We are on the trail of the abductors of Kagara students – Army
Senate confirms Adolphus as Auditor-General of the Federation
The Senate on Wednesday at plenary confirmed President Muhammadu Buhari’s nominee Mr Aghughu Adolphus, for appointment as Auditor-General for the Federation.
The confirmation was sequel to the presentation and consideration of a report of the Committee on Public Accounts by the Chairman, Sen. Urhoghide Mathew (PDP-Edo).
Urhoghide in his presentation, said that the committee after screening, found the nominee qualified to be appointed, given his experiences, pedigree and performance over the years at the Audit House.
He said the nominee when he appeared before the committee, was clearly told that the Senate and the nation expect him to justify the confidence reposed in him.
He said the screening of the nominee clearly showed that the nominee displayed competence on matters of audit and public finance.
He said his responses on issues of audit and public finance were satisfactory and beyond the expectations of the committee.
He said that the nominee has sufficient experience to occupy the office of the Auditor-General for the Federation, if eventually confirmed by the Senate.
“Consequently, the committee, having been satisfied on his qualifications, performance and suitability of the nominee recommends him for confirmation by the Senate as Auditor-General for the Federation,” he said.
Senate President, Ahmed Lawan, in his remarks, after the confirmation, said the National Assembly and the executive are to ensure that the auditor-general remains truly autonomous and independent.
“We have achieved so much by giving the auditor –general the financial autonomy which he requires, but I think we can do better as a government.
“The Audit House is still not a befitting headquarters for the office of the Auditor-General for the Federation.
“The auditor-general needs office accommodation, like the Treasury House, like the EFCC office complex, where it can accommodate all its staff to carry out their auditing jobs.
“A situation where the audit staff are resident in the organisations where they should audit is unacceptable, so we need to do a lot more to support the Auditor-General for the Federation to be more effective and efficient.”
‘Wildly unfair’: UN boss says 10 nations used 75% of all vaccines
The United Nations chief has sharply criticised the “wildly uneven and unfair” distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, pointing out that just 10 countries have administered 75 percent of all vaccinations.
Addressing a high-level meeting of the UN Security Council on Wednesday, Antonio Guterres said 130 countries have not received a single dose of vaccine.
“At this critical moment, vaccine equity is the biggest moral test before the global community,” he said.
Guterres called for an urgent Global Vaccination Plan to bring together those with the power to ensure fair vaccine distribution – scientists, vaccine producers and those who can fund the effort – to ensure all people in every nation get inoculated as soon as possible.
The secretary-general further called on the world’s leading economic powers in the Group of 20 to establish an emergency task force that should have the capacity to bring together “the pharmaceutical companies and key industry and logistics actors”.
Guterres said a meeting on Friday of the Group of Seven top industrialised nations “can create the momentum to mobilise the necessary financial resources”.
Reporting from the UN headquarters, Al Jazeera’s diplomatic editor James Bays said there was a broad agreement over the potential future problems in the fight against the pandemic due to the uneven distribution of vaccines.
“Rich countries are vaccinating people but many other parts of the world are not. You’re never going to get rid of COVID-19 if you have it spreading in some parts of the world and potentially mutating, and potentially in the future making vaccines not work,” Bays said.
“Less than 1 percent of COVID-19 vaccines so far globally have been administered in the 32 countries currently facing the most severe humanitarian crises.”
Call for ceasefires
UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, whose country holds the Security Council presidency this month, urged the UN’s most powerful body to adopt a resolution calling for ceasefires in conflict zones to allow the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines.
The UK said more than 160 million people are at risk of being excluded from coronavirus vaccinations because they live in countries engulfed in conflict and instability, including Yemen, Syria, South Sudan, Somalia and Ethiopia.
“Humanitarian organisations and UN agencies need the full backing of the council to be able to carry out the job we are asking them to do,” said Barbara Woodward, the UK’s ambassador to the UN.
Woodward said ceasefires have previously been used to carry out vaccinations, pointing to a two-day pause in fighting in Afghanistan in 2001 that enabled 35,000 health workers and volunteers to vaccinate 5.7 million children below the age of five against polio.
Thirteen ministers were scheduled to address the meeting on improving access to COVID-19, including new United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
On Tuesday, Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard said Mexico would stress the importance of equal access for all countries to COVID-19 vaccines at the council meeting.
He was sharply critical that countries where vaccines are produced have high vaccination rates, while Latin American countries have problems obtaining any jabs.
The World Health Organization’s COVAX programme, an ambitious project to buy and deliver coronavirus vaccines for the world’s poorest people, has already missed its goal of beginning vaccination in poor countries at the same time that shots were rolled out in rich countries.
Numerous developing countries have rushed in recent weeks to sign their private deals to buy vaccines, unwilling to wait for COVAX.
Woodward said the UK supports reserving 5 percent of COVAX doses as a “last resort” buffer to ensure that high-risk populations have access to COVID-19 vaccines.
The coronavirus has officially infected more than 109 million people and killed at least 2.4 million of them. But many countries have not yet started vaccination programmes and even rich nations are facing shortages of vaccine doses as manufacturers struggle to ramp up production.
Ops Tura Takaibango: Troops Eliminate More BHT/ISWAP Terrorists; Destroy their meeting point in Yobe State.
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Bandits are undefeatable, grant them amnesty – Zamfara PDP lawmakers tell governors
Lawmakers from Zamfara State in the in the upper and lower legislative Chambers in the National Assembly on Wednesday called on governors of North West Nigeria to grant amnesty to repentant bandits and other criminal elements, if there must be lasting peace.
The Zamfara lawmakers caucus who are of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) said negotiation and dialogue with bandits cannot be out of place in the obvious failed bid to defeat them through forceful approach.
They said Zamfara State governor, Hon. Bello Matawalle used the approach and it worked, hence, they said, “carrot and dagger’ approach remain the best option, which was being recommended to other States in order to achieve peace in the troubled zone.
Leader of Zamfara National Assembly caucus, Senator Ya’u Shahabi who led other lawmakers at a world press conference in Abuja explained that there was relative peace in Zamfara State now because the State governor toed the part of peace when he invited bandits to a negotiation table that eventually led to the laid down of arms by the bandits.
The lawmakers said, insecurity in Zamfara State was not the creation of the present administration, noting that it had lingered for eleven years until it grew into a full blown banditry, kidnapping and rape of citizens, lamenting that the previous administration didn’t defeat them because it never contemplated amnesty option.
They argued that amnesty was the way to go because it afford the State government to put in place infrastructure and address those things that forced them into criminality.
Shahabi said: “The insecurity in the State had assumed a dangerously galloping dimension prior to the assumption of office of Rt. Hon. Bello Matawalle as governor.
“This was in clear recognition that something new needed to be deployed, wisdom came into bear and governor opted for the carrot and dagger approach in dealing with this brand of crime that was fast growing at a geometric progression.
“The carrot approach was to dialogue with repentant bandits with a view to reintegrate them into the society, while the dagger approach was to ensure that the unrepentant bandits face the full wrath of law.
Reacting to concerns that some of these bandits and.ceiminal elements are foreigners, the caucus leader explained that foreigners among them might not be granted amnesty, which said, depended on the situation at hand.
They believed that peace in Zamfara would be sustained through the provision of modern cattle rearing facilities which the governor has put in place for the repentant cattle rustlers and other criminal elements.
In addressing the challenge, lawmakers said, governor Matawalle looked at it from a transhuman angle, and rolled out measures which they claimed worked well.
“The governor taught it wise to roll out other measures that would address the real causes of cattle rustling which metamorphosed into full banditry.
“To this end, the Governor quickly propose to establishment of one Rural Grazing Area (RUGA) in each of three Senatorial districts of the State with modern facilities that would usher in a 21st century method of cattle rearing and product development.”
‘In COVID I bought my third jet’ – Apostle Johnson Suleman boasts
"I was praying for Covid not to end
,While people were complaining, my wife asked me can life be this sweet?"
One of the most destructive pandemic in our lifetime shouldn't end cos you want to enjoy more wealth… Hmmmm pic.twitter.com/Y0S9OsteLp— Wale Gates (@walegates) February 16, 2021
Future Assured, North East Region Coordinator, Congratulates Hajiya Aisha Buhari At 50
North East Coordinator, Future Assured, the pet project of Nigeria’s first lady, Hajiya Dr Aisha Buhari has sent a message of congratulations on her 50th Birthday.
The Coordinator who doubles as Borno Commissioner Women Affairs, Social Development, Hajiya Zuwaira Gambo said her contributions to the advancement of women, children and the vulnerable in the society is immeasurable.
She commended the Nigerian First Lady for her exceptional attention to the North East as well as the entire Nation in the area of Health, Education and social services along with people with special needs.
Her golden age, according Hajiya Zuwaira Gambo laced with her records of charitable and empowerment instincts, will be enough opportunity for God to grant her more years of service to the people.
She wished the wife of the President, Dr Aisha Buhari many more years on earth, so as to encourage and attract more social services to the downtrodden in the society.
Breaking: Obinwanne Okeke sentenced to 10 years in jail in US
A court in Norfolk, Virginia, United States on Tuesday jailed Nigerian scammer Obinwanne Okeke 10 years for computer-based fraud scheme that caused approximately $11 million in known losses to his victims.
The sentencing was pronounced by Chief U.S. District Judge Rebecca Beach Smith, said the Department of Justice, Eastern District of Virginia.
“Through subterfuge and impersonation, Obinwanne Okeke engaged in a multi-year global business email and computer hacking scheme that caused a staggering $11 million in losses to his victims,” said Raj Parekh, Acting U.S. Attorney for the district.
“Today’s sentence further demonstrates EDVA’s and FBI’s worldwide reach in vigorously pursuing justice on behalf of American victims and others and holding international cybercriminals accountable, no matter where they commit their crimes.”
According to court documents, Obinwanne Okeke, 33, operated a group of companies known as the Invictus Group based in Nigeria and elsewhere.
From approximately 2015 to 2019, Okeke and others engaged in a conspiracy to conduct various computer-based frauds.
The conspirators obtained and compiled the credentials of hundreds of victims, including victims in the Eastern District of Virginia.
As part of the scheme, Okeke and other conspirators engaged in an email compromise scheme targeting Unatrac Holding Limited, the export sales office for Caterpillar heavy industrial and farm equipment.
In April 2018, a Unatrac executive fell prey to a phishing email that allowed conspirators to capture login credentials.
The conspirators sent fraudulent wire transfer requests and attached fake invoices. Okeke participated in the effort to victimize Unatrac through fraudulent wire transfers totaling nearly $11 million, which was transferred overseas.
Additionally, Okeke engaged in other forms of cyberfraud, including sending phishing emails to capture email credentials, creating fraudulent web pages, and causing other losses to numerous victims.
“The FBI will not allow cyber criminals free reign in the digital world to prey on U.S. companies,” said Brian Dugan, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Norfolk Field Office. “This sentencing demonstrates the FBI’s commitment to working with our partners at the Department of Justice and our foreign counterparts to locate cyber criminals across the globe and bring them to the United States to be held accountable.”
Raj Parekh, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, and Brian Dugan, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Norfolk Field Office, made the announcement after sentencing by Chief U.S. District Judge Rebecca Beach Smith.