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Former Super Eagles coach, Samson Siasia has stated that Lionel Messi remains the only real advantage Argentina has over Nigeria in this summer’s FIFA World Cup in Russia. Speaking to brila.net ahead of the Mundial with Nigeria and Argentina paired to battle it out at the group stage again alongside Croatia and Iceland, Siasia said, “Argentina is a big side, but one fact remains, it’s Lionel Messi and he is the only advantage they have over our own National Team.” Messi “They have good players and we also have our own good players, but one person stands out which is Messi,” the former coach added. Siasia led the Under-20 Flying Eagles to the World Youth Championship in the Netherlands where Nigeria were runners-up losing 2-1 to a Messi-inspired youth team. The young Argentine at that time in 2005 scored from the penalty spot to give Argentina the lead but a flying header from Chinedu Ogbuke Obasi gave the Flying Eagles a deserved equalizer before Messi put another penalty past goalkeeper Ambrose Vanzekin. Lionel Messi won the Golden Ball being the best player of the tournament followed by John Obi Mikel and Taiye Ismail Taiwo in second and third respectively.
Nollywood actress Ope Aiyeola has debunked rumours that she had a child in secret for veteran actor Babatunde Omidiran, a.k.a Baba Suwe. Aiyeola who now lives in London, told BBC Yoruba Service she was not in any romantic affair with the elderly Baba Suwe. “He is my boss and a kind man”, she said. “He used to cast me in a lot of roles when I started. And I am grateful to him”. Asked about the man she ever had a crush for, she mentioned the veteran Bollywood actor, Amitabh Bachchan, who is now 75 years old. “I used to write him as a child, using the addresses she read on the jackets of Indian movies. Now I have a secret, I reach him on Facebook”. Asked on the career path she would have trod, without venturing into acting. She did not hesitate in her response. ” I would have loved to be a midwife or a child minder or surrogate mother”, she said. Aiyeola, 41 next August, was born in Sagamu Ogun state. She is married to Babatunde David Olowolomose
A Boko Haram attack on a girls’ school in northeast Nigeria has revived fears of another Chibok-style mass kidnapping, even as the government claims the jihadists are on the verge of defeat. Dozens of heavily armed fighters stormed Dapchi village in the Bursari area of Yobe state on Monday evening, firing shots and setting off explosives. Chibok school girls Students and teachers at the Girls Science Secondary School fled into the bush for safety, fearing the Islamist militants would abduct them. The potential for a repeat of what happened some 275 kilometres (170 miles) away by road in Chibok, in neighbouring Borno state, has not been lost on many Nigerians. Both were state-run boarding schools in rural areas teaching girls of a similar age a so-called secular curriculum; Boko Haram fighters came in a convoy of pick-up trucks at night. Boko Haram, whose name translates from Hausa to “Western education is forbidden”, has kidnapped thousands of women and young girls since beginning its bloody insurgency in 2009. But it was only the mass abduction of 276 girls in Chibok, in neighbouring Borno state in April 2014 that brought global attention to the conflict for the first time. Fifty-seven girls managed to escape in the immediate aftermath while 107 have been found, escaped or released since May 2016; 112 are still being held. – ‘A dirty game’ – Some locals maintained Boko Haram deliberately targeted the school. But with all those who fled not yet returned and the institution now closed, it is still not clear exactly what happened. Some security analysts and those closely involved in the conflict said the attack may have been motivated by knowledge of payments to secure the release of the Chibok girls. Last May, at least two million euros ($2.5 million) is said to have been paid for the release of a batch of 82 students in an exchange with jihadist fighters in Nigerian government custody. Amaechi Nwokolo, a security analyst at the Roman Institute for International Studies in Abuja, said ransoms had become “a new way of financing” Boko Haram activities. “They need money for arms, ammunitions, vehicles, to keep their army of fighters moving across the borders. They’re spending a lot of money on arms and logistics,” he told AFP. Payment of a kidnap ransom is often seen as the only way of securing a person’s release but civilian militia said the government risked being dragged into “a dirty game of money”. Boko Haram has not specifically targeted a girls school since Chibok. But one militia leader said should they ever emulate the feat, “the government will be under intense pressure to secure their release, which means giving them money”. “The reality is whether girls from Dapchi school were taken or not, the importance of the attack is that this could be a new strategy for the group to raise money. “So we have to be careful.” – Wider tactics – Nigeria’s military and government have repeatedly claimed that Boko Haram is on the run after a sustained fight-back by troops since early 2015. A senior military source in the Borno state capital, Maiduguri, said operations had “destabilised Boko Haram and they have realised they have nowhere to hide”. Kidnapping for ransom could purely be a way of making money for after the end of the conflict, he suggested. Others, including Babaji Katagum, a security analyst and former Nigerian Army captain, pointed out that Boko Haram had only ever made a ransom demand for the Chibok schoolgirls. Persistent raids across northeast Nigeria were now primarily about survival — the need for food, fuel and medication, he added. “You can see from the attacks in the villages in the Dapchi area last night. No one was killed. It was all about looting,” he said. “I believe the attack on the Dapchi girls school was not meant to abduct anyone. They were just there looking for food and other supplies, which they got. “If the school was their target, they would have gone straight to the school unannounced, like they did in Chibok.” Yan St-Pierre, a counter-terrorism specialist with the Modern Security Consulting group, agreed and said he saw kidnapping as part of its wider, long-established tactics. “They do so every week, regardless of ransoms… or the pressure put on them by military operations,” he said.
Football star, Cristiano Ronaldo shared this stylish photo of himself and girlfriend, Georgina Rodriguez leaving his private jet with the caption "Love is in the air"
FacebookTwitterGoogle+PinterestLinkeAll Progressives Congress (APC) stalwart Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu yesterday enjoined former President Olusegun Obasanjo and former military president Gen. Ibrahim Babangida to retire and “allow us to move our country forward”.
Obasanjo, in a “special press statement” last month, slammed the Muhammadu Buhari administration and “advised the President not to seek reelection”.
Babangida followed it up with a controversial statement which was also not complimentary to the Buhari administration.
Tinubu and Chief Bisi Akande, the former interim chairman of the APC, met with President Buhari at the Aso Villa one and a half hours after the President’s meeting with another former Head of State, Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar.
Responding to a question on the statements made by Obasanjo and Babangida, Tinubu said: ”I don’t address those shadows. We should let our former presidents join retirees’ club and take pensions but they can participate in our politics if they are interested.
“It is a free world but this freedom is not served a la carte. They should allow us to move our country forward. It is a challenge to every Nigerian.”
On the chances of the APC in the 2019 elections, the former Lagos State governor said: “You are asking me an obvious question. I belong to this party. My commitment is to this party. We have a better chance and we are strongly determined to prosecute election in a most transparent and democratic manner and we will win.”
Tinubu, who is the head of a presidential panel to reconcile APC leaders and unite the party, told reporters that he felt “greatly honoured” being offered the job.
.He said: “I feel greatly honoured with the mutual confidence that the President has reposed in me, which is a very strong political challenge. We have started in earnest.
“He has given me a free hand to put cohesion, confidence and trust in the party. Democracy is about conflict resolution process. You can’t do it without resolving conflicts.
“We can’t build it without understanding the conflicts and sources where we are coming from. But we want to leave the country with a legacy. It’s not about Mr. President. That is what he’s telling the country.
“It’s about our country and no other choice to democratic tenets than through political party platforms.”
Tinubu described President Buhai as “one of those rare beings around the country, around Africa who has experienced both worlds: he fought a battle to save Nigeria and came to politics to save Nigeria.
“Very rare people have such an opportunity in their lifetime and that’s what we talk about legacy, and where we have all the challenges, do what we should do. I’m enjoying the challenges so far.”
Gen. Abubakar met with the President immediately after he received letters of Credence from the Ambassador of Niger to Nigeria, Mr Alat Mogaskia; the High Commissioner of Ghana, Alhaji Rashid Bawa and that of Apostolic Nuncio of the Holy Sea to Nigeria, the Most Rev. Archbishop Antonio Guido Filipazzi.
The former Head of State declined to speak to reporters after the meeting, which lasted for less than one hour.
THE Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in Lagos State has kicked against the enforcement of the Yoruba language preservation and promotion law 2018, calling on Governor Akinwumi Ambode to suspend the law. •From left, Lagos State PDP members In a statement by its Publicity Secretary, Mr Taofik Gani, the party argued that the bill recently signed into law by the Governor was an early misapplication and revenue coloration in bad faith. The party stated that the lack of due considerations by the Lagos House of Assembly “in making and passing the bill gives one strong doubts on the competence of the house to deliver flawless legislation.” It accused the state government of hastily directing all its tertiary institutions and other schools to demand credit pass in Yoruba language before any applicant could be qualified for admission. “To the PDP, this is a clear indication that the law is more interested in revenue, thus tainted and in bad faith,” the party stated. According to the party “Frankly speaking the law was not brilliantly considered and its hasty applications make it laughable. To us in PDP and a lot of other groups, the law is ethnocentric and direct attack on all non Yoruba residents in the state. It has also usurped the inherent powers of the Senate in the various institutions to determine their qualifications for entry. Imagine an Igbo or Hausa with 9 distinctions but a pass in Yoruba language. Such will be denied admission into our schools. Whereas by the combined provisions of Sections: 17(2c) (3a) and 18 (1) of the 1999 Constitution of the FRN (as amended), all citizens should have equal rights and fair opportunities to education in any part of the country.” Indeed, this vindictive law will eventually be applicable to persons employed or seeking employments in the state establishments” “We will notwithstanding advise Governor Ambode to get careful with bills emanating from and passed by the Lagos State House of Assembly to save Lagosians and the state from further embarrassment.”
