The Nation Newspaper

Category: Northern Report

  • Council recruits vigilance groups

    The Chairman of Kuje Area Council Alhaji Abdullahi Galadima has disclosed plans to recruit vigilance members that would collaborate with the security agents to checkmate any form of crime in the council.

    Galadima while addressing journalists in Kuje after a closed-door security meeting with traditional rulers and security agencies, urged the youth in the area to continue to remain law abiding to all constituted authorities.

    He however, called for the continued support to the council and noted that plans were underway to recruit vigilante members that would also collaborate with the security agents to checkmate any form of crime in the entire council. while urging residents to remain law abiding to all constituted authorities.

    Galadima said the issue of security was a collective responsibility of everybody, hence it had become necessary to rid the council of any form of crime and criminality.

    He advised residents to always partner with security agencies by giving them useful information.

     

  • Yobe targets kids in anti-polio road show

    Yobe targets kids in anti-polio road show

    Following the resurgence of the polio virus in neighbouring Borno State, Yobe is not taking anything for granted, targeting children coming into the state through the major highways.

    The State primary healthcare agency, the World Bank, UNICEF and the state Committee on Polio Prevention and Eradication headed by the state Deputy Governor Abubakar Aliyu has organised immunisation points on the Maiduguri-Kano-Jos Road  to track and immunise all children coming or passing through the state.

    According to the immunisation of officials, over 500 children have so far been immunised in this initiative.

    During one such advocacy and inspection of the exercise at one of the entry points from Maiduguri, Aliyu  said the state decided to take such a proactive measure of tracking children in transit due to the insurgence of the virus in neighboring Borno State.

    Aliyu who was in company of the State Commissioner for Health Dr. Bello Kawuwa, stated that Yobe has devised several ways to eradicate  the virus in the state with the highway immunisation initiative as one of them.

    “Because of the three cases of polio that we got in Borno State ,we decided to scale up the campaign against the virus by devising so many means of eradicating the diseases and stopping it from coming into our state. This measure is one of our own measures as a state to ensure that the certification of Nigeria as a polio free nation by the WHO is not dragged backward further because of what happened in Borno State.

    “This exercise that you see is a response of what happened in Borno State. As you are aware, this checkpoint where we are is the one leading to Maiduguri where those three cases were discovered, so the idea is to target those children of polio age at the entrance point in Yobe State. These vaccinators are in all other entrances to the state carrying out the exercise,” Engr. Aliyu said.

    Another cheery news has emerged that immunisation officials have started accessing the Boko Haram liberated communities in Gujba and Gulani Local Government areas, the deputy governor has announced at the advocacy visit on the highway where he administered the oral polio vaccines to children travelling with their parents through the state.

    The Executive Secretary Yobe State Primary Healthcare Management Board Dr. Hauwa Goni Fika also collaborated the news of the deputy governor  at a polio survivor rally held in Damaturu  that health officials have started accessing the hard-reached areas of Gujba and Gulani that were hitherto taken over by Boko Haram.

    “The good news is that our people have started accessing those hard-to-reach areas of Gujba and Gulani which were no go area because of the Boko Haram crisis,” Dr. Hauwa informed.

    During the survivors rally, Dr. Hauwa called on the victims to desist from begging but rather identify meaningful trades that would change their lives while charging them to be ambassadors of kicking out the disease from Nigeria.

    The Nation reports that the survivors of polio victim penultimate week staged a grand rally in Damaturu, the Yobe State capital, to sensitise the community on the need to accept the vaccine and kick out the disease out of the state and Nigeria at large.

    The rally which is one of the campaigns against the disease in the state   had in attendance hundreds of polio victims including men and women ridding on their wheelchairs with others on their rollers, members of the Yobe State Social Mobilization Committee, drum beaters and members of the press  began at the head office of the Cripple Association Damaturu behind KeyStone Bank opposite the Damaturu Ram Market and went through some of the major  settlements cutting through some major streets in the metropolis singing, dancing and distributing pamphlets to the locales.

     

     

     

  • Peaceful atmosphere as school resumes

    An impressive turnout of students and pupils was recorded on the first day of resumption of public schools across the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), as school children in their thousands defied an early morning downpour to attend classes.

    It would be recalled that the FCT Administration had penultimate week extended the resumption date for the 2016/2017 academic calendar for all public primary and post primary schools in the FCT, from September 4 and 5 to 18 (for boarding schools) and Monday, September 19 2016 (for day schools).

    However, a visit to some public primary and secondary schools in the nation’s capital revealed that while many school children were seen moving around cleaning up their classrooms, in readiness for full learning session; some were already learning in their classes.

    Some of the schools visited included Government Secondary School (GSS)-Wuse zone 3, Festival Road Primary School and two Government Secondary Schools, all in Area 10 and Area 11 of Garki District.

    At the Senior Secondary School in Garki, Area 10, the Principal of the School, Haruna Mohammed Nabayi, disclosed that a total of five hundred students were recorded on the first day of resumption, out of the eight hundred students on the school’s register, which is about 80%

    turnout.

    And most of the students in their separate interviews expressed joy over the resumption of schools, saying they are very ready and eager to continue their learning process.

    Speaking to newsmen during an inspection tour of FCT schools, to assess the level of turnout of students and pupils, Acting Secretary, Education Secretariat of the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA), Musa Maikasuwa Yakubu, expressed delight with the impressive turnout at the schools.

    He observed that when the team visited some of the secondary schools, the classes were almost filled up, which he said shows that everybody is ready for full academic activities.

    “We are very pleased with what we have seen; because in spite of the fact that it rained heavily this morning, students and pupils were able go to schools, and some of them are still coming.

    “And the fact that the students are ready for the teachers, only means that they should be more serious with their job.

    “The teachers have had their pre-resumption meeting in all the schools, so they are ready-they have prepared their lesson notes and scheme of work.”

    According to him, the school inspection will be a continuous exercise, as even at the zonal level across the six Area Councils; the inspection is also going on there.

    On what could be responsible for the impressive turnout of students on the first day of resumption of schools, he said; of course everybody is really serious, because it seems that the change agenda of the government of the day is really moving into the system.

    “And I believe we should be able to move with time, so if you do not change, of course the change will change you,” he stated.

    He added, “The environment is also ready to absorb all manner of children from any part of the country.

    “FCT is the centre of unity, and as such we are always ready to accept pupils and students at any time they come, we are aware of the exodus of school children from private schools.

    He advised pupils, students and teachers alike to not only maintain the momentum, but also up the tempo of academic activities in order to improve learning and performance in the schools.

  • 100 youths trained in Taraba 

    100 youths trained in Taraba 

    The Bank of Industry (BOI) has ended its five-day job creation training exercise for Northeast youths in Jalingo, the Taraba State capital.

    The programme tagged Youth Entrepreneurship Skills (YES) is a job creation and youth empowerment plan run nationwide by the federal government through the Bank of Industry. In Jalingo, the closing event was organised by the African Community Bridge Foundation, a consultancy firm, on behalf of the Bank of Industry.

    The programme is aimed at reducing the rate of unemployment and poverty in the country, particularly among the youth.

    The participants, about 100, were drawn from Gombe, Adamawa and Taraba States, after they were earlier intensively trained online for twelve weeks. 10 facilitators at the training came from the Lagos Business School, adjudged to have huge experiences in their chosen topics.

    The participants were all issued Certificates of Participation to obtain loans from the Bank of Industry to begin their business empires.

    The Bank of Industry Manager for the zone, Bala Dahiru, congratulated the participants. He said the training was meant to equip the youth with the basic knowledge on how to run successful and profitable businesses cum become employers of labour.

    Dahiru urged the trained youths to justify the “high level skills” impacted onto them and as well transfer the knowledge to other youths in their various communities.

    He warned them not to consider the loans given them as free gifts but ensure they pay off the loans on time to be able to access more BOI facilities.

    “This training is designed by the federal government to give the participating youths skills in finance, marketing, sells and business laws among other fields, to enable them create jobs with small businesses.

    “The training is a federal government’s deliberate policy to create jobs through entrepreneurship skills for the teeming unemployed graduates in Nigeria.

    “And we are training you not just to be self employed but to also be employers of labour as you assess the loan and begin your businesses.

    “The loans will be refunded in three years when it is expected that your businesses must have gained grounds and become sustainable,” Dahiru said.

  • ‘We must rid councils, satellite towns of waste’

    The FCT Minister Malam Muhammad Bello has directed that a comprehensive waste evacuation exercise be undertaken in all the council areas as well as satellite communities of the territory.

    The operation is scheduled to last seven days.

    The Acting Director of the Satellite Towns Development Department (STDD) Mrs. Victoria Imande disclosed this, saying that the STDD has concluded arrangements to commence the seven-day exercise.

    Mrs. Imande stated that the FCT Administration is poised to clean up all the nooks and cranny of the satellite towns.

    She solicited for the cooperation and understanding of all the residents of the Federal Capital Territory particularly those resident in the Satellite Towns, by keying into the exercise to make it a success.

    The Director urged the residents to take personal interest in the exercise by owning the initiative and making personal hygiene part of their daily personal lives.

     

  • Demolition backlash

    Demolition backlash

    Pulling down structures has been going on apace, but not without victims crying foul. GBENGA OMOKHUNU reports
    img_20160907_142541-ok-copyBack in January everyone thought the new minister was joking when he said he would go the el-Rufai way. Kaduna State Governor Malam Nasir el-Rufai, in his days as minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) was the Demolition Man because he went about pulling down structures in a way that some thought was quite brazen. He was feared and fought for his troubles.

    Now, one of his successors, Malam Muhammad Bello is proving that he is no joker and that he can bite as much as he can bark, much like the good old Demolition Man. Several property owners can attest to that, to their horror.

    Bulldozers from the Abuja Metropolitan Management Council (AMMC) have been at work, while their owners have been vehement in condemning the operation.

    A few weeks ago, investigations revealed that the AMMC intensified the continuous demolition of what it termed illegal structures within the city centre on the order of the FCT minister.

    Bello has always made it known that he would stop at nothing to restore the Abuja master plan, and that at the end of the planned demolition, there would be no slum in the FCT.

    It would be recalled that Bello, during one of his press briefings early this year, said, “Buildings on sewer lines, green areas and areas of public interest that are not authorised will be removed. Beneficiaries of undeveloped lands in Phase 1 and Phase 2 stand the risk of forfeiting them. To run this city, we must go back to the law.”

    Several houses and shops have been demolished with many people going through pains and hardship on how to get themselves together and face the challenges of life.

    Affected people said they did not what next to do or where to go after their shops were pulled down.

    Many of them complained that government was carrying out the demolition exercise on short notice.

    Affected areas include Salsa Spot close to H-Medix supermarket, located at Ademola Adetokunbo Crescent, Wuse 2 Abuja, Shops and malls located around Banex plaza area.

    A village located at Utako area was also affected in the ongoing exercise.

    One of the affected victims of the demolition exercise a worker with a Suya Spot, Malam Sani Umaru told Abuja Review that AMMC did not give them adequate notice before the demolition.

    He said, “They only gave us 24 hours’ notice and before the 24 hours the demolition was carried out; this is inhuman treatment meted on us by the authority of the FCT. This business has existed here for the past 15 years there was no time we were ever harassed by the authority or any government official.  This action has denied about 13 persons means of livelihood and other beneficiaries of this business.

    “We are 13 persons working here earning at least N1,700 daily, if you calculate that you know what you can get. Right now I am hungry because my means of earning income has been stopped by the same government that supposed to create job for the people.

    Another shop owner who doesn’t want his name in print described the exercise as one lacking in objectivity as some buildings owned by highly influential individuals were not affected in the demolition exercise.

    “They marked there and here, they pulled down mine they didn’t pull down that one. That is the world, a world of wickedness, the notice they gave was only 24 hours.

    When asked whether he got approval from necessary authorities before the structure was erected, the victim insisted that his building was not illegal, claiming that he had been operating there for more than 10 years.

    He said, “It is not illegal, this structure has been here since the first tenure of Obasanjo, what are we talking about?”

    Other property owners have been lamenting the sudden resumption of demolition exercise, accusing the FCTA of insensitivity and violation of due process.

    Another affected lady Chioma Chukwu said: “Yesterday, I got a call about the demolition at about 4pm and this morning, they are already demolishing at other parts of the town, Banex to be precise, so we are trying to pack our things. We have been here for the past five-years, and nobody has said we are doing anything wrong.”

    The demolition, according to other affected persons that spoke to Abuja Review in recent times, become worrisome in view of the fact that the country is facing a serious economic meltdown occasioned by the economic recession with the government urging the youths to look for alternative job opportunities in order to be gainfully employed.

    All efforts to speak with a Deputy Director at AMMC, Mukhtar Galadima, to react to the allegation that government gave them short notice were futile.

    For government, it is a win-win process, but for the masses, it is pain and agony.

     

  • N250m jobs tools for artisans, groups in Kwara

    N250m jobs tools for artisans, groups in Kwara

    Senate President Bukola Saraki has spent N250 million on jobs tools distributed to artisans, women associations, taxi drivers, Hausa groups, Igbo groups, Zuru and Fulani groups in the state. Other beneficiaries, according to him, were members of Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT), Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Nigeria Association of Local Government Employees (NULGE), and Ilorin Emirate Descendants Progressive Union (IEDPU).

    Eighty tricycles, 1,777 grinding machines and 664 sewing machines, among other items, were distributed to the beneficiaries.

    The empowerment scheme, according to the senate president was designed to alleviate poverty and equip the less privilege to be economically self-reliant.

    Saraki was represented at the distribution of the items which took place at his mandate constituency office by the state chairman of All Progressives Congress (APC), Alhaji Ishola Balogun-Fulani.

    Senator Saraki said that the gesture was to give back to reciprocate the honour done to him to represent them at the upper house which gave him the opportunity to become the president of the Senate. He promised the beneficiaries more of such assistance.

    The senate president advised the beneficiaries to use the items judiciously so that it can uplift them economically.

    The Director-General, Mandate Constituency Office, Abdulwahab Issa, said beneficiaries of the scheme were selected across the 16 local government areas of the state.

    Alhaji Issa said that “we painstakingly spread it round all the Local Government and wards in Kwara Central as well as Kwara North and Kwara South Senatorial districts.

    “I appeal to all beneficiaries to use the materials judiciously. On our part at mandate we shall endeavour to monitor how it is being utilised.”

    The Emir of Ilorin, Alhaji Ibrahim Sulu-Gambari, was represented by the Magaji Are of Ilorin Alhaji Aremu Zubair hailed the effort of the former Kwara State governor and urged other political office holders to emulate him.

     

  • Minister courts Igbo support for Buhari

    The Federal Capital Territory (FCT)  Minister Malam Muhammad Bello has urged the Igbo people resident in Abuja to continue to support the government of President Muhammadu Buhari.

    The Minister made the call when a delegation of the Igbo community resident in the Federal Capital Territory paid him a visit.

    Bello emphasised that the continued support from all Nigerians irrespective of ethnic, political or religious inclinations is necessary to enable the President take Nigeria to greater heights.

    He also urged them to extend that same support to all his appointees in the Federal Capital Territory to enable them deliver quality services to the residents as encapsulated in the Change Agenda of the Federal Government.

    The Minister reiterated that his administration was working assiduously to make the Abuja light rail project operational by December 2017, adding that all the rail corridors would be developed to boost trade and commercial activities in the Territory.

    According to a statement issued by the Chief Press Secretary,  Muhammad Sule, said that the history of Abuja cannot be complete without the mention of the contributions of the Igbo traders.

    He assured that his administration would continue to run an open door policy and all-inclusive government with all the strata of the society carried along to give every sector of the country a sense of belonging.

    The Minister called for peaceful co-existence amongst all ethnic groups resident in the Federal Capital Territory, stressing, “We should maintain the tempo of the peace we are enjoying in Abuja”.

    Bello used the occasion to admonish the residents of the Federal Capital Territory to always report any suspicious movement to the law enforcement agents, in order to nip in the bud any security breach.

    Speaking earlier, the leader of the delegation and the Eze Ndigbo of Abuja, Eze Ibe Nwosu promised to maintain high degree of peace wherever they found themselves in the Territory and would continue to contribute to the economic development of Abuja.

    Eze Nwosu asked the FCT Administration to carve out new layouts to develop new markets, in order to decongest the existing ones.

    Eze Ndigbo appealed to the Minister to include the Igbo people resident in Abuja in Board appointments and other political appointments to give them a sense of belonging.

     

  • Council recruits vigilance groups

    The Chairman of Kuje Area Council Alhaji Abdullahi Galadima has disclosed plans to recruit vigilance members that would collaborate with the security agents to checkmate any form of crime in the council.

    Galadima while addressing journalists in Kuje after a closed-door security meeting with traditional rulers and security agencies, urged the youth in the area to continue to remain law abiding to all constituted authorities.

    He however, called for the continued support to the council and noted that plans were underway to recruit vigilante members that would also collaborate with the security agents to checkmate any form of crime in the entire council. while urging residents to remain law abiding to all constituted authorities.

    Galadima said the issue of security was a collective responsibility of everybody, hence it had become necessary to rid the council of any form of crime and criminality.

    He advised residents to always partner with security agencies by giving them useful information.

     

  • 3,000 displaced orphans off to school

    3,000 displaced orphans off to school

    Thousands of children whose parents were killed by Boko Haram insurgents have been enrolled in schools in Gombe State, but they have the Emir Alhaji Abubakar Shehu Abubakar III to thank for making it possible. VINCENT OHONBAMU reports

    The Emir of Gombe Alhaji Abubakar Shehu Abubakar III has given thousands of displaced orphaned children the best gift ever: sending them to school.

    Boko Haram fighters set out to make life miserable wherever they set foot. In the Northeast especially they succeeded in ruining communities, in many cases, killing couples in the presence of their children. Thousands of those children ended up in camps built for internally displaced persons or IDPs, where they depended on charity for everything. But one thing was missing: education.

    Alhaji Abubakar III has filled that void, sending a total of 3000 displaced and other needy children to school, pledging to pick up their bills.

    The children will remain grateful to the federal government and the military for crippling the terror group and working to restore normalcy in the devastated region. They will also remember the gesture of kind-hearted individuals and organisations who supplied their daily needs. But they are likely to have the emir in their hearts forever for giving them the best gift they could ever ask for: education.

    At his palace on September 9, the emir flagged off the enrolment of 1,500 children into various primary schools across the state, pledging to bear the full burden of their schooling. It was the second phase of such enrolment, having enrolled the same number of children at the beginning of last academic session in the state.

    The royal father is worried that Nigeria has 11,000,000 out of school children, the highest number of such children in the world. He is even more pained by the fact that these kids were mainly from the northern part of the country. He was moved by the need to give them hope for a better life in future and the determination to cut down on the disturbing figure of out-of-school children which UNICEF says are more in the Northeast.

    It is in this regard that he challenged well-to-do northerners, especially those in the immediate neighbourhood, to consider the statistics a serious challenge and wakeup call to help send the children to school.

    He said, “I want to call on well-to-do individuals to assist in educating the less privileged around them. It is a task for us all to assist the poor. For that reason, it is important for everyone to begin to look out for ways to assist the less privileged in order to alleviate government’s burden,” he said.

    Among the recently enrolled children, 50 live with disability while 67 were withdrawn from leading their blind parents or guardians to beg for alms in the streets.

    The Emir in order to make up for the vacuum created by the withdrawal of those children took it upon himself to feed those they led three times a day.

    An impressed ambassador to the Internally Displaced Children of Nigeria, Khadijat Salisu Isa at the occasion praised the royal father for starting the process of giving the children a hope for a good future by setting them on the path of good education.

    “These children,” she said, “are no orphans because they have a father in you. You have given them fatherhood, then education, then a future and a dream to live for,” said the elated Children’s Ambassador.

    “We will not have out-of-school children in the camps, we will not have beggars in the streets and we will not have criminals,” she stated.

    Ambassador Khadijat spoke further: “These children are no orphans because they have a father in you. You have given them fatherhood, then education, then a future and a dream to live for.

    “If you continue like this in the next twenty years, there will be no orphans in Gombe State. In the next thirty years, the children you have given hope for life and education today will become governor(s), voices in government and champions in business community. In the next forty years, who knows, one of these children might become the president of Nigeria.

    “If all rich people in Nigeria take up this kind of challenge by His Royal Highness, we will not have children roaming IDP Camps aimlessly and hopelessly today and we will not have beggars in the streets and we will not have criminals.

    “Today we have children in the IDP camps that are out-of-school and dying of lack of food. We have the money to close the camps in one day and give every child a hope and a home, but because of corruption and stealing of relief materials our children are still in camps and dying.”

    Three of the children, Hafsat, Abdullahi and Fasuma said they were happy to go to school and thanked the Emir for it.