Court remands alleged drugs baron arrested in Lagos Church (Guardian)
A FEDERAL High Court sitting in Lagos has ordered the remand of alleged drug baron, Stephen Afam Ikeanyionwu, who was recently arrested in a Pentecostal church in Ojodu area of Lagos State by Operatives of the National Drugs Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA).
Justice Tijjani Ringim made the remand order following the drug lord’s not guilty plea to the six-count charge of conspiracy and unlawful dealing in the banned drug preferred against him by the anti-narcotic agency.
According to the NDLEA, the suspect conspired with one Uche and Emeka, who resides in Nigeria, and one Sunny and Salaja, who resides in United Kingdom (UK), to attempt to smuggle the banned substance which consists of Indian Hemps, Cocaine and heroin, weighing a total of 66.65 kilogrammes to the UK through his logistics and freight forwarding company, Farawell Company Limited. Read more
6 men, teenager on remand over cultism, murder (DailyTrust)
An Ikeja chief magistrate court, on Thursday, ordered the remand of six men and a teenager in Kirikiri Correctional Centre over cultism and murder.
The defendants are: Ezekiel Ekeug, 27; Timileyin Oyetunji, 22; Kingsley Effiong, 25; Azeez Bello, 28; Victor Agba, 28; Mubarak Abubakar, 20 and Mohammed Yinusa, 19.
The police had charged the defendants with conspiracy, belonging to Eiye/Klu Klas Klan (KKK) confraternity, an unlawful society, and murder.
The Magistrate, Elizabeth Adeola, did not take the plea of the suspects for want of jurisdiction to entertain the case.
Adeola ordered the prosecution counsel to send the case file to the Lagos State Department of Public Prosecution (DPPs) for legal advice. Read more
VAT row gets messier, Appeal Court orders stay of execution (Guardian)
The ongoing row between the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) and the Rivers State governments over the collection of Value Added Tax (VAT) in the country deepened yesterday with the Court of Appeal, Abuja Division, ordering the Rivers Government, FIRS and the Attorney-General of the Federation to maintain status quo, pending the hearing and determination of applications before it in respect of VAT.
This is even as Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, yesterday, signed the state VAT Bill into law less than 24 hours after it was passed by the state House of Assembly.
The state government also filed an application at the Appeal Court to be joined in the appeal filed by FIRS challenging the judgment of the Federal High Court, Port Harcourt, which declared that the Rivers State government and not the FIRS should collect VAT and Personal Income Tax in the state. Read more
3 abducted Obasanjo’s workers regain freedom (Nation)
Three abducted workers of the former President Olusegun Obasanjo, have regained their freedom.
The victims who are workers at the former President’s farm, located at Kobape area in Obafemi-Owode Local Government area of Ogun, were allegedly kidnapped on Wednesday evening at Seseri Village.
Ogun State Police Public Relations Officer, Abimbola Oyeyemi, said they were released following the pressure mounted on the kidnappers.
Read Also: Amotekun rescues 9 abducted Lagos-bound passengers
Oyeyemi said the Anti-Kidnapping and SWAT operatives had been in the bush since the incident happened,mounting serious pressure on them. Read more
LAGESC arraigns two for impersonation (Guardian)
The Lagos Environmental Sanitation Corps (LAGESC) Friday arraigned two suspects for impersonating the agency and carrying fake identity cards after a tip-off from an informant.
Corps Marshal of the agency, Gbemisola Akinpelu, who made the disclosure, said the three suspects, Mathew Ilesanmi, 36, Gbadeyinka Kola, 64 and Kehinde Akinmoyero, portrayed themselves to be LAGESC personnel and arrested a man for open urination around Abiola Garden, Ojota.
She added that a concerned citizen alerted them of the illegal activities of the suspect after they arrested the man for open urination and subsequently tried to extort him before he could be released. Read more
BBN: I didn’t have sex with Boma, we acted a script, Tega insists (Punch)
A recently-evicted Big Brother Naija (Shine Ya Eye edition) contestant, Tega Dominic-Ajeboh, has said that she considers herself such a prize that every man would want to have her beside him. According to her, all the male housemates in the house liked her.
Maintaining that nothing had changed about her relationship with Boma, She told Saturday Beats, “I did not have sex with Boma in the house. Everything we did under the duvet was intentional; it was part of our strategy. If we had not been evicted on Sunday, perhaps the viewers would have got a clear picture of what we were trying to do. Since we were evicted, we went home with an ‘uncompleted script’.
“We have always been friends and we had an understanding. Whatever it was (between us) ended in the house. He said it a couple of times that he liked me. Every guy in the house liked me and some of them said they wished I was not married. I’m a ‘guy’s girl’. There’s no man that would not want to have a woman like me beside him.”
Speaking on her experience since leaving the competition in the light of the backlash she had faced from many Nigerians, she said, “It was initially rough at the beginning but we are getting over it. I had so much fun and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. When I came out of the house and I watched some clips from the show, I realised why it is so easy for people to judge from outside. When one is in the house, the atmosphere is completely different and there is a lot of tension… Read more
Police rescue 8 abducted boat passengers, arrest kidnappers (Guardian)
The Rivers State Police Command has rescued eight abducted boat passengers who were kidnapped last Monday, September 6 and Tuesday, September 7, 2021, along the Bonny waterways in Bonny local council of the state.
The command has also arrested some of the kidnappers terrorising the Bonny waterways. The Bonny and Kula waterways in Akuku-Toru local council had witnessed series of kidnapping in recent times.
The spokesman of the State Police Command, Nnamdi Omoni, while parading one of the suspects yesterday in Port Harcourt, said the police commenced investigation into the incident by inviting one of the boat drivers whose passengers were kidnapped and he was able to identity an arrested suspect. Read more
Babandede retires as Immigration boss after five years (Punch)
The Comptroller General of the Nigeria Immigration Service, Muhammad Babandede, has retired after 36 years in service.
The Deputy Comptroller-General, Finance and Account, Idris Jere, has since stepped in as acting CG until a substantive CG is appointed by the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.).
Babandede, who was appointed to the highest Immigration office on May 15, 2016, succeeded Martin Abeshi.
He was said to have enacted several reforms in the service, notably the digitisation of passport operations and the introduction of paperless administration. Read more
Jennifer Lopez, Ben Affleck make their romance official at Venice Film Festival premiere (ChicagoSunTimes)
After weeks of smooching on yachts and holding hands on intimate walks, Jennifer Lopez and old flame turned new again Ben Affleck made it official Friday night on the red carpet for the premiere of Affleck’s “The Last Duel” at the Venice International Film Festival.
She was dripping in Cartier diamonds in a white mermaid body hugging gown with plunging neckline and high side slit by Georges Hobeika. He was dapper in a black Dolce & Gabbana tuxedo. There were plenty of kisses and hugs for the cameras after a summer of love for the two, who rekindled their romance in May, 17 years after they broke up in 2004.
They were spotted out and about in Venice before their formal coming out. At the premiere, Affleck waved to the crowd as he helped Lopez out of a black car and onto the red carpet. Read more
“I was responsible for those people” (TheAtlantic)
On the evening of September 4, 2021, one week before the 20th anniversary of 9/11, Glenn Vogt stood at the footprint of the North Tower and gazed at the names stamped in bronze. The sun was diving below the buildings across the Hudson River in New Jersey, and though we didn’t realize it, the memorial was shut off to the public. Tourists had been herded behind a rope line some 20 feet away, but we’d walked right past them. As we looked on silently, a security guard approached. “I’m sorry, but the site is closed for tonight,” the man said.
Glenn studied the guard. Then he folded his hands as if in prayer. “Please,” he said. “I was the general manager of Windows on the World, the restaurant that was at the top of this building. These were my employees.”
The man glanced over Glenn’s shoulder. “Which ones?” Read more
How AI and 5G will power the next wave of innovation (ZDNet)
In the next 10 years, artificial intelligence is expected to transform every industry, and the catalyst for this transformation is 5G. Together, the two technologies will enable fast, secure, and cost-effective deployment of internet of things devices and smart networks.
AI-powered 5G networks will accelerate the “fourth industrial revolution and create unprecedented opportunities in business and society,” Ronnie Vasishta, senior vice president of telecom at graphical chipmaker and software platform developer NVIDIA, said in a special address at the 2021 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona several weeks ago.
“Billions of things are located throughout the network and data centers. A ubiquitous 5G network will connect these data centers and intelligent things at the rate, latency, cost, and power required by the application,” Vasishta said. “As this network morphs to adapt to 5G, not only will AI drive innovation, but it will also be required to manage, organize, and increase the efficiency of the network itself.” Read more
Alabama man dies of cardiac event after 43 hospitals with full ICUs turned him away (USAToday)
The family of a man who died of heart issues in Mississippi is asking people to get vaccinated for COVID-19 after 43 hospitals across three states were unable to accept him because of full cardiac ICUs.
Ray Martin DeMonia died last week in Meridian, Mississippi. He was three days shy of his 74th birthday and a well-known native in Cullman, Alabama, his family said.
DeMonia suffered from a cardiac event, and emergency staff at Cullman Regional Medical Center had to bring him to the nearest available bed, which was nearly 200 miles away at a Mississippi hospital. Read more
“9/11 changed everything forever”: Colorado Muslims reflect on 20 years of bias (DenverPost)
A couple of days after Sept. 11, 2001, a man walked into the Wiggins convenience store owned by Muaatasem Ibrahim and and started making disparaging comments about Islam and Muslims.
The gas station just outside of Fort Morgan sold knives and fantasy swords, and the man told Ibrahim he wanted to buy three of them. Ibrahim refused the sale, leading the man to get more irate. Ibrahim’s 6-year-old daughter and wife were in a room in the back, watching it on the security camera, though they couldn’t hear what was happening.
“Somebody told him in the restaurant (next door) that I’m a Muslim,” Ibrahim said. “That’s why he came here.”
Another customer told Ibrahim he’d called the authorities about the angry man, and police arrived before anything else could happen. Read more
NASA: Mars rover rocks reveal ‘potentially habitable sustained environment’ (CNET)
NASA had high hopes for Mars’ Jezero Crater and what it could tell us about the potential for past life on the red planet. The Perseverance rover’s first rock core samples from this now-dry lakebed are giving scientists plenty of reason to get excited.
“It looks like our first rocks reveal a potentially habitable sustained environment,” Perseverance project scientist Ken Farley of Caltech said in a NASA statement on Friday. “It’s a big deal that the water was there a long time.” Researchers have been investigating just how long water had lingered on the lakebed. If groundwater was present for long stretches, it could have been conducive to microbial life.
After its first sample collection attempt crumbled, Perseverance triumphed by successfully drilling and stashing its first core sample from a different rock nicknamed “Rochette.” It then followed that up with a second sample. Analysis shows Rochette appears to be volcanic in origin. Read more
Why Leylah Fernandez’s father Jorge doesn’t have a ticket to the US Open final (WTA)
Leylah Fernandez’s father Jorge will not be at Saturday’s US Open final cheering on his daughter in the biggest match of her young career. He learned his lesson the hard way, and after years of helping his daughter achieve her ultimate dreams, there’s no way he’s getting in the way now.
“Yes, I’m extremely superstitious,” Jorge told reporters on the eve of the US Open final. “My daughter is as well.
“It’s working, so let’s not ruin it. The last time I showed up to a finals it was Acapulco and she lost it. I was hating myself for a good two months afterwards. I didn’t really want to talk about it. I didn’t want to talk to anybody.
“They say, C’mon, it’s just a game, she made it to the finals, right? C’mon. But inside me it’s like, No, I shouldn’t have shown up, I shouldn’t have been there.” Read more
Volleyball: Nigeria breaks 16-year jinx, qualify for quarter-final (Punch)
Nigeria on Friday defeated Ethiopia to qualify for the quarter-final of the ongoing 2021 African Men’s Senior Volleyball Nations Championship in Rwanda.
Usman Abdallah’s side had to work extra hard to get the better of their opponent with a 3-1 (25-20, 25-12, 32-34, 25-17) win in their last match of Pool B win.
The victory means Nigeria breaks a 16 years jinx of failing to make it to the round of 16 of the volleyball nations championship.
Speaking after the game, Abdallah expressed satisfaction with his team’s display against the Ethiopians and added that the team hoped to do better this year than the previous years. Read more
Italian Grand Prix: Valtteri Bottas beats Lewis Hamilton for F1 ‘sprint’ race front row (BBC)
Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas beat team-mate Lewis Hamilton to qualify fastest for Saturday’s Italian Grand Prix ‘sprint’ race.
The Finn beat Hamilton by 0.096 seconds, with Hamilton’s title rival Max Verstappen third, 0.411secs behind.
The usual second Friday practice was replaced by an hour-long qualifying session to decide the grid for Saturday’s ‘sprint’ race qualifying.
Hamilton trails Red Bull’s Verstappen by three points in the title race. Read more
US Soccer asks men’s, women’s national teams to split World Cup prize money (UPI)
Cindy Parlow Cone, the president of the US.cont Soccer Federation, sent an open letter Friday asking the unions of the men’s and women’s national teams to agree to equally divide FIFA’s World Cup prize money.
In the public letter, Cone called for the men’s national team to allow the USSF to redistribute a portion of FIFA’s World Cup payouts to the women’s national team. Cone said the federation will offer the unions the same contract.
Led by star forward Alex Morgan, members of the U.S. women’s team sued the USSF in March 2019 for equal pay, and the disparity in World Cup prize money has been a major sticking point between the two sides. The federation insists that due to FIFA’s control of the prize pot, it is out of U.S. Soccer’s control to split the funds equally. Read more
Cristiano Ronaldo return: Ole Gunnar Solskjaer says Man Utd players have ‘no place to hide’ (BBC)
Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer says there is “no place to hide” for his players following the return of Cristiano Ronaldo.
Ronaldo, 36, will make his second United debut in the Premier League game against Newcastle at Old Trafford.
His arrival, and that of France defender Raphael Varane, has raised expectation levels at a club which last won the league title in 2013.
Solskjaer said: “He will get on the pitch at some point, that’s for sure.” Read more
‘Wait for it’: Tennis fans react to Novak Djokovic drama at US Open (Yahoo)
If Novak Djokovic is to create tennis history at the US Open then he seems determined to do it the hard way.
On Friday night in New York, the World No.1 was taking on Alexander Zverev for a place in the finals at Flushing Meadows and a step closer to a record-breaking 21st major that would also complete a rare calendar year Grand Slam.
No male player has won all four majors in the same year since Australia’s Rod Laver in 1969 and Djokovic has been determined to avoid talking about it in New York. Read more