Author: straightnewsng.com

Scores of mourners were mowed down by suspected Boko Haram militants at a funeral in Badu village of Nigeria’s north-eastern state of Borno. Gunmen on motorcycles and in vans opened fire on mourners in a village near the state capital, Maiduguri, on Saturday, eyewitnesses say. The death toll was higher than 65 and was seen as a reprisal attack by the insurgents over the killing of their colleagues few weeks ago in the area, AFP news agency reports. There has been an increase in attacks by Boko Haram and other Islamist groups in Nigeria and across the region. Tens of…

President Muhammadu Buhari has approved establishment of a National Action Committee, NAC, for the implementation of African Continental Free Trade Area, AfCFTA, agreement. Recall that President Buhari signed the AfCFTA at the 12th Extraordinary Session of the African Union Heads of State on July 7, 2019, in Niamey, Republic of Niger. A statement signed by Mallam Garba Shehu, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, in Abuja Sunday, explained that the National Action Committee, NAC, would comprise representatives of Ministries and Agencies with competent and relevant jurisdiction, and selected stakeholder groups from the private sector and…

The Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, LCCI, said Sunday that the Central Bank of Nigeria’s milk importation policy would do more harm than good to both investors and the citizens. LCCI in a statement by Mr. Muda Yusuf, the Director-General, said the policy would trigger avoidable disruptions and dislocations in the investment environment and further undermine investors’ confidence as well as create huge supply gaps in the market with severe harmful consequences. Yusuf said the economy was not ripe for the policy, adding that for all practical purposes, it was tantamount to a ban on importation of milk in…

By Akanimo Sampson As the deadline is gradually drawing near for the shipping industry to clean up its act on reducing air pollution, Viva Energy appears to be bracing up to give the industry some relief. From this coming January, vessels across the world will be required to use low-sulphur fuel oil. The sulphur content in oil is be capped at 0.5 per cent by the International Maritime Organisation (IMO). Insiders say that is down from the current level of 3.5 per cent sulphur in fuel oil used by ships. The global shipping industry contributes 8 per cent of the…

Kano Pillars, Sunday, emerged the winner of the 2019 Aiteo Cup following a 4-3 penalty shootout win against Niger Tornadoes at the Ahmadu Bello Stadium Kaduna, reports Completesports.com. This was as Nasarawa Amazons have won their first Women Aiteo Cup title in Kaduna on Sunday. It was the first time the Sai Masu Gida will lift the title and it came as a consolation for their defeat to Enugu Rangers in last year’s final. Niger Tornadoes also lost in the final of the competition on penalties to Akwa United in 2017. The two teams fought hard in the game but…

Nelson is the sixth person to be evicted on Sunday following the way of Avala, Isilomo, Ella, Kim Oprah and Tuoyo evicted Nelson is the latest housemates to be evicted from Big Brother Naija Pepper Dem edition Before his eviction Mercy Eke smashed Big Brother’s phone following a heated argument with Gedoni Ekpata after the Saturday night party. Some of the housemates were tipsy after the party, including Diane. Trouble started when Gedoni made a video of drunk Diane and Mercy repeatedly asked him to stop filming as she as tipsy. Gedoni, however went on to film and dared Mercy…

By Akanimo Sampson These are certainly troubling times for the Nigeria. There are battle fronts everywhere, and the government under the watch of President Muhammadu Buhari, a supposed progressive of the All Progressives Congress (APC) appears to be overwhelmed. After his seeming failed political intercourse with the defunct All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), one of the coalition parties in the APC, Buhari jumped ship and adorn a progressive toga on the platform of the defunct Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), also one of the coalition parties he founded. Sheikh Ahmad Abubakar Mahmoud Gumi, a seeming radical Islamic scholar based in Kaduna,…

By Akanimo Sampson In Akwa Ibom State, one of the big oil and gas states in Nigeria, with a profile of more than N7 billion internally generated revenue as at the first quarter of 2018, there is a community in Etinan local government area where school pupils are daily exposed to risk in their frantic bid to access basic education. Following the recommendations of the Akilu Commission of Inquiry into the administrative structure of the then South Eastern State, Etinan local government area was created in 1976 out of the defunct Uyo Division with Etinan as its headquarters. The area…

Two Dutch have been sentenced to death by Moroccan court over the accidental killing of a medical student in 2017, a lawyer for the victim’s family said Saturday. Two years ago Edwin Gabriel Robles Martinez and Shardyone Girigorio Semerel allegedly opened fire on a cafe in the tourist hub of Marrakech. They had apparently been aiming at the cafe’s owner, but instead killed the student and wounded two other people, local media reported. At the time local officials said the shooting was a “settling of accounts” that was “directly linked to a criminal network which has ramifications in some European…

By Akanimo Sampson The coup in Sudan was hatched to foil transition to democracy in the country, security sources have said. The country’s army chief and at least a dozen high-ranking army officers and Islamists have been arrested in a second coup plot. Sudan’s military is insisting that it was a plot to restore the party of ousted autocrat President Omar al-Bashir to power, who is despised for his iron-fisted rule and repression on women. According to the military, “failed attempt aims to abort our glorious revolution and to return the former National Congress regime to power, and to disrupt…