From Lagos State website:

The Federal Government has fumed and ordered all illegal miners across the country to immediately vacate sites or will be seriously dealt with.

The stern warning was given by the Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake, during the graduation ceremony and presentation of starter-packs to 30 graduating trainees under Batch 3 of the Ministry’s Programme on ‘Gemstone and Jewellery Master Training and Empowerment’ under the Mineral Support for Economic Diversification, MinDiver, a World Bank assisted project.

Alake said the skill acquisition programme is part of the ‘Renewed Hope’agenda of President Bola Tinubu, which Tinubu during his presidential campaign promised to create jobs massively for the youth, and this graduation is a fulfilment to it.

He also commended MinDiver for the efforts made so far to add value to the lives of Nigerians via the intensive training which was done by dedicated, experienced and committed experts for the days and weeks spent to transfer the knowledge and skills into young Nigerians who also will in turn train other Nigerians and create jobs for them in all the 774 Local Government Areas of the 36 States and the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, in order to contribute their quota to the growth and development of the economy.

He also acknowledged that the programme had earlier produced 40 Master Jewellers who were trained between 2021 and 2022, and today (Thursday) additional 30 jewellers are graduating.

He said the pioneer set of 70 Master Jewellers will be a faculty that would train would-be jewellers in the 774 local governments of Nigeria.

However, the Minister called on state governments to partner with the Ministry by sponsoring at least 10 youths per local government for training to acquire this highly profitable skills.

he also assured them that the faculty will be mobilised to any state that is ready to empower their youths to impart their technical knowledge and demonstrate the procedures for using solid minerals to embelish the beauty of our people.

The Minister of Works, David Umahi has said that the proposed Lagos 4th Mainland Bridge Supersonic Highway will make travelling from Lagos to Abuja a four-hour journey.

The Minister stated this during a visit to Ogun and Oyo states on Thursday in continuation of his highway inspection tour, according to a statement by the Director Press and Public Relations unit of the Ministry of Works, Blessing Lere-Adams on Friday.

During a meeting with the Ogun State Governor, Dapo Abiodun in his Office in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital, Umahi was quoted to have said, “Let me announce to you that Lagos proposed 4th Mainland Bridge Supersonic Highway will take four hours to drive from Lagos to Abuja.

“We had a presentation on it yesterday with the consultant and it’s going to be on Public Private Partnership (PPP), driving from Lagos to Abuja will take 4 hours, we are concluding on it within one or two months and work will start.”

He further told the Governor, “We have a programme called Highway Development Management Initiative (HDMI) and it allows states and other private investors to engage with the Federal Government either to take over a fully constructed road to toll and maintain it in partnership with FG or take a brand new road and reconstruct it and toll it under laid down agreement.

“l am very much open to that, we also bring some roads architecture into this kind of arrangement. Solar lights where we can fix CCTV to monitor our roads and increase visibility; this will largely reduce insecurity and also create service stations. We can monitor security at these service stations; we have mini clinics, toll vans at these stations just as we see outside the country.”

Also holding similar meeting with Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State in his office in Ibadan, the Minister commended Oyo government for working on Federal Roads.

“You have done quite a number of roads and you were not waiting that you must have all approval before you do it, if we are waiting for due process of refund for working on FG roads, our people will be the ones to suffer. We are excited with Governor Seyi Makinde, we as a Government has also done a number of roads” Umahi said.

The Legislative Assembly Building is the former seat of the Assembly that was ruling the tiny Territory of Norfolk Island in the South Pacific Ocean.

The building is actually located in a large walled compound which dates back from the time when the British Empire was ruling the region.

There is a series of stone Georgian buildings which were built by convicts between 1829 and 1834, and in the past they were known as the Old Military Barracks and Officer’s quarters, whereas between 1979 and 2015, it was the home of the Norfolk Island Legislative Assembly, which is today abolished by the Australian Government.

Located in what is known as the capital city of the island, Kingston, the sandstone walls from the colonial era with four rounded towers on each corner are one of the best preserved structures which can be found there.

Even though on the political front the Norfolk Island has never been part of the Commonwealth of Australia, it existed as a separate colony administered by Britain until administration was passed to Australia, which in other words means that the Australian Government was in charge of looking after and protecting the island, unlike the events that lead to the abolishment of the Assembly, and unilaterally “annexing” it on 1 July 2016.

Nowadays, only the Court House can be found on the ground floor of the main building which is two floors, however, there are ancillary buildings which were in the past officers’ outbuilding, officers’ privy, guard room, powder magazine, military hospital and wells.

Britain has experienced its eighth warmest summer since 1884 thanks to record-breaking June temperatures, the country’s national weather service said on Friday.

The Met Office said the average mean temperature during the meteorological summer season was 15.4 degrees Celsius (59.7 degrees Fahrenheit), around 0.8 C warmer than average.

It was also a wetter than average summer, however, the wettest of the ten warmest summers on record. The Met Office said provisional data showed July this year was the UK’s sixth wettest July on record.

Despite the high average temperature, the highest individual temperature recorded was 32.2 C, far below the record of 40.3 C reached last year.

Greece on Friday rescued a group of 25 migrants trapped in a wildfire which has been burning in the northeastern region of Evros for almost two weeks, authorities said.

The wildfire in Evros, Europe’s deadliest this summer, burned for a 14th day after killing at least 20 people, destroying homes and livelihoods and scorching lush forests.

All but one of the dead in the Evros fire are believed to have been migrants who crossed over from Turkey, evading police in the forest. Evros is a popular crossing into the European Union for thousands of migrants and refugees every year.

Aircraft and hundreds of firefighters battled the blaze in the Dadia Forest amid fast-changing winds on Friday.

A Reuters video showed migrants sitting on a road next to a field, with trees engulfed in thick grey smoke in the background, before authorities drove them away on an open-backed truck.

“While operating between the villages of Giannouli and Dadia, 25 people were found and taken to a safe place by the fire brigade and police,” Greek fire brigade spokesperson Ioannis Artopoios told Reuters.

The migrants were all male and said they were from Syria, Iraq and Lebanon, a police official said. The official said they were arrested.

The Copernicus Emergency Management Service said the Evros fire had ravaged at least 812.6 square kilometres (313.8 square miles), larger than New York City’s 778.2 square kilometres (300.5 square miles).

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) said at least 30% of Greece’s protected Dadia-Lefkimi-Soufli Forest had been burned.

Australia recorded its warmest winter on record, its weather bureau said on Friday ahead of a widely anticipated decision over whether to declare El Nino conditions, which typically bring hotter, drier weather.

The June-August season’s national mean temperature was 1.53 centigrade above the 1961 to 1990 average, and the highest since records began in 1910, the Bureau of Meteorology said on its website.

Winter rainfall across the country was meanwhile 4.2% below the 1961 to 1990 average, although the northern parts of Western Australia state, western Queensland and large parts of northern and eastern South Australia bucked that trend.

The end of an unseasonably hot southern hemisphere winter sets the stage for the potential declaration of El Nino. The Bureau of Meteorology has previously said the weather pattern is likely to develop between September and November.

El Nino is associated with extreme weather phenomena, from wildfires to tropical cyclones and prolonged droughts.

The World Meteorological Organization said last month the weather pattern had emerged in the tropical Pacific for the first time in seven years.

The Australian Bureau of Meteorology has so far only issued an El Nino alert, which it says has historically led to the event around 70% of the time.

The Asian financial hub of Hong Kong and the Chinese province of Guangdong cancelled hundreds of flights and evacuated nearly 800,000 people Friday as the imminent arrival of Typhoon Saola forced closures of businesses, schools and financial markets.

Packing winds of around 200 kph (125 mph), the super typhoon could make landfall late on Friday or early on Saturday in Guangdong, and rate among the five strongest to hit the populous province since 1949, authorities have warned.

Across Guangdong, 785,155 people had been evacuated from high-risk areas, while 13 cities delayed the start of the school term on Friday following the summer break.

In Hong Kong, more than 300 people were stranded at the airport by the cancellation of about 460 flights as the city of 7.5 million people raised its hurricane warning to the highest level.

“It’s very sad for me because I am not able to attend my daughter’s oath-taking,” said a tearful Ledenila Barizo, 54, who had been due to fly to the Philippines, as she paced in front of the airline desk.

The weather will deteriorate rapidly as the typhoon makes landfall, Hong Kong weather officials said, with storm surges of about 3 metres (10 feet) higher than the normal tide and maximum water levels reaching a record.

Weather authorities in China have said Saola could make landfall along the coast between the cities of Huidong and Taishan. Hong Kong and Macau lie in the centre of that stretch.

Saola is one of three tropical cyclones to have formed in the northwest Pacific Ocean and South China Sea. The second, Haikui, is approaching Taiwan, and is set to hit the island on Sunday before heading towards China’s province of Fujian.