How We Snatched SUV from Pastor – Robbers

A three-man armed robbery gang has revealed how it robbed a pastor, Mr. Gboyega Akerele, of his Sports Utility Vehicle in Awule area of Akure, Ondo State, on April 20, 2012.

The three robbery suspects are Ibukun Olaoluwa, Adeyemi Adedoyin and Bolaji Kazeem. They confessed to robbing Akerele of his Toyota Highlander car.

They were paraded by the Osun State Commissioner of Police, Mrs. Kalafite Adeyemi, on Friday, at the police headquarters, Oke-Fia,  Osogbo.

Kazeem explained that they forced the pastor’s SUV to stop by deliberately ramming their motorcycle into its rear.

He said they ordered the pastor and his wife out of the vehicle after the wife came out to inspect the extent of damage done by the motorcycle.

The police commissioner said the tracking device  installed in the car helped them to track it from Akure in Ondo State to Ikirun, Osun State, where it was intercepted by the police.

Akerele said, “I was returning home from a function; it was around 10pm and I was on my street when a motorcycle bumped into my car from the rear.

My wife got out to see the extent of damage and I just saw one young man pointing a gun at me. He demanded for the car keys and I gave it to him. The three of them entered into the car and sped off.”

Managing Director of the firm that installed the tracking device, Mr. Olumuyiwa Oke, said his firm began to track the vehicle as soon as it was reported stolen.

He said, “When we were called that the car had been stolen, we looked into our system and saw that it was moving at 165kmph through Akure-Ilesa Expressway.

“We tracked them till they got to Gbongan when we alerted the police. We decided to shut the car down in Ikire, where the police arrested them.

“We waited till they got to Gbongan because we want the police to get easy access to them. It would have been difficult for the police to get them if we shut the car down in a remote area.”

Oke advised vehicle owners to fix trackers in their vehicles for easy recovery in case of theft.

Culled from The Punch.

RhemDy: Ramsey Noah Retires From Acting

RhemDy: Ramsey Noah Retires From Acting: Screen lover-man and Nigerian enterprising actor, Ramsey Noah has announced his retirement from playing active role in Nollywood after...

Ramsey Noah Retires From Acting

Screen lover-man and Nigerian enterprising actor, Ramsey Noah has announced his retirement from playing active role in Nollywood after almost two decades in the industry.

He said he has to quit the industry that gave him fame because he has reached the pinnacle and that it was high time he left the movie industry with good legacies.

“I think I’ve had my fair share. To my fans and loved ones, I know they’ll always want to see me on screen, but as they say, it’s best to leave when the ovation is loudest. I want to leave a very strong legacy,” Noah said.

“I believe I have left a very strong imprint in that line. There’s no possible way you can mention ‘Nollywood’ without mentioning Ramsey Noah.” He restated that he would only like to be involved with movies that are poised to take the industry to another level and tofocus on working behind the scenes,” he restated.

Giving an insight into the next phase for the retiring actor, he said, “I started a project at one point in time, but due to circumstances I wasn’t able to see it through, so it didn’t see the light of day, but I’m working on that now and getting the resources together,” Ramsey explained.

He featured in many movies including Figurine which won him the 2010 AMAA award as best actor with the leading role he played in the movie. He explained that he would continue to play passive roles behind the scene in the movie industry.

Libya Outlaws Religious, Tribal or Ethnic Parties

As Libya prepares for elections in June, the National Transitional Council announced ban on religious, tribal or ethnic based political parties.

Laws Nos. 29 and 30 on the organisation of parties were approved by the NTC at a meeting in Tripoli which also stops parties from receiving any foreign funding.

The legislation is one of the laws required to be put in place by government to set the electoral process in motion. Out of 200 seats in the National Congress, political parties will contest for 80 seats while individual candidates would contest for the rest 120 seats.

The election will hold on June 19, 2012.

The ban was announced by Mohammed al-Harizy, NTC spokesman who explained that the council passed the law governing the formation of political parties on Tuesday evening.

"Parties are not allowed to be based on religion or ethnicity or tribe," he stressed.

However, he did not clarify on the effects of the new law on Libya’s Muslim Brotherhood, which was formed in March and perceived to be a leading contender for June election.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s Justice and Construction Party launched on 3 March is led by Mohammed Sawan. The party has been perceived to have strong religious affiliation, although it claimed to be open to both members from the Brotherhood and non-Brotherhood alike. 

Other parties that could find themselves in face-off with the new law include the National Party formed by Abdul-Hakim Belhaj, leader of Tripoli Military Council and a former commander of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group in Afghanistan.

The party has backing of notable Islamic cleric, Ali Sallabi, and openly canvassed for an Islamic agenda as contained in its declaration during its launching on April 16.

“The aim of the party is to preserve the identity of Libya as a Muslim country,” coordinator Mohammed Ghula said.

The Reform and Development party set up by religious leaders in Benghazi is likely to face limitations.

Political analysts predict the Muslim Brotherhood is likely to emerge as the most structured political party in the post Ghaddafi Libya.

Libya is one of the Arab countries that witnessed the Arab Springs which swept away leaders of Tunisia, Egypt and Morocco. The battle to oust Ghaddafi climaxed on October 20, 2011 when he was killed, ending the nine month armed struggle to overthrow him.

Oil-rich Libya was ruled for 42 years by Ghaddafi and his family. 

Asset in Youthfulness

As I was thinking of what it would look like adding values to my peers across the globe, I had these feelings that values are fast fading and this piece might not receive same welcoming perspective globally.

However, the first thought that struck me was the truth that our views notwithstanding, there is a leveler to all human existence and that is the reality of time. We may have the grace of looking back and appreciate how much of time we have invested rightly or wrongly as we aspire to reach some goals set in our early years.

Except we can premise what we have been able to achieve along the path of pressure of peers or even our family which of course is still  subject or should be subject to our natural potentials, we may have some natural resentment against how much time we discovered have been wasted doing the wrong things.

So, we have to deeply reflect on our time and understand what has to be done so that we may be able to measure our development in terms of career, achievements and possibly spirituality and be glad that certain things have been done rightly. The best way to prove that is through confidence of fulfillment; not even material or financial accumulation.

As young people, all over the world, we live in a very challenging time. Values are getting eroded, the planet in which we live is facing a very deep threat through climate change and global warming. The career challenges are enormous; roles of the genders are getting swapped and the social tension is becoming so alarming.

The youth of today is existing in a very combative time. There are reasons to panic everywhere because of violent agitations across the globe. Africa is getting increasingly finding itself in difficult situation. Nigeria is going through series of terror that was unknown to it before 2009, Mali just witnessed a coup d’etat. Arab is settling down from the perilous Arab Spring while Syria is still deep into it. Europe witnessed massive street protests; there are panic of natural disasters everywhere.

In all these, the youth is at the center. Most of the man-made threats and destructive tendencies cannot be achieved by any despot except with the consent of the youth. Hence the need to prick our conscience and alert our peers on the dangers inherent in choosing the bad path which might get us distracted, leaving us with regrets; some with endless pains, deformation, psychological imbalance or even death. 

The time of a youth according to this piece is assumed to be between age 18 and 45. This age bracket places immense pressure on those within it to aspire and overcome some challenges; ranging from education, career, family, business, financial decisions and others. It is expected that this period should peak the productivity time of an individual because of energies and sharpness of the cognitive abilities.

Most achievers make remarkable marks within this age grade and we have many proves to feel so. Many who achieved remarkable feats in their chosen fields have done so when very active; some became professional gurus, business moguls, tycoons, political leaders, world-class preachers, great motivators, great models and others.

Faced with these, we, as youths must understand what lays ahead and make deliberate efforts to live above boards. No great warrior can pull down a territory or kingdom without us. That is evident in the glory of our strength and soundness of mind; we are known to be swift, have strong wits and very daring.

We can begin to see why we cannot appear to be apathetic in the way we live our individual lives, the views we hold about leadership, our roles in the home, nation building, our perception about other people around us and the roles we must play in all these.

Let me remind us that we are the weapon and ingredients of positive change. If the youth of any nation chose to gravitate the right way through a reformed mindset, no one can stop them. This is our time, we must politely put our feet down to start to build our nations from our homes.

This requires that we begin to review our negative views about our self worth, the values of others and the power of teamwork even in the home. We have to position ourselves as models to our siblings and be seen to place values above gains.

Today’s youth must realize that the period of youthfulness is so slippery and not eternal. Some say life is short. There is no better gauge than is trying to recall the time you have lost to performing a task that would have been beneficial. Youthfulness is not endless, we must commit our hearts to things that add values to our immediate environment, our community and society and then bear the impact it would have on the global platform.

It is not too early for the youths to start thinking of worthy legacies to be left behind for our succeeding generations. In fact, that is how great minds think. They came and witness an existing gap in any system and make every effort to bridge such gap.

Time is not on our side, but the one we have at hand is an asset. The power of global relationship have been negatively annexed by most youths when it could be an opportunity to enhance our value system. Let the youths of the world raise a banner; we can resist to be indolent, we can say NO to violence. We can determine not to be negatively used and dumped by despots, terrorists and ignore their pressure.

Our time is our asset. It would take a strong persuasion for one to grow old and discover how bad a son, a daughter, a brother, a father, a teacher, a leader, a model and so on that he has been and regret how much has been wasted because the time of the youth is wasted and gone forever.

For those who believe in God, we must rely on the grace of God. This earth is not an accident or just a natural occurrence or  coincidence. The relational sequence and inter-dependency of creations prove it. We can rely on God for wisdom and direction to be focused and make impact.

Secondly, we must live an uncompromisingly disciplined life. It is not easy to resist evil in the midst of very corrupt and stinking world we live in. Criminality and vices come to us cheaper and easier but we can make landmark influence if we stand for something strong, valuable and positive.

This time is our asset. Let us live it to be remembered for the good of our world. Great mind live for others, smaller ones live for themselves. Let us determine to make others happier, satisfied and grateful to God for coming in contact with us.

We can surely use the assets coded in our youthfulness to make our world a better place.

Scrap EFCC, ICPC, Oronsaye Panel Recommends

The Presidential Committee on the Rationalisation and Restructuring of Federal GovernmentParastatals, Commissions and Agencies has recommended the scrapping Nigeria’s two anti corruption agencies.

The committee believes that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission, ICPC, along with the Federal Roads Safety Commission, FRSC, should be dismantled because they all perform the duties of the Nigeria Police Force and a department in the ministry of works. 

The committee, chaired by Stephen Oronsaye, former head of service of the federation, also asked government to reduce the number of its ministries, departments and agencies, MDAs, from 541 including, 263 statutory agencies, to 163. 

It made these recommendations yesterday at the presentation of its report to the president at the Presidential Villa, Aso Rock, Abuja. 

The committee argued that many MDAs have been discovered to have overlapping functions which allowed for duplication of functions thereby encouraging corruption and indolence in government.

Citing some agencies with outright overlapping roles, the committee recommended that the Federal Road Safety Commission, FRSC, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Independent Corrupt Practice Commission, ICPC should be scrapped.

 The committee in its report drew attention to the fact that many committees had been set up in the past with their recommendations never implemented.

It advised government to emulate more successful nations which had faced realities of the global financial trends and had pruned government to sizeable measure with better results.

While presenting the report to the president, Oronsaye observed that “12 years after the White Paper on the Ahmed Joda Panel Report on the Review, Harmonization and Rationalization of Federal Government Parastatals, Institutions and Agencies, in 2000, some parastatals and agencies, which government had decided should either be scrapped, commercialized, privatized or self-funding, are still receiving full government funding, which runs into billions of Naira.”

He drew the attention of government to indiscriminate setting up of agencies and parastatals by successive governments mostly to satisfy political and selfish needs.

The committee also noted that the Nigerian Communications Satellite, NigComSat Limited, which was established as the commercial arm of the Nigerian Space Research Development Agency,NASRDA, has now expanded its scope and is in rivalry with its parent body.

Oronsaye said the committee also observed that other agencies are playing the same roles citing the duplication of the statutory functions of the National Broadcasting Commission, NBC, and the Nigeria Communications Commission, NCC, in the area of frequency allocation.

 It observed that nations with very effective communications delivery maintain only one agency for that purpose.

Concerning education, Oronsaye stated “If the country is to stem the present trend of mass failure in certificate examinations at the secondary school level as well as the poor quality of graduates being spewed from the nation’s tertiary institutions, there is indeed an urgent need to address the critical factors that are exacerbating the current challenges facing the Education Sector.”

The committee noted that three different agencies – the Universal Basic Education Commission,UBEC, the Nomadic Education Commission, NEC and the National Commission for Mass Literacy, Adult and Non-Formal Education, NCMLA - all perform the same functions.

It recommended that UBEC should  take over the functions of the other two agencies.

The committee also lamented that none of the Nigerian universities was among the first 1000 in the world.

It recommended that government should put in place a mechanism to transform the six first generation universities at Ibadan, Zaria, Lagos, Nsukka, Ife and Benin into model institutions with each having a niche or area of comparative advantage.

The committee also expressed concern on the cost of governance in Nigeria, observing that it ranks among the highest in the world.

Noting that it would take government strong political and administrative will to achieve these, the committee urged the Executive to collaborate with other arms of government especially the Legislature to achieve a slimmer and more cost-effective means of running government.

“The Committee believes that if the cost of governance must be brought down, then both the Legislature and Judiciary must make spirited efforts at reducing their running costs as well as restructuring and rationalizing the agencies under them since the three arms make up the government.” Oronsaye said.

The committee thereby proposed ways of immediately reducing the cost of governance which include that government reduce the number and size of the governing boards of parastatals.

South West and the Future of ACN

A lot has been said about the 2011 elections that restored political power to the ‘progressives’ Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN with the influence of its national leader and former governor of Lagos State, Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

Tinubu, a political ‘myth’ or colossus; had wrestled power from the Nigeria’s leading party, Peoples Democratic Party, PDP in the 2003 election when he was the only surviving governor from his party after the rest five had fallen to an alliance deception set by the then president, Olusegun Obasanjo; who was desperate to garner political home support to continue his presidency that he lacked in the face of serious political pressure for his former’s vice, Atiku Abubakar who was bent on seizing power from him in 2003.

The setback for his party, Action Congress, AC notwithstanding, Tinubu succeeded in transfering power to a successor in 2007 when his constitutional terms to lead Lagos elapsed; but not without a commitment to reclaim the old AC’s territory.

The battle he launched, which ranged from fierce judicial and politically fights have confidently placed the South West in the hands of the Action Congress of Nigeria; a presumed progressive political platform crafted in the semblance of the Obafemi Awolowo’s Action Group, AG of the first republic.

With the exception of Ondo State which presently rests with the Labour Party, LP with Olusegun Mimiko as the governor which of course was generously helped by Tinubu to reclaim his mandate through a very lengthy and fierce legal battle, the South West is now snoring on the palm of the ACN/Tinubu.

This notwithstanding, the sustenance of the ACN’s dominance of the zone is still a subject for consideration. The party itself is coming from a political-oligarchy system where the structure for internal democracy has collapsed from the beginning. The events that preceded the 2011 elections witnessed much dictatorial imposition of candidates.

Some candidates were disenfranchised and the people’s preferred candidates were substituted to loyalists of Tinubu. This type of development has led to political horse-trading and arm-twisting. Tinubu, a core intellectual has seen himself bowing to fielding incompetent candidates in some areas because of political patronage.

In Oyo State, the ACN’s winning stride in the state was with a margin of about 33,000 votes, an aggregate of the votes it garnered from the local governments in Oyo where the monarch had to labor extra miles to ensure the victory of the party; albeit at all costs.

This glaringly anti-democratic means of course is not sufficient to exercise the true political acceptance of the ACN by the people. The party’s unorthodox means of politics stampedes the electorates and debase the traditional institution that the office of the governor should protect.

The performance of the Lagos governor, Babatunde Raji Fashola as a light among others gave credit to the ACN as a party of programmes and vision and when the Edo State governor came on board, also through a judicial pronouncement; Adams Oshiomhole, himself a former labour leader, the party had a good stand to prove it could surpass others in ideas and implementation of its programmes. The same could be said of the Ogbeni Rauf Aregesola’s reign in Osun State. Aregbesola is also a product of judicial declaration after he packed the then governor, Olagunsoye Oyinlola from the Bola Ige Government Secretariat in Oshogbo. The same for Kayode Fayemi, who uprooted the Segun Oni’s reign in Ekiti State.

With the ACN’s insistent battle to wrest power from the grips of Mimiko in Ondo State and other elections to be held soon in Edo and Osun soon, the future it faces in the 2015 is of utmost interests.

By then, the ACN would be contending for the soul of Lagos, Ogun and Oyo States. The landmark achievements of Fashola in Lagos if that is the measurement, if continued would still make the ACN the darling party of the Lagos people. Performances in the former political headquarters of the Western Region would be more interesting.

With a slight escape of ACN through unresolved internal political feuds in the Oyo PDP, if the efforts being mounted on the party in the state to mend fence and close ranks work, especially with the coming on board of Bamanga Mohammed Tukur as the new PDP chairman, the ACN may be in  for a shocker.

It would be recalled that if Rasheed Ladoja, a former PDP chieftain and candidate of the Accord Party, AP had stayed back in the PDP and delivered the votes of the AP to the PDP, there would not have been an ACN’s governor in Agodi today.

Another consideration would be the performance level at these states. The governors must prove their mettle as being outstandingly different from what was obtainable under the PDP regime in the region. Delivery of election campaign promises are key into why the politically sophisticated region would continue to give its mandates to the ACN.

More than anything, the party’s leadership must set for its office holders a set of basic standard that cannot be lowered. It should also set in place a platform through which it reaches out to these individuals with a view to  encourage them and keep them on perpetual focus. 

The approaching of various elections in the zone should not be perceived as settled cases for the party, rather, it should weigh the performances of the party and like the PDP did with the candidature of Timipre Sylva in Bayelsa, ACN must impress it upon its flag bearers that it would not be confident to re-present a deficient candidate that performs below score line.

If the party can weather the storm and restore a progressive generation in the South West and possibly expand after the 2015 general elections, then it must have survived and positioned itself not only as an alternative party but foiled the PDP’s agenda or foisting a one-party system in the country.