News & Announcements

The Department of State Security Services has apprehended Wale Adedayo, the suspended chairman of Ogun State’s Ijebu East Local Government Area.

Adedayo appeared at the DSS facility in Oke-Imosan, Abeokuta, at 11.45 am on Friday as a result of a secret police invitation. Saturday PUNCH exclusively learned that the DSS neglected to question Adedayo.

The governor was seen driving into the DSS building shortly after Adedayo arrived there, and they later met at the operations desk with the suspended chairman.

“The DSS has detained Wale Adedayo just now. They asked us to leave, that they’re not ready to interrogate him yet. But they were the ones that kept calling him since morning to come to their office for interrogation, and he arrived around 11.45am, but he was not allowed to go in with his mobile phone,” a family source told one of our correspondents on Friday.

An eyewitness, who simply identified himself as Jide, also said, “The DSS just chased us away from their office here in Abeokuta close to the governor’s office. They said they’re not ready to investigate the chairman for now. But the governor was here hours ago, and he left around 4pm, but he met with the chairman before he left.”

Adedayo had previously told Saturday PUNCH that he honored the secret police’s invitation and that he would testify before the House of Assembly about it.

The embattled council boss had alleged that local government areas in the state had been receiving zero allocation from the Federal Government purse since 2021, alleging that about N10.8bn belonging to the council areas in the state was missing.

In a letter to Chief Olusegun Osoba, the party’s national leader and a former governor, Adedayo pleaded with him to persuade the governor to release money intended for councils. Adedayo was suspended by seven councillors in the area on Thursday over 15 allegations involving alleged financial mismanagement of more than N50 million.

He also penned a petition asking the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to look into any charges of corruption made against the state government over LG allocations.

The state administration, however, insisted that the Joint Account and Allocation Committee members in Ogun State were in charge of administering the LG allocations and refuted the claim of cash mismanagement.

In a related incident, JAAC members refuted claims that money from the local government was misappropriated.

According to them, all funds agreed by the committee at its monthly meeting were always sent through the various local government council accounts.

The committee members appeared before the state House of Assembly to give clarification over the allegation of fund diversion as alleged by Adedayo.

According to a statement from the Assembly, the JAAC members explained that the process of fund administration took place monthly at a meeting.

They added that it was at the meeting that all first-line charges, including primary school teachers’ salaries, LG pension, traditional council, leave bonus and check-off dues of labour unions were aggregated among LG chairmen and payment made.

They said that on occasion, the state government had to make up the difference so that all local government councils could take care of their first-line expenses.

The Assembly did, however, forbid media covering the state from entering the location on Friday.

The entrance gate to the Assembly’s grounds was closed to media.

The journalists were politely asked for their names and informed that their names were not on the list of those expected by security personnel from the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps assigned to the Assembly.

The prohibition on media entering the Assembly, according to one of the members who confided in our correspondent, was a “order from above.”

In Oshoku Village, Ijebu North Local Government Area, Ogun State, a 20-year-old man going by the name of Ridwan is accused of ritually killing his father, Ishau.

This was said in a statement released on Friday by Soji Ganzallo, Commander of the Ogun State Community, Social Orientation and Safety Corps, via Moruf Yusuf, Director of Information and Public Relations.

The statement claims that the suspect was apprehended during a normal patrol by members of the So-Safe Corps on Thursday at around 12 a.m. when they heard a peculiar noise coming from a building and checked what was going on, which led them to find the victim’s lifeless body.

The statement read, “At about 12:00hrs on Thursday, August 31, 2023, officers of the Corps on routine patrol heard a strange noise in a building while at Oshoku Village in Ijebu North Local Government Area.

“The Officers entered the building to confirm what was happening, but to the officers’ dismay, they found a man’s body lying lifeless in a pool of his own blood and the alleged killer fled the scene.”

The corps started looking for the suspected murderer on the commander’s orders, and they eventually found him hidden in a bush.

The suspect admitted to murdering his father for the ritual’s purposes.

“Ganzallo instructed the Zonal Commander, Ijebu Zonal Command, ACC Marcus Ayankoya, to get the suspected killer Ridwan arrested under 24hrs. The suspected killer was nabbed where he was hiding in a bush.

“He confessed to having killed his father, Ishau, with a rope tied to his neck and a knife used to remove the needed parts of his body for ritual purposes.

“The alleged killer told the officers of the corps that he only removed the private part, larynx, and just four teeth of his father as requested by a ritualist he identified as Baba Kekere.

However, the corps’ attempts to learn more about the ritualist who gave the suspect the order to obtain body parts for rituals were unsuccessful since the suspect refused to reveal the ritualist’s location.

He was subsequently turned over to the police for additional inquiry and legal action.

“Ganzallo further revealed that when he was asked about the whereabouts of the ritualist, he refused to give details.

“The alleged killer had been transferred to the Nigeria Police Force, Ogbere Divisional Headquarters for further investigation and likely prosecution,” the statement concluded.

The Nigerian Bar Association has debunked the rumor that the performer was paid to appear at the association’s 2023 Annual General Conference on Thursday by explaining why musician Habeeb Okikiola, also known as Portable, sang at the event.

Late Friday night, online users criticized the NBA for bringing Portable to their event, which featured “learned” people, saying that by doing so, the organization damaged its standing and lowered itself to “razz.”

Others claim that the program was a joke and a disgrace to the traditionally conservative legal community.

However, in his response, NBA National Publicity Secretary Akorede Lawal connected Portable’s attendance at the event to musician Obi Cubana’s participation with the show as the main sponsor in an exclusive interview with PUNCH on Friday.

He added that the latter’s Cubana Group brought Portable because he served as a brand ambassador for one of their products (Odogwu bitters) and because being the headline sponsor required bringing a guest performer to the “Unbarred concert,” which typically features lawyers of all ranks to close the conference.

Lawal said, “We did not pay a dime to Portable for the concert. It is the largest gathering of lawyers anywhere in the world and so to that extent, we always write to sponsors to finance every level of our events.

“We have partners from America, Chile, and a host of other countries who pride in what we do and take it upon themselves to get the programme financed annually.

Speaking on whether lawyers staged a walkout on Portable at the event, the publicity secretary said, “No, they did not. The Friendship Centre is the customary place where all lawyers go to unwind, network and do all other social activities.

“So, the concert was meant to take place there but we later told the lawyers to move to the ‘Unbarred concert’ at the Velodrome of the National Stadium in Abuja because we don’t want two events at the same time given that that place (Friendship Centre) had been decorated already to promote their brands.

“They were the headline sponsor of the centre and that’s where the DJs and every other social activities had been going on since the start of the event. So we closed the place down to have a unified event,” he added.

He further appreciated the Cubana Group for sponsoring the event.

The conference tagged “Getting it right” marked the 63rd and it started on Friday, August 25 to Wednesday, August 30, 2023, with several activities earmarked for the occasion.

On Tuesday, September 5, 2023, the Nigeria Labour Congress will begin a two-day warning strike over what it termed as the government’s inability to appropriately mitigate the impacts of the elimination of subsidies on Premium Motor Spirit, more commonly known as gasoline, according to The PUNCH.

The labor center organized a countrywide demonstration earlier in August against what it deemed to be “anti-poor” measures taken by the Bola Tinubu administration against Nigerians.

On May 29, 2023, the subsidy was eliminated, raising the cost of PMS to N610 per litre. Cost of living eventually increased as a result of the fuel price increase.

Although committees were established by the Tinubu administration to organize the distribution of palliatives to workers, the labour center highlighted that the committees had not yet developed any plans.

In a succinct statement, a member of the NLC national body announced that a warning strike would begin on Tuesday. The national organization will soon publish a notice.

The Delta State government on Thursday, denied an online news report, which it described as fake, that the Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja, has sacked Governor Sheriff Oborevwori based on the petition by the Labour Party and its governorship candidate, Ken Pela.

Reacting to a social media report on the matter, the Chief Press Secretary to Governor Oborevwori, Sir. Festus Ahon in a statement, noted that the appellate court merely ordered the tribunal to hear Pela’s case.

Ahon, in a statement on Thursday, said: “We have been inundated by reports from a section of the media that the Appeal Court had declared Mr Ken Pela of the Labour Party as the winner of the 2023 Governorship election in Delta State.

“The report is nothing but fake news as the Appellate Court only ordered the tribunal to hear the case.

“From the results declared by the electoral umpire, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, it was obvious that the Labour Party did not win the election and therefore couldn’t have won in court.

“Our people came out in large numbers to elect Governor Oborevwori and they are happy with him. We therefore urge Party faithful and Deltans to disregard the said reports as it was a concoction of the Labour Party and their followers.

“We also urge Deltans to remain calm. At the time of the fake news, Governor Oborevwori was busy inspecting various ongoing projects within Asaba and its environs.

“He is focused on delivering dividends of democracy to the people of the state and would not be distracted by the rumour mills.

“Our lawyers are studying the Appeal Court judgment with a view to taking necessary action,” he added.

The Algerian Foreign Minister, Ahmed Attaf, on Tuesday, said the country is proposing an initiative to resolve the political crisis in neighbouring Niger with a six-month transition period led by a civilian.

Attaf, who recently toured West African states, said “Most of the countries we have talked to are against military intervention to end the crisis”, as quoted by Reuters.

President Mohamed Bazoum was ousted on July 26 in a military coup led by the former commander of Niger’s presidential guard, Abdourahamane Tchiani.

Leaders in the Economic Community of West African States said that they would keep all options on the table for a peaceful resolution to the crisis and ordered the activation of an ECOWAS standby force to restore constitutional order in Niger.

Algeria has repeatedly said it was against military intervention, pointing to the chaos that followed NATO action in Libya in 2011 during its uprising against longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi.

Algerian officials have spoken three times since the coup to the Niger military leader, who wants a transitional period of up to three years, Attaf said.

As part of its initiative, Algeria would seek a United Nations conference to restore constitutional order, propose guarantees for all sides in the crisis and host a conference on development in the Sahel region, it said without elaborating.

Last week Algerian state television said President Abdelmadjid Tebboune had denied permission to France for a possible military operation in Niger, but France denied it had sought any such permission.

 Pa. Michael Taiwo Akinkunmi (OFR), the designer of the Nigerian flag, is dead.

Pa. Akinkunmi, aged 93, died in the early hours of Tuesday after a brief illness.

His demise was announced via the Facebook account of one of his children.

He wrote, “Life is indeed transient; I can say boldly that you live a life with a landmark. Continue to rest, my father! Pa Michael Taiwo Akinkunmi (O.F.R.): Great Man has gone.”

Pa Akinwumi, a native of Abeokuta, Ogun State, was born on May 10, 1936, but lived in Ibadan until his demise.

He started his career as a Civil Servant at the Secretariat of Ibadan and later travelled overseas to study Agricultural Engineering at Norway Technical College.

In 1958, during his stay abroad, Akinkunmi stumbled upon an advertisement in a national daily calling for the submission of designs for the Nigerian national flag in view of Nigeria’s imminent Independence from British governance.

His entry was adjudged the best among the roughly 2,000 entries submitted.

The original design of the flag featured a white band flanked by two green ones, and a red sun with streaming rays was located on the white band.

The sun was eventually done away with by the overseeing committee to produce the present design.

Akinkunmi’s design was selected because of its ingenuity and profundity (the green bands represent the forests and abundant natural wealth of the country, while the white band represents peace).

The flag was officially hoisted on Independence Day (October 1, 1960) instead of the British Union Jack.

Akinkunmi was awarded 100 pounds by the government when his design was selected.

Following Wednesday’s revolution, a video of deposed Gabon President Ali Bongo pleading with his foreign friends to raise awareness has surfaced on social media.

In the 51st second, Bongo acknowledged that he had been taken into custody and separated from his wife and son, who he said were being held somewhere else.

The putschists emphasized severe institutional, political, economic, and social difficulties as causes of the coup, which they labeled as “necessary” for the advancement of the West African nation.

Bongo said, “My name is Ali Bongo Ondimba, President of Gabon. I am sending a message to all friends that we have all over the world, to tell them to make noise, to make noise”

Alain Bernard Bongo, 64, who was born in Congo-Brazzaville on February 9, 1959, took office as president of Gabon in 2009 after the death of his father Omar Bongo, who had controlled the country for nearly 42 years starting in 1967.

Omoyele Sowore, editor of Saharareporters and well-known human rights advocate, claimed to have recordings of vile remarks made by Kwara State Commissioner of Police Ebunoluwa Adelesi regarding Isese activist Adegbola Abdulazeez alias Tani Olorun.

“The Kwara State police commissioner expressed her hatred for Tani Olohu in a cell phone conversation that I now have,” the former presidential candidate of the African Action Congress said during an interview with PUNCH online, on Tuesday.

Adegbola is on trial for allegedly defaming traditional and religious authorities in Kwara State.

“I am a staunch believer of the freedom of expression, freedom of thoughts, and the freedom of worship.

“I have followed what was done to Tani Olohun, and I have concluded that he was kidnapped and taken across state lines to appear before a kangaroo court.

“The commissioner of police is in bed with those who didn’t want him (Tani Olohun) to fully express himself, and there are plans to prevent the Isese worshippers from carrying out their activities in Kwara State.

“I believe what they did is wrong, and they have no right to charge him for the crimes they claimed he committed.”

In addition, Adelesi allegedly held a personal grudge against Tani Olohun, according to Sowore.

‘He (Tani Olohun) should not have been arrested and charged before a magistrate court who again adjourned the case for 50 days over a bailable offence, that’s if he even committed any offence, and he did not.

“Tani Olohun was just expressing himself, if what he was doing was deemed wrong, he would have been penalised by Facebook where he shared these contents.

“Facebook has community rules, if he broke them, he would have been penalised but he wasn’t.

“They (Muslim clerics) capitalised on their relationship with the Kwara state commissioner of police, who had expressed her hatred for this particular person (Tani Olohun) in a cell phone conversation that I now have.

“They ganged up against him and abducted him from across state line with what they claim was a warrant of arrest from an Upper Area Court.

“An Upper Area Court doesn’t have jurisdiction across state lines. I’m not a lawyer but I know these things because I get frequently arrested by the government.

“I have asked for the removal of Adelesi as the police commissioner of Kwara State, she is not worthy to be a police officer.

“The CP in the tape with me was very upset. She was part and parcel of the conspiracy to arrest Tani Olohun from Oyo State and bring him to Kwara.

“Another guy made a Facebook post admitting that he lured Tani Olohun to the spot where he was eventually picked up.

“There’s no chance in hell Tani Olohun would have got justice in a court that has no jurisdiction to try his case, in the first place.

“They could have gone to Oyo State, sue him in a superior court, defamation is a civil offence.

“The one they are using that they call ‘defamation of character,’ is what the white people used in suppressing people under colonial rule.

“This law was struck out by the Court of Appeal in 1983. Justice Babatunde Belgore, now retired, was part of the panel that struck out that law.

“So they are abusing their powers to oppress people who are simply practicing their religion and this is why I stand with Tani Olohun and the oppressed in the country.”