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Omotayo Adanlawo, a primary school teacher in Ondo State, was on Thursday sentenced to life imprisonment for raping a 10-year-old girl. He was jailed by the state’s High Court in Akure, the capital, after he used N50 to lure the little girl before defiling her. The teacher had on August 28, 2018, committed the offence in the family house of the victim and threatened her not to tell anyone or she will die. SaharaReporters gathered that a few weeks after the incident, the girl began to complain of stomach pains and could not also walk properly. She was taken to a private hospital where a test confirmed that she had been raped. The victim later opened up and explained that Adanlawo, who also attends the same church with her father, forcefully had sexual intercourse with her. The case was first reported at Iju/Itaogbolu Police Division but later transferred to Ala Area Command in Akure. The primary school teacher in his confessional statement confirmed to the court that h...

Olawale Olayiwola, an employee of the Institute of Agricultural Research and Training, Oyo State, has narrated how some armed robbers hiding inside an uncompleted housing estate attacked him and his family members. Olayiwola, who spoke with SaharaReporters, said the robbery attack took place on July 18, 2020 at the Owode Housing Estate Phase II, leaving him with injuries that required medical attention at a hospital. He explained that the abandoned housing estate located along the Apata-Ibadan expressway in Oyo State had been left to decay for over 20 years, providing a hideout for criminal elements. “Two people came with masks and demanded we open the door. We tried to inform our neighbours but they started removing the burglary of the window and immediately they entered our apartment, they used axe to injure me and my wife before escaping through the window to other houses to rob. “My wife spent three days in a private hospital while I spent 19 days at UCH. In fact I w...

The Advocacy for Alleged Witches has urged the Niger State Government and the police in the state to take immediate measures to stop the planned ‘healing’ and witchcraft exorcism session in Mokwa by Hassan Patigi, a self-acclaimed healer and witchcraft exorcist. AFAW said it gathered that Patigi had commenced plans and will in coming days embark on his supposed witchcraft healing. The group said Patigi had attempted to carry out witchcraft healing in Kwara State but was cancelled after uproar by residents of Kwara. BBC It described the healing as a show of shame as Patigi had previously subjected some alleged witches to embarrassing and dehumanising treatment. “AFAW has reliably gathered that the self-acclaimed healer and witchcraft exorcist, Muhammad Hassan Patigi, who travelled for the Sallah celebrations, is now back in Mokwa town and is planning to commence his ‘healing’ activities. “AFAW has also been informed that Hassan Patigi’s planned ‘healing’ session in Lafiagi ...

The International Press Centre has berated the National Broadcasting Commission over the N5m fine imposed on Nigeria Info, a radio state, as penalty for comments made by a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Dr Obadiah Mailaifa, on terrorism and insurgency in the country. Mailaifa had said that a Northern governor was a commander of Boko Haram and the group was planning a civil war in the country. The NBC management described the broadcast as “unprofessional” in a statement. Condemning the fine on the radio station, the International Press Centre stated that the commission imposed the fine without any evidence whatsoever that the alleged statement had degraded any person or groups of persons, which would have amounted to hate speech. See Also Sahara Reporters Nigeria’s Broadcast Regulator Orders Radio Station To Pay N5m Fine Over Mailafia’s Comments 0 Comments 9 Hours Ago Executive Director of IPC, Lanre Arogundade, in a statement by Olutoyin Ayoad...

Ascon Oil Company Ltd has denied a claim by Stanbic IBTC Bank PLC that it retook possession of its petrol station at Block 36, Admiralty Way, Lekki Phase 1, unlawfully. Ascon said it recovered the filling station with the assistance of court bailiffs pursuant to a July 24 order of Justice Mohammed Liman of the Federal High Court in Lagos. It rebutted the bank’s claim that it resorted to self-help and that its actions were contemptuous. Stanbic IBTC had in a statement on August 11 said that no court order was granted for the takeover of the property. “No court order was granted to Ascon to warrant their extra-judicial action, which they undertook in forcefully seizing a petrol station validly belonging to a third party, in total defiance and disregard of the ruling of Justice Liman of the Federal High Court on 24 July 2020.” But debunking Stanbic’s position in its own statement on Thursday, Ascon said, “We note that Stanbic IBTC PLC in its statement on August 11, 2020 stated...

Louis Odion Lagos, like other states, was groping in the ghost land that Nigeria had become that dusk in 1997. Middle-class Surulere was roiling in virtual lockdown as hordes of riot cops led by the Commissioner of Police barricaded the road in what appeared a pre-emptive move against the scheduled pro-democracy rally at a time the iron knee of squat Sani Abacha was literally on the nation’s neck. Indeed, cemeteries were bristling with fresh graves of innocents and martyrs. MKO was languishing in Abuja gulag. His wife, Kudirat, had recently been brutally cut down on a Lagos highway. Rebels like Pa Anthony Enahoro, Professor Wole Soyinka, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, Ralph Obiora had fled to exile. Louis Odion My brother and friend, Segun Adeniyi, and I were then working at Sunday Concord. We were assigned by our editor, Mr. Tunji Bello, to cover the rally arranged to commemorate the fourth anniversary of June 12.  It turned out that the Abacha goons fell for the initial decoy ...

The Multinational Joint Task Force has said that Boko Haram terrorist group had introduced the use of child soldiers to resuscitate its declining influence in the Lake Chad Basin. Chief of Military Public Information for MNJTF, Timothy Antigha, said this in a statement issued from N’Djamena, Chad on Thursday. Antigha said the recruitment of child soldiers by the sect was part of their new strategy following the recent mass surrender of fighters to the military. He said information on this disturbing development was brought in by intelligence sources and corroborated by concerned individuals and groups a few days ago. He added that the Boko Haram terrorists further confirmed the development when they posted pictures of children dressed in military gear and holding assault rifles in a video released during the Sallah celebration. The statement reads, “Earlier, Boko Haram have engaged in the mass abduction of school girls, sexual enslavement of women and mass murder of inn...

If some people feel offended by a song and consider it as blasphemy to the extent of calling for the death of a fellow citizen, I think it should also be made known to them that we’re offended by such beliefs. The belief that people should be killed to satisfy the law of blasphemy is ridiculous alone, but that it makes some people feel priggish, is evil. I feel tempted to think that some of the people that are supporting the blasphemy ideology in Nigeria may have been secretly supporting Boko Haram for doing what they cannot do by themselves. Perhaps, it is one of the reasons the insurgency in that area has lasted for this long. The freedom of expression protected by the section 39(1) of the Nigerian constitution is the only “hope and tool of freedom for common people”, and some of us will defend it, by all lawful means, regardless of our individual religious beliefs. I have observed online in the past few days that most of the Northern Muslims (especially the...

Prof Oluwatoyin Ogundipe Embattled Vice Chancellor of the University of Lagos, Prof Oluwatoyin Ogundipe, has asked Mike Ozekhome (SAN) to file a suit to challenge his removal from office. The university’s Governing Council led by its Chairman, Wale Babalakin, had on Wednesday in Abuja presided over the removal of Ogundipe as VC of the university, while later naming Prof Omololu Soyombo as the Acting Vice Chancellor. Prof Oluwatoyin Ogundipe In a letter of instruction dated August 12, 2020 and addressed to Ozekhome, the embattled Vice Chancellor stated that the act of the Governing Council of the university removing him from office was illegal and unconstitutional. He added that it was carried out without due process and contrary to the Act establishing the university and other extant laws governing discipline, suspension and removal of the Vice Chancellor of the university. See Also Education UNILAG Vice Chancellor, Prof Ogundipe, Removed By Governing Council 0 Comment...

Sesugh Akume Many people are incensed at the injustice whereby a boy in Yobe who scores 2 in the National Common Entrance can be deemed to have passed, whereas, a girl in the very same state has to score 27, or else she would have failed. In this very same exam, a child (boy or girl) in Anambra who scores 138 is deemed to have failed. None of this is new, as many are aware this has been going on for decades and/or have experienced it. For how long shall this and such practices continue? The constitution, it was, that first created this crisis. In section 14(3) it states: ‘The composition of the Government of the Federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner as to reflect the federal character of Nigeria, and the need to promote national unity, and also to command national loyalty, thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few states, or from few ethnic or other sectional groups in that Governm...

Azu Ishiekwene From the way he addressed the letter, you could almost guess that he had some difficulty writing it, but Olusegun Obasanjo being Olusegun Obasanjo, he wrote it anyway. Usually, condolence letters are addressed to the bereaved family, while others could be in copy. But former President Obasanjo chose, instead, to indulge his pet peeve his own way. He sent his condolence letter on the passing of Buruji Kashamu to Ogun State Governor, Dapo Abiodun, hoping that somehow, the family will get the message. Well, thanks to social media, not only Kashamu’s family, the wider public also read Obasanjo’s letter to the dead. It has drawn the extremes of emotions, which the former president has come to represent in public life and which he is used to. In the past, the former president has been accused of exaggerations or making up stories in which he is the only legend. This time, however, what he said about Kashamu was true.  Azu Ishiekwene It’s true that in his l...