Wike had foreknowledge of S’Court ruling –Peterside

THE governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress in the 2015 election in Rivers State, Dr. Dakuku Peterside, said on Tuesday that the state Governor, Chief Nyesom Wike, had foreknowledge of the Supreme Court ruling before it was eventually delivered.

Peterside also accused Wike of promoting violence by making inciting comments.

He also claimed that while the Supreme Court ruling in favour of Wike was delivered at about 6.20pm, the Peoples Democratic Party and Wike’s supporters went into wild celebration around 9am.

The former APC governorship candidate, who made this remarks while speaking with newsmen in Port Harcourt, explained that “credible information confirmed” that Wike confessed to some persons that he (Wike) met with some of the justices of the Supreme Court in Mbaise, Owerri, Dubai and Saudi Arabia respectively.

Peterside added that the governor had at a thanksgiving service in Port Harcourt claimed that a former governor of the state, Dr. Peter Odili and his wife, Justice Mary Odili, were his (Wike) advisers.

He described the ruling of the Supreme Court on the Rivers governorship election as a product of compromise and an orchestrated contrivance to legalise electoral violence and rigging.

Suicide bombers kill six, injure 30 in Cameroon

At least six civilians were killed and over 30 injured Wednesday in a double suicide attack in Cameroon’s northern border region with Nigeria, regularly attacked by Boko Haram fighters, security sources said.

“Six civilians were killed as well as two suicide bombers who blew themselves up” during a funeral wake in the village of Nguetchewe, the source told AFP, adding that between 30-50 people were injured.

A police source in the region said several children were among the victims.

AFP

EFCC arraigns Saraki’s cousin, ex-commissioner for N371m scam

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission on Tuesday arraigned a former Special Adviser to the Kwara State Governor on Millennium Development Goals, Ope Saraki, who is also a cousin to Senate President Bukola Saraki for an alleged N371m scam.

The EFCC said in a statement by its spokesperson, Wilson Uwujaren, that a former Commissioner for Information, Olatunji Moronfoye, was also arraigned before Justice Oluremi Oguntoyinbo of a Federal High Court sitting in Ilorin for offences bordering on abuse of office, diversion of public funds and money laundering.

While Moronfoye served as commissioner under Saraki when he was the governor of Kwara State, Ope served under the current Governor of Kwara State, Abdulfatah Ahmed.

Moronfoye and Saraki, who were first arraigned on May 13, 2015, had to re-enter their plea on Tuesday following the transfer of the former trial judge, Justice A. O. Faji.

Arms scam: EFCC arrests military chief at airport

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has arrested a serving senior officer of the Nigerian Air Force in connection with the $2.1bn arms purchase scandal.

It was learnt that the officer, Air Vice Marshal R.A. Ojuawo, was arrested by operatives of the EFCC at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, on his way out of the country.

A top source, who spoke to our correspondent on condition of anonymity on Tuesday, said Ojuawo was arrested while accompanying the Chief of Defence Staff, Gen. Gabriel Olonisakin, to a meeting of the United States Africa Command in Germany on Sunday.

According to Wikipedia, the United States Africa Command, otherwise known as AFRICOM, is one of the nine unified combatant commands of the US Armed Forces, headquartered at Kelley Barracks, Stuttgart, Germany.

Metuh bought N500m house, gave Kema Chikwe N5m – Witness

A detective with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Junaid Sa’id, told a Federal High Court in Abuja on Tuesday that the $2m allegedly laundered by the spokesperson for the Peoples Democratic Party, Olisa Metuh, was part of the N10bn which the immediate past National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki (retd.), released for the party’s presidential convention in 2014.

The then President Goodluck Jonathan was adopted as the party’s sole candidate at the said convention.

Metuh and his company, Destra Investments Limited, are being prosecuted by the EFCC for allegedly receiving N400m in a fraudulent manner from the ONSA in November, 2014 and also on charges of money laundering of cash transaction involving $2m.

The EFCC had called as its first prosecution witness, Nneka Ararume, a former employee of Asset and Resource Management Company Limited, who narrated how Metuh handed her the $2m in $100 bills at his house in the Prince and Princess Estate, Abuja.

The protest embarked on by the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, over the prolonged detention of their leader, Nnamdi Kanu, yesterday, turned bloody in Aba, Abia State, as a combined team of security agents, comprising soldiers and policemen allegedly fired shots at the protesters, killing six members of the group and arresting 20. Also in Enugu, the Police in the state yesterday, arrested 25 members of the IPOB, who had gathered at the Naira Triangle in preparation for a protest march.

Read more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2016/02/biafra-6-ipob-members-shot-dead-in-aba-30-injured-45-in-police-net/

The protest embarked on by the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, over the prolonged detention of their leader, Nnamdi Kanu, yesterday, turned bloody in Aba, Abia State, as a combined team of security agents, comprising soldiers and policemen allegedly fired shots at the protesters, killing six members of the group and arresting 20. Also in Enugu, the Police in the state yesterday, arrested 25 members of the IPOB, who had gathered at the Naira Triangle in preparation for a protest march.

Read more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2016/02/biafra-6-ipob-members-shot-dead-in-aba-30-injured-45-in-police-net/

Nigerian judge, senior lawyer in trouble for allegedly colluding to pervert justice

The National Judicial Council (NJC), has queried a judge of the Federal High Court, Lagos, Mohammed Yunusa, over allegations he colluded with a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Ricky Tarfa, to ‘pervert the cause of justice’.

A November 19, 2015 letter by the chairman of the NJC and Chief Justice of Nigeria, Mahmud Mohammed, to Justice Yunusa was sequel to a complaint by a Beninese business woman, Rachidatou Abdou, against, Messrs. Yunusa and Tarfa accusing them of “bias and unprofessional conduct on the bar and bench”.

Mrs. Abdou had alleged that she went into a business venture with a fellow Beninese, Gnahoue Nazaire, sometime in 2005 by establishing an artificial hair making industry in Lagos, which they named “Rana Prestige Industries Limited”.

She said at inception, the company had the two business partners as sole directors and shareholders.
She also alleged that an instruction was given to a lawyer tasked with registering the firm (Ferdinand Egede) to ensure that fifty per cent share capital was allocated to each of the two directors. She however, said “my co-director colluded with the lawyer and changed it to 60-40 by forging my signature on the incorporation forms and papers”.

Mrs. Abdou also claimed that her business partner diverted the company funds in connivance with his younger brother, Senou Modeste, an employee of the firm. She said all the “anomalies” were perpetuated when she travelled to France for almost six years.

“Upon my return from France, when I noticed these anomalies, I instructed my lawyer to write a petition to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, to investigate and prosecute (if need be) Mr. Gnahoue Sounou Nazaire over allegations of forgery, stealing and fraudulent conversion of company funds,”she said.

DSS arrests Nigerian student recruiting terrorists for ISIS

The Department of State Services said in Abuja on Tuesday that it had arrested a student of the Federal University of Technology, Minna, Abdussalam Yunusa, who was recruiting for the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.

A statement issued by the spokesperson for the security agency, Mr. Tony Opuiyo, said that the suspect was arrested in Kano.

He said that the arrest of the suspect was sequel to available intelligence, which he said indicated the suspect’s terrorist antecedents and covert drive to indoctrinate and recruit susceptible youths in the country.

The statement said, “On January 17, 2016 one Abdussalam Yunusa, a recruiter for the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria was arrested in Kano.

“His arrest was sequel to available intelligence which indicated his terrorism antecedents and covert drive to indoctrinate and recruit susceptible youths in the country.”

Before his arrest, Opuiyo said that Yunusa had completed arrangements to embark on a journey to join an ISIS terrorist training camp in Libya, with other Nigerians whom he recruited for the group.

Source: PUNCH