Author: Chief Editor

Wayne Rooney has been appointed as Derby’s coach on a permanent basis, the Championship club announced on Friday. The former Manchester United and England player has been in charge of the Rams on an interim basis since Phillip Cocu was sacked in November. [Punch]

• Aviation, health experts warn second lockdown will spell doom • Nigeria won’t survive another one, economists warn • Say it will escalate poverty • ‘Don’t follow other countries blindly, focus on sensitisation’ • Violators of protocols inviting for lockdown, says health expert As nations go into another round of lockdowns in response to the second wave of coronavirus (COVID-19), Nigerians have warned government against shutting down the economy again, saying the impact of doing so will be deadlier than the effect of COIVID-19 itself. At the height of the pandemic last year, many countries and territories around the world…

Incumbent and former Houses of Assembly speakers across the South West geopolitical zone have endorsed the 2023 presidential aspiration of former governor of Lagos State, Bola Tinubu, in 2023. Rising from a meeting in Ibadan, Oyo State, the Lagos Speaker, Mudashiru Obasa, formally introduced the Bola Ahmed Tinubu (BAT) Foundation and Movement to the gathering. The speakers, who were up to 20, at a meeting in Ibadan, agreed on some far-reaching resolutions to actualise Tinubu’s presidential aspiration. Obasa, who convened the meeting, said the BAT Foundation was meant to break the shackles of poverty in Nigeria and create a coordinated…

If there is any zone in Nigeria where the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has been struggling to get its acts together, it must be Southwest. Although, the party has never had it so good in the geopolitical zone even during the President Olusegun Obasanjo dispensation, things went awry after the prolonged leadership squabble between Senators Ahmed Makarfi and Ali Modu Sheriff. In most states of the federation, the crisis split the party structure, but Southwest has continued to reel from instability and crisis, especially in Lagos State, where PDP has never produced the governor. For instance, when former…

After two days of meetings with Malian political and civil society figures, the mediator for the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), former president, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, has expressed optimism that Mali’s post-coup interim administration will hand over power to civilians within the agreed 18-month deadline. “It’s too early to doubt them,” said Jonathan, who was accompanied on the trip to Bamako by ECOWAS President Jean-Claude Kassi Brou and other members of his mediation team. “We believe they will be able to complete everything that they have set out to do within the 18 months timeframe,” he said, adding…

•Charges Buhari, security agencies to ensure Catholic bishop ’s safety •Wounds of civil war yet to heal, says cleric Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) has cautioned those threatening the Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese, Bishop Matthew Kukah, to stop their “unlawful” actions. It also asked President Muhammadu Buhari and security agencies to ensure the security of the cleric, who is under attacks from Muslim groups over his Christmas homily in which he accused the president of promoting northern hegemony. This comes as Kukah said Nigeria has not recovered from wounds of the civil war, 51 years after it ended. In…

•Your performance below average, insist PDP, Afenifere In a self-assessment yesterday, President Muhammadu Buhari awarded his administration high marks, saying the country is better than he met it more than five years ago. But the main opposition party, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and the pan-Yoruba socio-political group, Afenifere, faulted the president’s claim, contending that he has underperformed. Buhari, in assessing his administration yesterday, gave himself a pass mark for a job well done, tasking the elite to be fair in their criticism of his stewardship. Buhari, who spoke while hosting the Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Christian Pilgrims Commission, Reverend…

•Say experience of polio eradication will be useful •Urge Buhari to persuade traditional rulers to back vaccination Following concerns over the opaqueness of the recent allocation of expected 100,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines to states by the federal government, governors of the 36 states of the federation are making moves to take over the distribution of the life saving substance, THISDAY gathered yesterday. The allocation made by the National Primary Healthcare Development Agency (NPHCDA) has come under severe attacks by stakeholders that wondered about the formulae for the exercise as the allotment was disproportionate between the non-prevalent and prevalent states.…

The presidential bid of the National Leader of All Progressives Congress Asiwaju Bola Tinubu has received a boost as former and current Speakers of State Houses of Assembly in the South-west Thursday drummed support for his 2023 presidential quest. The former and current top lawmakers in the zone gathered at Carlton Gate Xclusive Hotel, Ibadan, on Wednesday and Thursday for a strategic meeting convened by Lagos Speaker Mudashiru Obasa. At the meeting where they agreed on some far-reaching resolutions on how to actualise the presidential aspiration of Tinubu, Speaker Obasa formally introduced the Bola Ahmed Tinubu (BAT) Foundation and Movement,…

AuGF report indicts NCDC for financial irregularities The federal government released the total sum of N63.8 billion for COVID-19 response for the period that covered between March and June 2020. The released amount is N20.097 billion lower than the N83.9 billion the Presidential Taskforce (PTF) on COVID-19 had budgeted in its proposals. This was disclosed in the “Interim Report of the Special Audit of Federal Government of Nigeria’s Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic for the Period, 1st March to 30th June, 2020” that was submitted to the Clerk to the National Assembly by the Auditor-General of the Federation, Mr. Anthony…