A photographer with the Eti-Osa Local Government, Lagos was allegedly beaten to a coma by a policeman during a demolition exercise in Ikoyi area of the state last Wednesday.
CODEWIT learnt that the victim, Bolaji Madamidola, is an occupant of a building which formerly belonged to a former Managing Director of Oceanic Bank plc, Cecilia Ibru.
It was learnt the building had been acquired by Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria and sold off to another individual.
Our correspondent gathered on March 6, 2013, some policemen stormed the building to eject the occupants of the building.
It was in a bid to salvage some of his properties that Madamidola was allegedly beaten up by one of the policemen.
The lawyer to the occupants of the building, Okwarauba Nastor, said the policemen were shooting indiscriminately in a bid to scare off the occupants of the building.
He said the victim did not provoke the policemen but only attempted to evacuate some of his properties when one of the policemen hit him with a sledge hammer.
He said, “The policemen came with guns and started shooting into the air sporadically so that all the occupants of the building will run away. He (Madamidola), on hearing that the policemen were ejecting them (tenants), he rushed back to the house.
“As he ran into his apartment to salvage some of his things, one of the policemen later identified as Sergeant Raimi Aliyu, picked up a sledge hammer and struck the victim with it, causing him to faint immediately.”
It was learnt that the policemen, who thought Madamidola had given up the ghost, immediately fled the scene.
Sympathisers were said to have rushed the victim to about four hospitals in the area where he was rejected. He was later taken to St. Nicholas Hospital, Lagos Island.
A friend of the victim, who craved anonymity, said Madamidola was still in critical condition and due to the severity Madamidola’s condition, he would need at least N1m before proper treatment could begin.
The lawyer said it was unfortunate that AMCON would authorize such a demolition even though the matter was still in court.
He said, “This is not the first time that the occupants of the building will be threatened with eviction. In April 2011, the same policemen attached to the company wanted to eject them but we took the matter to court because the tenants have been paying rent to AMCON.
“The matter is still in court and that is why I’m surprised that such a thing could happen.”
It was however learnt that AMCON had promised to offset part of the hospital bill.
When contacted on the telephone, the AMCON spokesman, Mr. Kayode Lambo, denied that the victim was beaten up by a policeman, adding that he only got injured after he slipped and fell.
Lambo said the occupants of the house no longer had the right to live in the house since it had been relinquished by Ibru after her conviction in 2010.
He said, “The property has been sold and the tenants there no longer pay rent. When the policemen went to the house, one of the tenants slipped and fell and sustained a minor injury. We took him to St. Nicholas Hospital and he is fine.
“There is no case pending in court because the property was acquired legally by AMCON.”
When contacted on the telephone, the spokesperson for the state police command, Ngozi Braide, said she would call back but was yet to do so as at press time.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
Having grown up in this hardscrabble corner of Nigeria, Naomi Benjamin seized the opportunity when a man offered her a lucrative job as a nanny in Europe. She thought the job would finally make her rich, or at least not desperately poor.
Years later, seated amid bleating goats outside a row of clay homes, she smiles meekly as she recounts how her optimism drove her to agree to undergo a juju spell, guaranteeing that she would repay the debt she would incur traveling there.
As part of the spell, she offered pieces of fingernail and hair.
"I swore that if I refused to pay, the oath will kill me," said Benjamin, now 23.
She would soon break the oath.
It took 19 days to get to Europe, crossing the Sahara in the back of a truck with very little food or water. On her first night in Italy, she was placed under the control of a madam and ordered to sleep with a man. When she refused, the madam beat her. Benjamin ran out of the house. She was soon lost in a strange city where she knew no one and didn’t speak the language.
Eventually, the police found her. She spent two years in jail before being deported.
In fleeing her madam, Benjamin is the exception. Magic spells have great power over Nigerians — compelling them to do things they would never otherwise consider.
According to Nigerian authorities, across Europe tens of thousands of Nigerian women are bonded to sexual servitude — not with chains, but via juju, an ancient form of West African magic.
The women typically travel to Europe willingly, after being promised lucrative jobs. But as a precondition to their sponsor, each woman swears an oath administered by a traditional priest, vowing to repay a large sum for their passage, or face death.
In an interview under the searing equatorial sun, in a neat dirt yard where goats bleated in the shade, Benjamin seemed self-assured despite having only a few years education. But her poise faltered as she thought about the juju spell.
"It wasn't my fault," she repeated several times. Her eyes shifted around the yard, as if afraid the spell would jump out at her.
"She said that when I get there I will take care of a baby," Benjamin continued. "I didn’t know when I get to Italy I was supposed to do prostitution."
Most Nigerian women bonded to prostitution in Europe are, like Benjamin, from here in poverty-stricken Edo State, home to only 4 million of Nigeria’s 160 million plus population.
Sex trafficking in Edo was openly big business in the 90s, before current anti-trafficking laws were passed in 2000, said Grace Osakue, the head the aid organization Girls Power Initiative.
The business still operates but in secret, entrenched in the local economy, according to Beatrice Jedy-Agba, the executive secretary for Nigeria’s national anti-trafficking agency, known as NAPTIP.
"It is big enough to be a source of concern to both the Nigerian government and the international community," Jedy-Agba narrates in her Abuja office. "We have also interacted with the Edo State government and they are also concerned and indeed alarmed at the sheer magnitude of citizens involved in this trade."
Anti-trafficking laws are currently being revised, she added, to stiffen penalties and criminalize the juju oaths that prevent victims from running away. Aid organizations and the government said they are also conducting awareness programs, trying to teach young people about the dangers of illegal immigration.
Awareness campaigns do work, but often traffickers just move on to rural areas that have not been reached by aid organizations, Osakue added.
Like Benjamin, the victims tend to be desperately poor and under-uneducated, she added. Local traffickers, often acquainted with their families, convince them they will be safe and will easily pay down their debts.
"Most of the children you find in Europe who are victims of trafficking did not go to school beyond five or six years," she says in a garden outside an Edo church.
The women who make it back are typically angry and embarrassed about being tricked into leaving their homes. They almost never retaliate. Several women said they were told they would have a good job in Europe and were forced into prostitution. When asked if they knew the person who recruited them, a few nodded shyly. None would say anything else on the matter, fearing reprisals or unwanted attention to the ordeal.
Despite being duped, the women are often treated as criminals, as Benjamin was. Even after managing to escape horrific ordeals, they are often considered a financial hardship back in Nigeria, which lacks services needed to help them.
Most, it seems, have little choice but to try to forget the trauma they have suffered.
At 20, Amaka Chinye was already saddled with responsibility. Both of her parents had died. Having finished high school, she opened a small boutique in a run-down shopping center to support her younger brothers.
Strong and energetic, Chinye struggled to feed her small family.
Then an acquaintance offered her a way out.
Two years later, Chinye said she never considered refusing the offer, but it turned out to be the worst mistake of her life.
"I was coping then suddenly somebody came and said, 'I will take you to London. I will take you to America — all over the world — and when you get there you will not be doing this kind of job.”
"So I was like, 'Ah! I want to go to Europe,'" she continued, smiling as she recalled her high hopes. "So I said, 'Okay, let's go!"
Chinye sold all the items in her shop and told her brothers that she would send money home as soon as possible.
Like many women trafficked to Europe, she was taken to a juju priest — known locally as the "herbalist" — to seal the deal with local magic. During the ceremony, she vowed she would obey her boss in Europe and pay back her travel expenses with the money she would make at her new job.
The 'spell' called for her death if she failed to fulfill her oath. Chinye wasn't worried.
"I said, 'Ah! Since you've assured me of a job I'm going to do there, there's no problem. I'm going to pay,'" she said. "All my life I've been dreaming, how can I help my younger siblings? How can I help them? I don't want them to suffer, because I love them so much."
A dangerous journey
It wasn't long after Chinye left home that something seemed wrong about the journey. She joined nearly 30 young women loaded onto an open-backed truck, headed toward the vast Sahara Desert. Chinye wondered: Why weren't they taking a plane to Europe? And didn’t she need a passport?
When they reached Libya, she learned the real extent of the danger. The country was at war. The truck sped through the desert to avoid gunfire and bandits known to rob and rape Nigerian women on their way to Tripoli.
"The bad people in Libya were all in that desert hanging out everywhere," Chinye said, no longer smiling. "They were shooting."
Their supplies of food and water dwindled. Two young women died from heat and exhaustion.
"The sun — it’s as if the air is fire," Chinye explained. She raised her arms and waved them slightly, imitating the sun beating down and trying to find the words to describe the horrors of the desert. "You see how it's going to look like then, when God will come. The sun was so hot."
Eventually, the driver was killed when a stray bullet hit his chest. But by then, it was too late to turn around and go home. They were out of food and almost out of water. Chinye and the other girls knew they were likely to die on their way to Europe, but if they turned around and tried cross the desert again — without supplies or money — they had no chance of surviving.
"You can't say, 'I want to go back.' The only hope you have is to go further," she said, appearing relieved as she described reconnecting with the network of people charged with trafficking the women to Europe. "There is no way. You'll die there." European dream
For the next few months, Chinye was passed from person to person — individuals linking the recruiter she met at home to her Nigerian “madam” in France.
In Tripoli, she and other women hid inside for months while men fetched them food and other necessities. Chinye was told she had to hide because Libyan rebels were wary of black people, believing them all to be potential supporters of Muammar Gaddafi's army.
When passage to Italy was finally arranged they boarded boats that Chinye said looked like balloons. Forty-two people on her boat survived, but another boat of immigrants headed for Italy on the same day capsized, killing everyone on board.
"I was very scared but I didn't have a choice because I don’t have any money on me," she said. "We have to go with them. We were very, very lucky."
In Italy, Chinye met a lawyer who knew her name. He had been sent from France to bring her to her new "home" — an apartment in Paris that housed the madam, her husband and between one and three "girls" at any given time.
She was welcomed to the house with skimpy clothing and high heels. "Hit the streets," her madam told her. She owed more than $80,000 for her passage to Europe, and the only available job was prostitution.
A few weeks later, the madam threw a party for two other young Nigerian women who had apparently paid down their travel debt and were going home. The message was clear: If Chinye worked hard, she could be a success.
"She introduced those two girls to me," Chinye said, proceeding to draw out her words as she imitated the madam's voice. "'You can see, these are my girls. They just finished paying me. Do you know how much they have in their accounts? Do you know they have a house in Nigeria?”
For a month, Chinye worked the streets as many as 20 hours a day, but she never made enough money to send anything back to her brothers in Nigeria. The madam forced her to pay for food, housing and work clothes, and demanded $500 a week towards her debt. It was not long before she realized that at the rate she was going, she would always be accruing debt faster than she could pay it off.
Fighting back
The madam counted on all her "girls" to keep quiet and make money.
They had all sworn an oath with a juju priest, and believed they could die if they disobeyed or refused to pay. She didn't know that Chinye was different.
Chinye befriended an older Frenchman, who convinced her to go to the cops.
At the police station, she explained how she had been tricked into coming to France without a passport and forced into prostitution. She was detained and interviewed. She told them everything.
Both the madam and her husband were arrested, but for Chinye the nightmare wasn’t over. She was in France illegally, and she was about to be deported, penniless. Impressed by her bravery, employees at the detention center gave her about $800 to help her return home after landing in Nigeria.
"They said, 'Take this money. You are a very brave girl. You are a very good girl. I like the way you came to us,'" she said. "Some of them just gave me fifty euros — just like that. So that's how I came back."
Fourteen other young Nigerian girls were deported from France that day, she recalls. Some, having not fulfilled the oath and in fear of death, would eventually return to Europe.
Back in Nigeria, Chinye began to rebuild her life. She learned that for most trafficked women, the ordeal didn’t end upon arriving back in Nigeria. She tried to re-open her business but lacked the capital to restock it. With only a few items to sell, she now carries clothes in a plastic bag and hawks them on the street.
When asked if she is afraid the juju spell will one day kill her, Chinye said she no longer worries.
"They said I'm going to die if I did not pay," she said. "But I've been waiting for death and death did not come. I know it will not come. I am very much stronger than juju."
After enduring five years of sexual servitude in Italy, Patience Ken was deported and unceremoniously dumped back in Nigeria. Penniless, she sold her cell phone to pay for the journey from Nigeria's financial capital, Lagos, to her village in Edo State.
She had been lured to Europe with the promise of a good job. It was a horrific ordeal. And when she arrived back home, her family was not happy to see her.
"They felt bad," she said. "A lot of them say, 'Now you are here. To feed you is very hard.”
Patience, 8 months pregnant with her second child, gazed beyond the dusty parking lot near where she spoke to GlobalPost, recalling those first days back in her village.
Life was better now, she said. Her current baby’s father is her partner, not a customer.
For victims of sex trafficking here in Edo State, sometimes returning is as difficult as the journey.
But the dream of a job — any job — continues to lure women far from home and trick them into working as prostitutes.
Most residents of Edo State, like Patience, live in farming villages and travel for hours every few days to sell their goods. Wealth in Edo State can be found in the capital, Benin City, behind gated compounds — a different world from the raucous markets, crumbling homes and bumpy roads that make up most of the city.
Locals say that for most people, the only way to get ahead is to leave Nigeria.
Everyone in Benin City seems to know at least one woman who has financed a house through her work in abroad. Locals say those women may be envied for their money, but they are also ostracized for what is assumed to be an illicit past.
Many trafficked women, however, come back broke and shamed, said Solomon Okoduwa, the president of the Initiative for Youth Awareness on Migration, Immigration, Development and Re-integration, an aid organization set up to help returnees.
"They repatriate such persons back to Nigeria without a dime," he narrates in his one-room headquarters in a shabby commercial complex. "What do you expect to happen to this society?"
While a handful of organizations, including both the state and federal governments, are aware of the problems returnees face, there is little help to be had. Okoduwa's organization offers training in agriculture and entrepreneurial skills. Hundreds of returnees have trained this year, he said, but upon completion of the programs students often can’t find jobs or don’t have the resources to go into business.
The state government claims to offer soft loans and grants to returnees who have completed similar government trainings, but Okoduwa said he has never seen any evidence of the funding. Likewise, none of the women had heard they could get help from the government.
For some, lack of resources is the least of their problems.
Many believe they could be killed by a juju spell if they were deported before they paid the traffickers for their passage to Europe.
To allay these fears, traditional priests, or herbalists, are recruited to cast new spells, according to Florence Igbinigie, a former commissioner for Women's Affairs in Edo State. Other girls go to churches to free themselves of the juju.
"Some of them they go back to the herbalist who did the previous oath to undo it," she said. "Some of them, they go to Christian homes, to religious bodies to pray and cast out the demons and they are free."
Still others, she added, go back to Europe after being deported, because they believe they will be killed if they don’t pay up.
When 24-year-old Precious Uyinmwen was deported from Spain back to her clay house in Edo State, she had nothing but the clothes on her back. She had sworn to pay the traffickers $45,000 but was swiftly deported and never paid the bill.
Uyinmwen said she didn’t attempt to counter the spell because she was tricked. She wasn't told she was vowing to be a prostitute. When asked if she believes she is in danger, she turned defensive.
"They didn't fulfill their part of the oath," she said quietly, sitting on a wooden bench outside her home. She looked as if she hadn't smiled in many years. "So it’s not my fault."
As long as young people are desperate enough to risk their lives and freedom for the hope of an income, women and girls will be vulnerable to traffickers, said Okoduwa, the aid worker.
In Abumwenre village, a few hours outside the state capital, Benin City, two young women demonstrated the point.
Naomi Benjamin, a 23-year-old returnee, told a small crowd of her ordeal.
"We spent 19 days in the desert," she said. "There is no food, no water. We were hungry. It was only God that was protecting us."
When she finally got to Italy she found out that she had been tricked into sexual servitude. She tried to run away and spent more than two years in jail before she was deported.
While Benjamin spoke, 18-year-old Joy Eriamentor listened intently. She empathized with Benjamin's horrific ordeal, and could see that vowing to pay back facilitators upon arrival is not a safe way to travel.
"It makes me afraid to travel," Eriamentor said. "If you swear and then you refuse to pay, maybe something will happen."
Officials say teaching young women about the dangers of trafficking is the only way to stop it. Benjamin's story, however, didn't alter Joy's dreams of leaving Nigeria. She said she wants to study science, but that she'll never get ahead if she stays in Abumwenre, where children almost never go to college.
"We do not have any help here," she said. "Nothing, no work. Because my family is too poor, that is why I want to go."
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
A young man, Ejike Igwekile, has been thrown down from a two-storey building at 7 Rev Adegoke street Canal Estate, Okota, Lagos by his angry in-laws at Okota, Lagos State, southwest Nigeria.
Ejike’s sin is that he allegedly beat his wife, Nkiru, 27, from Delta State, south-south Nigeria, and she ran away with their only daughter to her parents’ house at 4, Iworo street, Orile Coker, Lagos, barely a year after they got married.
According to Igwekile, who is from Okija in Anambra State, southeast Nigeria, sometime this year they had a little quarrel and Nkiru took their only daughter to her parents’ house when he left for his business.
He said trouble started when their baby fell sick and his wife phoned him to bring money so that she could take her to a hospital for treatment.
He said he ignored them and insisted that Nkiru should come back to his house with the baby so that he would take her to a hospital.
After he refused to send the money, his mother in-law, Patricia Philip, 53, allegedly went to Ejike’s house at Okota to pack her daughter’s property to end the marriage.
He said when he resisted, Patricia immediately contacted her son, Charles who allegedly came with two other suspects and descended him, beat him mercilessly after which they threw him down the two-storey building.
Although he survived the fall, he was rushed to a hospital where he is being treated.
He broke his head and legs and cannot walk properly as a result of injuries he sustained during the fall. Patricia was arrested by the police at Okota division and charged to court, while Charles and the two other accomplices are on the run.
Patricia denied the allegation and told the police that it was during the scuffle that Igwekile jumped and fell from the building.
She was charged with conspiracy and attempted murder under the Criminal Code, before the presiding Magistrate, Mrs Abegunde Davies.
When she was arraigned, she pleaded not guilty to the charge. The court granted her bail in the sum of N250,000 with two sureties in like sum. She was remanded in prison custody pending when she will fulfill her bail condition.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
Bonny Gas Transport, BGT, a subsidiary of Nigeria LNG Limited, NLNG, yesterday, finalised the deal for the acquisition of six new vessels valued at N254.4 billion ($1.6 billion).
According to a statement by the company, signed by Kudo Eresia-Eke, Acting General Manager, External Relations, the deal which was finalised in London, will see the company acquiring four vessels from Samsung and two from Hyundai, two Korean companies.
Eresia-Eke said the six vessels will have a combined capacity of 1.053 million cubic meters and are expected to increase BGT’s overall shipping capacity by 17 per cent.
Eresia-Eke stated that the tankers will be delivered over a period of nine months from October 2015 to June 2016.
Continuing, Eresia-Eke disclosed that the new ships which will replace BGT’s six oldest vessels were ordered through retained earnings from BGT, additional borrowings from an existing facility and new vessels debt provided by a combination of Korean Export Credit Agencies, international, regional and local commercial banks.
Eresia-Eke added that, “This particular deal entails BGT supporting more development of Nigerian Content through utilization of Nigerian manpower, services and materials in all elements of the value chain in support of Nigeria LNG’s commitment to increased local productivity.
“This is in advancement of government’s aspiration to increase the country’s participation in the maintenance and repair of large ocean going vessels.
“BGT, a subsidiary of Nigeria LNG Limited (NLNG) was established in 1989, to provide shipping capacity for NLNG projects. It directly owns 13 of the 24 vessels which deliver liquefied natural gas for Nigeria LNG to customers across the world. The remaining 11 vessels are owned via long term leases.
“NLNG is a Nigerian Joint Venture company whose shareholders are the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (49 per cent), Shell Gas B.V. (25.6 per cent ), Total LNG Nigeria Limited (15 per cent) and Eni international n.a.n.v. (10.4 per cent).”
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
Nigeria goalkeeper, Vincent Enyeama has confirmed that he broke his promise of dancing in his under pants following the Super Eagles’ triumph at the 2013 Afcon in South Africa.
Enyeama has during their training tour in Faro, Portugal in January said, “It will be a dream come true and I am certain I will strip to my shorts. Yes, let everyone hear it that I will strip to my shorts if we are champions.”
The goalkeeper has now declared that he had no intentions of keeping such a promise.
“No I did not keep the promise because I am not obliged to keeping it. It is not all the promises that the federal government has made that has been fulfilled. People also make promises and they don’t keep them,” Enyeama said.
Enyeama described his action as “one of those failed promises” but insisted that he had a reason for his decision.
“It is one of those failed promises…. I have my reasons I failed to fulfil it,” he added.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
The Japanese have done it again! For the first time in human history,they have successfully utilized sperm cells created with stem-cell techniques to fertilize eggs and produce live, normal offspring.
They used embryonic stem cells of mice to make primordial germ cells,which are the precursors for sperm cells.
Scientists have for ages tried to create sperm by using stem cells in earlier in-vitro studies using mice and human cells, but up until now they haven’t been successful.
The breakthrough research by the Asian scientists, led by Professor Mitinori Saitou from the Kyoto University, is published as an abstract in the journal Cell,, entitled: “Reconstitution of the Mouse Germ Cell Specification Pathway in Culture by Pluripotent Stem Cells”.
They then transplanted them into the testicles of infertile mice, after which the cells produced normal-looking sperm. The mature sperm cells were used to fertilize eggs and produced healthy, fertile offspring.
These findings will encourage further research into the process of how primordial germ cells develop, something that has been difficult to investigate because these cells don’t grow in vitro.
Whether future findings eventually will lead to new discoveries in human fertility remains a question. Human and mouse embryonic stem cells have different properties and any research of this kind with human stem cells will of course become an ethical issue as well.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
The International Police Organisation (INTERPOL) says it will collaborate with Nigeria to fight cross border crimes, drug trafficking, corruption and terrorism in the effort to achieve global peace.
The President of the organisation, Mrs Mereille Ballestrazzi, gave the assurance in Abuja on Tuesday when she visited the Minister of Police Affairs, retired Navy Capt. Caleb Olubolade.
Ballestrazzi, who expressed concern about the security situation in the country, said the collaboration would be in the areas of timely and accurate exchange of information for effective law enforcement.
She commended Nigeria’s commitment to the ideals that informed the setting up of the INTERPOL and its active participation in INTERPOL activities.
The INTERPOL is a 90-member country organisation set up in the early 20′s and recognised by the UN as an inter-governmental organisation in 1971.
Responding, Olubolade urged the INTERPOL to assist Nigeria to set up a National Crime Database for improved policing.
He gave the assurance that Nigeria would continue to honour its obligations to the organisation.
According to him, a revitalised collaboration between Nigeria and the INTERPOL will impact positively on the security situation in the country.
The INTERPOL president also visited the Inspector General of Police, Mr Mohammed Abubakar, at the Force Headquarters, Abuja.
She said that the purpose of her visit was to explore the possibility of collaborating with the police in training and information exchange to make the country and the world safer.
Abubakar, who was represented by the Deputy Inspector-General of Police in charge of Investigations, Mr Peter Gana, said the collaboration was necessary to make the country and the world safe for economic and other activities.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, NAFDAC, has expressed worry over the high rate of drug hawking and sale of fake drugs and other narcotics in Kebbi State.
State Director of NAFDAC, Mr. Bitrus Fradel, stated this while responding to questions from newsmen in Birnin- Kebbi, yesterday.
Fradel, who said hawking of drugs was more prevalent in Jega Local Government Area of the state also stressed that the exposure of drugs to harsh weather was not in the interest of their users as such drugs could be ineffective and harmful to health.
He said the agency was grappling with the problem of sale of fake and narcotic drugs in the state, advising the public to be careful about what they buy and eat.
Fradel lamented that drugs like tramol, which was being sold by almost every chemist in the state and which is being used illegally by many youths in the state, should only be administered according to doctors’ prescriptions.
He said: “Tramol is supposed to be prescribed by a doctor but you can see that the youths are fond of using it indiscriminately,” adding that although the registration of Tramol as a product was in 50mgs, the ones being consumed by youths were in the category of 200mgs.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
Nigeria’s hope of defending their African Youth Championship crown, Tuesday went into smoke as Egypt’s U-20 team thrashed the Flying Eagles 2-0 in a semi-final game decided at the Ain Temouchet.
After managing to scrape into the last four of the eight-nation tournament, which also served as the qualifier for the forthcoming FIFA U-20 World Cup in Turkey, the John Obuh-tutored team played without vision as they wasted the early chances that came the way of their strikers.
Kayode Olarenwaju, who missed the last Group B match against the D.R. Congo, was the worst culprit of the day, as his selfish play robbed the team of numerous scoring chances.
It was so bad that the Eagles played without wings for most part of the match. Even though they had more ball possession in the first half, which ended goalless, it was clear that the Nigerians were just living on past glory.
In the second half, the Egyptians, who topped Group A, came out with a new approach and deservedly scored a quick-fire goal in the 46th minute, through Monem Hamid Mahmoud.
Kayode, in the first two Group games of the Flying Eagles, showed how wasteful he was in front of goal and when he missed the last group match on Saturday, his replacement, Aminu Umar, showed the star in him by scoring a brace to seal Nigeria’s place in the last-four.
But against all wisdom of modern-day football, Obuh brought back the out of touch Kayode and Nigeria paid dearly for his tactical blunder.
Despite pushing forward without any real threat of scoring, the Nigerians looked like untrained boys in the mine-field of war against the Egyptians, who showed maturity, calmness and purpose in attack.
The Pharaohs’ tactical superiority was again to show 14 minutes from regulation time when Mahmoud netted his second of the night to end Nigeria;s miserable run at the competition.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
Nigerian US Army deserter, Allen Williams Abiodun, 52, who was arrested on February 20, 2013, for allegedly killing his younger brother, a Merchant Navy personnel in Imude community, Oto Awori Local Government area of Lagos, has finally opened up on why he committed the dastardly act.
The six-footer confessed to Crime Alert that he stabbed the deceased, Allen Olawale Ayetimi,24,to death, following continuous threat on his life by Olawale.
The late Olawale was reportedly sleeping when Williams allegedly stabbed him in the head, neck and jugular.
After allegedly committing the devilish deed, Williams reportedly dumped Olawale’s remains in an uncompleted building foundation behind their compound and,covered it with leaves.
Report said he thereafter, took his late brother’s ATM card, Merchant Navy uniform and phone.
Crime Alert gathered that the deceased only returned from an official trip to Port Harcourt at about 11pm that fateful day. Although, he was based in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, his mission to Lagos, as reliably gathered, was to settle a score between his elder brother and their mother.
On arrival,the late Olawale reportedly washed his uniform, took his bath and shared a brief moment with his mother and siblings in the shop they were confined to,during which he informed them of his intention to convince his brother to accept them back to the main building,unaware that he would never live to see his mission accomplished.
Before retiring to the bedroom which he shared with his elder brother, Olawale was said to have instructed one of his sisters to boil water for him to bath the next morning.
Apprehension set in next day, after his sister went to inform him that the hot water was ready, only to discover his blood-stained clothes on the floor without any sight of him. As she was about to leave, she reportedly met Williams, who informed her that Olawale had gone to the bank.
Unsure of what to do, she reportedly alerted her mother who raised alarm that created a scene in front of the building.
A neighbour who claimed to have seen Williams dragging what he suspected to be Olawale’s body into the bush told Crime Alert: “I came out at about 1 am to ease myself, only to notice some movements. Out of curiosity, I peeped to see what it was, only to find Williams dragging something on the floor.
“When I finished from the toilet, he was returning from where he went. I noticed his hands were stained with blood and out of curiosity, I asked where the blood came from and he said he just killed a goat. Since I did not suspect anything, I went inside to sleep. It was when I heard a shout from their compound in the morning that I was compelled to disclose what happened.”
This revelation reportedly led to William’s arrest after which he was handed over to the police.
However in this interview with Crime Alert at the State Criminal Investigations Department, Yaba, Monday, where he was paraded alongside some robbery suspects that have been terrorizing Lagos, it was observed that Williams was not coherent with his words. He simply stated that the deceased was never his brother.
According got him, “He is not my brother. He is Ogunmadede’s son. What happened on that very day was that as I was in my room at midnight, somebody pointed a torch light in my face. And I said hey man, you know you have been threatening me. The next thing I did was to reach for a cutlass. I moved over and stabbed him in the head in order to act safe. It did not look easy for me to kill him”
Asked why he chased his mother and siblings from the main building, he denied that stating: “ I am a US soldier for your information. I only escaped and returned home in 1992 because of a lady I fell in love with from the Ogunmade family in Ondo State. But when I returned, she dumped me and I could not go back”.
Back to the question about his mother, he said, “I did not chase my mother away. In fact, she was in her office in Ikeja when the incident occurred”.
Asked how that was possible since he said the incident occurred at midnight, he simply stared at this reporter. At a point, he started behaving funny like one who is mentally deranged, saying things that were not relevant to the issue at hand.
Investigation carried out in his community revealed that he was feigning to be mentally deranged, in order to be let off the hook.
One of his relatives who spoke on condition of anonymity said: “ He has never had any mental problem since I knew him. He is just pretending so that one will think he is a mad man”.
Meanwhile, his mother and siblings are currently gripped with fear over the possibility of Williams’ release. But police operatives assured they would conduct a test on him to ascertain his mental state before charging him to court.
Anthony-Claret is a software Engineer, entrepreneur and the founder of Codewit INC. Mr. Claret publishes and manages the content on Codewit Word News website and associated websites. He's a writer, IT Expert, great administrator, technology enthusiast, social media lover and all around digital guy.
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