the Kara Bridge end because we are fully in the dry season unlike the other time when the work started. Everything will be faster and we will likely have speedy completion on most parts of the road.”

He stated the work would be completed by mid-February. “Now that we are in the dry season, all hands must be on deck so we can spend less time and finish before the rains begin,” he said.

Julius Berger, the contractor handling the section 1 of the road from Old Toll Gate to the Sagamu Interchange, had diverted both the inbound and the outbound traffic to one side of the road on September 2, when reconstruction of the Berger/Kara Bridge part of the Lagos/Ibadan Expressway commenced.

On the Magboro/Ibafo section of the road, Kuti said it could not be opened during the festive period due to the level of work. “We haven’t reached a stage where we can open that section for safety reasons, which explains why we had workers on the ground during the Christmas period and up until now,” he said.

According to him, the work on that section is also expected to be completed by February when the contractor will open another section for reconstruction.

The Ogun State Sector Commander of the Federal Road Safety Corps, Mr Clement Oladele, said motorists should obey traffic rules to avoid chaos on the road. “In other climes, when people see road signs around construction zones, nobody forces them to obey. I urge motorists and members of the public to do what is right,” he said.

Oladele stated that officials of the FRSC would do their best to control the traffic situation throughout the road reconstruction period.

SOURCE: https://punchng.com/fresh-gridlock-looms-as-kara-berger-bridge-reconstruction-resumes-jan-6/

There was panic on Wednesday 25 December 2019, as two fuel-laden tankers crashed into each other at the Sagamu interchange end of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. It was gathered that the tankers collided around 5.30pm and the impact led to an explosion.

PUNCH Metro learnt that one of the tankers was rolling backwards after suffering a mechanical fault when the other rammed into it from the rear. Our correspondent gathered that no life was lost but the two tankers got burnt. Men of the fire service of the Redeemed Christian Church of God and the Ogun State Fire Service attended to the inferno.

Confirming the accident, the Sector Commander, Ogun State, Federal Road Safety Corps, Clement Oladele, said traffic had been diverted to avoid a secondary crash.

He stated, “Two tankers conveying petroleum products crashed into each other on the outward lane of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway under the Sagamu Interchange Bridge. The white tanker in the front developed a mechanical fault and in the process of rolling back, the one coming from the rear collided with it.

“The fire service of the RCCG and the Ogun State Fire Service attended to the fire and we made a necessary diversion to prevent a secondary crash.”

SOURCE: https://punchng.com/tankers-collide-burst-into-flames-on-lagos-ibadan-expressway/

Lin Helena Halfon, a 26-year-old Florida woman, is accused of trying to scam her 77-year-old businessman husband out of at least $1 million. Lin faces charges including money laundering and exploitation of an elderly person, according to The Tampa Bay Times.

Investigators with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement say the case popped up on their radar after she attempted to cash a $1 million cashier’s check in the name of her husband on November 7. Employees at a Tampa Amscot refused to process it, and they maintained their stance when she returned with 3 checks of $333,333, authorities said.

It’s unclear if there’s going to be a co-defendant. A man allegedly cashed 2 of the $333,333 checks at a business in Carteret, New Jersey in late November. According to authorities, Her husband claimed that the $1 million was to buy a yacht. Employees at the Amscot didn’t cash it because he wasn’t there, and it was his name on it, authorities said. The defendant (wife)’s attorney Todd Foster reportedly said “we look forward to bringing forward additional facts to bring clarity to this situation.”

The couple reportedly got married last Summer. Authorities said that according to the husband’s daughter, she and no one else in the family knew about the marriage. Investigators said the daughter “believed Halfon was ‘conning'” the alleged victim “due to his age.”

The man apparently wanted to stay with her at first, as told in the official account. When authorities first asked him about the check, he said that he wanted to give Halfon the benefit of the doubt, and didn’t want her deported to her native country of Israel, investigators said.

That attitude apparently changed. Investigators said they asked him on Dec. 10 if he believed he was the victim of fraud and theft. He said yes, according to authorities.

SOURCE (abridged): https://lawandcrime.com/crazy/woman-allegedly-tried-to-scam-her-husband-in-attempting-to-cash-1-million-cashiers-check/

There are reports of many people (especially food vendors) using paracetamol to cook meat. Their reason for this is to quickly tenderize the meat and avoid long boiling times.

However, putting paracetamol into food has very serious health implications. When the drug is used for cooking, it is hydrolyzed (broken down) into 4-aminophenol, which is highly toxic to the kidney. Also, high consumption of analgesics over many years is a well-known cause of kidney damage.

Paracetamol poisoning usually causes liver failure which may also be accompanied by acute renal failure. High doses of aspirin or paracetamol can cause acute renal failure. Therefore (for health reasons), use of paracetamol for tenderizing meat must be highly discouraged.

Toughness of meat comes from the collagen (the connective tissues). During cooking it slowly breaks down into a substance called gelatin, and the meat becomes soft.

Without using paracetamol, you can tenderize meat by:
1. Cooking with a pressure cooker.
2. Brining (salting). This involves soaking the meat in a highly concentrated salt-water solution, typically for about 20 hours, before cooking.
3. Slicing the meat. This helps to sever muscle fibres and thereby hastens softening while cooking.
4. Pounding meat (e.g. with a mallet) before cooking.
5. Marinating (soaking) with acid in the form of vinegar, citrus juices or wine before cooking.
6. Marinating with enzymes. Pineapple, kiwi, ginger, Asian pear and pawpaw contain enzymes that can help tenderize meat.
7. Velveting the meat. This involves coating/soaking pieces of meat in a mixture of cornstarch, rice wine, salt, sugar, egg whites, and sometimes soy sauce, for about 30-45 minutes before cooking.
8. Slow-cooking the meat.
9. Using commercial meat tenderizers, which are sold in powder or liquid form. They should only be used sparingly, to avoid the meat becoming unpleasantly soft.

If you know anybody that uses paracetamol for softening meat, please advise them to desist forthwith!

This is an original article, published here for the first time.

A man carrying out banking business without license and obtaining money by false pretence to the tune of N5.1 billion has been arrested by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

The suspect, Mr Suani Neenwi, a Ponzi scheme operator, was arraigned before Justice I. M Sani of the Federal High Court sitting in Port Harcourt, Rivers State on Monday on a three-count charge by the anti-graft agency.

It was said that Mr Neenwi operated two companies; Bluekey Technologies Nigeria Limited and Cityclyk Bluekey Payment to defraud unsuspecting members of the general public. The EFCC informed the court that these two firms were run as a pseudo bank, with money taken from depositors, who were promised to receive 10% returns on their investments every week.

But the business soon went awry and the EFCC was invited to salvage the situation. He was subsequently apprehended and taken to court.

At the arraignment on Monday 23 December 2019, the agency said the suspect committed an offence contrary to Section 1 (1) (a) of the Advance Fee Fraud and Other Related Offences Act No. 14, 2006 and punishable under Section 1(3) of the same Act.

SOURCE: https://businesspost.ng/general/man-dupes-depositors-n5bn-in-port-harcourt/amp/

The Nigeria Navy forward operating base (FOB) at Ibaka in Mbo local government area of Akwa Ibom has arrested 24 suspects with 1,831 bags of smuggled rice. Peter Yilme, the commanding officer of the FOB, disclosed this to journalists in Ibaka, on Sunday. Yilme said 5 wooden boats used in smuggling the rice from Cameroon to Nigeria were also seized, and that the arrest was made during routine operations by operatives in the past one month.

Yilme, who was represented by Kabiru Yusuf, base operations officer, during the handing over of the suspects and items to the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), said the command would remain steadfast in fighting criminals on Nigeria’s territorial waters in line with the directive of the chief of naval staff.

Dauda Garuba, an officer of the NCS, received the suspects and items from the navy. Two of the suspects claimed they were not told that they were to carry bags of rice from Cameroon to Nigeria while another said he was told that he would be transporting fish. He said it was when the rice was loaded into the boat that he realised that he would not be conveying fish as told.

The federal government closed Nigeria’s land borders in August to check smuggling. While some Nigerians condemned the action, other citizens praised the government’s initiative. In October, the Gombe state chapter of Rice Farmers Association of Nigeria (RIFAN) expressed its support for the border closure, saying farmers in the country can produce enough rice to feed Nigerians and to export.

Kalagar Lubo, state secretary of RIFAN, said the closure is a positive development that will promote the production of fresh locally made rice.

“With the extension of rains to the end of October, the yield will be good. The home production is very good, first it is fresh and the value is good. If the border is opened the farmer will not have it good. When you buy a bag at N10,000, it will cost you just N20,000 for two bags. When you go to the market, a bag of foreign rice is sold at N18,000,” he had said.

SOURCE: https://www.thecable.ng/navy-seizes-1831-bags-of-rice-smuggled-by-sea-from-cameroon