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Louis Vuitton Taps French Artist Philippe Parreno For Paris Fashion Week Stage

By
Koko Lawrence
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(Photo by Victor VIRGILE/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)

Philippe Parreno, a French artist known for his large-scale installations, designed the stage for Louis Vuitton’s runway show during Paris Fashion Week.

The set, a monumental installation shaped like a blooming flower, was located in the courtyard of the Louvre. It was constructed of red nylon fabric panels to create a circular form that at its highest point rose to more than 90 feet.

Collaborating with production designer James Chinlund and Nicolas Ghesquière, the French luxury house’s womenswear creative director, Parreno said the concept for the installation was inspired by circuses.

In an interview with the Times, Parreno said he used red curtains and mirrors to create a carousel-like atmosphere that plays on those themes. Models dressed in Ghesquière’s designs, replete with gigantic zippers, walked through Parreno’s stage in circles.

Throughout, flashing bulbs provided the lighting in a way that was reminiscent of sculptures produced by Parreno. In 2015, for example, the artist showed 27 of these works at New York’s Park Avenue Armory.

Ghesquière remarked that Parreno’s carnival concept reflects a “nomadic” mode that is typical of fashion weeks, for which hoards of international spectators flock to urban hubs.

Parreno was not the only artist tapped for collaborations during Paris Fashion Week.

Long-Unseen Painting Of Jamaican Man Identified As Rare Richmond Barthé Work

By
Koko Lawrence
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A painting of a Jamaican man that has been hidden away from public view for years has been identified as a work by Richmond Barthé, a key figure within African American art history.

The painting, titled Seated Man in a Landscape, dates back to the 1950s, during a period when Barthé was based in Jamaica. But art historians did not know that he was the author of the work because the attribution was “incorrectly transcribed,” according to the National Trust, the U.K. organization that announced the new research done on the painting

The National Trust plans to put the piece on view at Belton House in Lincolnshire starting on Thursday. The painting’s display is meant to coincide with Black History Month in the U.K.

Belton House, which owns the work, has never before put the piece on display. The National Trust said it did not know how the work had arrived at Belton House in the first place, although the organization speculated that it may have been acquired by Perry Brownlow, who lived from 1899 to 1978 and had a vacation home in Jamaica.

The late art historian Margaret Rose Vendryes, an expert in Barthé, conducted the research on the painting in collaboration with Alice Rylance-Watson, an assistant curator at the National Trust. Together, they also identified the painting’s sitter as Lucian Levers, a worker at Barthé’s studio in St. Ann Parish.

“We are delighted to be able to identify Lucian Levers as the sitter as it can be difficult to name black individuals who appear in historic portraits, chiefly because of a lack of documentation,” Rylance-Watson said in a statement.

Barthé is best known as a sculptor of images of African American men, whose bodies he rendered in exacting detail. These works achieved fame during the mid-20th century in the U.S., and he moved to Jamaica to escape the violence he encountered in New York and the attention being lavished upon him countrywide. He also spent time in Haiti, where he designed coins and built a monument to Toussaint Louverture in Port-au-Prince.

Strike: Federal Govt, ASUU Fail To Reach Out-of-court Settlement

By
Rhoda Onuzulike
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The lawyers for the Federal Government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities, on Thursday, told the Court of Appeal that both parties could not resolve the eight months old strike, despite the out-of-court settlement as advised by the Appellate Court.

The FG’s lawyer, James Igwe, and lead counsel for ASUU, Femi Falana (SAN), told the Court of Appeal that despite the admonition, they could not resolve the dispute.

The presiding judge, Justice Hamma Barka, thereafter, stepped down the matter for an hour to enable the counsel for ASUU, Falana, to file a reply to the counter affidavit deposed to by the FG in opposition to the hearing of the appeal.

At the resumption of the hearing, Falana said they had begun consultations which would continue at the end of the day’s proceedings. He suggested that their application challenging the ruling of the Industrial Court be heard by the three-man panel of the Appeal Court.

Both parties agreed that the court should hear the application, as there was no amicable resolution reached as advised by the court.

Poor Socialisation Influences Substance Abuse In Schoolchildren, Expert Warn

By
Rhoda Onuzulike
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An addiction counselor, David Folaranmi, has warned parents and teachers to improve children’s socialisation and decision-making skills in the fight against substance abuse.

The expert made this statement while speaking at a seminar hosted by Fundawazi Foundation for teachers, in commemoration of the World Teacher’s Day on Wednesday, at the Fountain of Life Church in Oshodi, Lagos state.

According to the foundation’s team lead, Abisola Soneye, the seminar, tagged ‘Project I-Care’, was to guide, educate and share ideas on how to properly train children against abuse and substance use.

“The Fundawazi Foundation provides relevant tools and resources to help children resist abuse and other social vices, and we’ve had a series of talks in the last five years,” she added.

Speaking during the event, Folaranmi said educators had roles to play in supporting preteens and teens through a challenging life, noting substance use was a major area they should be concerned about.

“A survey carried out early this year in Africa showed that Nigerian teens ages 13 to 19 came up in the most numbers of marijuana users in Africa,” he added.

Folaranmi said educators should understand behavioral changes in students who are engaged in substance abuse in order to respond to the abuse quickly.

He said, “When an educator doesn’t know what to do against substance abuse in children, it’ll cause a lot of things like unwanted pregnancy and it’ll destroy lives.

“The primary objective is to help those entrusted in their care to avoid initiation into the use of psychoactive substances. As educators, they must understand the sociology of negative behaviors like poor socialisation and poor decision-making skills.”

A child health expert, Dr. Oluyemisi Akindolie, encouraged teachers to be resilient when dealing with tough children, noting that children were meant to be understood.

She said, “A naughty child is not the enemy. The real enemy is the enemy of that child’s destiny. Teachers need to be passionate, intentional, and strategic to match a child’s wisdom with superior wisdom and kindness.”

Another facilitator, Gbemisola Agbato, said teachers must build a relationship of commitment and trust with children before children can open up to them.

“Teachers must learn to smile and forget it’s about them when building relationships. They must show acceptance and empathise,” she added.

A clinical psychologist, Olumide Okeowo, said educators must help children to discover themselves.

A teacher, identified only as Paul, said, “Teaching is not only within the four walls of the classroom. The purpose is to impact lives. The success of a student is the success of the teacher.”

Soneye encouraged participants to leverage what they had learnt to improve the lives of their students.

National Examinations Council Releases 2022 SSCE Results

By
Rhoda Onuzulike
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The National Examinations Council has released the 2022 Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination results.

NECO Registrar, Prof. Dantani Wushishi, announced the results on Thursday at the NECO Headquarters in Minna, Niger State.

Aside from the results, Wushishi said the council blacklisted 29 supervisors for their alleged involvement in various malpractice offences.

He also said four schools were recommended for de-recognition for two years over consistent malpractices.

Meanwhile, Wushishi revealed that the council recorded a decline in malpractice in the 2022 internal senior school certificate examinations as against other years.

According to him, the decline in malpractice during the examination was appreciable.

 “In the area of malpractices, 13, 595 were caught as against 20, 003 in year 2021, which showed appreciable decline in number of malpractices cases.”

“Twenty nine supervisors were blacklisted for various offended ranging from poor supervision, insult, aiding and abetting during the examinations”.

Dantani gave the number of candidates that registered for the Examinations as 1, 209, 703 while 1, 198, 412 sat for the examination.

He further stated that the number of candidates who got five credits and above, including English Language and Mathematics is 727, 864 representing 60.74 per cent.

Dantani also added that the number of candidates with special needs is 1, 031 adding that 98 with albinism, 177 with autism, 574 with hearing impairments and 107 are visually impaired.

Nigerian Varsities Set To Develop Curriculum On Logistics

By
Rhoda Onuzulike
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The Committee of Vice Chancellors of Nigerian Universities, CVCNU has signed a Memorandum of Understanding, MoU with the Kuhne Foundation to integrate logistics and supply chain studies into Nigerian University’s curriculum.

The MoU is aimed at strengthening the local capacities in logistics and supply chain management along the different higher education levels.

During a meeting with the Foundation, the Secretary -General of CVCNU, Professor Yakubu Ochefu said that seven universities had been selected to pilot the programme.

Ochefu stated that the National Universities Commission, NUC alongside with universities would develop competitive education programmes to meet international standards on logistics.

“This partnership that we have signed represents their efforts at coming into the Nigeria space like they said, they have been operating basically in the East Africa and now this is their first time in west Africa and the number justify that investment.

” The MOU represents formalisation of a relationship between the selected Nigeria universities and Kuhne foundation.

“Kuhne is part of the Kuhne group which is the largest logistics and supply Chain Company of the world, a global leader of logistics and supply chain company development to the world.

” Nigeria is the largest economy in Africa when you translate that into logistics and supply chain, you will understand why the biggest player in the world wants to play in Nigeria,” he said.

Ochefu said that the foundation had already engaged with the NUC in the last one year to develop a curriculum for logistics and supply chain management in Nigerian universities.

“What we have had in the past is transportation and as we all know transportation is the component of logistics and supply chain management so when they work with NUC to develop the curriculum at the undergraduate level so that it is possible for you to teach in logistics and supply chain at the undergraduate level.

” What we are doing here is to help train the manpower at the postgraduate level to be able to teach at the level of undergraduate because we really don’t have qualified manpower for logistics and supply chain management to teach in the Nigeria university system.

” So part of the training programme has to build that first for this seven universities and we will take it up from there,” he said.

Also, the Country Director, Kuhne foundation, Mr Stephen Akuti, said that Nigeria must not be left behind considering the value of logistics and supply chain management to any economy.

Akuti said that the Foundation had research into why Nigerian universities do not offer logistics and supply chain management as a course.

He said that the Foundation was ready to scale up its support for Nigerian Universities in the training of manpower at the undergraduate level.

“There is a lot of value in logistics and supply chain education in the entire world generally and for the Nigeria education system.

” Basically, it is the way the world works, logistics and supply management in education works and we have been working in Nigeria here for five years now.

” One of the things we’ve been doing underground is to research why is it that this programme is not available in Nigeria educational system particularly at the undergraduate level.

” And we’ve seen those reasons and so we are working with NUC and other stakeholders and today now we are signing the MoU with CVCNU to move that level forward to bring those value to Nigeria.

” Basically, all our problems in Nigeria educational system and all the entire economy is logistics and when we begin to research and teach the new principle we see all of them begin to function appropriately, so basically the value are unquantifiable,” he said.

The Vice-Chancellor, First Technical University, Ibadan, Professor Adesola Ajayi, commended the gesture of the Foundation.

He said that the Universities would domesticate the teaching of logistics and supply chain management as well as replicate it in other sectors like agriculture.

Professor Samuel Odewunmi, who represented the Vice Chancellor, Lagos State University, Professor Ibiyem Olatunji-Bello, called for the inclusion of logistics and supply chain management into the school’s curriculum.

Also, Dr Charles Zaure, representing the Vice-Chancellor, Gombe State University, Professor Ibrahim Umar, said though the programme may come with its challenges, but the challenges would be profitable while pledging the participation of the programme in its university.

Abuja-Kaduna Train: Military Secures Release of Last 23 Hostages

By
Rhoda Onuzulike
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The Seven–Man Presidential Committee assembled by the Nigerian Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor has secured the release of all the 23 remaining passengers held hostage by Boko Haram Terrorists following the attack on the Abuja to Kaduna train on the 28th of March, 2022.

This was contained in a statement signed by the Secretary, Chief of Defence Staff Action Committee, CDSAC, Professor Usman Yusuf on wednesday. He did not provide details.

According to defence official, the nation owes a debt of gratitude to the Nigerian Military under the leadership of the CDS, General Irabor who conceived and guided the operation from start to finish.

He noted that all sister Security Agencies and the Federal Ministry of Transport contributed immensely to the operation.

“The unwavering support of the President and Commander in Chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces, President Muhammadu Buhari GCFR is what made it all possible.”

Members of the Committee were grateful for the honour and privilege to be part of this Humanitarian Operation.

The government blamed the attack on Islamist insurgency Boko Haram. The attack on the Abuja-Kaduna train led to the suspension of a service that was popular with passengers who feared attacks and kidnappings by gunmen on Nigerian highways.

Nigeria’s state railway company initially said it could not account for 168 people who according to a passenger log had booked to travel on the train. Most were later traced to their homes, but 65 were confirmed missing.

The kidnappers had been releasing hostages in batches.

ASUU Drags FG To Court Over CONUA, NAMDA Registration

By
Rhoda Onuzulike
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The Academic Staff Union of Universities is set to sue the Federal Government over the registration of the Congress of Nigerian Universities Academics and the National Association of Medical and Dental Academics.

ASUU’s lawyer,  Femi Falana, said this on Channels Television, on Thursday.

The minister of labour and employment, Chris Ngige, had on Tuesday presented certificates of registration to CONUA and NAMDA.

Ngige, who spoke while presenting the certificate of registration to the two unions, explained that the two bodies will exist along aside ASUU.

ASUU had been on strike since February 14, 2022, as lecturers of public universities protest unpaid allowances and demand better welfare package from the Federal Government.

Speaking with Channels Television, the lead counsel to ASUU, Falana noted that the union would sue the Federal Government over the registration of the two unions.

“ASUU is going to court. It is going to be the NIC,” Falana said.

Former chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Professor Attahiru Jega, in an interview also accused Ngige of complicating matters.

“He took the matter to the industrial court and the decision has been appealed by ASUU and now, he has registered two unions while trying to proscribe ASUU. If this is allowed by this government, I think it is a recipe for disaster and it may really create more problems than it can solve on this matter of strike action,” Jega had said.

Russia’s military woes mount amid Ukraine attacks

By
Henry Williams
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Even as the Kremlin moved to absorb parts of Ukraine in a sharp escalation of the conflict, the Russian military suffered new defeats that highlighted its deep problems on the battlefield and opened rifts at the top of the Russian government.

The setbacks have badly dented the image of a powerful Russian military and added to the tensions surrounding an ill-planned mobilization. They have also fueled fighting among Kremlin insiders and left Russian President Vladimir Putin increasingly cornered.

Here is a look at the latest Russian losses, some of the reasons behind them and the potential consequences.

STRING OF DEFEATS IN THE NORTHEAST, SOUTH

Relying on Western-supplied weapons, Ukraine has followed up on last month’s gains in the northeastern Kharkiv region by pressing deeper into occupied areas and forcing Russian troops to withdraw from the city of Lyman, a key logistical hub.

The Ukrainian army has also unleashed a broad counteroffensive in the south, capturing a string of villages on the western bank of the Dnieper River and advancing toward the city of Kherson.

Russian rockets slam into Ukrainian city near nuclear plant

By
Henry Williams
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Seven Russian rockets slammed into residential buildings in the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia before dawn Thursday, killing one person and trapping at least five in the city close to Europe’s biggest nuclear power plant, the governor of the mostly Russian-occupied region said.

The strikes came just hours after Ukraine’s president announced that the country’s military had retaken three more villages in one of the regions illegally annexed by Russia, the latest battlefield reversal for Moscow.

Governor Oleksandr Starukh wrote on his Telegram channel that many people were rescued from the multi-story buildings, including a 3-year-old girl who was taken to a hospital for treatment. He initially reported two people were killed but later said that one woman initially thought to have died was saved by doctors.

Photos provided by emergency services showed rescuers scrambling through rubble in the wreckage of a devastated building.

Regional authorities reported another rocket attack later in the morning, but there were no immediate details of casualties or what was struck.

The deputy head of the Ukraine president’s office, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, said 10 people had been killed in the latest Russian attacks in the Dnipro, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions.

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