Another victim of Fulani herdsmen attack in Enugu State dies

A woman severely injured during the suspected Fulani herdsmen attack in Ndiagwu Attakwu, Akegbe-Ugwu in Nkanu West Local Government Area of Enugu State has been confirmed dead.

Mrs Ifeoma Agbo, until her death was receiving treatment at one of the hospitals in the community, along with three other victims. 


The Chairman of Nkanu West LGA, Mr Afam Okereke, who confirmed the death of the victim in an interview with Channels Television, said in a bid to prevent such occurrence, especially after the Nimbo attack, he had called several security meetings with the Fulani community.

Suspected Fulani herdsmen on Thursday, August 25th invaded the community, killing a seminarian identified as Lazarus Nwankwo, a final year student of Spiritan International School of Theology and wounded four persons, including a pregnant woman.

Enugu State Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, who visited the community on Friday vowed to bring perpetrators to book, adding that his administration will not tolerate the wanton destruction of lives and property in the state by the herdsmen.

Meanwhile, the state police command arrested one of the suspects identified as one Umaru Isah from Zamfara State. Investigation has commenced in full scale into his alleged nefarious activities with a view of unmasking his gang members. The state commissioner of police Emmanuel Ojukwu has vowed to unmask all those involved in the attack.

The traditional ruler of Ndiagwu Attakwu autonomous community, Gregory Ugwu, urged the Federal and state government to take a firm and decisive action on the activities of Fulani herdsmen in the area. The people of the area also urged the government to direct that all Fulani should leave the area immediately or they might be pushed into taking laws into their hands.

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Polish Olympian sells Rio silver medal to help 3-year-old boy with eye cancer

Polish discus thrower Piotr Malachowski sold the silver medal he won at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics to help pay for the medication of a 3-year-old boy suffering from eye cancer. 

Malachowski wrote, according to Facebook's translation: "In Rio I fought for gold," "Today, I appeal to everyone -- let's fight together about something that is even more precious. The health of this fantastic boy."

According to Malachowski, the procedure to treat the rare form of cancer isn't available in Poland; it is offered only in New York.

Malachowski said on Facebook that siblings Dominika and Sebastian Kulczyk,who are among the richest Poles, "declared the intention to buy my silver medal," which he put up for auction to help pay for treatment of the boy, Olek, who is suffering from retinoblastoma.

Malachowski did not reveal the amount he raised by selling his medal on Friday, but said the target, which was almost $130,000, has been met.

"My silver medal is worth much more today than it was a week ago," Malachowski said.

Source: ESPN

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Ibe Kachikwu's daughter Nkemdili celebrates her daughter's first birthday

Nkemdili, daughter of NNPC Group Chairman and Minister of State for Petroleum, Ibe Kachukwu recently celebrated her daughter's first birthday. The party was attended by family and friends, including her parents. More photos after the cut...

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Man gets 40 years in jail for throwing boiling water on sleeping gay couple

An Atlanta man has been sentenced to 40 years in prison after he was found guilty on Wednesday after he threw boiling hot water on a gay couple, Anthony Gooden and Marquez Tolbert, as they slept. The man, Martin Blackwell was convicted of 10 counts – two counts of aggravated assault and eight counts of aggravated battery – in the February attack on the gay couple.

The jury deliberated for about 90 minutes after the brief trial and returned with the guilty verdict. Prosecutors have said that on the night of the attack, Blackwell filled the largest pot in his home with water and set it to boil before tossing it on Gooden and Tolbert, who were sleeping and who had been dating for about a month.

The couple had been staying with Gooden's mother, who was dating Blackwell.

"You were soulless, malicious and a violent person [during the attack]," Fulton County Superior Court Judge Henry Newkirk said to Blackwell Wednesday before sentencing him, according to the AJC.

Prosecutors argued that Blackwell was motivated by  homophobia.

Tolbert testified at trial that Blackwell grabbed him after the attack and said, "Get out of my house with all that gay sh**" 

Gooden and Tolbert's injuries were severe.

Gooden was hospitalized for about a month, including two weeks in a coma, and while his boyfriend, Tolbert was hospitalized for 10 days.

Both men had several surgeries and both testified at Blackwell's trial.
Blackwell's defense attorneys did not present any evidence at trial or call any witnesses but they argued that the attack was reckless rather than premeditated.

"It's not about hate. It's about old-school culture, old-school thinking," attorney Monique Walker told jurors.

Blackwell's defense argued he was motivated by a sense of disrespect for the victims' behavior in the home – a claim the prosecution dismissed.

After the verdict, Tolbert told reporters he felt "justice was served," adding "I'm ecstatic," Tolbert said Wednesday.


Source: Associated Press

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Naira appreciates to N315.93/dollar as foreign investors take advantage ..

By Peter Egwuatu, with agency reports Naira, yesterday, appreciated by 3.52 per cent to close at N315.93 to a dollar at the interbank market, prompting calls for foreign investors to take advantage of the appreciation. 

However,  the naira suffered a loss in value as it depreciated at the parallel market to trade at N402 per dollar, weaker than N397 it traded at its previous session as dollar shortages gripped the official market. 

The naira, which hit fresh record low since the central bank floated the currency on the official inter-bank market in June, first touched N400 on the black market this month. 

On the inter-bank market yesterday, no trade was posted until three minutes before the end of the session, when the central bank which has been reducing its dollar sales, intervened, traders said.

 Only three deals worth $0.75 million were traded at 305.50 per dollar, a level the market has closed at since Monday. Specifically, according to Bloomberg, in the last two weeks, Exotix Partners LLP and Standard Bank Group Ltd. 

have told clients;  most of who fled after the country started imposing capital controls from late 2014, that they should start buying naira assets again. 

The  naira which has been the worst-performing currency this year among more than 150 globally has depreciated 37 percent against the dollar since the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN  abandoned its peg on June 20, while bond yields have jumped to more than 20 percent. The naira strengthened 4.6 percent to 315 per dollar on Tuesday after falling to a record 350.25 on August 19, 2016. 

The cheap naira is attracting foreign investors,” said Lutz Roehmeyer, a money manager at Landesbank Berlin Investment, which oversees about $12 billion of assets. “At 325 per dollar, the naira is too weak” and Landesbank anticipates a rebound, he said. Roehmeyer’s funds have doubled their holdings of naira debt, albeit in the form of bonds issued by the World Bank’s International Finance Corp. rather than the Nigerian government, to the equivalent of around $9.2 million this month, he said. 

The CBN  fixed the currency in February 2015 at 197-199 per dollar to stop it plunging amid the decline in the price of oil, on which Nigeria depends for 90 percent of exports and the bulk of government revenue. He relented after 16 months as the country stumbled toward a recession and foreign reserves fell to their lowest level in 11 years. 

The naira has now weakened more than any other major oil currency since mid-2014, when crude prices started retreating. 

It’s lost almost half its value against the dollar in that period, compared with 46 percent for Kazakhstan’s tenge and 35 percent for the Colombian peso. 

That makes it a good time to buy Nigerian one-year Treasury bills with yields of about 22 percent, Stuart Culverhouse, chief economist at Exotix in London, wrote in an Aug. 9 note. 

The potential return is more than 33 percent if the naira strengthens to its fair value of 290 against the greenback, he said. In April, one-year T-bills yielded just 10 percent. 

Oil Production The trade is not for everyone, given Nigeria’s outlook. The economy will shrink 1.8 percent this year, its first contraction since at least 1991, the International Monetary Fund forecasts. 

Oil production has sunk to a near three-decade low of about 1.5 million barrels a day as militants attack pipelines and export terminals in the south of the country. 

While Landesbank Berlin and Exotix say the currency has fallen enough, others aren’t convinced. The naira will weaken to 396 by year-end and 515 by the second quarter of 2017, according to Access Bank Plc, Nigeria’s fourth-biggest lender. Forward prices also predict worse to come. 

Three-month non-deliverable forwards trade at 357 to the dollar, and one-year contracts at 394. The median forecast of economists in a Bloomberg survey is for the currency to stabilize at 344 this year. 

Sidelines Preferred “The combination of a cheaper naira and higher yields on naira paper are tempting, but we remain comfortable on the sidelines,” Brett Rowley, a managing director at Los Angeles-based TCW Group Inc., which oversees $195 billion of assets, said in an e-mailed response to questions on Aug. 16. “Restoring oil output would help assuage our concerns.” 

Investors are also yet to be convinced that the naira truly floats. 

The central bank sold dollars at 309 last week and may be trying to keep the rate stronger than 320, according to Craig Thompson of Continental Capital Markets SA, based in Nyon, Switzerland.

 The naira trades at 395 on the black market, 20 percent weaker than the official rate. 

The exchange rate is closer to fair value in the eyes of most investors,” said Andrew Howell, a New York-based frontier-markets analyst at Citigroup Inc., the world’s biggest foreign-exchange trader. 

But there still aren’t many inflows. 

You can’t really call it a normally-functioning exchange rate yet.” 

Mitigating Risk Bottom of Form Still, bond investors are closer to pulling the trigger than they have been in more than a year. 

They’d be even more confident if they were able to mitigate the risk of further depreciation by buying the naira-settled futures that Nigeria introduced in June, according to Stephen Bailey-Smith, senior economist at Copenhagen-based Denmark’s Global Evolution Fonds A/S, which manages $3.2 billion of assets. Nigerian local-currency bonds have lost 17 percent in dollar terms this quarter, through yesterday, compared with the 3 percent average return for 31 developing nations monitored by Bloomberg indexes. 

The yield on benchmark government naira notes due January 2026 has climbed 226 basis points since June to 15.08 percent. 

We haven’t come back in to the local market yet, but we’re looking at it closely,” Bailey-Smith said. “If you can get a yield above 20 percent and hedge the FX risk, it’s not a bad trade at all. The futures market is intended to help you do that, but it’s difficult to buy them

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APC Governors hold meeting in Kaduna state(see photos)

APC Governors under the auspices, Progressive Governors, had a meeting in Kaduna state yesterday night where they discussed issues of national importance. More photos after the cut...

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Religious crisis: All the people burnt to death were muslims- Zamfara state gov

While condemning the religious crisis that broke out in the Abdu Gusau Polytechnic in Talata Mafara in the state on Tuesday which resulted in the death of eight people, the state governor, Abdulaziz Yari, yesterday disclosed that all those killed during the attack were Muslims. Narrating what led to the attack to state House corespondents after his meeting with President Buhari yesterday August 24th, Governor said:

"From the intelligence I heard from the security agencies, there was a fight between two students and I think one of them injured the other and started shouting that the other person abused Prophet Muhammed. Other students came and beat the other boy who is Yoruba and from Kogi State. Some people are saying he was a Muslim and some say the boy was a Christian. They beat the student until he collapsed and thought he was dead. Then security personnel requested help from one shop owner who then took the boy to the hospital in his car. When the students heard that the boy was still alive and in the hospital, they went to the hospital.  But the boy was rescued by the army in the hospital. 

Then the students went back to the polytechnic and burnt down the shop of the person who gave his car to rescue the boy. They went back to town again and as you know the police in the division don’t have enough men to contain the riot and before reinforcement came, the crowd threw tyre in the man’s house and burnt the house down. That was how everybody in the house was killed and everybody killed in the House were Muslims and not like the rumours going around in the social media that Christians are being killed in Zamfara. 

Infact the mob wanted to go and burn churches and attack non- Muslims but the security forces stopped them. It’s my home town and that’s where I live.”

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Muslims now occupy the Security and Intelligence Committee of the Federal Government - Christian Elders Forum says

The National Christian Elders Forum NCEF which is an affiliate body of the Christian Association of Nieria CAN, yesterday expressed worry over the fact that more Muslims occupy positions in the Security and Intelligence committee of the Federal government. 

In a statement signed by the NCEF Chairman, Solomon Asemota and released yesterday, the group alleged that Nigeria is an Islamic state which is contrary to Section 10 of the Nigerian constitution. 

The Elders in their statement expressed worries over the recent attacks meted on Christians in most parts in the North.
There is a bill now pending before the National Assembly, titled “NGO Regulatory Bill” intended to silence NGO’s including the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN). 

It is not in dispute that Nigeria is an Islamic State contrary to Section 10 of the Constitution. 

What is in dispute is whether Nigeria is ruled by mainstream Muslims or by Islamist Jihadists.

We plead with the Sultan to appreciate that Nigeria is safer and more peaceful when the Government of the Federation or of a State does not adopt any religion as State Religion. 

It is as a result of the understanding (or lack of it) of civilized Jihad that we are apprehensive of those in the “Security and Intelligence Committee” of the Federal Government by some unexplained reasons are mainly Muslims. 

President Buhari, (Muslim), Chief of Defense (Christian), Chief of Army Staff, Chief of air Staff, Minister of Defense, Minister of Internal Affairs, Inspector General of Police, National Security Adviser, Director General of DSS are all Muslims from the North. 

We are not too sure whether the Vice President is a member of this Committee following information that he was once excluded from the meeting the President called.

When the Vice President summoned the same meeting in the absence of President Buhari who was away in the UK, there was resistance and the meeting had to end abruptly. 

The conclusion which we, Christians, draw is that jihad is being committed against our country, Nigeria, especially when the cohesive instrument of state is in the hands of three ethnic nationalities and one religion. 

This enlists fear in the minds of the populace, especially Christians"the elders said.

They also condemned the recent arrest and arraignment of Joachim Chinakwe Iroko for naming his dog Buhari.  

Chinakwe was picked up again based on Police belief that the suspect’s action was capable of provoking an ethno-religious crisis. Because the complainant and his group have threatened to kill him if he comes back and this may happen.

If Nigeria is being run as a secular State, the Constitution in Sections 10, 37, and 38 guarantees right of private and family life, freedom of Thought, Conscience and Religion that should protect Joe Chinakwe and the Complainant would have been arrested but because Nigeria is an Islamic State, Joe Chinakwe has to face trial in the process promoting; the most effective way to get rid of critics is to instill fear in ordinary Nigerians,” the statement said.

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Cheeky little boy steals his sister's makeup and proceeds to give himself and all his toys a makeover

Little Damon from Canada just can't wriggle out of this one, the evidence is all over his face and he looks as guilty too. The kid stole his sister's makeup and went all gaga on himself and he gave his toys a treat too.His family filmed the inquisition in his room with loads of evidence in sight. Budding makeup artist. 

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Linda Ikeji Media is hiring! And here's how you can apply...

Like most of you know, I'm expanding my business to include TV, Radio, Music and something else ...shhh...lol. If you missed it, read all about it here. I need to hire staff to get the work done.

At Linda Ikeji Media we are looking to hire the following;
Front desk officer/receptionist, TV presenters, editors, producers, content developers, cameramen, entertainment/music/crime writers, Radio hosts, sound engineers, HR, Accountant, Administrative staff, customer care, marketers and IT professionals. They even said I might need a PA...lol.

If you think you can fit in any of these roles or even qualified for them, please send CV to contactus@lindaikejimedia.com or lindaikejimedia@gmail.com. If you're shortlisted, we will call you for a one-on-one interview. Thanks guys, good-luck and God bless!

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#MTNProjectFame9 : Hearty Birthday cheers For Bolanle Olukanni

... all contestants placed on Probation as Benjamin and Blessing Depart 

The ongoing MTN Project Fame 9 continues to excite with more twists and turn as all contestants were once again placed on probation by the judges.

However there was time enough for the audience and co-show host, Joseph Benjamin to wish Bolanle Olukanni a happy birthday. 

The delectable screen goddess, whose birthday fell on the day of the show was overwhelmed with emotions as the audience broke into rapturous cheers and a birthday song. 

Not one to be left behind, co-host Joseph Benjamin serenades Bolanle with a special birthday song. As the chants of “Happy Birthday” and “I love you Bolanle” faded, Bolanle and Joseph wasted no time in getting down to the business of the day.

On the beautiful Saturday evening, the contestants performed a mash-up of African contemporary songs. But the moment of truth came when the contestants lined up to hear the verdicts based on the viewers’ votes. Gabriel, Oluchi, Benjamin, Blessing and Eli polled the least votes and had to perform one more time to prove themselves capable to continue in the race towards fame.

The captivating performances by the five left powerful emotions in the room, with Gabriel out shining his compatriots. Oluchi and Eli were saved by the Faculty members and fellow Project Fame contestants respectively while Blessing and Benjamin were evicted from the academy. 

The duo wrapped up the show with powerful performances and strong words of self-encouragement.

Sunday was a Rock and Roll Night. The remaining contestants put up gutsy and energy performances. However, despite their performances, all contestants were once again placed on probation by the judges. The Sunday show closed with a performance by Johnny Drille from Project Fame Season 7.

The journey to fame continues to get more intense. However, there can only be one winner. Who would that winner be? Each week brings us closer to the answer!

To save your favourite contestant, all you need do is get the PF Super Subscription data bundle by sending PF to 303 for 100 naira only and start voting 

You can join the conversation online @www.projectfamewestafrica.com , and catch all the interesting moments in the Academy.

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Muslims attended church Catholic mass is France

(No PICTURE To SHOW)

Muslims attended Catholic mass in churches around France on Sunday in solidarity following the brutal murder of an 85-year-old priest, Father Jacques Hamel by 2 ISIS jihadists. More than 100 Muslims were among the 2,000 people who packed the 11th-century Gothic cathedral of Rouen, near the Normandy town where the priest's throat was slit.

"I thank you in the name of all Christians," Rouen Archbishop Dominique Lebrun told them. "In this way you are affirming that you reject death and violence in the name of God."

A few policemen and soldiers stood guard outside but did not conduct searches on the attendees. The local imam Otaman Aissaoui led a delegation of Muslims to a Catholic mass and said:
"Being united is a response to the act of horror and barbarism."
Notre Dame church in southwestern Bordeaux also welcomed a Muslim delegation, led by the city's top imam, Tareq Oubrou.
"It's an occasion to show (Muslims) that we do not confuse Islam with Islamism, Muslim with jihadist," said Reverend Jean Rouet.
Muslims were responding to a call by the French Muslim council CFCM to show "solidarity and compassion" over the priest's murder on Tuesday.

A woman wearing a beige headscarf who sat in a back pew at a church in central Paris said:
"I'm a practising Muslim and I came to share my sorrow and tell you that we are brothers and sisters." Giving her name only as Sadia, she added softly: "What happened is beyond comprehension."
At the Saint Leger church in the northern city of Lens, around 30 Muslims attended mass wearing T-shirts emblazoned with messages such as, "Terrorism has no religion or identity".

Father Hubert Renard told the congregation: "We are not alone; our Muslim brothers are here too."

Many were moved to tears during the sign of peace, a regular part of the liturgy when the faithful turn to greet each other in the pews, either shaking hands or kissing.

Muslims also attended Catholic masses in Italy, notably at Rome's Santa Maria di Trastevere church, in response to a call by the Sant'Egidio community known for its international mediation efforts.

Also on Sunday, dozens of prominent Muslims published a joint letter pledging: "We, French and Muslim, are ready to assume our responsibilities."


Source: AFP

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