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Olojongbodu commends Gov Oyetola’s efforts in security
By Richard Ayinde, Osogbo.
The Coordinator, Chief Friedrick Fasheun’s led Oodua Peoples Congress, OPC, in Osun State, Alhaji Leke Akintayo Olojongbodu has commended the Osun State governor, Mr Gboyega Oyetola on his efforts in protecting life and property in the state.
Olojongbodu made this commendation in Osogbo the state capital while answering questions from our Correspondent in his office on Wednesday.
He said, since inception of the incumbent administration in the state, Mr Governor has been putting some measures in place to ensure Osun is criminal free.
According to Olojongbodu, “Governor Oyetola’s efforts on security network in the state cannot be over emphasised in which is making the state one of the peaceful states having in the country today.
Mr Governor’s relationship with the security operatives including us the OPC in the state is very cordial as we can all see, he relates with us regularly with his Special Adviser on Security, Mrs Abiodun Ige just to ensure adequate peace in all nook and cranny of the state”.
Olojongbodu who used the medium to debunk the insinuation making the round that there is division in the entire OPC groups in the state said there is no any division in the group as there is only one OPC having in Osun state today.
” We members of the OPC in the state see ourselves as one family, we hold security meeting together to ensure there is no room for any criminal activities ” the security expert said.
The security guru who reiterated their readiness to collaborate with Governor Oyetola’s administration in tackling criminality however warned the hoodlums to stay away of Osun State as they are battle ready to avert any breaking of law and order.
June 25, 2021
New Controller for A’Ibom Correctional Service assumes Duty
A new Controller of the Nigerian Correctional Service, Akwa Ibom State Command, Nse Akpan Ukut has assumed duty as the 15th commanding Officer in the State.
The command’s Public Relations Officer, DSC Ogbajie Ogbajie who disclosed this in a press statement on Friday described Ukut’s redeployment to the State as a home coming.
Ogbajie explained that Ukut holds bachelor of Science degree in Agriculture from the University of Maiduguri, Borno State and has undergone multiple training courses locally and internationally.
He said until the controller’s appointment, he was the zonal agric supervisor, Zone “E” Owerri, Imo Statement.
According to the statement, “we wish to inform the general public that the Controller General of the Nigerian Correctional Service, Haliru Nababa (mni) has appointed a new Controller of Corrections to Akwa Ibom State as the commanding officer.
“The Controller of Corrections, Nse Akpan Ukut took over as the 15th Controller of Corrections, Akwa- Ibom State Command on the 16th of June, 2021.
“He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Agriculture from the prestigious University of Maiduguri, Borno State and has undergone multiple training courses locally and internationally. CCS Ukut has served in many capacities and specialized in Agriculture and inmates productivity in many formations.”
The areas Ukut had worked the statement further said included Elele; Rivers State Command as the Project Officer and as Root Crop Production Officer at Ibite- Ollo; Enugu State Command.
“The Pioneer Rice Project manager, Obubra Farm Centre, Officer-in-Charge Human Resources; State Correctional Headquarters, Cross River State Command. Zonal Supervisor, Agric; Zonal Headquarters, Zone ‘E’ Owerri.
“He was one time Officer-in-Charge, Ikot-Ekpene Custodial Centre and he equally served at the Itu Farm Centre, Akwa-Ibom State Command.”
Meanwhile, the newly redeployed controller in his maiden speech to the officers and men of the Service in the State Command pledged to ensure the safe custody of the inmates.
He promised to use his wealth of experience in penal administration to ensure the total rehabilitation of offenders in order to reintegrate them as law abiding citizens of the society at large.
“I will invoke my passion in agriculture to revamp the farm centre as well as increase inmates’ productivity for subsidized food products to the overall benefit of the service and the general public in line with achieving the visions and mission of the service.” He said
The statement noted that the new controller’s hobbies included farming, teaching, football, music and photography.
June 25, 2021
Senator Nwaoboshi dumps PDP for APC
Senator Peter Nwaoboshi has defected to the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC.
Nwaoboshi‘s defection was confirmed when President Muhammadu Buhari received him at the State House on Friday
The Senator who represents Delta North District, Delta State, was presented to Buhari at the State House by the Deputy Senate President, Ovie Omo-Agege.
Buhari was quoted to have welcomed him to the All Progressives Congress (APC)
He had said, “You are welcome to the progressives family.’’
Recall that Sen. Nwaoboshi was suspended from the PDP a few days ago.
PDP had said the lawmaker was suspended over “anti-party” activities.
June 25, 2021
BREAKING: Buhari postpones London medical trip
President Muhammadu Buhari has postponed his planned trip to London.
The planned trip scheduled for Friday was to allow Buhari embark on a follow-up medical check-up.
However, Buhari’s spokesman, Femi Adesina said a new date will be announced soon.
A terse statement by Adesina reads: “The medical follow-up visit of President Muhammadu Buhari to the United Kingdom earlier scheduled for today, Friday, June 25, 2021, has been postponed.
June 25, 2021
China creates great miracle of respecting, safeguarding human rights
By People’s Daily
It is the lofty ideal of mankind that everyone enjoys human rights to the full. Over the past century, the Communist Party of China (CPC) has invested a huge effort in human rights protection, adding significantly to global human rights progress.
The State Council Information Office issued a white paper titled “The Communist Party of China and Human Rights Protection — A 100-Year Quest” on Thursday, June 24.
The white paper systematically reviews how the CPC has stood together with the Chinese people in times good and bad and turned hardships into glories. It also comprehensively introduces the theories and practices of the CPC in fighting for, respecting, safeguarding and promoting human rights over the past century. The document fully demonstrates the CPC’s firm resolution and practical actions in safeguarding human rights on a higher level, promoting overall development of human rights, and advancing the cause of human rights protection.
General secretary Xi Jinping of the CPC Central Committee said that following a people-centered development philosophy, the CPC and the Chinese government have all along placed people’s interests above all, and worked hard to meet people’s desire for a better life and improve respect for and protection of the fundamental rights of the Chinese people.
The 100-year history of the CPC is a glorious history of striving for people’s liberation, safeguarding people’s rights and devoting itself to well-rounded human development.
For a hundred years, the CPC has always put people first, applying the principle of universality of human rights in the context of the national conditions. It regards the rights to subsistence and development as the primary and basic human rights, and believes that living a life of contentment is the ultimate human right. It promotes the well-rounded development of the individual, and strives to give every person a stronger sense of gain, happiness and security. Its success in pioneering human rights in a socialist country is unique and readily apparent.
Since the 18th CPC National Congress in 2012, under the strong leadership of the CPC Central Committee with Xi Jinping at the core, decisive success has been achieved in the final stage of building a moderately prosperous society in all respects, and the mission of eradicating absolute poverty has been completed. The CPC has forcefully promoted the overall and coordinated development of economic, social and cultural rights, as well as citizens’ civil and political rights. It has made conspicuous improvement in protecting people’s rights to subsistence and development, and promoted comprehensive progress in human rights.
The 100-year history of the CPC has witnessed a human rights development miracle in the history of the Chinese nation, as well as a huge contribution made by China to the global human rights progress.
For a hundred years, the CPC has committed itself to peaceful development and common progress. China is firm in its international stance – to safeguard world peace and seek progress through cooperation, ensuring human rights with the benefits deriving from development. It has been an active participant in matters of international human rights, providing a Chinese contribution to global human rights governance and progress, and working with other countries to forge a global community of shared future.
Facts prove that the CPC is a peace-loving political party committed to progress, justice and human rights in the world.
China’s national rejuvenation represents a process of promoting social fairness and justice, and advancing human rights, general secretary Xi Jinping remarked. Upholding CPC leadership and the socialist system in promoting human rights, promoting human rights through development, taking a people-centered approach to human rights, aiming for people’s well-rounded development, and building a global community of shared future, the CPC has opened a new path of human
It has achieved numerous successes throughout the land in the process of bringing happiness to the Chinese people and national rejuvenation to the Chinese nation. Its pursuit of world peace and progress, and a global community of shared future, opens a new chapter for human civilization.
The founding of a new China could not have happened without the CPC, nor could the progress that has been made in human rights protection. CPC leadership is the most fundamental guarantee that underpins every progress in and better protection of human rights in China.
After a hundred years of magnificent development, the CPC still maintains its original aspiration. As long as it unites more closely around the CPC Central Committee with Xi Jinping as the core, takes a people-centered approach to development, and follows the human rights development path with Chinese characteristics, all rights of the Chinese people will be safeguarded at a higher level, and China will make a greater contribution to the protection of global human rights.
June 25, 2021
Splendid chapters to be written with Olympic spirit
By Hui Yan
On June 23, the Olympic Day was once again celebrated all around the world.
The day this year also marked the start of a one-month countdown of the Tokyo Olympics. Though the COVID-19 pandemic is still impacting the world, the Olympic spirit sheds a light.
Athletes from across the world will gather under the Olympic flag and firmly join the games to jointly fight for their dreams. Today, the Olympic spirit, which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play, is inspiring the world with a strong power.
Facing the first Olympic Games that has ever been postponed, Chinese athletes are rising to challenges and training hard. They have never slowed their steps to become faster, higher and stronger.
In the past year, they have created a number of world records in swimming, athletics and weightlifting, showing desirable athletic performance. At present, all teams of the Chinese sports delegation are going all out to prepare for the Tokyo Olympics, in hope of outdoing themselves on the global stage.
The Beijing Winter Olympics will kick off on Feb. 4 the next year as scheduled. As the host country, China is opening its arms to welcome global athletes who are expected to showcase the charm and beauty of winter sports. The event coincides with the Chinese Lunar New Year, the most important festival of China. It will surely become a unique opportunity for China to tell the Chinese stories to the world and build its image.
Striving to make the Beijing Winter Olympics “simple, safe and wonderful,” China has entered the final and critical stage of preparation. From venue construction to game running, and from supporting facilities to volunteering services, the country is contributing Chinese wisdom to the sports event and showcasing its capabilities. Beijing, the only city in the world to host both the summer and winter editions of the Olympic Games, will present a splendid, remarkable and extraordinary sports event to the world.
By holding the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games, China has a grand vision to bring winter games to 300 million people. The games will benefit numerous households and better help the country build itself into a sports power. With a “green, inclusive, open and clean” approach, the Beijing Winter Olympics will make new contribution to regional coordinated development and make Olympic Games more glorious.
Pursuing the Olympic spirit, the Chinese sports have left splendid chapters one after another. As a host country of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, the 2014 Nanjing Youth Olympic Games, and the 2022 Beijing Winter Games, China is a staunch participator to Olympic Games and an active practitioner of the Olympic spirit. Striving for excellence in competitive sports and carrying out a national fitness program, China is witnessing ceaseless energy as the Olympic spirit inspires every one.
In the past more than a hundred years, modern Olympic Games forged ahead despite turbulences. When the world today is facing common challenges, sports are serving as a bond among countries. It is expected that more people can join hands and face up to challenges, and hold high the torch symbolizing solidarity and hope in the spirit of Olympics.
June 25, 2021
China to build closer Belt and Road partnership with all sides
By He Yin, People’s Daily
China stands ready to work with all parties to build a closer Belt and Road partnership, adhere to the path of unity, cooperation, interconnectivity, and common development, and jointly promote the building of a community with a shared future for humanity, Chinese President Xi Jinping said Wednesday in a written message to the Asia and Pacific High-level Conference on Belt and Road Cooperation.
China has entered a new development stage, acted on a new development concept, and has been fostering a new development paradigm, which provides more opportunities in the market, investment and growth for Belt and Road partners, Xi said.
Belt and Road cooperation pursues development, aims at mutual benefits, and conveys a message of hope.
Xi proposed the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2013 in an attempt to carry on the Silk Road spirit, co-build an open platform for cooperation with all countries and generate new driving forces for the development of all countries.
Over the past eight years, 140 countries and 32 international organizations have joined in Belt and Road cooperation.The BRI has evolved from a concept and vision into real actions and reality, and brought about enormous opportunities and benefits to countries around the world.
When fully implemented, the BRI could increase global trade by 6.2 percent and global real income by 2.9 percent, according to a World Bank report. It has truly become the world’s broadest-based and largest platform for international cooperation.
Faced with the outbreak of the COVID-19 epidemic, China and BRI partners have helped and supported each other to overcome difficulties together, strengthened the building of a “Silk Road for health”, a “green Silk Road” and a “digital Silk Road” and brought forward the Belt and Road development, conveying confidence and vitality to the international community and contributing to the global fight against COVID-19 and economic recovery.
China has held over 100 meetings to share experience on COVID-19 prevention and control with BRI partners, provided a large amount of medical supplies for other countries, as well as donated and exported more than 400 million doses of finished and bulk vaccines to more than 90 countries.
Statistics suggest that last year, China’s trade in goods with countries along the Belt and Road hit a record high of $1.35 trillion.
In the face of the test posed by the pandemic, the BRI has shown strong resilience and vitality, with relevant projects continuing to advance, cooperation yielding many fruits, and trade and investment keeping growth against headwinds, said the Asian Economic Outlook and Integration Progress Annual Report 2021 of the Boao Forum for Asia.
While delivering a keynote speech at the Boao Forum for Asia Annual Conference 2021 in April, Xi proposed building a closer partnership for health cooperation, connectivity, green development, as well as openness and inclusiveness, charting the route to pushing ahead high-quality BRI construction under new circumstances.
Asian and Pacific countries are the pioneers, contributors and examples of Belt and Road international cooperation.
During the conference, 29 countries jointly launched the Initiative for Belt and Road Partnership on COVID-19 Vaccines Cooperation and the Initiative for Belt and Road Partnership on Green Development.
As a mirror of the efforts of China and other parties to build a closer Belt and Road partnership, the two initiatives will effectively support global anti-epidemic cooperation and facilitate low-carbon, resilient and inclusive post-pandemic economic growth.
China will soon complete the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects, and then embark on a new journey of fully building a modern socialist country under the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC), which will celebrate its centenary on July 1 this year.
Standing at a new starting point in history, China will bring about new opportunities for high-quality construction of the Belt and Road. The country will build a closer Belt and Road partnership and make the Belt and Road a public road open to all together with other parties, helping promote the sustainable recovery of world economy and enhance and improve global governance.
June 25, 2021
FG makes U-turn, denies sponsoring bills to regulate social media
The Federal Government on Friday denied sponsoring bills purportedly meant to gag the press and regulate social media.
Recall that the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, had urged the House of Representatives to include regulation of Twitter in the National Broadcasting Commission Act.
The Minister made the call at the public hearing on a bill to amend the NBC Act organized by the House Committee on Information.
“I will want to add that specifically, internet broadcasting and all online media should be included in this because we have a responsibility to monitor content— including Twitter,” he said.
However, in an interview with newsmen in Lagos, Mohammed said the bills concerning the Nigerian Press Council and the National Broadcasting Commission were private member bills sponsored by a lawmaker in the National Assembly.
“First, let me say how disappointed I am that those who have been berating me on these bills have been doing so on a false premise that the Federal Government had sponsored bills to stifle the press.
”This is a classic case of misinformation because the Federal Government did not sponsor any bill to gag the press.
“It baffles me that those who rushed to the media to slam the government didn’t even try to verify the facts,’’ he said
The minister further stated that the National Assembly member who sponsored the bills had done nothing wrong. He said the legislator was only doing what he was elected to do.
“I insist that the bills were not sponsored by the Federal Government.
“I was invited, as the Minister of Information and Culture, to make my contributions, just like many other stakeholders at the public hearing.
“It was an opportunity for stakeholders to make their input into the bills.
”I attended and made my contributions,’’ he added.
June 25, 2021
2021 UTME: JAMB releases results
The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has released the results of candidates who sat in more than 720 CBT centres for the 2021 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination conducted between June 19 and June 22.
Dr Fabian Benjamin, JAMB Spokesperson made this known in a statement made available to newsmen in Abuja on Friday.
Benjamin advised each concerned candidate to check his/her result by sending UTMERESULT to 55019 through the GSM number used by each candidate to obtain profile code and UTME registration with the board.
He said that their results would be relayed to them immediately after following the instructions given to check results.
He added that the results for subsequent days would however be released daily.
“ The Board notes with satisfaction that the utilisation of NIN (National Identification Number) has helped in curbing examination malpractices as the 2021 UTME has recorded the least incidence of irregularities since the inception of the CBT examinations.
“ Nevertheless, the Board would still review all the CCTV footages and other technical gadgets for detection of possible examination misconducts.
“Extremely comparatively few results are being withheld for further investigation,” he said.
He, therefore, said that the Board would not hesitate to withdraw the results of any candidate subsequently found to have committed any form of examination misconduct.
June 25, 2021
Lawan To FG: N/Assembly Won’t Approve Frivolous Loan Requests
Senate President Ahmad Lawan has said the National Assembly would only approve loans they could ascertain their targeted projects, saying there would be no frivolous support of intents of the executive.
Lawan was addressing reporters after a meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari to discuss important national issues, at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
He said the National Assembly would always observe due diligence before giving approval to the executive for any loan request.
He said such requests would be subjected to thorough scrutiny to be sure they are necessary and when approved, the use of the loans would be monitored through oversight.
He said as a poor country, Nigeria would only be able to meet most of its development targets by acquiring loans as it could not over-tax the citizens and yet unable to strike public/private partnerships because of the unfavourable atmosphere across the country.
“So, we’ll not be frivolous and will not take it lightly to just approve any loan. Our options are really very limited as a country. First, we don’t have the necessary revenues, Nigeria is poor, we shouldn’t deceive ourselves.
“Nigeria is not rich, given the circumstances we live in, given the challenges we have; our resources are so low, our revenues are so low and therefore the option of not doing anything, just to sit because we have no money, we shouldn’t go for infrastructure development is not even an option worthy of consideration. You cannot keep the economy stagnant.
“Two, you cannot, in my view and judgment, tax Nigerians further for you to raise the money for infrastructure development. Other countries do that, but we have serious situation across the country, so you cannot put taxes on people.
“The other option is public-private partnership. You need to create the environment to attract investors to come into our country because of the security challenges we face today. Not many investors would like to come to Nigeria, in fact, even those inside Nigeria may not like to invest properly in this sector of infrastructure development.
“So, the only option left is for us to borrow, borrow responsibly, utilise prudently and economically, and ensure that the projects are self-sustaining that they can pay back the loans that Nigerian economy will benefit from the implementation of such infrastructure development.
“So, that’s the only option we have and I believe that Nigerians will understand, of course, it’s not desirable, it’s not something that we like too, no Nigerian would like to have, in fact, even an individual not like to be on loan, but when you must, then you have to, and I want to be very practical here that we do so with that feeling of ‘this is our country, we must move forward, we must provide the enabling environment for our economy to grow and Nigeria to develop,” said Lawan.
June 25, 2021