N10bn Private Jet: Reps Give Allison-Madueke Fresh Summons, Lawyer Protests

The House of Representatives Committee on Public Account has issued fresh summons to the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Deziani Allison-Madueke, to appear before it over the alleged expenses of 10billion Naira on private jets.

Also summoned are the Group Managing Director of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, Andrew Yakubu; Managing Director, Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria, Engr. Saleh Dunoma; the Managing Director of Pipeline and Petroleum Products Marketing Company, PPPMC, Mr Haruna Momoh; Vistajet International Limited and other stakeholders.

The Chairman, House Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Zakari Mohammed, said that all those summoned were to appear between June 15 and 17 to shed light on various aspects of the alleged N10 billion expenses.

He added that anyone who refuses to appear would face a subpoena under the law.

You Can’t Probe Deziani For Now, Lawyer tells House

Meanwhile, Constitutional lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mike Ozekhome, has warned the House of Representatives against making any move to resume probe of the Minister of Petroleum Resources, on the alleged N10B aircraft charter scam.

The senior lawyer asked the House to put the probe on hold for now since the Minister has a legal action before a Federal High Court in Abuja, challenging the legality of the House of Representatives’ decision on the over-sight function.

In a letter of protest delivered to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Waziri Tambawal, Mr Ozekhome faulted the announcement of the fresh move to begin the probe, warning that the move would amount to an affront to the law court where the legal action was pending.

The human rights activist, in the letter also copied to the Senate President, Senator David Mark, said that the practice in the world especially in a civilized society is for both parties in a dispute to take their hands off the disputed matter once a law court has been invited for adjudication on the issue.

He said that it was wrong and abnormal for the House to proceed to probe the Minister even when the House has already joined issued with her in a law court of record and in competent jurisdiction.

Bring Back Our Girls

By what form of education were the arms and ammunition used by these cowards called Boko Haram made? If Western, then #BringBackOurGirls.

By what form of education were the clothes worn by these cowards called Boko Haram made? If Western, then #BringBackOurGirls.

By what form of education were the vehicles used to convey the #ChibokGirls by these elements produced? If Western, then #BringBackOurGirls.

U.S. Criticizes Nigeria Over Kidnapping Response

U.S. Criticizes Nigeria Over Kidnapping Response

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A top U.S. Defense Department official on Thursday said Nigeria had been too slow to respond to the threat of Boko Haram but Washington is committed to helping fight the Islamist militants and rescue over 200 girls seized from their school a month ago.

U.S. officials have said the effort to retrieve the girls is now a top priority but has been complicated by Nigeria's early reluctance to accept assistance, and U.S. rules banning aid to foreign forces that have committed human rights abuses.

"In general Nigeria has failed to mount an effective campaign against Boko Haram," Alice Friend, the Pentagon's principal director for African Affairs, told a hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's Africa subcommittee.

"The Department has been deeply concerned for some time by how much the Government of Nigeria has struggled to keep pace with Boko Haram’s growing capabilities," Friend said.

Friend said it was troubling that atrocities have been perpetrated by some Nigerian forces during operations against Boko Haram.

Robert Jackson, acting assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, said Washington has urged Nigeria to reform its approach to the group. "When soldiers destroy towns, kill civilians and detain innocent people with impunity, mistrust takes root," he said.

The U.S. Embassy in Abuja offered help almost immediately after the kidnapping. But it was two weeks before U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry called Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan to offer aid, which was accepted on May 4, Jackson said. Friend said U.S. reconnaissance flights started days later.

Nigeria has been reluctant to designate Boko Haram as a terrorist threat at the United Nations, but Jackson said it has changed its position and he expected that designation imminently.

Delaware Senator Chris Coons, the subcommittee chairman, said that the odds the girls would get home safely were diminishing every day.

"It took too long for the Nigerian government to respond to the girls’ abduction. It took too long for the Nigerian government to accept offers of assistance from the United States, the United Kingdom, France and China, and once accepted, it took too long for that assistance to be fully implemented," he said. The U.S. officials said Boko Haram is a regional threat that is becoming international, with ties to al Qaeda. They said the Pentagon and Department of State were developing a "regional response," including improved security along Nigeria's borders with Chad, Niger and Cameroon.

"We've definitely determined that there are links between al Qaeda in the Islamic Mahgreb and Boko Haram. They have probably provided at least training, perhaps financial support," Jackson said. 

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle; Editing by Sofina Mirza-Reid, Andrew Hay and Ken Wills)

Source: Reuters Mobile

Chibok: Borno Governor Gives Names Of 54 Teenage Schoolgirls Spotted in Boko Haram Video

Some of the girls seen in the YouTube video posted online on Monday by the terrorist group Boko Haram have been identified by their parents, guardians, fellow students and school officials, the Governor of Borno State, Mr. Kashim Shettima said Tuesday.

THEWILL recalls that over 200 teenage schoolgirls were seized in the night of April 14th 2014, from the dormitory of the Government Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State, by the radical Islamic insurgents.

Governor Shettima had during a press briefing held after a peaceful procession by a coalition of civil society bodies and activists under the Bring Back Our Girls initiative in Abuja on Tuesday, said some of the girls had been identified.

A statement by the governor’s spokesman, Isa Gusau, said 54 of them were spotted in the video which Shettima Monday ordered to be downloaded into mobile devices and sent to Chibok in order for parents, fellow students and school officials to view.

The parents and students who did the identification were Tuesday transported to Government House Maiduguri for another round of identifications away from the media and observers.

Officials attached to the Chief of Staff to the Governor, Mr. Abubakar Kyari, prevented the parents and students from speaking to journalists after the exercise as they were escorted into waiting government marked vehicles and taken to unknown destinations.

THEWILL can however report that over 80 girls have been identified as at the time of filing this report. A senior official who asked to remain anonymous told THEWILL that “85 girls have so far been identified in the video as at this night (Tuesday). So that that is 31 more than the official number whose names have been made public. The list will be updated formally tomorrow.”

Those identified according to the statement are:

1. Agnes Gafane
2. Saraya Stober
3. Hauwa Bitrus
4. Hajara Isa
5. Na’omi Philimun
6. Hauwa Abdu (1st Speaking)
7. Magret Yama
8. Shitta Abdu
9. Jummai Muta
10.Ladi Paul
11. Roda Peter
12. Filo Dauda
13. Godiya Bitrus
14. Saratu Tauji (2nd Speaking)
15. Ross Daniel
16.Hauwa Ali
17. Hajara Isa (Amira 3rd Speaking)
18.Luba Afga
19.Na’omi Luka
20. Saraya Emos Ali
21. Bilkisu Abdullahi
22. Mairama Ali
23. Maryam Ali Maiyanga
24. Dabora Abbas
25. Kabu Mala
26. Halima Ali
27. Yana Bukar
28. Solomi Pugu
29. Lydia Emmar
30. Luba Sanda
31. Saraya Samuel
32. Comfort Habila
33. Rejoice Shanki
34. Gloria Yaga
35. ‎Mary Nkeki
36. Moda Baba
37. Hauwa Isuwa
38. Patient Jacob
39. Ladi Jajel
40. Abigel Bukar
41. Fanta Lawan
42. Zainabu Yaga
43. Aisha Lawan Zanna
44. Dokas Yakubu
45. Kabu Mala
46. Maryama Bashir
47. Hauwa M. Maina
48. Mary G. Dauda
49. Susana Yakubu
50. Maryam Abbas
51. Laraba John
52. Hanatu Nuhu
53. Na’ omi Bukar
54. Rifkatu Galang.

The statement further said their names are currently being compared with school records as well as names published some days back to ensure accuracy.

It added that “the exercise continues at the Government House and it is hoped that more names will be established by parents, students and teachers as well as management of the affected school.”

THEWILL gathered that the identification exercise will continue through the night until all the girls in the video are identified as Shettima has insisted that the names of all the girls in the video be established and compared with school and security records.

SOURCE: http://thewillnigeria.com/news/chibok-borno-governor-gives-names-of-54-teenage-schoolgirls-spotted-in-boko-haram-video/

THEWILL_ Posted date: May 13, 2014

THEWILL_ Posted date: May 13, 2014

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Goodluck Jonathan's Slow Motion Response to an Appalling Crisis

Goodluck Jonathan's Slow Motion Response to an Appalling Crisis

By Stephen Hayes - Associated Press 

The kidnapping of hundreds of schoolgirls, followed by the announcement by the leader of Boko Haram – the terrorist group which has claimed responsibility for taking them – that the girls are to be either sold or forced into slavery is beyond appalling. It amounts to mass rape. It also does no honor to Islam. Although child marriage may be permitted under Islam, certainly kidnapping and rape is not. It is primitive and barbaric that deserves the strongest condemnation of the entire world.

According to news reports, more than 300 school teenage schoolgirls were kidnapped from their school in a remote section of northeastern Nigeria last April 15.
The mass kidnapping and the response by Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan's administration may determine the future of his tenure and who is to succeed him. So far, the political leadership has handled the situation poorly. The question that hangs over the whole matter is how could more than 300 girls be kidnapped en masse and no one seems to know where any of them are? The president of Nigeria has admitted publicly he has no idea where the girls are, and only now has he begun to ask for outside help in finding the girls.

The whole matter raises many other questions, including why few, if any, of the northern governors, most of them in opposition to the Jonathan administration, have publicly been of assistance. One hopes that some have been quietly working with helping in the search. Nigerian politics, like those of many countries, are especially complicated. The northern governors, nearly all of them Islamic, believe that Jonathan has twice broken a political understanding that the ruling People's Democratic Party has that the presidency rotate between the north (mostly Islamic) and south (mostly Christian). Jonathan is a southerner who assumed the presidency in 2010 when his northern predecessor fell ill and died. Some northern factions believed Jonathan violated the agreement by standing for election to a full term in 2011 and then did so again by announcing that he will seek re-election. There may be no sense of urgency by the governors of the north to help Jonathan out of this. That they seem to know as little as Jonathan about the girls also raises questions about the connection between the rulers and the ruled, as well as the threat from Boko Haram that some may feel.

The Nigerian Government has also been slow in reacting to the crisis because much of their focus on Boko Haram has been a defensive one, aimed at protecting those participating in the upcoming World Economic Forum, to be held in Abuja this week. Several hundred of Africa’s top business leaders, along with various other representatives of Western governments and businesses are planning to be in Abuja for the group's annual Africa Forum. The forum’s presence in Abuja was to be a major feather in Jonathan's cap, and a showpiece of Nigeria for global business. Ironically, now the forum finds itself in a very awkward position of doing business as usual in the face of one of the most serious political crises in Nigeria since the Biafran Civil War. Yet, it is almost impossible for the group to cancel the forum, given that this program is a major part of their overall master plan for Africa. To cancel the forum would also be an enormous vote of no confidence in Nigeria’s ability to manage its most serious problems. The fact that the bulk of Nigerian security has focused on this meeting of the economic elite and not on the search for the schoolgirls has not gone unnoticed in Nigeria and elsewhere, as is underscored by demonstrations in New York and Washington.

How the Nigerian government handles these next 10 days may be not only the most important to Jonathan but to those that follow him.

Source: https://www.causes.com/causes/298145-for-a-corruption-free-nigeria/updates/911463-goodluck-jonathans-slow-motion-response-to-an-appalling-crisis?utm_campaign=post_mailer%2Fcause_update.cb_50474&utm_medium=email&utm_source=causes&ctag=9a229f9453c00f0b2d3ff4b9245d18ba96&ctoken=i6I-mGH4jKHnp-fSBu9ri0VP9fACWFicf0MsaWd1ufNph5zQqHvLkor_CB2j4i3TT73QATCQbVQEML3o6blXpKqBybHLDltK&uid=91781643

Boko Haram Bombs Bridge Linking Nigeria and Cameroun

The Boko Haram Thursday bombed the sole bridge linking Borno State, Nigeria and Cameroun. The strategic bridge is located at the border town of Gamboru, where the Boko Haram killed over 300 persons on Monday.

Residents of Gamboru told journalists that the downed bridge has cut off some of their relatives from Nigeria and left them stranded in Cameroun. One source who spoke to THEWILL said "The only option left for people traveling to and from Gamboru, is to go into Banki near Bama Local Government area of Borno into Cameroun and later enter Gamboru from another Camerounian village."

The source further revealed that 315 corpses were buried following Monday's attack.

Residents Malam Kolomi, a trader in the commercial city of Gamboru and Mamman Abu told reporters via telephone that several persons are still trapped under rubbles following the attack.

The Boko Haram a few weeks ago abducted over 200 teenage female students from a secondary school in Chibok town, Borno State and its leader Ibrahim Shekau has boasted that the girls would be sold into slavery or married off to men. The United States, UK, China, South Africa and the UN have promised to help Nigeria secure the girls' freedom.

Source: http://thewillnigeria.com/news/author/thewill_/

Stop those trivialising schoolgirls’ abduction, Falana tells Jonathan

May 8, 2014 by Ade Adesomoju

Human rights lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN), has asked President Goodluck Jonathan to stop people from further trivialising the abduction of over 200 schoolgirls from Government Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State, on April 19.

The Lagos lawyer in a statement on Thursday said the comment credited to “some people”, including the President’s wife, Patience, that “no child was missing”, was “incendiary” and capable of deepening the agony of the abducted children’s parents.

“President Goodluck Jonathan should ensure that the abduction of the innocent girls is not further trivialised in the interest of our collective sensibility and public morality,” he stated.

He described as insensitive for some highly placed persons to insist that there was no missing child despite the step by the Christian Association of Nigeria to publish some of the abducted girls’ names.

He said, “In spite of the inauguration of the Presidential Committee to investigate the abduction of the over 200 girls  and the publication of the names of about 185 of the missing girls by the Christian Association of Nigeria some political leaders have insisted that no child has been abducted.

“Such level of insensitivity is being displayed by highly placed persons at a time that the Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau has admitted that the criminal sect abducted the innocent girls and threatened that they would be sold into slavery.”

He queried the basis for the government’s accepting of international aid to rescue the children if truly the girls were not missing.

His statement also read, “Why has the Federal Government accepted the offer of the United States’ Government to join in the frivolous -search for the girls since they are no longer missing?

“No doubt, the incendiary statements credited to certain people to the effect that “no child is missing” must have accentuated the agony of the parents of the abducted some of whom had taken part in street demonstrations to demand ‘Bring Back Our Girls’.”

He asked the President to disband the committee set up by Patience to investigate the incident arguing that she had no power to do so.

He added that even the one set up by the President himself for the same purpose could best serve as a “ministerial act” and never as a Commission of Inquiry.

The Punch Newspaper.

US To Assist Nigeria In Rescue Of Chibok Girls

The US government has offered to assist Nigeria locate and rescue the girls from the Government Girls Secondary School in Chibok, Borno State, abducted three weeks ago in by suspected members of the Boko Haram sect.

Accepting the offer on Tuesday, President Goodluck Jonathan said Nigeria would appreciate any support that would be given in ending the insurgency in Nigeria’s north east, reiterating a statement he made during a media chat on Sunday.

A statement by a spokesman for the president, Reuben Abati, said President Jonathan welcomed and accepted the offer.

“The offer from President Barack Obama which was conveyed to President Jonathan by the United States Secretary of State, Mr John Kerry in a telephone conversation, which began at 15:30 Hours on Tuesday, includes the deployment of U.S. security personnel and assets to work with their Nigerian counterparts in the "search and rescue operation."

“Mr Kerry assured President Jonathan that the United States is wholly committed to giving Nigeria all required support and assistance to save the abducted girls and bring the reign of terror unleashed on parts of the country by Boko Haram to an end,” the statement read.

President Jonathan thanked Mr Kerry for the call and offer of further assistance and told him that Nigeria’s security agencies, who were already working at full capacity to find and rescue the abducted girls, would appreciate the deployment of American counter-insurgency know-how and expertise in support of their efforts.

After speaking with the United States Secretary of State, President Jonathan on Tuesday met with the Chief of Defence Staff, Service Chiefs and heads of national security agencies in continuation of the national efforts to find and rescue the abducted girls.

He also received updates on the ongoing search and rescue efforts, and gave approval for further actions as recommended.

The terrorist group, Boko Haram, has carried out series of attacks on villages, churches and schools in Nigeria’s north-east. Scores have been killed in bomb attacks, with the latest attack on Chibok on April 14 resulting in the abduction of over 200 girls of a secondary school. The abduction occurred same day that the members of the sect carried out a bomb attack on a Motor Park in Nyanya area of Abuja. The attack left at least 70 persons dead and over 200 injured.

The abduction of the girls has sparked protests in Abuja, Lagos and some other states, with the protesters mounting pressure on the government to take drastic action in efforts to rescue the girls.

Last week a bomb blast also occurred in Nyanya few meters away from where the blast of April 14 occurred. at least 19 persons were killed while over 60 were injured.

The Nigerian government had declared a state of emergency in three states in the north east in an effort to quell the increasing insurgency. But many are saying that the state of emergency has not changed the situation.

The recent attacks in Abuja raised fears of insecurity as the nation prepares to hold the World Economic Forum on Africa from Mar 7-9, but President Jonathan during the media chat reassured the international community of the government’s commitment to the safety of participants.

Ahead of the Forum, there is increase in Police presence in Abuja and surrounding villages.