Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, believes that it is impossible to bring development to an entire state.

He made this known when friends and political associates paid him a surprise visit, to felicitate with him and his wife, Justice Suzzette Eberechi Nyesom-Wike on his birthday at the Government House, Port Harcourt, Sunday night.

Wike said he would continue to stand on the path of truth to defend the interest of the state.

According to him, anyone who is opposed to the interest of Rivers state will never be considered a friend by him.

He used the occasion to further acknowledge God’s benevolence towards him and his family, particularly, for the privilege to become the governor of the state.

The governor said his preoccupation has always been to use every opportunity he has in public service to advance society and improve the quality of life of the people.

He dismissed insinuation that he was concentrating development in Port Harcourt, the state capital.

“I want to challenge anyone to tell me which local government that you can’t find the presence of our government. I can tell you exactly what we’re doing in each local government.

“People say all your development is in one area. I say fine, it means there’s development. However, it is concentrated in one area. I should be happy that I have come to develop part of the state. When you come too, you can develop another part of the state. No one person can develop the whole areas of the state.” the country.

The Special Assistant on Digital/New Media to President Muhammadu Buhari, Tolu Ogunlesi, has given the hint that there could be a fresh lockdown in the first quarter of 2021.

Ogunlesi gave this hint in a tweet on his handle on Monday afternoon, saying the measures will be “desperate attempts at curve-flattening”.

“From a COVID-19 POV, looks like H1 2021 will be a lot like 2020 – restrictions, lockdowns, desperate attempts at curve-flattening.

“That’s probably the second most daring roguish feat 2020 has pulled off – this act of deluding us all into regarding it as an aberration,” he wrote.

It would be recalled that Buhari ordered a lockdown across the country, earlier this year in order to stop the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic in the first quarter of 2020.

However, it appears the second wave of Coronavirus is sweeping the nation, with the number of infections rising.

On Sunday night, the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) confirmed 418 new COVID-19 infections, taking the country’s total cases to 73,175 cases.

THE Minister of Defence, Gen. Salihi Magashi (rtd), on Sunday, assured parents and relatives of the abducted students of Government Science Secondary School that rescuing their missing wards from the grasp of bandits would be a simple task

The minister, who said his optimism is predicated on reports from security agencies, stressed that the rescue mission would be accomplished ” within the next few hours.”

He gave the assurance in Katsina shortly before he led Service Chiefs to a closed-door meeting with Governor Aminu Masari.

The minister and the service chiefs were in Katsina on a sympathy visit over the abduction of the students on Friday by bandits.

Others in the entourage included the Chief of Defence Staff, the Chief of Air Staff, the Chief of Naval Staff, the Inspector-General— of Police, the DG, DSS and the DG, NIA as well as heads of security agencies in Katsina, including the Commissioner of Police.

The Defence Minister said from the briefings he was given by heads of security agencies on the ground, the rescue of the students was a matter of time.

He said, “With the brief we received from the sister security agencies in the state, this task will be very simple.

“Within the next few hours, we will ensure that these people are back without any collateral damage to the people of Katsina State we have strategised. We only need prayers.

“All hands are on deck to ensure that within the armed forces and the police the task will be accomplished.”

Governor Aminu Masari thanked the delegation for the visit, assuring that the state was making every effort to ensure the release of the students.

He said, “The children so far kidnapped cut across the state because the boarding school houses all children from all parts of the state and some even from outside the state. It (Government Science Secondary School, Kankara) has a population of 839 and so far, we are yet to account for 333 students.”

The Centre For African Liberation And Socio-Economic Rights (CALSER) has condemned the United States’ blacklist of Nigeria as a religious intolerant nation, describing the report and its intent as subjective.

According to CALSER, the U.S’ assertion is a disservice to Nigeria as it will serve to further aggravate the problems on the ground rather than help.

The centre made this known at a press conference on Friday by its Executive Director, Barrister Ehis Imoukhuede.

Contrary to claims by the United States, the CALSER said members of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN) or any other group were never prevented from worshipping in the fashion they prefer.

The centre further said that it is irresponsible to hold the Federal Government accountable for crimes committed by Boko Haram and ISWAP.

According to the group, it is misleading and unfair to infer that Boko Haram killed only Christians, adding that the classification of herdsmen as Muslims and farmers as Christians is a lazy stereotype that rings of racism.

The centre, however, advised the United States to send its mandarins to Nigeria to undertake a proper study of not just the religious relations in the country but to also understand the peculiar dynamics that do not lend themselves to the series of fallacies that made it into that report.

It added that the Nigerian government under President Muhammadu Buhari is working for the wellbeing of all Nigerians.

Read Full statement below:

The United States recently placed Nigeria on a religious freedom blacklist, in its Nigeria 2019 International Religious Freedom Report which is published on November 5, 2020. Let us state from the onset that this is a strategy for preparing the ground to impose sanctions on Nigeria if in the United States’ estimate it thinks that progress has not been made in ensuring religious freedom for the diverse ethnic nationalities of the country.

Unfortunately, the report and its intent are subjective going by what we can glean from it. For instance, the report in its executive summary said: “Throughout the year, Shia Muslims, under the auspices of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN), conducted a series of demonstrations – including several in July against the ongoing detention of IMN leader Sheikh Ibrahim El-Zakzaky – resulting in violent confrontations between protesters and security forces, which left as many as 30 dead, including protesters and police.”

Other noteworthy excerpts from the report are: “Terrorist groups including Boko Haram and ISIS-West Africa (ISIS-WA) attacked population centres and religious targets and maintained a growing ability to stage forces in rural areas and launch attacks against civilian and military targets across the North East, according to observers.”

The report further speculated that: “Conflicts between predominantly Muslim Fulani herdsmen and predominantly Christian farmers in the North Central states continued throughout the year, although the violence was lower than during the 2017-2018 spike, reportedly due to government intervention and efforts of civil society to resolve conflicts.”
Gentlemen of the press, from the foregoing you can see that the United States’ 2019 International Religious Freedom Report conclusions on Nigeria are a disservice to Nigeria because it will serve to further aggravate the problems on the ground rather than help.

First, it is inconceivable that the United States can regard security operations against IMN as a denial of religious freedom. No one prevented IMN members from worshipping in the fashion they prefer to the extent that they also respect the rights of other people, for instance, the right of others to have access to public infrastructures like the roads that its members usually obstruct. The reality is that IMN is a proscribed group based on constitutionally recognized processes, which included a White Paper on the Kaduna State Judicial Panel of Inquiry. The trial of its leader is by a competent court of Kaduna State, which leaves one wondering if the United States will tolerate Nigeria meddling into matters being handled by its circuit courts.

Secondly, it is a travesty that borders on being irresponsible to hold the Federal Government accountable for crimes committed by Boko Haram and ISWAP, which the United States and its media organizations have refused to properly designate as terrorist groups operating in the Lake Chad Basin. This refusal to so classify Boko Haram has been behind the absence of international support to eradicate it from operating in the region.

If Boko Haram’s crimes are being imputed to Nigeria, then the United States must accept joint responsibility as the nation that created the atmosphere that allowed these terrorists to thrive and torment Nigerians of all religious shades. The US’ activities in the Middle East and North Africa supported the growth of ISIS brand of terrorism and also flooded those areas with weapons that have found their way into the hands of Boko Haram terrorists.

We must not also lose sight of the fact that it is misleading and unfair to infer that Boko Haram killed only Christians or killed more Christians. Boko Haram kill Nigerians and the loss of any human life is a tragedy. Boko Haram bombed mosques and killed Muslims, Christians, Animist, Agnostics and Atheists all alike. Reducing the acts of terror being committed by Boko Haram to a sectarian debate is an irresponsible act that should not be encouraged.

Similarly, classifying herdsmen as Muslims and farmers as Christians is a lazy stereotype that rings of racism. It is in the same territory as Americans referring to Africa as a country when it is in reality a continent. The lack of Nigeria’s sectarian appreciation on the part of the US report is a major reason to discard its findings.
Furthermore, we observe that the report significantly relied on secondary sources like “news reports”.

Unfortunately, these reports that the report relied on were dominated by fake news and organizations that are involved in the manufacture of dissent. Some of the organizations that were cited were at some points in the past found complicit in sharing military intelligence with Boko Haram, which leaves us to question the reliability of what they passed on as news or facts. Some of the individuals that these organizations cited or interview are also questionable.

It is pertinent that the United States send its mandarins to Nigeria to undertake a proper study of not just the religious relations in the country but to also understand the peculiar dynamics that do not lend themselves to the series of fallacies that made it into that report.

The US must know not to act on fake news as this detracts from its global standing.

We want to categorically tell the United States that the Nigerian government under President Muhammadu Buhari is working for the wellbeing of all Nigerians. The military is fighting Boko Haram as the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and that is because the life of every Nigerian is considered important.

If the US is interested in intervening, we believe that it should start by not paying lips service to issues of Boko Haram, ISWAP and other terrorist entities that thrive because of its geostrategic activities like supporting al-Nusra affiliates in Syria, which in turn ship their US-supplied weapons to Boko Haram and ISWAP.