The Chief of Army Staff of Nigeria, Lieutenant General Tukur Yusuf Buratai, on Wednesday said the army will soon embark on the recruitment of Nigerian youths into the force to enable it to fight insurgency in the northeast of the country.
Buratai, who was represented by Brig. Gen. Emmanuel Akpan, the Director Directorate of Army Recruitment, Resettlement and Reserve, DARRR, made this known during a courtesy visit to the Governor of Ebonyi State, Chief David Umahi at the exco-Chambers Government House, Abakaliki.
According to him: “The normal army that was trained to engage particularly in conventional warfare are having a lot of problems as you can see in the North-Eastern region. So, recently the Chief of Army instituted Special Forces concept; a special skill that you can use to fight war.
“This special training will now be integrated in every training in the Nigerian Army. So, this means that anybody that is recruited in the Nigerian Army with effect from now, will have to go through that
process. It is a tough training, it requires a lot of physical and mental fitness. So, we need young men and women who are physically fit”, he noted.
He noted that those from the age of 16 and above would be employed in the Nigerian Army with four credits including English and Mathematics in not more than two sittings, urged the youths of Ebonyi state to massively apply for recruitment into the Army when its portal opens for recruitments which he said will soon commence.
A prisoner may well have staked a claim to the worst attempted escape from jail ever after it ended with her plummeting through the ceiling of the waiting room.
Jessica Boomershine, 42, was in jail after allegedly breaking into a house with another man and assaulting an 85-year-old in Miamisberg, Ohio.
As she was sitting in the waiting room at the Montgomery County Jail she decided to try to escape.
In CCTV footage, Boomershine is seen using a chair to hoist herself into a hole in the ceiling.
Other stunned inmates watch on before police finally enter the room.
Pieces of the ceiling begin to fall down before the entire roof collapses and Boomershine crashes back to the ground.
Officers rush to restrain the dazed prisoner who seemed to soften her fall by crashing into a trash can.
She was sitting in the waiting room before attending her court trial on January 21.
Boomershine is now facing new charges for escape and destruction of property on top of her original charges.
Six people have been shot dead after a gunman opened fire at the MillerCoors beer factory headquarters in Milwaukee.
The shooter, described only by police as a 51-year-old local man, has been confirmed by the company CEO as a former employee - understood to have been fired earlier on Wednesday before he returned with a gun, reports local media.
Emergency calls of an active shooter were first made at 2.11pm local time.
It has been reported the shooter was one of those killed, by a self-inflicted gunshot wound, and police confirmed there was no longer an active threat at around 4.45pm. The identities of the victims have not been released.
The Government of Mexico has returned an Ile-Ife bronze sculpture to Nigeria after it discovered that it was illegally exported.
This was contained in a press statement obtained on Mexico’s website yesterday.
The statement said the origin of the sculpture was authenticated by experts.
It read in part, “The customs agency of Mexico’s Tax Administration Service, in coordination with the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Culture, returned a bronze Ife sculpture of the Yoruba people to Nigeria.
“The sculpture was discovered by customs officials at the Mexico City International Airport when the buyer tried to get it into the country.
“The sculpture and its provenance were authenticated by experts and agencies of both countries, with the participation of specialists from the National Institute of Anthropology and History. It had been exported illegally.”
The statement added that returning the sculpture to Nigeria was part of Mexico’s commitment to protecting cultural heritage.
It added, “Mexico strongly opposes illicit trafficking in cultural property. By returning it to Nigeria, the government shows its commitment to protecting cultural heritage. International monitoring and cooperation are essential for complying with current laws, including the 1970 UNESCO Convention.
“The illicit trafficking of cultural property is one of the main causes of the impoverishment of cultural heritage. It deprives the world of valuable information about the origin, context, and nature of these objects.”
The statement quoted Nigerian Ambassador Aminu Iyawa as thanking Mexico for its assistance.
“Mexico and Nigeria have strong bilateral ties and channels of dialogue that made it possible for this sculpture to be returned,” the statement added
British Airways has cancelled its flights to Italy.
Thousands of Brits face having their holiday plans ruined by coronavirus as it continues to spread across Europe and British Airways has now cancel flights to bug-ravaged Italy.
The UK government has advised against "all but essential travel" to 10 towns in the north of Italy, primarily in the Lombardy region.
More than 400 people have been infected across the country - a surge of 25 per cent in 24 hours, with 12 dead.
The crisis continues to grow in Europe as Spain, France, Croatia, Austria and Switzerland have all recorded new cases this week and Greece, North Macedonia and Georgia all recorded their first cases.
The World Health Organization said yesterday that the virus is now spreading faster outside China.
A pupil of IMG Grammar School, Oke-Bola, Ibadan was on Wednesday feared dead while some others were injured during a clash between pupils of the school and those of Oke-Bola Comprehensive High School.
Students of the two schools, which are located on the same street, are suspected to be members of rival cult groups, making them clash regularly.
A lawyer, whose office is located near the school, told The Nation that the pupils have been clashing daily as from 1:30 pm for several years.
He said the pupils started Wednesday’s clash at about the same time but decided to attack some people whose workshops and offices are near the schools, vandalizing their vehicles. He said they specifically attacked an auto-technician workshop near their school. By the time the attack was over, over 10 vehicles have been vandalized.
The eye witness said he expected a reprisal attack from pupils of IMG today (Thursday) having suffered a loss on Wednesday. The victim is thought to be an SS3 student.
Footballer, Emmanuel Adebayor was a year older yesterday and hos former reality star girlfriend, showered praises on him. To celebrate turning 36, the footballer also showed off his fleet of cars and ofcourse his mansion right behind.
Captioning the post, he wrote ”Thank God for another year”
The male hostel of Government Secondary School (GSS) in Gboko area of Benue state was on Wednesday gutted by fire.
The fire started around 8:30am barely few minutes after the students settled in class for the day’s lesson.
It was learnt that the fire completely razed down the Green and Orange houses of the students male hostel while part of the Red house hostel was also affected.
The school’s Principal, Mr. Francis Iorfa Tarkumbur, was yet to make any statement about the incident, but some students alleged that their JAMB/WAEC/NECO documents, cash, foodstuffs and other valuables perished in the fire.
An Ebute Meta Chief Magistrates’ Court in Lagos on Wednesday ordered that a 27-year-old legal counsel, ThankGod Nwedukwu, who allegedly defiled a 13-year-old girl be remanded in Custodial Centre.
Chief Magistrate Adeola Adedayo, ordered that he be remanded in the Ikoyi Custodial Centre, pending when the case would be filed at the Ikeja Sexual and Domestic Violence Court.
The police charged Nwedukwu with defilement.
She adjourned the matter until March 11 for mention.
The Prosecution Counsel, Insp. Chinalu Uwadione, told the court that the defendant committed the offence on Feb. 19, about 7. 30p.m, at No. 96, Herbert Macaulay St. Ebute Meta. He alleged that the defendant defiled the teenager.
The offence, he said, contravened the provisions of Section 137 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State which prescribes life imprisonment for convicts.
A 100-Level student of Cross River University of Technology, (CRUTECH), Barnabas Otu has drowned in a swimming pool in Calabar.
The student, who gained admission into the Department of Urban and Regional planning, faculty of Engineering did his Matriculation on Monday, February 24, 2020.
According to a source, who spoke under anonymity, the incident occurred at Orange Resort, Akai Efa in Calabar Municipality local government area on the same day of the CRUTECH Matriculation.
The source said the students went to cool off as a way of marking their Matriculation into the University a memorable one.
“A group of CRUTECH students went to Orange Resort to swim after their Matriculation and that was how one of them (Otu) drowned.
“People were saying the guy was drunk, but what really transpired is still uncertain as the friends refused to say anything,” the source said.
The source added that the family of Otu wanted to carry his corpse to his hometown in Ugep, Yakurr local government area of the state for burial, but the police refused.
“Maybe the police or relevant security agencies are investigating the circumstances surrounding the boy’s death but his body has been deposited at the morgue at General Hospital Calabar”, the source added.
A city in China’s Hubei province, the epicenter of the global coronavirus epidemic, will pay residents as much as 10,000 yuan ($1,425.96) if they proactively report symptoms of the illness and it is confirmed after testing.
Qianjiang, a city of around one million people located about 150 km (90 miles) from the stricken provincial capital of Wuhan, has reported a total of 197 cases so far and is stepping up efforts to ensure its infected people are confined and treated.
It is the latest of a number of regions to offer cash rewards to encourage members of the public to volunteer for medical checks.
Hubei has reported over 65,000 cases and more than 2,600 deaths from the epidemic. Worldwide, the death toll is about 2,800 and about 80,000 have been infected.
The Qianjiang task force handling the epidemic said in a notice that residents would be entitled to the full 10,000 yuan payment if their coronavirus diagnosis is confirmed. Those who have previously been diagnosed will not be eligible.
Those who are not immediately ruled out as suffering from the disease will be given 1,000 yuan, while those declared to be “suspected” cases will earn 2,000 yuan, it said.
Other parts of Hubei, including the Wuhan district of Hanyang and the neighboring city of Huangguang, have also offered cash rewards for people volunteering for medical checks, but at a much lower rate of around 500 yuan.
An Irish drug dealer learned the hard way what every bitcoin investor knows: never lose your codes.
Clifton Collins, a former security guard and a beekeeper turned weed grower/dealer, lost $60 million when his landlord cleaned out the house he’d been renting and sent everything to the dump, including Collin’s fishing rod case that hid his Bitcoin codes. Without the codes, the accounts can’t be accessed.
According to the Irish Times, “Collins bought most of the Bitcoin in late 2011 and early 2012 using cash he made growing crops of cannabis. In early 2017 he had just over 6,000 Bitcoin in one account but he feared it may be too easy for a hacker to access.
He decided to spread his wealth across 12 new accounts … then printed out the codes for the 12 accounts onto a piece of paper. He hid the paper inside the aluminum cap of his case containing his rod which he kept at his rented home in Farnaught, Cornamona, Co Galway.
It all went south for Collins when he was arrested in 2017 for cannabis possession and sentenced to five years in prison. His house was broken into and, shortly thereafter, his landlord sent his belongings -- including the fly fishing case to the dump.
Dump employees remember seeing fishing gear, but the garbage was soon cleared and sent to either Germany and China to be incinerated.
The Criminal Assets Bureau confiscated the 12 accounts, but can not access them either, without the codes, the Irish Times Reported.
Collins has since come to terms with the loss and “considers it punishment for his own stupidity.”
A woman found herself being accused of alcoholism by doctors after she began urinating alcohol.
The 61-year-old was diagnosed with cirrhosis, a condition that can be caused by alcohol abuse, and was added to a waiting list for a liver transplant.
The unnamed woman would have her urine tested and always tested positive leading two sets of doctors to believe she was hiding an addiction.
She went to see specialists at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre and they were able to diagnose bladder fermentation syndrome.
High levels of Candida glabrata, yeast naturally produced by the body, were accumulating in her bladder when she ate or drank sugar.
Tests showed the yeast was then fermenting and turning into alcohol in the patient's bladder.
Because of this, the liver worked harder to eliminate it from her body every time she ate certain foods, which took its toll.
She was prescribed oral antifungals, to get rid of the yeast infection
The case report was revealed by medics from the University of Pittsburgh's Presbyterian Hospital in Pennsylvania.
They said it showed 'how easy it is to overlook signals that the syndrome may be present' in some liver transplant patients.
They also want to raise awareness in doctors so that they can be more aware of the condition and then patients can avoid being mistaken for alcoholics.
Photos have emerged of an unlikely wedding ceremony carried out between a one-year-old infant boy and a local dog in the Indian state of Odisha.
This peculiar ritual is reportedly conducted by the regional Santhal tribes whenever a baby is born whose first tooth appears in the upper portion of their gums.
Believing this tooth placement to be highly inauspicious, a hastily arranged wedding ceremony between the child and a dog is believed to be the only way to effectively ward off evil spirits.
The wedding is purely ceremonial, and children who go through with it are supposedly still allowed to form more conventional marital unions later in life.
They can later marry without any requirement to formally divorce the dog, it is also reported.
A video captured on February 23 shows the wedding party in Bariyan village was a colourful affair, with plenty of smiling guests in brightly coloured outfits.
Wandering drummers provide an upbeat soundtrack to proceedings and the boy groom, though no doubt bewildered by the attention, looks extremely smart in a blue chequered head dress.
His bride also looks very fetching.
In 2003, a nine-year-old girl was married to a local dog in the same ritual.
A millionaire businessman has refused to help his struggling parents because they wouldn’t invest in his fledgling company five years ago.
The unnamed boss explained that his mum and dad refused to put in £100 because they thought his firm was doomed to fail.
But he went on to rake in “seven figures a year” after the company unexpectedly took off.
Writing on Reddit, he insisted he won’t help them pay off a £200,000 mortgage because they only have themselves to blame for having no retirement savings.
He explained that he quit his £26,0000 a year office job in 2015 – when his parents and siblings earned twice or triple what he did.
He wrote: “When I opened my business, I asked if they wanted to invest as little as £100 in it, no one did... My entire family thought that my business was going to fail, just like I failed my sixth form.
“My parents still have around £200,000 in mortgage payments left and are about to retire.
"Yesterday at a family reunion, my aunt asked why I don't help them out financially considering I make more in a year than they make in a decade.'
“I also told her that my parents made more than enough to put aside some money each month towards retirement, but due to their unorganised spending habits they were living paycheque to paycheque every month. They were making TRIPLE what I was making when I was an office boy [sic].
“My aunt called me an a***** for not helping them out and spending my wealth on "lavish" things.
“I told her I earned my s*** through hard work, sleepless nights and dedication.”
One user blasted: “Yeah I feel like OP is ungrateful, and quite frankly chintzy. He hasn't provided info about the dynamics of his family, and has only provided income info - which sounds like all he cares about is money.”
“I don't know what your relationship with your parents is like, but I'd give my parents anything and everything, simply because I owe both more than I could ever give.”
But another said: “I don't owe my parents for raising me. I didn't have a choice to be born. It's literally their job to feed and clothe me. You don't get to be a parent if you don't do that."
Tuface Idibia has taken to his instagram page to appreciate his first babymama, Pero Adeniyi as their daughter, Ehi heads to high school. Ehi is Tuface's first daughter. Excited that is daughter is entering high school and thanking her mom, the singer wrote;
''Meanwhile in other news!!
Like play like play My princess off 2 high school
#GRATEFUL #20yearsaking
@perosaiyemi_ thanx 4 all u do. E no easy.''
A 28-year-old mother has been jailed after she drowned her toddler while 'disciplining' her for wetting her bed.
Lin Li, 28, from Brooklyn, New York, held her two-year-old girl's head under water in a storage bin until she drowned.
She has been convicted of her daughter Melody Zheng's manslaughter, but was acquitted of second-degree murder following a trial last June.
A jury also found Li guilty of first-degree attempted assault for holding her four-year-old son's head under water the day before she drowned Melody four years ago.
She was today sentenced to 18 years in prison over the death as the court was told she was a 'strict mother' who had used dangerous methods of punishment on her children, the Mail Online reports.
Prosecutors portrayed Li as a strict parent during her trial, telling the jury she had taken Melody into a bathroom at her family's squalid Sunset Park apartment to discipline the child for wetting herself on March 13, 2016.
While the toddler's father was asleep, she submerged Melody's head in a plastic container filled with water, and held her there until she stopped struggling.
i walked out of the bathroom without stopping to check whether Melody was still alive.
She later called 911 and police who responded to the call found her husband performing CPR on their daughter.
Melody was rushed to hospital, but was pronounced dead.
A Medical Examiner found the girl's injuries consistent with the little girl being held underwater and drowned.
Li admitted in a police interview that she had held her daughter's head under water up to her forehead then left the room.
She reportedly said in the taped interview that she saw bubbles coming out of her daughter's mouth.
Li had denied drowning her daughter, telling the jury in her defense testimony that she had left Melody in the storage container for a brief period of time without supervision, according to US reports.
She also denied allegations she forced her son's head under water the previous day to discipline him too.
Li's defense lawyer said the the couple and their two children were living in an overcrowded apartment, in which they shared the bathroom with a dozen other people.
The children had been living with their grandparents in China before joining their parents in New York just weeks before the drowning, the court was told.
Li directly addressed the sentencing judge, telling her through a translator she would accept whatever term of imprisonment was handed down.
She tearfully addressed the court, saying via the translator: "I would like to say being a mom, it is my duty to take care of my children, and I really regret my daughter's death.
"It was my mistake...losing my daughter is very, very painful to me."
Saudi Arabia has halted trips to the holy sites of Mecca and Medina over coronavirus outbreak fears.
Riyadh issued the ban in an effort to halt the spread of the virus, suspending visits to the holy cities in response to Covid-19 concerns.
The Kingdom's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it was taking precautions in line with World Health Organisation efforts to stop the surge of the novel coronavirus.
Pilgrims make 'umrah' Islamic pilgrimages to the holy sites throughout the year.
The Haji, is an annual mandatory pilgrimage to Mecca Muslims must take at least once in their lifetime according to the faith.
Unlike the umrah, the Haji attended by millions happens just once a year.
The Saudi Press Agency, the Kingdom's official news outlet, announced the decision yesterday
It also suspended entry to Saudi Arabia for travellers on tourist visas from the worst-hit countries, although it did list the countries in the report.
The Gulf state has imposed the stricter controls on its borders as countries around the world react to climbing rates of infections, with entire cities in lockdown and travellers quarantined as the killer virus spreads.
More than 80,000 people have been infected by Covid-19 worldwide so far.
A mum found her 11-year-old daughter's lifeless body lying in a bathtub after the girl suffered an electric shock while using her smartphone.
The girl was in the bath at her parents home in Dornbirn, Austria, in the far west of the country on the border with Switzerland.
The incident happened on Sunday afternoon when the girl reportedly had an electric shock in the bath where she was using her smartphone while lying in the water.
According local media, the girl had locked the door and her mother became suspicious when she knocked and heard no answer.
Suspecting something was wrong, she looked through the bathroom window and then spotted her daughters motionless body in the bath tub.
An uncle who was on the property at the time then smashed the door down, pulled the girl out of the water and started the resuscitation process.
Medics were also called to the scene but could only confirm the girl had died.
Expert from the Feldkirch public prosecutor, Rudolf Mork-Morkenstein, told local media that judging by the burns, a lot of electricity must have been involved.
He said that, provisionally, it appeared there was a significant problem saying: "Injuries of this type cannot happen in a properly functioning cell phone alone, the must have been something significantly wrong."
He said it was suspected that the cell phone charging cable may have been connected via an extension cable when it fell into the bathtub.
A 16-year-old boy, who allegedly hid in a bank toilet overnight and stole N340,000, was yesterday brought before an Igbosere Magistrates’ Court in Lagos.
The teenager (surname withheld) of Abimbola Street, Even Estate, Ajah, Lagos was arraigned by the Ajah Police Division, Lagos, on a one-count charge of stealing.
Prosecuting Inspector Peace Chukwudi told the court in a charge marked C/09/2020 that the defendant committed the offence on February 19.
She alleged that the defendant was caught by security officials in the banking hall of a branch of First City Monument Bank (FCMB).
Chukwudi said upon interrogation, the boy confessed that he gained entry into the bank just before 4pm, during closing time rush hour.
He went to the toilet and hid until everyone left for the day.
The court heard that the boy ransacked the workers’ safe at about 2:30 am, found the sum of N340,000 and concealed it in his clothes.
He tried to sneak out of the banking hall but was spotted and arrested by the bank’s guards.
The offence, according to Chukwudi, was punishable under Section 28 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2015.
The defendant pleaded not guilty.
Magistrate Doja-Ojo remanded him at the Oregun Juvenile Corrective Home, Ikeja.
She adjourned till April 15 for facts and sentencing.
