Governor Zulum has gifted N5m to Borno indigene who fabricated ‘hand tractor’.
Ijaw Communities Protest School Teachers’ Shortage
The Ijaw communities in Delta State have protested the shortage of teachers in their community schools, calling on Governor Ifeanyi Okowa to as a matter of urgency absorb community teachers.
The protesters who carried placards of different inscriptions barricaded the Government House’s gate and urged the government to incorporate the community teachers into the state workforce.
Speaking on behalf of the protesters, the President of Ijaw Elite Forum, Ganagana Francis, stated that the reason for the peaceful demonstration was to set the educational standards in riverine communities.
Ganagana decried the dearth of teaching staff in riverine communities, saying that in most schools in urban areas there were over 130 teachers in a school but only a principal and a teacher could be seen in riverine areas.
He called on the government to employ the community teachers that were being paid by the PTA in order to improve the standard of education in the areas.
Other representatives of the various concerned riverine communities who spoke at the protest said many schools in the riverine areas do not have more than two or three teachers who were employed by the state government.
“We are calling on the state government to consider our community teachers and ensure they are incorporated into the state workforce.
“For the state government to impact positively on the children of riverine communities in the area of driving its educational policy, government needed to employ the community teachers, since they understood the terrain much better,” the representatives said.
Addressing the protesters, the state Chairman of Post-Primary Education Board, Christiana Etaluku, said she had already informed the State Governor on the importance of considering community teachers in the recruitment exercise.
She assured the community that the board would intensify monitoring of teachers in riverine areas as part of strategy to ensure that teachers in the areas took their job seriously.
Hanifa Murder: Kano High Court Sentences Principal Suspect To Death
The Kano State High Court on Thursday sentenced the Proprietor of Nobel Kids Academy and North West Preparatory School, Abdulmalik Tanko, the principal suspect who masterminded the kidnap and killing of 5-year-old school girl, Hanifa Abubakar, to death.
The Presiding Judge, Justice Usman Na’abba, sentenced him to death by hanging while delivering his judgment on Thursday.
Austin Umahi Rejects Buhari’s Appointment On Grounds Of Social Status
The immediate younger brother to Ebonyi state Governor, Mr Austin Umahi has rejected President Muhammadu Buhari’s appointment as the Secretary of Revenue Mobilization Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC)
He said the appointment was not for a person of his social status. In a statement issued in Abakaliki, Umahi said that the appointment was good for job seekers or retired civil servants and not for someone of his social status.
He announced that anyone who is interested in the position should contact the Governor because as far as he is concerned, the position was still vacant.
He said: “Let me deeply appreciate each and every one of you that sent his or her congratulatory message and numerous calls for my appointment as the RAMFC Secretary.
“I am honestly humbled by this show of love, however I regret to inform you that I declined the appointment because it is at best for job seekers or retired civil servants or better still anyone who loves the job and secondly, I am convinced that at my age and work experience it is not in doubt that I know what I want in life”.
“Please if you are interested in the position do not hesitate to approach our indefatigable governor to do the needful because as far as I am concerned the position is still vacant. Thanks and God bless”.
Austin Umahi who emerged as the candidate of the All Progressives Congress withdrew from the race for Governor Umahi.
However, INEC refused to accept the senior Umahi’s candidacy for the position forcing him to sue INEC.
The court however agreed that INEC was right to refuse to publish his name as the candidate of the party as the second primary which he won did not follow the stipulations of the electoral act.
The court ordered a fresh primary election within 14 days.
Commonwealth Games: Birmingham Set For Thursday’s Opening Ceremony
Over the next 12 days, Birmingham will welcome 72 teams and about 6,500 athletes and officials to compete in the biggest sporting programme in Commonwealth Games’ history.
For the first time at a major multi-sport event, there will be more medal events for women than men – 136-134.
There are also a record 42 Para-sports events at the Games.
The opening ceremony takes place at Alexander Stadium on Thursday from 21:00hours
The live action gets under way on Friday and among the new sports to be showcased are women’s Twenty20 cricket, three-on-three basketball and mixed synchronised swimming.
It is due to be the best-attended Games with 1.2m tickets already sold.
The action will take place in 15 venues across the West Midlands with one – track cycling – at the Lee Valley velodrome in London.
British Olympic stars Laura Kenny and Adam Peaty will race in cycling and swimming events for England, while Geraint Thomas, who finished third in the Tour de France, rides for Wales as the home nations countries compete individually.
Jamaican sprint superstar Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, fresh from her 100m world title, will attempt to add individual Commonwealth gold to her glittering collection.
Ariarne Titmus, who did the 400m-800m freestyle double at the Tokyo Olympics, will compete in the pool for Australia.
Bermuda’s Olympic triathlon champion Flora Duffy is expected to vie with England’s Georgia Taylor-Brown in the women’s race.
A modern Games with familiar forces at work
New names will emerge and new ideas will be floated as well.
At the end of the Games, in Birmingham’s International Convention Centre, Commonwealth nations will battle it out in a pilot event.
After 10 days of in-person action though, the pitches will be virtual and the battlegrounds out in cyberspace.
It is expected that there will be something more familiar about the medal table’s final look.
On home soil four years ago, Australia topped the standings with 80 gold medals and 198 trips to the podium in all. England were a distant second with 45 golds, ahead of India and Canada with 26 and 15 respectively.
Wales will hope to build on 2018 when they enjoyed their most successful Commonwealth Games with 10 golds.
Laura Muir and Duncan Scott, world and Olympic medallists in athletics and swimming respectively, lead a Scotland team with aspirations to go better than the nine golds they picked up on the Gold Coast.
A Commonwealth with less in common
Once all the duels are done and the medals dished out though, the biggest question will be whether Birmingham – Europe’s youngest city with nearly 40% of its population aged 25 or under – has injected new life into an old concept.
The Commonwealth Games began life in 1930 as the British Empire Games. Now, the legacy of Britain’s Victorian-era expansion and exploitation is coming under scrutiny.
In March, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge were warmly welcomed to Jamaica, which celebrates 60 years of independence on 6 August, by Fraser-Pryce and double Olympic champion Elaine Thompson-Herah. But the country’s Prime Minister Andrew Holness was clear that he wants to remove the Queen as head of state. And soon.
The sounds of protest mixed with welcome during that royal visit. It could continue during the Games.
In the years since 1930, the Commonwealth and the Games have evolved into something different and distinct from Empire. Competing in Birmingham, will be athletes from Rwanda and Mozambique, two nations that were never part of the Empire.
A 65-strong Barbados team will take part in their first Commonwealth Games since the Caribbean nation replaced the Queen as its head of state in 2020.
Sports Minister Nigel Huddleston accepts that the world around the Commonwealth Games is changing, but says their relevance endures.
“The Commonwealth still has resonance and value, particularly in a diverse city like Birmingham where there’s a lot of people who have come from the Commonwealth,” he said.
“It does have meaning. It might not be what it was in the past, but it’s evolving and changing, and that focus on values and what can unite us is key.”
The Games will need to keep evolving, not just to out-run history, but also to keep pace with the present.
The first Games, staged in Hamilton, Canada, promised to be “free from the excessive stimulus and the babel [sic] of the international stadium”.
“They should be merrier and less stern, and will substitute the stimulus of novel adventure for the pressure of international rivalry,”
Space in the sporting calendar is more squeezed now than it was a century ago though – the World Athletics Championships finished on Sunday, the cricket season is in full swing and the Premier League football season starts on 5 August.
Is there still room for “merry” sport when grudges and spats sell seats and subscriptions? Can any stimulus be “excessive” in a world of competing bells, whistles and screens?
Birmingham will need all its verve and energy and every star to shine bright.
If it does, then it could prove there is still a place for a curious, and unique slice of sporting competition.
Botswana Hits Historic Goal Against HIV
Botswana has become the second nation in the world, after Eswatini, to reach a landmark goal towards eradicating AIDS, in what health experts hailed as “stellar results”.
The country has met the so-called “95-95-95” target on HIV diagnosis, treatment and viral suppression several years early, according to a study published ahead of a global conference on HIV/AIDS
About one in five people in Botswana live with the virus — one of the highest rates in the world — according to the UN AIDS agency. The goal was for 95 per cent of HIV-positive people to know their status, 95 per cent of those diagnosed on medication and 95 per cent of those under treatment to show signs that the virus is being suppressed in their blood by 2025.
But the study led by Botswana’s health ministry found the country had already met or surpassed all three thresholds, with a 95-98-98 score. The global average in 2020 was 84-87-90, UNAIDS says.
“Botswana is making historic new progress against HIV,” Sharon Lewin, president-elect of the International AIDS Society (IAS), told a virtual press briefing presenting the results.
The country is “well positioned to end its HIV epidemic by 2030. To put it simply, these are really stellar results.”
Madisa Mine, the study’s lead author and a Botswana government virologist, said the results were encouraging.
“We have translated a hopeless situation into a situation where now there is hope,” he said.
Now both the government and people on medication could look forward to Botswana one day becoming an AIDS-free country, Mine added.
That was a far cry from when he started working on the disease two decades ago, and it seemed the nation was “facing extinction” due to the high number of infections.
Kwara State To Establish Waste Recycling Plant
Kwara State Commissioner for Environment, Mrs Remilekun Banigbe
Commissioner for Environment, Mrs Remilekun Banigbe, made this known during an interview in Ilorin, the state capital.
She said the state government planned a Public Private Partnership (PPP) in which an interested group would manage the recycling aspect of waste generated in the state.
Banigbe further said that a professional would be engaged, just like someone who recently showed interest in recycling waste in the state.
“We talked about how he will set up a recycling plant, as some of them already have the plan to do so.
“Some go into plastic recycling, while others are into cardboard recycling, because the dump site cannot be left like that, as it is supposed to be an asset and not liability,” she said.
The commissioner said that the state government has a lot to do in order to transform waste to wealth and waste to energy.
“We plan to partner with reliable professionals very soon, as some scavengers are already visiting dump sites to pick valuable items and sell to generate money for themselves,” she said.
Banigbe recalled that the ministry had a meeting with some people who worked at dump sites, though they did not remit anything to the state, but specialised in the business for their daily income.
“We spoke on the security challenges associated with scavengers, especially at this crucial time, when some people disguise as scavengers to steal and commit various offences.
“We were made to understand that each scavenger has those they work with and they could be easily identified.
“Also, the scavengers recognised themselves well and so when they see new faces they will boldly challenge them and may even raise alarm,” she said.
The commissioner further said that they have partnered with security agencies to caution scavengers from misbehaving.
“Civil Defence and Police have been very helpful in curbing the excesses of scavengers and they have arrested some of them on different occasions for committing crimes.
“Many communities have also been proactive in stopping the scavengers from moving freely in their areas, through local vigilantes and voluntary service, except for those that they had known in the business,” she said.
Banigbe assured that when the state eventually has a recycling plant, some of the scavengers would be employed and it would also provide employment opportunity for more people in the state.
Saudi Prince To Sign Deal With Greece For ‘Cheaper Energy’
Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman announced upcoming bilateral projects on a visit to Greece Tuesday, including a power cable between both countries to provide Europe with “cheaper renewable energy”.
Prince Mohammed landed in Greece on Tuesday on his first Europe trip since the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi and is set to head to France later in the week.
At a press conference with Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis in the capital Athens Prince Mohammed commented at the historical opportunities between the two countries. This would include linking electricity grids to “provide Greece and southwest Europe through Greece with… much cheaper renewable energy,” he added.
The Greek foreign ministry said agreements on maritime transport, energy and defence technology among other things were due to be signed on Wednesday.
The crown prince got international condemnation for the October 2018 killing of Khashoggi’s and by Saudi agents in the kingdom’s Istanbul consulate.
Prince Mohammed’s trip to Europe comes less than two weeks after US President Joe Biden visited the Saudi city of Jeddah for a summit of Arab leaders and met one-on-one with the prince, greeting him with a fist bump.
That move sealed Biden’s retreat from a presidential election campaign pledge to turn the kingdom into a “pariah” over the Khashoggi affair and wider human rights controversies.
US intelligence agencies determined that Prince Mohammed, Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, had “approved” the operation that led to Khashoggi’s death, though Riyadh denies this, blaming rogue operatives.
Prince Mohammed’s stay in Europe represents a “highly symbolic move past his post-Khashoggi isolation”, said Kristian Ulrichsen, a research fellow at the Baker Institute at Rice University.
“While there has not been any formal coordination of policy in the ‘West’ against Mohammed bin Salman since 2018, the fact is that he has not visited any European or North American country since Khashoggi’s killing,” Ulrichsen said.
Prince Mohammed has also received a recent boost from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who visited Saudi Arabia in April, then welcomed Prince Mohammed in Ankara in June.
Erdogan had enraged the Saudis by vigorously pursuing the Khashoggi case, opening an investigation and briefing international media about the lurid details of the killing.
But with ties on the mend, an Istanbul court halted the trial in absentia of 26 Saudi suspects linked to Khashoggi’s death, transferring the case to Riyadh in April.
Russia – Ukraine triggered a spike in energy prices earlier this year, Saudi Arabia came under pressure from the United States and European powers to pump more oil.
Elevated oil prices have been a key factor in inflation in the US soaring to 40-year highs, putting pressure on the Biden administration ahead of mid-term elections later this year.
But the world’s biggest crude exporter has resisted pressure to open the supply taps, citing its commitment to production schedules determined by the OPEC+ exporting bloc it co-leads with Russia.
In May, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan stated that the kingdom had done what it could for the oil market.
Nitrogen Emissions Plan: Protesting Dutch Farmers Dump Manure, Garbage On Roads
Dutch farmers protested government plans to reduce nitrogen emissions by dumping manure and garbage Wednesday on highways and setting fires alongside roads — the latest actions in a summer of discontent. Police urged them to stop for safety reasons and were investigating who was responsible.
Traffic authorities said several roads in the central and eastern Netherlands were completely or partially blocked by the early morning blockades and fire services rushed to clear roads as traffic built up. Cleanup operations were expected to take hours on some roads.
By the end of the day, some roads were still not cleared, in part because some companies involved in the cleanup had received threats, said Diederik Fleuren, a spokesman for the the government’s roads and waterways organization Rijkswaterstaat.
“We are doing everything to clear the roads but … some contractors are being intimidated,” Fleuren told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. He said it was not clear when all the roads would be fully cleaned.
“It is very extreme now that people are being threatened” for assisting the cleanup, he added.
Dutch media reported that at one location, a sign was left behind that said: “Sorry for the inconvenience, Rutte IV is driving us to despair,” a reference to Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s coalition government.
Police and security authorities appealed to farmers to halt what they described as dangerous situations.
“Protesting is a fundamental right and as long as it stays within the limits of the law, a lot is possible,” the emergency services said in a joint statement. But they said the latest actions “seriously endanger road safety and can lead to life-threatening situations for road users.”
The latest demonstrations came a day after a government-appointed mediator sent invitations to farmers’ organizations to discuss with the country’s ruling coalition ways of reducing nitrogen emissions.
German Government Reduces Incentives To Buy Electric Cars
The German government plans to reduce incentive payments for buyers of electric cars and end subsidies for buying plug-in hybrids at the end of this year.
The government had announced shortly after taking office in December that, starting in 2023, it would only provide payments for electric vehicles that demonstrably have a positive climate-protection effect.
At present, buyers of electric-only cars are eligible for government incentives of up to 6,000 Euros ($6,100) and people who buy plug-in hybrids can get up to 4,500 Euros ($4,570).
The economy and climate ministry said the number of electric cars on the road is rising fast, with the total expected to near 2 million this year. They “are becoming ever more popular and will need no state subsidies in the foreseeable future,” Minister Robert Habeck said.
Starting in January, government incentives for electric and fuel-cell cars will be cut to 4,500 Euros apiece for vehicles with a list price up to 40,000 Euros and to 3,000 Euros ($3,045) for cars costing 40,000-65,000 Euros.
Beginning in September next year, the incentives will be limited to private individuals, although the government is considering allowing small businesses and charitable organizations to remain eligible.
Starting in January 2024, the government incentives will be cut to 3,000 Euros for vehicles priced up to 45,000 Euros and scrapped for more expensive cars.
The funding will also be capped. Finance Minister Christian Lindner said Wednesday that the government incentives will end when a final 2.5 billion Euros is exhausted and after that, only tax advantages for buying climate-friendly cars will remain.
The government wants to have at least 15 million fully electric cars on the road by 2030. It also aims to step up efforts against climate change by expanding the use of renewable energy and bringing Germany’s exit from coal-fired power forward from 2038, “ideally” to 2030.
