Category: South East

Abia State Governor Okezie Ikpeazu has inaugurated the Abia Model Basic Schools and Digital Teaching Programme, as part of his administration’s efforts to improve education.

Ikpeazu, at the inauguration yesterday of Abia Model Basic School, Osusu-Amaukwa, in Obingwa Local Government Area, said education remained a vital contributor to the transformation agenda of the government.

The governor said it was pertinent to prioritise teaching and learning ‘as it is at the foundation of everything in the society’.

He added that the decision to set up the model schools and begin a digital learning programme followed the desire to provide a world class learning experience for Abian children.

Ikpeazu urged the teachers to use the equipment effectively, saying the availability of good teachers, content and infrastructure would produce excellent outcome in improving the standard of education.

He added: “Our expectation is that in the next two to four years, the products of the model schools will shine forth in Nigeria and rank topmost in education. We want every student from Abia to pass through this digital programme and excel in their educational pursuit and career.”

Commissioner for Basic Education Emma Ukwu described the project as a fulfilment of the government’s objective to transform education from analogue to digital.

Ukwu said this was part of the government’s efforts to provide an avenue for Abia schools to be equipped with teaching materials that would enhance the quality of graduates.

Chairman of the Abia State Universal Basic Education Board (ASUBEB) Josiah Anonaba said the model schools were designed to provide a child-friendly learning environment.

Anonaba hinted that five model schools were built in the three senatorial zones to serve as a standard for public and private schools to follow.

He added that the schools would serve as a platform that would provide an ICT- based environment that would expose pupils to a multimedia experience for qualitative education.

The principal, said the projects will yield unprecedented development in education sector.

“We assure you that we will continue to align our programme and input with the government’s education road map,” Onwukwe said.

Former Minister of Niger Delta affairs Pastor Usani Usani has confirmed his defection from the All Progressives Congress (APC) to the People’s Redemption Party (PRP).

Usani, who confirmed the development in a telephone interview yesterday, said ‘it is the constriction of the democratic space that has occasioned this expediency’.

Usani said he holds nothing against the APC. “We built up the APC and the members are not my enemies,” he maintained.

The former minister also confirmed that he will be contesting the 2023 governorship election in the PRP. He was a factional governorship candidate of the APC in 2019 before the court faulted his candidacy.

The PRP was originally founded in 1978 by supporters of the late Aminu Kano after his withdrawal from the National Party of Nigeria (NPN).

The PRP is barely known in Cross River State, and Usani has the task to market his new party.

Bayelsa State has directed the suspension of all meetings involving Community Development Committee (CDC), Chiefs’ Council, Youths and Women groups in Otuogori Community, Ogbia Local Government Area.

It also directed the Commissioner of Police, Ben Okolo, to deploy riot police men in the community as part of measures to forestall the breakdown of law and order.

Deputy Governor Lawrence Ewhrudjakpo gave the directive yesterday during a meeting with some stakeholders of Otuogori Community in the Government House in Yenagoa.

A statement by his media aide, Doubara Atasi, warned that no person or group must tamper with the community’s bank accounts until normalcy is fully restored.

The government has also constituted a seven-man conflict resolution committee to look into the festering leadership crisis. The committee, chaired by the Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Biriyai Dambo (SAN), will look into the immediate and remote causes of the leadership tussle, make recommendations and submit its findings in two weeks.

Ewhrudjakpo restated that the government will not tolerate actions that would destroy the prevailing peace in any part of the state.

He emphasised the need for communities to be guided by the provisions of the state’s chieftaincy law on succession or election of their paramount rulers.

The deputy governor, who urged the people to embrace love and peace, also warned that nobody should parade himself as paramount ruler or CDC chairman of Otuogori until a new leadership is duly instituted.

He added: “Don’t allow chieftaincy issues tear your community apart. As a government, we will not allow any crisis in any community. All that had transpired in your community in recent times, and even here, is illegality upon illegality.

“The role of CDCs and chiefs councils’ is clearly spelt out in the Chieftaincy Law of Bayelsa State. Nobody should mix the two. Everybody should live peacefully in Otuogori until the committee finishes its work and we all work together to enthrone a new leadership.”

Members of the committee include the Commissioner for Local Government, Chieftaincy and Community Development Thompson Amule; of Police Ben Okolo and Chairman of Ogbia Local Government Area Ebinyon Turner.

Others are Special Adviser to the Governor on Security CP Akpoebi Agberebi (rtd), Technical Adviser on Chieftaincy Matters Chief Douye Naingba and the Technical Adviser on Conflict Resolution Chief Boma Spero-Jack.

The Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of Raedal Farms Limited, Uwadiale Agenmonmen, has said the palm oil value chain is now the best in Nigeria, especially with the recent ban by the Indonesian government on exportation of oil palm and its products.

He noted that the ban had increased the pressure on Nigerian palm oil producers, which he described as an opportunity to build oil palm cultivation and palm oil production in Nigeria.

Agenmonmen addressed reporters after a tour of the company’s oil palm farm at Iguemokhuwa village in Orhionmwon Local Government Area of Edo State. He took some investors and bankers to the plantation.

According to him, the modern farm needed a minimum of N2 billion to complete its expansion programme, while insisting that finance remained the major challenge of the company.

He said: “The business environment is interesting. It may have its ups and downs but, lately, the palm oil value chain has been the best, fostered by Indonesia recently shutting down its export, which has driven the pressure back home.

“So, the prices are going up and it is good for us farmers that actually cultivate and sell. Right now, the business environment is okay.”

Agenmonmen also said the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) provided funds to boost the industry, but hinted that beneficiaries must pass through commercial banks which set their conditions.

He said the farm sits on 1,509 hectares of land, with 700 hectares currently cultivated, and another 500 hectares to be cultivated this year. The mill currently has produces 16 tons of palm oil and 27 tons of palm kernel oil daily, with full stock of raw materials.

Agenmonmen added: “We have to bring our current investors and bankers here to physically see what we are doing, because there is a difference when you talk to people about what we do on paper or through phone calls. We want to connect real time to where they have their money.

“With this, we look forward to better business opportunities. To plant what we have left and do further development, we are looking to raise the excess of N2 billion.”

Agenmonmen also called on the Federal Government to specially support farmers, particularly the oil palm and palm oil producers, so they can meet the huge demand following the Indonesia ban.

The Ebonyi Democrats have called on Governor David Umahi to concentrate on his presidential ambition. It vowed to lead campaigns against the governor if rumours of his senatorial bid comes out true.

Governor Umahi is a presidential aspirant in the All Progressives Congress (APC), but there are speculations that the governor might have also bought the nomination form for Ebonyi South Senatorial District.

A statement by the group’s Chairman, Kelechi Cornelius, advised Umahi to come clean on his Senatorial ambition. It said it was ready to campaign for Umahi’s presidential ambition, but would readily campaign against him should he betray their trust.

The statement, signed by its 30-man executive working committee, said it was becoming ‘worried over the numerous reports which have, with consistency and without a robust refutation from the necessary quarters, alleged that Governor Umahi has also picked the forms for senate while also contesting for the APC presidential ticket’.

Cornelius wondered why Umahi was engaged in a hide and seek game, seeking two positions which the electoral act naturally frowns upon. He urged Umahi to focus on his presidential ambition as double speaking could be tantamount to reducing the chances of Ndigbo producing a president of Igbo extraction.

He added: “We call on Governor Umahi to focus on his presidential ambition. Such double speaking, that he is now presently eying the senate, portrays him as politically unstable and could possibly dent the chances of Ndigbo producing a president of Nigeria.

“Matter of fact, Umahi should concentrate on convincing the APC delegates on why he is the best man for the job and come out to dissociate himself from such a less vaunting ambition.”

A coalition of Etsako, Owan, and Akoko Edo political leaders and All Progressive Congress (APC) chieftains has backed the re-election bid of Senator Francis Alimikhena.

The group’s members claimed that there are moves by unnamed godfathers to truncate democracy in Edo North by scuttling Alimikhena’s aspiration, adding that this would spell doom for the party in the state.

The coalition, comprising former local government chairmen, vice-chairmen, former councillors and commissioners, stated this in a communique following a meeting last Saturday, ahead of the forth-coming Edo North Senatorial election.

“Enough is enough to self-styled godfathers who have apportioned the state to themselves as their farmland,” they said.

They described the National Assembly as Nigeria’s stabilising force and not a place to elect people with “divisive tendencies to create chaos and instability rather than consolidate on the gains of our democratic experience.”

According to them, Alimikhena had created unfettered access between himself and his constituents.

“He is one Nigerian with an extraordinary flame of passion for development and up-liftmen of the less fortunate in the society,” they added.

Enugu State has reiterated its willingness to assist farmers with farm inputs to boost food production and security.

Programme Manager of the Enugu State Agricultural Development Programme (ENADEP) Boniface Eze said the government had acquired 1,000 hectares of land for dry season rice production to make Enugu retain its status as the highest rice producing state in the Southeast. According to him, eight of the 17 local government areas produce rice in commercial quantity.

Eze added that 50 rice destoning machines were distributed to farmers last year to enable them produce more quality rice. He said the inputs would expose the farmers to new techniques of producing, processing, packaging and marketing rice to attract more buyers.

He said: “The government’s effort has become imperative because the state is the bedrock of rice production in the Southeast.

“If we say we are producing rice, we should equally eat good rice because what took us to foreign rice is the cleanliness. You can cook foreign rice without removing the stones.

“Parboiling is one of the things that leads to having less stones in rice. When you parboil with good technique, the chances of having stone will not be there.”

Eze reiterated government’s determination to sustain and improve rice production in the state for local consumption and exports.

He added that as part of efforts to boost rice production in the country, the government would train extension agents who would in turn train the parboilers. He noted that parboilers who had been trained in other states had adopted the technology and testified to increase in yields and income.

Eze was confident that those is Enugu would not be left out.

“This training is a very good one and it has come to the right people because Enugu State is the home of rice production,” he added.

The absence of lawyer of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) stalled hearing yesterday of a suit challenging the use of sole administrator to administer the agency.

Odighonin Adienbo and 10 others had filed a suit at the Federal High Court in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, presided over by Justice Isa Dashen, opposing the use of sole administrator to run the NDDC.

The plaintiffs contended that the concept of sole administrator was alien and contrary to the NDDC Act which provides for a board consisting of representatives of all states of the Niger Delta.

The Attorney-General of the Federation and NDDC are listed as first and second defendants.

When the case was mentioned, Samuel Brisibe told the court that he was mandated by counsel for NDDC, Ume Kalu (SAN), to inform the court of his absence following a cancellation of his flight.

Brisibe further appealed to the court to adjourn the case to enable Kalu to personally argue the case as he was not abreast with developments, but was merely drafted to inform the court of reasons for Kalu’s absence in court.

Lawyer to the plaintiffs, Goodness Onuoha, however frowned on the reason advanced by Brisibe, saying Kalu should have arrived at Yenagoa on Monday ahead of yesterday’s hearing date. Onuoha urged the court to prevail on the defence to refrain from delaying the dispensation of justice.

Justice Dashen adjourned the suit till June 28 for continuation of hearing.

He, on April 5, granted an interim order restraining the Federal Government from using sole administrator to run the NDDC pending the determination of the pending suit.