News
BREAKING: We’re moving in – ECOWAS military chiefs *10 countries vote for invasion
Military operation is at the doorsteps of Niger where a military junta, which took over power on July 26 is currently holding the reins of power after ousting Mohamed Bazoum, the civilian President, as military apparatchik of Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), toed the same line with their leaders on Thursday.
The Authorities of the Heads of Government, the highest body of the sub-regional bloc, had on Thursday, last week, strengthened its decision for a military action to flush out the junta after the expiration of a one-week ultimatum to the military leaders to restore Bazoum to office expired without compliance.
On July 29, three days after the military struck, the ECOWAS Bola Ahmed Tinubu, had rallied the leaders to a meeting in Abuja, the Nigerian capital, where a rash of decisions was taken, including placing immediate sanctions, such as border closure, economic blockade, imposition of no-fly zone among others, to be followed with military action.
But undeterred, the junta reacted by snubbing the delegation sent by the body to hand over the demand and broker a possible truce, and instead, declaring the closure of its airspace and days later, threatened to put Bazoum on trial for high treason – an euphemism for the death penalty.
In what seems an escalation of the decision of sub-regional leaders, 10 of the 15 military chiefs of the various countries, were said to have voted to move in militarily to chase away the junta and restore constitutional power, an initiative, believed to have fallen on Nigeria, the largest donor country both financially and militarily.
At a meeting in Accra, the Ghanaian capital, the 10 countries on Thursday, were said to have expressed readiness to participate in a standby force should the need arises, a move meant to chase out the military under the leadership of Abdourahamane Tchiani, with the only dissenting voice being that of Cape Verde, outside countries under military rule.
ECOWAS commissioner, Abdel-Fatau Musah, was quoted to have said: “Let no one be in doubt if everything else fails, the valiant forces of West Africa…are ready to answer to the call of duty.
“By all means available, constitutional order will be restored in the country,” Musah told assembled defence Chiefs from member countries, listing past ECOWAS deployments in Gambia, and Liberia as examples of readiness.
Al Jazeera also quoted Nigeria’s Chief of Defence Staff, General Christopher Gwabin Musa, to have said, “Democracy is what we stand for and it’s what we encourage. The focus of our gathering is not simply to react to events, but to proactively chart a course that results in peace and promote stability.”
The presidential guards seized power from President Mohamed Bazoum on July 26, making the ECOWAS to issue a one-week ultimatum to the military to restore the president or risk sanctions.
The military ignored the ECOWAS threats and vowed to resist foreign intervention.
In the same vein, the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) bloc in Nigeria has endorsed the stand taken by both the African Union (AU) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) on the political impasse.
The SADC in Nigeria made up of Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana, DR Congo, South Africa, Angola, Tanzania and Namibia threw its weight behind the actions taken so far by the continental body and the West African subregional bloc to force the military junta led by General Abdourahamane Tchiani to hand over power back to President Mohamed Bazoum.
Speaking with journalists at Hope of Survival Ophanage Home, Abuja where the SADC donated food items to orphans as part of activities to mark the organisation’s anniversary, the High Commissioner of Namibia to Nigeria and the Dean of the SADC, H.E. Humphrey Geiseb, said the Southern Africa is part of the African Union and definitely concerned about the situations of coups as expressed by ECOWAS which is a regional body just like the Southern Africa Development Community, and equally by the African Union.
He said: “So, we are fully behind the statements and positions of ECOWAS and the African Union.”
Geiseb, while noting that Southern African region is mostly peaceful, as “we hold regular elections and democracy is very strong in our region,” said there is need for continuity of democracy everywhere on the continent.
Geiseb who led other envoys from SADC in Nigeria to the donation of the food items put at over N3 million, explained that the Southern Africa region is part of the African Union, stressing that whatever happens in other regions of the African continent indirectly affects SADC.
Speaking about the decision to visit the orphanage, he said the SADC wanted to provide succour to the orphans and also demonstrate the enduring friendship between the Southern African countries and the government and people of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
He said: “We came to celebrate with the orphanage here by making official donations.
“This is our way of honoring the Southern Africa Development Community as well as the Federal Government of Nigeria which has supported strongly the liberation struggle of Southern Africa.
“Today, our sub-continent is free and independent. Many of our countries can recall that the Federal Republic of Nigeria has strongly supported us during the dark days of colonialism.”
While commending the SADC for the gesture, Mrs. Ruth Ibrahim, proprietress of the orphanage home, said the gifts would go a long way in helping her to feed the 75 children under the care of the home.
She, however, called for assistance in paying the school fees of the children in the orphanage home, stressing that it had been difficult for the management to cope with the high cost of education in the country.
Chidi Odinkalu, Nigeria’s fiery lawyer, law teacher and former Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), is emphatic that President Bola Tinubu is pushing to perpetuate himself in office, beginning with gaming the electoral process in 2027.
Odinkalu, Professor of Practice in International Human Rights Law at the Fletcher School, told his host Naija Unfiltered, a popular Nigerian podcast programme, that he was as sure as death that the President would not exit office in 2031, if he succeeded with his current gambit to remain in power beyond next year.
Hear him: “Yes. But as I said, let me repeat myself. There’ll be a third term. President Tinubu has not done all of this just for another four years. There will be a third term. And anybody who is doing, ‘it is not our portion,’ is not reading the evidence.”
To achieve this aim, the activist, who was also emphatic that the National Assembly, would play a role, added: “The current National Assembly is anything but national or an assembly. And if it’s an assembly, it’s not a parliamentary one. Many people have called it a rubber stamp, but I think that is actually abusive of rubber stamps. I think this National Assembly is a disgrace.
Citing how bizarre and completely compliant the national legislature had become to Tinubu, the ex-NHRC’s boss, stated: “If you can change your national anthem in less than 24 hours with no public hearing, no public consultation, no public involvement, it tells you you don’t have a country because a national anthem is fundamental to the construction of a national identity.”
Also referring to the current move by the President to introduce state police, Odinkalu, wondered how the Nigerian Senate would introduce the bill to that effect and proceed towards the first and second readings, as well as committee stage and passage in less than two hours, questioning how that was possible in normal clime.
Hear him: “Once we finish our elections, we’re going to amend our Constitution, introduce a single six-year presidential term. The current incumbent will be elected until 2031. In 2031, what will happen? The question will be, will he be entitled to run on the six-year term or will he not?
“You will then get the best Senior Advocates in Nigeria telling you the law is not retrospective. That is why the administration is supporting the litigation over President Jonathan’s tenure—not because the Constitution is not clear, but because they will say there is precedent. There will be a third term, and I’m prepared to bet on it.”
“If we continue to pay ransom, we are encouraging these criminals to kidnap more people. The cycle will only continue unless we stop rewarding criminality,” were the words of Dauda Lawal, Governor of Zamfara State, with which he blamed those in the habit of paying ransoms as the major factor fuelling the current wave of kidnapping incidents across the country.
Lawal, on Thursday at the ARISE News/THISDAY Town Hall Conference on State Police and National Security in Abuja, told his audience how he flatly refused to pay a ₦300 million ransom demanded by kidnappers who abducted his brothers in 2019.
Reiterating his opposition to negotiating with bandits and renewed his support for the establishment of state police, Lawal, while recounting the incident, said: “My own brothers were kidnapped in 2019, and the kidnappers demanded about ₦300 million. I told them I was not going to pay a dime. If they wanted to kill them, they could go ahead.”
Stating that his brothers were eventually released without any ransom being paid, he argued that paying ransom usually emboldened criminal groups by providing financial incentives for further kidnappings.
He added: “My position on ransom payments remains unchanged. I will not negotiate, and I will not pay ransom to any criminal, no matter what happens.”
Endorsing the move for the establishment of state police, to enable governors have greater operational authority over security within their states, he regretted that the current constitutional arrangement left governors with responsibility for security without corresponding powers to direct security agencies.
His words: “In as much as I am called the chief security officer of the state, I do not have the command-and-control authority to direct the operations of the security agencies. I’m prepared to support the funding of state police if the proposed policing structure is established. I’m confident that decentralised policing will improve intelligence gathering, response time and the overall fight against insecurity.”
Exactly seven years, two months and four days after he forced Walter Onnoghen, the 16th Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) out of office, Danladi Umar, former Chairman of the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT), on Thursday, found himself in Kuje prison.
Justice Peter Kekemeke, of the High Court of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), sitting in Maitama, handed the ex-CCT boss the unwelcome package on Thursday, following his arraignment by the Federal Government on a four-count corruption charge.
Umar’s ordeal began after an investigations revealed that he abused his official position by conferring an undue advantage on himself while serving as head of the tribunal, having in 2021, reportedly using his wife’s bank account to collect the sum of N5.5 million from a contractor engaged to paint the headquarters of the CCT in Abuja.
He was also accuse of using the same account to collect another N6million on January 25, 2024, from a contractor who handled the digitisation of the CCT’s records and yet another N2.43 million a contractor paid as tuition fee of his daughter at Baze University, Abuja.
After pleading not guilty to offences, said to be punishable under section 19 of the Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Act, 2000, Christopher Mshelia, lawyer to the FG, prosecuting the matter, applied for his remand in a correctional facility, while urging the court to set a date for the commencement of trial.
His pleas to be freed on bail pending the determination of the case, was opposed by the prosecution, which drew the court’s attention to the fact that it had just been served with the bail application, saying it needed time to respond to it, forcing Kekemeke to adjourn the case till July 15 for hearing while the former CCT boss remained behind bars.
Umar, had as CCT Chairman, on January 23, 2019, issued a controversial ex parte order that led to the removal of a serving Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Walter Onnoghen.
Following the ex parte order, the late President Muhammadu Buhari, on January 25, swore in the next most senior jurist of the Supreme Court, Justice Tanko Muhammad, to take over the leadership of the judiciary as Acting CJN.
Even though Onnoghen later voluntarily resigned his position as CJN on April 4, Umar went ahead and convicted him on April 18, 2019, on the federal government’s allegation that he had failed to properly declare his assets as required by law.
He gave the federal government the go-ahead to confiscate all monies in five accounts belonging to the former CJN, and also removed him as Chairman of both the NJC and the Federal Judiciary Service Commission (FJSC).
-
News4 weeks agoBREAKING: Troops rescue wife of kidnapped General! *Terrorists flee scene
-
News4 weeks agoBREAKING: Count me out, Okonkwo tells Atiku *Amaechi VP’s choice an insult to Ndigbo
-
News2 weeks agoBREAKING: Court sentences Nigerien, two others to death over terrorism
-
News4 weeks agoDickson: Obi, a big asset to NDC, we’re working together … but!
-
News4 weeks agoOvia, ex-Zenith Bank boss swings into luxury apartments *Flats hit $2.8million price tag
-
News7 days agoBREAKING: EX-SSG mowed down by gunmen! *He resisted being kidnapped – driver
-
News3 weeks agoAbductors of Oyo teachers panicking, freedom coming for victims soon!
-
News3 weeks agoTwo hours after Igboho’s ‘red-eyes’ to ‘Fulani’ leaders, gunmen free kidnap victims!