Buried in rubble of 21-storey Ikoyi building, surrounded by corpses, we thought the end had come – Survivors (Punch)
He shook his head intermittently in disbelief, wiping off tears with his right palm. For about two minutes, Nurudeen Solagbade, could not utter a word from his bed at the Lagos Island General Hospital.
He kept nodding his head in assurance to his worried relatives waving at him through the ward window that he was fine. The more he tried to engage them, the more he betrayed emotion.
“I never thought I would be alive,” the 33-year-old bricklayer intoned when he eventually mustered courage.
Solagbade was one of the survivors rescued from the rubble of a 21-storey building that collapsed around 2pm on Monday on Gerrard Road, Ikoyi, Lagos. The building was one of the three high-rise residential buildings owned by the Managing Director, Fourscore Heights Limited, Femi Osibona. Read more
Lagos bridges turn abodes for hoodlums (Sun)
In other environments, bridges are monuments – places that citizens and foreigners like to visit for sightseeing! Sometimes they serve as nests for lovers. But in Nigeria, especially in Lagos, that appears not to be the case, these days. Lagos bridges rather emit fear, horror, panic, and trepidation as they act as abodes for hoodlums.
If that were their intention, to find a place where they can just lay their heads and catch some sleep, perhaps nobody will have any cause to worry. But to constitute a big menace to saner minds after taking some substances is what Lagosians are not prepared to live with.
Hardly would a day pass without you hearing stories of unsuspecting people who were robbed, attacked, harassed or swindled while passing some of the Lagos bridges. Saturday Sun findings show that the most notorious are: Eko, Empire, Ojuelegba, Carter, Apapa, Ikeja, and Oshodi bridges. While some of the attacks take place in the day, especially in lonely places and during lonely hours, others take place at night when workers or travellers are on their way home.
A guided tour of some of these bridges will show that underneath them are dirty sights characterized by littered plastics and disused packs and packets. Some of them look dingy with odours of dead rats, Indian hemp and other substances oozing from there. Sometimes you see madmen and women strolling around the places. Read more
Police kill 3 during clash with Lagos tricycle riders over N100 (Punch)
There was pandemonium on Command Road, Meiran, Lagos State, as a clash between men of the state police command and tricycle operators in the area left no fewer than three persons dead.
PUNCH Metro gathered that trouble started when a yet-to-be-identified traffic warden allegedly stabbed a tricycle operator, identified only as Eleyele, to death for refusing his demand for N100.
Angered by the development, the victim’s colleagues ran after the policeman, who fled the scene.
After the cop escaped, the protesting crowd carried the victim’s remains to the front of the Meiran Police Division, where it was deposited. Read more
100-floor Audacity Skyline project to commence in Lagos (Guardian)
To address housing deficit in Nigeria, a real estate firm, Landwey Investment Limited, is set to commence the development of a project called “The Audacity Skyline” a 100-floor that will be a mixed-use high-rise in Eko Atlantic City, Lagos State.
The proposed tower will be seated on 3,500 square metres of land space the firm operates within the commercials retail residential property segment.
Speaking on the proposed project, the Chief Executive Officer, Landwey, Olawale Ayelara, said the project is an architectural masterpiece that would feature tastefully finished residential with pent-houses, commercial spaces and multi-level parking designated area.
According to him, the project will start in August 2022 and will be finished in a two-year period. Read more
My husband took another wife while I was nursing our child in the hospital —wife (Tribune)
A man, Abdulai Abdusalam, recently brought a divorce suit against his wife, Nofiast Abdusalam, at Oja Oba/ Mapo Court C Customary Court, Mapo, Ibadan, Oyo State.
Abdulai in his divorce suit alleged that his wife was deceitful and rebellious in nature.
The plaintiff explained that the defendant introduced him to her mother’s family instead of that of her father when they were preparing for their marriage.
According to him, her father’s family came demanding that he carried out the normal marriage rite which included payment of dowry a few months after they got married and dowry paid. Read more
‘We started killing policemen because they were killing our members’ (Sun)
A gang of suspected robbers recently ran into troubled waters in Niger State.
Police operatives in the state arrested two suspected armed robbers and kidnappers identified as Muhammed Bello, 32 years old and Nura Umar, 30, who are alleged to have been involved In various kidnapping and armed robbery incidents in the state. They are accused of attacking policemen on duty and stealing police guns.
The police said they also recovered AK47 rifles, magazines and cartridges along the Makara/ Mokwa Road axis in Niger State.
The Niger State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Monday Bala Kuryas told Saturday Sun that on September 25, 2021, the police operatives on the “Safe, Highway Patrol Team” while on routine patrol along Makara /Mokwa road during their stop and search, gave a hot chase to some armed robbers who ran to Sabon Makara village, where the driver abandoned the vehicle and they took to their heels. Read more
Justice Odili’s home raid may cost Malami SAN title, says NBA president (Punch)
The Nigerian Bar Association has continued to fume over the invasion of the Abuja home of Supreme Court Justice, Mary Odili, by agents of the Federal Government last week.
The President of the NBA, Olumide Akpata, at a special press briefing in Lagos on Friday, described the operation as egregious and the gathering of an ominous cloud over the judiciary, saying it was reminiscent of how operatives of the Department of State Services in 2016 raided the homes of seven judges and how a former Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Walter Onnoghen (retd.), was “illegally removed from office,” ahead of the 2019 general elections.
Apata vowed that the NBA would stop at nothing to ensure that those behind the latest operation were unmasked and punished, to put a stop to “the assault on the judiciary.”
He said the NBA would not accept the flurry of denials by the Attorney General of the Federal and security agencies that they knew nothing about the operation. Read more
My husband gives me N120 to feed 4 persons per day, woman tells court (Tribune)
A Shari’a court sitting at Rigasa, Kaduna, Kaduna State, has dissolved a one-year-old marriage over the husband’s inability to provide for his wife.
According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), the judge, Salisu Abubakar-Tureta, delivering judgment, granted the prayer of Mariya Zhulyadaini for divorce from Jamilu Hassan.
Mariya in her petition prayed the court for divorce because her husband did not provide her with three square meals.
“My husband gives me only N120 daily to feed four people since we got married in 2020,” she said. Read more
Awka, Onitsha, Nnewi, Ekwulobia turn ghost towns (Leadership)
Ahead of today’s governorship election, major towns in Anambra State, including Awka, Onitsha, Nnewi and Ekwulobia, have been deserted and have become a mere shadow of their boisterous selves.
Checks by LEADERSHIP Weekend revealed that there is palpable fear in state over impending attacks following the sit-at-home directive by the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).
Although the group has since lifted the directive amid massive deployment of security operatives in the state, prospects of low voter turnout persists.
It was observed that virtually all markets in the state, especially in Awka, Onitsha, Nnewi and Ekwulobia did not open for business yesterday, as the traders stayed away from the markets for fear of the IPOB threats. Read more
London: 12 arrested as Million Mask March protesters clash with police outside parliament on bon fire night (SkyNews)
Twelve people have been arrested after hundreds of anti-establishment protesters gathered in Parliament Square in London on Bonfire Night, before scuffles broke out with police.
Demonstrators wearing Guy Fawkes-style masks gathered at Trafalgar Square and burned an effigy of Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
The protesters then moved to Parliament Square where fireworks appeared to be thrown towards police.
Many of the members of the movement, known as the Million Mask March, held signs protesting against coronavirus restrictions.
The Metropolitan Police said eight officers had been injured. Read now
US trial over shooting of Ahmaud Arbery opens with majority white jury (Independent)
Opening statements began yesterday in the murder trial of three white men charged in the shooting death of Ahmaud Arbery, with a prosecutor telling jurors that faulty assumptions led them to chase down the 25-year-old black man.
Mr Arbery’s killing was largely ignored until a leaked mobile phone video stirred outrage that deepened a national reckoning over racial injustice.
Greg McMichael and his adult son, Travis McMichael, armed themselves and pursued Mr Arbery in a pickup truck as he ran through their neighbourhood just outside the Georgia port city of Brunswick on February 23, 2020.
A neighbour, William ‘Roddie’ Bryan, joined the chase and recorded graphic video of Travis McMichael shooting Mr Arbery three times with a shotgun. Read more
Ethiopian army recalls retired military officers as anti-government alliance forms (GlobeandMail)
The Ethiopian army on Friday called on former personnel to rejoin the military to fight the advance of Tigrayan forces, state media said, as nine anti-government factions formed a new alliance to push out Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s government.
Called the United Front of Ethiopian Federalist and Confederalist Forces, the alliance includes the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which has been fighting Abiy’s government for a year in a war that has killed thousands of people and forced more than two million more from their homes.
Faced with a spreading conflict and threats by Tigrayan and allied forces to march on the capital Addis Ababa, the federal armed forces appealed to retired soldiers and veterans to rejoin the military, setting a Nov. 24 deadline to register.
In the past week, the government and local authorities have also told civilians in the capital to register their weapons and prepare to defend their neighbourhoods. Read more
South African gay chef cancels Zimbabwe visit amid protests (ABC)
A trendy Zimbabwean restaurant has reopened but without an appearance by a South African gay celebrity following complaints by a group of conservative churches and ruling party members.
The cancellation of a visit by TV celebrity Somizi Mhlongo highlights the discrimination that members of the LGBTI community face “on a daily basis” in Zimbabwe where homophobia runs high, a rights group said Friday.
Members of the ruling ZANU-PF party’s youth wing and the Apostolic Christian Council of Zimbabwe vowed to block an appearance by Mhlongo. Owners of the restaurant have remained mum on the matter.
Mhlongo, who hosts gourmet restaurant events in South Africa and is a judge on the “Idols South Africa” TV show, announced he would not travel to Zimbabwe. Read more
‘I still fancy him’: Holly Willoughby gushes over husband Dan Baldwin (DailyMail)
Holly Willoughby has revealed she felt lost while trying to juggle her busy work and family life.
The This Morning presenter, 40, is married to TV producer Dan Baldwin and the couple have children Harry, 12, Belle, 10, and Chester, seven.
Holly gushed over her husband of 14 years, quipping it’s ‘fantastic’ that she still fancies him, while discussing how she become disconnected from her sense of self.
Holly said on Zoe Ball’s Radio 2 show: ‘I have a very happy relationship with my husband. I love him, I still fancy him – which is fantastic.’ Read more
Brody Dalle claims she “pleaded” with her children to see Josh Homme amid custody battle (NME)
Brody Dalle has testfied in court in an going criminal contempt trial, as the custody battle over her and Josh Homme‘s two sons continues.
It comes after her ex-husband was called as a witness to the trial, which began last Friday (October 29), following his accusation that the The Distillers frontwoman violated an equal custody agreement and was “alienating” Homme from his sons by allegedly not allowing him to see them.
The Queens Of The Stone Age frontman claimed that Dalle did not let him see their sons, who are aged 5 and 10, despite court orders allowing him to do so. Dalle previously pled not guilty to the contempt charge and denied Homme’s allegations, with her lawyers reportedly claiming that she had tried to convince the elder son to visit Homme, but he refused.
Now, The Distillers frontwoman has told the court she tried to convince the couple’s three kids to go to Homme’s house for his court-ordered custodial time on September 4, but the kids “refused”, reports Rolling Stone. Read more
Marília Mendonça: Brazilian singer and Latin Grammy winner dies in plane crash en route to concert (SkyNews)
One of Brazil’s most popular singers, Marília Mendonça, has been killed in a plane crash on her way to a concert.
The 26-year-old Latin Grammy winner died along with her producer, her uncle, who also worked as her adviser, and both the pilot and co-pilot of the plane, her press office said in a statement.
Ms Mendonça had posted a photo to her 38 million Instagram followers showing her walking towards the plane with a guitar case in hand.
The plane had departed from Ms Mendonça’s hometown of Goiania and crashed shortly before arrival in Caratinga on Friday afternoon, where she had a concert scheduled later in the day. Read more
Eben-Spiff, Bolaji emerge winners at Indian Cup Golf tourney (Guardian)
The week-long Indian Cup Golf Tournament was wrapped up last weekend at the golf section of Ikoyi Club 1938 in Lagos, with an 18-hole closing round for gentlemen, guests and veterans. Peter Eben-Spiff and Bolaji Martins were winners in their respective categories of the main event walking away with business class tickets on Qatar Airways.
The tournament, which teed-off with the caddies and professional’s round on October 25, also featured lady players a day later and ran a full field of competitors for the coveted Indian Cup on Saturday October 30. The Chairman of the Indian Golf Foundation, Sunil Thadani, said it was a fruitful development.
“The turnout of players this year was very impressive, and we got support from different corporates including Pepsi , African Industries, Qatar airways, Zenith Bank, who believe in the India-Nigeria business relationship. They have been very magnanimous in their support. As businesses continue to recover from the setback of COVID-19, we believe India Cup was the perfect event for our sponsors.” Read more
BWF bans Chinese players for match-fixing, China Badminton Association ‘fully supports’ decision (SouthChinaMorningPost)
The Badminton World Federation confirmed on Friday that it had banned two Chinese players for two years over match-fixing with the Chinese Badminton Association announcing that it “fully supports” the decision.
Regional level players Zhu Junhao and Zhang Bingrong have been suspended from all badminton-related activity until August 12, 2023 over bets placed on a mixed doubles match in France in 2019, with Zhang also betting on other matches.
“Both were found to have breached the 2017 BWF Code of Conduct in Relation to Betting, Wagering and Irregular Match Results during tournaments in March 2019,” the BWF said in a statement.
Suspect betting activity was flagged to the BWF by sports betting monitors ESSA relating to bets placed on the match between Zhu and partner Hua Xiaobei against Daniel Hess and Stine Kuspert at the Orleans Masters. Read more
Jesse Lingard ‘seriously considering’ Man Utd exit as West Ham offer new reason to leave (DailyExpress)
Manchester United playmaker Jesse Lingard is tempted by the possibility of a return to West Ham United after seeing the Hammers carry last season’s strong form into the new campaign, according to reports. The 28-year-old spent a fruitful period on loan in east London during the first half of the year, helping them to achieve Europa League qualification with nine goals and five assists in 16 appearances.
Lingard was targeted by West Ham over a permanent move for his services during the summer, but ultimately chose to stay and fight for his place at United.
However, the England man has only played 63 minutes in the Premier League since the beginning of the season.
He was hoping to work his way back into Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s plans at Old Trafford, but has failed to do so and looks set to move on in the near future. Read more
Fenerbahçe to ‘give answer to Olympiacos president’ (HurriyetDailyNews)
The first three half goals have helped Fenerbahçe secure an easy 3-0 win against Antwerp in the fourth match of the UEFA Europa League as the Yellow Canaries’ captain targeted the president of the Greek team Olympiacos.
The Istanbul giant will meet next on Nov. 25.
“It was important to win in Istanbul, in our city. I dedicate this victory to all the Greek public,” said Evangelos Marinakis, the owner of Olympiacos, after the 3-0 win against Fenerbahçe on Sept. 30.
Speaking at a press conference on Nov. 4 after the Antwerp match, Mert Hakan Yandaş reminded that they did not forget those words, saying, “I came out onto the pitch as the captain of Fenerbahçe. It is an honor. This match is over. Now we will beat Olympiacos there [Greece] and give a good answer to their president.” Read more
Dean Smith confident he can arrest Aston Villa’s slide if given time despite suffering their fifth consecutive defeat against Southampton (DailyMail)
Dean Smith is confident he can turn around Aston Villa’s fortunes if he is afforded time.
Villa slumped to a fifth straight defeat as Adam Armstrong’s early strike was enough for Southampton to earn a 1-0 win at St Mary’s on Friday night.
If results go against Smith’s side this weekend they could go into the international break in the Premier League bottom three.
The 50-year-old will come under increased pressure after a poor first half led to another loss despite rallying after the interval. Read more
Verstappen says he has ‘good feeling’ after dominating FP2 – but Horner warns Mercedes have time ‘in the pocket’ (FormulaOne)
Red Bull ended Friday of the Mexico City Grand Prix only cautiously optimistic about their chances for qualifying and the race, despite Max Verstappen having dominated proceedings in Free Practice 2.
Verstappen wound up third in FP1, behind the two Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas and Verstappen’s title rival Lewis Hamilton – who currently sits 12 points behind the Dutchman in the drivers’ standings.
But Verstappen was then indomitable as the qualifying simulations of FP2 got going on Friday afternoon, stopping the clocks with a time of 1m 17.301s – a full 0.424s faster than Bottas could manage in the leading Mercedes, and 0.509s quicker than Hamilton.
“It was quite a good day,” reckoned two-time Mexico winner Verstappen. “Of course, we’re always trying to improve the car, trying to make it feel better. Of course also in FP1, the track was very dirty, so in FP2 that was already a bit nicer. The car’s working quite well. A few things… to look at but pretty good. Read more
I’m passionate about grassroots volleyball, says Major Gen Gagariga (Guardian)
A board member of the Nigeria Volleyball Federation, Major General Taritimiye Gagariga has said that he is passionate about the growth and development of volleyball, especially at the grassroots level.
Gagariga spoke at the end of the Kontagora Volleyball Challenge, a grassroots tournament held in the Nigerian Army Cantonment, Kontagora, Niger State from October 27 to 31, 2021.
He revealed that his focus is to ensure that youths, who are yet to have the opportunity to participate in the centralised top level volleyball competitions in the country would have an avenue to play the game in their various localities.
“I am passionate about the growth of volleyball at the lowest level, which is the grassroots. No sporting nation can excel without the continuous production of players at the grassroots level. All the elite players we have today started from the grassroots, and this is why my focus is the continued organisation of local competitions where new talents are discovered.” Read more