#EndSARS: How policeman killed telecoms worker on duty- Widow (Punch)
A widow, Mrs Tolulope Opeyeniyi, has narrated to the Lagos State Judicial Panel of Inquiry probing allegations of brutality against men of the disbanded police Special Anti-Robbery Squad how one Sergeant Jide Akintola attached to the Sabo Police Station in Lagos shot dead her husband, Olusegun Opeyemi, on August 19, 2007.
The widow told the retired Justice Doris Okuwobi-led panel that her husband, who worked for a telecommunications company, Celtel, at the time, was on official duty, riding in the company’s vehicle when he was shot by the policeman around the University of Lagos area.
She said, “On that fateful day, he went on an official assignment to UNILAG. He told me he was going to the University of Lagos. He went in his official car. On his way back, he was stopped by the police. I don’t know if there was an argument, the police(man) shot his vehicle’s tyre, forced the door of the car open, and shot him in the left side of his chest.
“The policeman then realised he was an innocent man; he was taken to the military hospital at Yaba but he gave up the ghost.” Read more
Community drags EEDC before NERC (Guardian)
Electricity consumers in Ezema/Ubulenu and Osita-Osili communities of Uke in Idemili North Council of Anambra State have dragged the Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC) before the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) over what they termed “strange and unnecessary outrageous estimated bills,” which they alleged were outside method of estimated and prepaid billings approved by the Commission.
The residents, made up of mainly of retired and old rural people, in their cry to NERC, demanded full investigation into what they alleged to be a large scale estimated billing fraud and irregularities brought on their area by EEDC.
The visibly bitter residents accused the EEDC of over-billing them, disconnecting their supply and throwing them into darkness since June this year, when they drew the attention of the Distribution Company (DisCo) to the irregular geometric hike in their monthly bills. Read more
#EndSARS: Okorocha hails Sanwo-Olu’s leadership, courage (Sun)
Should there be a prize for the Courageous Man of the Year, Lagos State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu deserves to clinch the honour, says the lawmaker representing Imo West District in the Senate, Sen. Rochas Okorocha.
The two-term Imo State Governor said Sanwo-Olu has displayed uncommon courage in attending to emergency situations occasioned by the twin crisis of Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and the recent nationwide youth protests against police brutality of which Lagos was the epicentre.
Okorocha spoke when he paid a courtesy visit to the Lagos governor at the State House, Marina on Thursday evening. Read more
Lagos raises alarm over serial manhole vandalisms (Guardian)
Lagos State Government has raised alarm over continued theft of manhole covers on roads in the state, promising to continually pursue infrastructure delivery that would meet needs.
Mrs Aramide Adeyoye, Special Adviser to the state Governor on Works and Infrastructure, raised the alarm at a stakeholders’ meeting for the rehabilitation of Sobo Arobiodun Street in Ikeja GRA.
She was responding to concerns raised by some residents over missing manholes in some parts of the GRA, constituting danger. Read more
APC crisis: Sacked Oshiomhole-led NWC drags party, INEC to court (Punch)
A former National Vice Chairman and ex-acting chairman of the All Progressives Congress, Hilliard Eta, has asked the Federal High Court in Abuja to nullify the Caretaker/Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee of the party and declare him as the Acting National Chairman of the party.
The National Executive Committee of the APC had at its meeting held at the Presidential Villa on June 25, 2020 dissolved the party’s National Working Committee, led by the then National Chairman, Adams Oshiomhole.
The NEC, at the meeting presided over by the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), set up the caretaker committee and appointed the Yobe State Governor, Mai Mala Buni, to head the committee. Read more
Gunmen kill policeman, abduct Chinese expatriate (Vanguard)
Unknown gunmen have reportedly killed a policeman and abducted a Chinese expatriate in Ado-Ekiti on Friday.
The incident, according to the Police Public Relations Officer , Ekiti Command, ASP Sunday Abutu, occurred around 4.30pm along new Ado-Iyin road.
The Chinese, simply identified as Wang, was one of the Engineers handling the dualisation of the new Ado-Iyin road awarded to a Chinese Company by Governor Kayode Fayemi.
Apart from the police officer, Abutu said one other person was shot at the scene of the incident, who has not been confirmed dead. Read more
ASUU agrees to call off strike, to receive N70bn (Punch)
The Academic Staff Union of Universities has agreed to call of its eight-month strike which has grounded academic activities in the public universities since March.
The union leadership reached the consensus during a meeting with the government team led by the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr Chris Ngige, in Abuja, on Friday.
The government also pledged to pay N40 billion as the Earned Allowance and N30bn for the revitalisation of the university system bringing the total payment to N70 billion.
The FG further agreed to settle the arrears of salaries of the lecturers before December 31. Read more
Ogunsanwo, Nigeria’s acclaimed columnist takes a bow (Guardian)
The death of Gbolabo Ogunsanwo, Nigeria’s most captivating columnist, who rewrote history as Editor of Sunday Times of the 1970s, marks the end of an era. Ogunsanwo, who passed on yesterday, had endeared the heart of many through his celebrated style of writing that nettled bad leaders and won applause from the public.
The cerebral writer, who coined the very famous phrase If you ‘Tarka me I will Daboh you,’ was at the time both the Editor of the mass circulating Sunday Times (selling about a million copies every Sunday) and Acting Editor of Daily Times. Read more
Petition to have Amber Heard axed from Aquaman 2 reaches 1.5m signatures (Metro)
A petition asking for the axing of Amber Heard from Aquaman 2 has reached 1.5 million signatures. Supporters of Pirates of the Caribbean star Johnny Depp set up the petition in response to the recent legal battle that centred around the former couple, which saw Depp lose his libel case against The Sun’s publisher. This week he was denied the right to appeal. The petition, titled Remove Amber Heard from Aquaman 2, has amassed a staggering 1.5million signatures. The petition is full of unsubstantiated allegations that Heard abused Depp in their marriage. In 2018’s Aquaman, Heard played opposite Jason Momoa as Mera, and the film went on to make £860million at the box office. Heard is expected to play a part in a sequel, which is currently set for December 2022. Read more
Iran’s top nuclear scientist,Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, assassinated near Tehran (BBC)
Iran’s most senior nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh has been assassinated near the capital Tehran, the country’s defence ministry has confirmed.
Fakhrizadeh died in hospital after an attack in Absard, in Damavand county.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, has condemned the killing “as an act of state terror”.
Western intelligence agencies believe Fakhrizadeh was behind a covert Iranian nuclear weapons programme.
“If Iran ever chose to weaponise (enrichment), Fakhrizadeh would be known as the father of the Iranian bomb,” one Western diplomat told Reuters news agency in 2014. Read more
Defeated candidates in Burkina Faso elections congratulate president-elect Kabore (Vanguard)
Defeated presidential candidates have congratulated Roch Marc Christian Kabore who secured a second term of office.
Kabore won the November 22 presidential election in the West African country by garnering nearly 58 per cent of the total valid votes according to provisional results issued on Thursday by the National Independent Electoral Commission (CENI).
The president-elect was congratulated by the candidates, including Ouedraogo Gilbert Noel, Ablasse Ouedraogo, and Yeli Monique Kam who met him on Thursday.
The Constitutional Court is expected to endorse the provisional results and proclaim the final results within 15 days. Read more
Chinese academics say coronavirus spread in India months before Wuhan outbreak (RT)
The coronavirus did not start in Wuhan, but instead emerged in India last summer, Chinese academics have boldly claimed, as tensions continue to flare between the two states and amid the ongoing search for the origins of Covid-19.
Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences claim the pandemic actually originated in India, explaining that a heatwave there from May to June 2019 spawned a water crisis, which in turn led to increased close contact between humans and wild animals such as monkeys.
In a preprint paper with the Lancet medical journal – meaning it has yet to be formally peer reviewed – the Chinese researchers outline their explanation of the “zoonotic transmission” of the SARS-CoV-2 virus from monkeys to humans as they shared water resources. Read more
Man ‘wakes from dead’ when his leg is sliced open for embalming in morgue (Metro)
A Kenyan man who was declared dead by doctors woke up three hours later while workers prepared his body in a morgue. Local media reported how Peter Kigen, 32, was presumed dead on Tuesday after he collapsed at home. He was rushed to Kapkatet Hospital in Kericho county by his family after suffering from a stomach ailment. His younger brother told the Standard newspaper a nurse announced the patient had died before they arrived at the casualty department. Denis Langat, Mr Kigen’s uncle, told local channel Citizen TV how staff apparently ‘casually checked’ on the patient before pronouncing him ‘dead’. Read more
Brexit: Barnier arrives in UK for face-to-face talks (BBC)
The UK and EU will resume face-to-face Brexit trade talks in London this weekend, as negotiators race to reach a deal before a looming deadline.
It comes after EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier left a period of self-isolation after a colleague tested positive for Covid last week.
Ahead of travelling to the UK, he said the “same significant divergences persist” in negotiations.
After arriving, he said he would work with “patience and determination”. Read more
Electric cars need 50,000 miles before they’re greener than petrol ones, report claims (Metro)
Electric cars need to be driven for at least 50,000 miles before they become ‘greener’ than their petrol counterparts.
That’s the message from a report commissioned by several car brands that looked at the amount of CO2 created through manufacturing. It claims that producing electric vehicles generates 63% more carbon dioxide than regular petrol vehicles. The report found the production of an all-electric Polestar 2 – owned by Volvo – generates 24 tonnes of carbon dioxide, compared with 14 tonnes for a petrol-engine Volvo XC40.
The study, commissioned by Honda, Aston Martin, Bosch and McLaren, says: ‘You would have to drive 48,700 miles in a Polestar 2 before its carbon footprint becomes smaller than a Volvo XC40. Read more
African Champions League: Al Ahly beat Zamalek in all-Egypt final (BBC)
A sensational late Mohamed Magdy goal gave Al Ahly victory over Cairo rivals Zamalek in the first ever one-legged African Champions League final.
Magdy’s 88th-minute winner settled an entertaining match in which his side had gone ahead early through Amr El Soleya, only for Shikabala to cancel that out before half-time with a world-class effort of his own.
Ahly should already have been leading after Elshahat somehow hit the post when faced with a completely empty net early in the second half.
The win gave them a record-extending ninth African Champions League crown, and also means their boss, South African Pitso Mosimane, becomes just the third coach to win the title with two different clubs. Read more
Sarah Fuller set to make history by suiting up for Vanderbilt men’s football team (CBC)
Women’s soccer player Sarah Fuller will don a football uniform Saturday for Vanderbilt and is poised to become the first woman to play in a Power 5 game when the Commodores visit Missouri.
“Let’s make history,” senior Sarah Fuller wrote Friday on Twitter with a photo of herself wearing a football jersey with a soccer ball between her feet while holding a football in her hands.
No woman has appeared in an Southeastern Conference football game or for any Power 5 gridiron team. Read more
Mikel Arteta says Arsenal are a ‘few windows’ away from Premier League title challenge (Metro)
Mikel Arteta believes Arsenal are still ‘a few windows’ away from challenging for the Premier League title. The Gunners currently sit 12th in the table after four wins from their opening nine matches. Arteta guided Arsenal to an eighth-placed finish last term and is now targeting a top-four finish to return the club to the Champions League. The Gunners strengthened their midfield in the summer window with the £45 million signing of Thomas Partey from Atletico Madrid. Read more
Newcastle beat Crystal Palace with two late goals (BBC)
Newcastle manager Steve Bruce says they are starting to see the real Joelinton after the forward had a hand in two late goals in a win at Crystal Palace.
The Brazilian set up Callum Wilson for the first in the 88th minute and added his side’s second 99 seconds later.
It was his first Premier League goal of the season and a third in the top flight since joining Newcastle for a club record £40m in July last year.
“Sometimes you need time – it doesn’t matter about price tag,” said Bruce.
“In Joe’s case, the price tag and number nine shirt meant he struggled at times. Read more
Liverpool submit offer to sign Ajax defender Perr Schuurs (Metro)
Liverpool have submitted a €30 million (£27m) offer to sign Ajax centre-back Perr Schuurs, according to reports. The Premier League champions are depleted at the heart of their defence following the long-term injuries to Virgil van Dijk and Joe Gomez. Reports have claimed that Jurgen Klopp is keen to strengthen in that department and Liverpool are said to have made an approach for Schalke’s Ozan Kabak. But according to Corriere dello Sport, Liverpool are targeting Schuurs and are already in talks with Ajax. Read more
Barcelona players agree to 122m euros of wage cuts (BBC)
Barcelona’s players have agreed to wage cuts that will save the Spanish club 122m euros (£110m).
The 26-time La Liga champions have also agreed with their players to have about €50m (£45m) of variable payments deferred over a three-year period.
Their last accounts showed a 97m euros (£87m) loss while the net debt more than doubled to 488m euros (£438m). Read more