The United Kingdom (UK)-based forensic and ballistic company, engaged by Lagos State government to investigate the shooting incident at the Lekki Tollgate, has come  to a conclusion  that live military-grade ammunition were not fired at protesters on the night of October 20, 2020. The Executive Director of  Oxygene Consulting UK Ltd,  Dieye Willie-Harry, gave a review on Tuesday via zoom during the proceedings of the Lagos State Judicial Restitution for Victims of #EndSARS Related Abuses and Other Matters Panel investigating police brutality. He said: “We have not viewed any footage, which definitively shows a muzzle aimed towards any individual and at the same time being fired with the effect thereof, but what we can freely assess was that no live bullet was fired. “However, given the injuries sustained from 21:00 hours and further, we believe that live and military-grade ammunition were fired at some point by persons yet-to-be-identified.” He said by the tim...

President Biden received a third dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, a booster shot, on Monday. The White House hopes that the publicly broadcasted event will convince Americans of the vaccine's safety. He got his first shot on Dec. 21 and his second dose three weeks later, on Jan. 11, along with his wife, Jill Biden. Biden, 78-year-old has been a champion of booster doses since the U.S. experienced a sharp rise in coronavirus cases from the delta variant in the summer. Video Credit: The white House

  NEW YORK : A jury has found R&B superstar R. Kelly guilty on racketeering and sex trafficking charges after a trial where the prosecution portrayed the 54- year- old singer as a  heartless  predator who preyed upon young Black girls and women. The panel of seven men and five women had begun deliberating the charges on Friday afternoon after prosecutors and defense attorneys finished their closing arguments at the end of a grueling trial of often shocking testimony. He is accused of running a Chicago-based criminal enterprise that recruited his accusers for unwanted sex and mental torment. Multiple witnesses said Kelly had subjected them to perverse and brutal whims when they were underage in a scheme that stretched back more than two decades. Meanwhile , he  had denied any wrongdoing. The charges were based on an argument that the entourage of managers and aides who helped the singer meet girls — and keep them obedient and quiet — amounted to a c...

  Operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), have uncovered a hotel in Abuja where drugs are allegedly sold and young ladies camped for commercial sex. At least four persons; three ladies and a man were arrested when the said drug joint, JAT Suites, located at 30 Lobito Crescent, Wuse 2 was raided and some quantities of Rohypnol and paraphernalia – for smoking crack cocaine – were recovered on Wednesday 22nd September, 2021. Investigations reveal that the hotel is operated without requisite approvals in a high profile neighborhood and patronised by call girls while the bar serves as the spot to smoke and sell drugs to the young girls and their customers. In a statement on Sunday, the agency’s spokesman, Femi Babafemi, explained that the Chairman/Chief Executive of NDLEA, Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa has directed the FCT Command and the Directorate of Assets and Financial Investigations of the agency to do all within the law to ensure the property is forfeited...

Two  California women face murder charges Monday as a consequence of connection with an illegal butt implant surgery that results in the death of an aspiring social media star. Libby Adame, 51, and Alicia Galaz, 23, were both arrested Aug. 5 in Riverside. The pair are reportedly mother and daughter. According to LAPD Detective Robert Dinlocker, the two women performed an unauthorized and illegal procedure on 26-year-old Karissa Rajpaul of Encino on Oct. 15, 2019. Rajpaul had posted pictures of the procedures on a now-defunct social media account. LAPD Deputy Chief of Police Alan Hamilton said Adame and Galaz called 911 after Rajpaul developed complications following the September 2020 procedure, but they then fled the home,  KTLA reported . “They took people’s cash and we know in a couple of incidents, it resulted in murder,” Hamilton said.

  Popular socio-political activist and the former aide to ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, Reno Omokri has accused Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, APC, of campaigning for the presidency even from his sick bed in London. He also accused President Muhammadu Buhari of mis-governing Nigeria from London. He tweeted: “Bola Tinubu is campaigning to govern Nigeria from London. Buhari partially misgoverns Nigeria from London. “With the reality of this fact, why did we gain independence from Britain only to shackle ourselves with London based despots who are worse than the British?” It has been over two months since ruling party chieftain Bola Tinubu left the shores of Nigeria for medical treatment in London. While in London, the former Lagos State governor had played host to several top Nigerian politicians including Preident  Buhari, Governor  Akeredolu and  Governor Fayemi ...

    CSP Akintunde Oyeniran   The General Manager, JAMZ 100.1FM, Ibadan, Mr Tony Awobode was on Sunday beaten to stupor by the Divisional Police Officer (DPO)  CSP Akintunde Oyeniran  and his men from the Iyaganku Police station . Awobode, popularly known and address as Don Tee, suffered the harrassment, assault and humiliation from the supposed security operatives along Aleshinloye Junction on the fateful day. The incident happened when Don Tee who was riding on a power bike was stopped by the DPO alledging that his car mirror was hit by the power bike as the JAMZ FM GM was trying to cross towards the Aleshinloye axis. Efforts by Don Tee to prove otherwise even after stopping to see and confirm that there was no mark or sign of friction on the side mirror fell on deaf ears as the attempt only attracted slaps and bashing by the police boss. The DPO who was visibly angry at Don Tee for attempting to speaking while he was talking and even showing effrontery to prov...

The U.S. deported more than 300 Haitians back to their home country Sunday as the federal government copes with a major spike in border arrivals in the small community of Del Rio, Texas. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced this Saturday, saying it would “accelerate” efforts to remove the migrants. U.S. Customs and Border Protection will within 24 to 48 hours deploy 400 additional agents to the Del Rio sector, the area which has been the centre of the migrant surge, DHS said in a statement. “The Biden Administration has reiterated that our borders are not open, and people should not make the dangerous journey. “Individuals and families are subject to border restrictions, including expulsion,” DHS said. The agency announced steps it was taking to handle the surge of Haitian migrants at the Texas border with Mexico, including speeding up their removal and return to Haiti. “DHS will secure additional transportation to accelerate the pace and increase the capacity of removal ...

  The Middle Belt Forum, MBF, Sunday, gave an account of how activists and former Deputy Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Dr. Obadiah Mailafia gave up the ghost on Sunday at the Specialist Hospital, Gwagwalada, in the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Abuja. The Forum, in the statement issued by Dr. Isuwa Dogo, its National Publicity Secretary,  alleged conspiracy and spiritless attitudes of medical personnel as responsible for the untimely death of the presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress, ADC, in the 2019 general elections. The statement reads,  “The death of the former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria at the University of Abuja Teaching Hospital, Gwagwalada, Abuja, this (Sunday) morning came to us as a great shock. “As someone who relentlessly participated in the activities of the Middle Belt Forum, his untimely death has dealt a deadly blow on ethnic nationalities of not only the Middle Belt but the country...

BELGIUM: The city of Brussels has said it will name a new street after a murdered Nigerian sex worker, as part of a wider campaign to recognize women in Belgium.  The street will be the first named after a sex worker in the country,  according to Belgium broadcaster RTBF .  Late Eunice Osayande  was stabbed to death by one of her customers in June 2018. Ms Osayande moved to Brussels in 2016 after being lured by human traffickers disguised as  acting agents and film producers, but was forced into prostitution after arriving in Brussels. She was told she owed the smugglers €45,000 (£38,000; $52,000) for her transportation, pimps, and rent. In the weeks leading up to her death, she had contacted a sex worker charity and informed them that she was being subjected to violence and intimidation at work. She was afraid of going to the police because she was an undocumented migrant. Ms Osayande’s murder was charged to a 17-year-old man, who is currently on trial. Fo...

          Image Credit: bennyhinn.org Pastor Benny Hinn sent a touching  tribute to the late Pastor, Dr David Yonngi  Cho  and a part of the speech said  “Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints.  Cho, an emeritus pastor at Seoul’s Yoido Full Gospel Church, died on September 14, 2021  at a Seoul hospital where he had been treated since he collapsed due to a cerebral hemorrhage in July 2020.  Pastor Benny’s tribute : Even as I grieve Dr. Cho’s passing from this earth, I’m also rejoicing that he has graduated to his remarkable heavenly reward. I am praying for the members of the Cho family and the staff and membership of Yoido Full Gospel Church. I am especially lifting up Young Hoon Lee, who in 2008 succeeded Dr. Cho as senior pastor. Psalm 37:23  declares that a good person’s steps are “ordered by the Lord.” Certainly, this was true of each step of Dr. Cho’s well-spent 85 years. This was a man who rec...

   Maurice Fayne, who starred in Love & Hip Hop: Atlanta, has been sentenced to more than 17 years in federal prison for conspiracy and wire fraud related to a Ponzi scheme, and for bank fraud, and making false statements to a financial institution related a fraudulent Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan application. “Fayne planned to use the PPP program as a cover for his long-running Ponzi scheme,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Kurt R. Erskine.  “The funds the program supplies serve as a lifeline to many businesses desperately trying to stay afloat during the pandemic, and unfortunately his fraud helped deplete those precious dollars.”  “This sentence should serve notice that the FBI and our federal partners will investigate anyone who misdirects federal emergency assistance earmarked for businesses who need it to stay afloat,” said Chris Hacker, Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta. “We won’t tolerate anyone driven by personal greed to pocket American taxpaye...

I am pleased to address you at this moment upon my appointment as the leader of The SCOAN. To all our members, Partners, friends and compatriots in faith, I say, Good Morning and Win Today. It has been three months since the glorious home call of our dear father, founder and General Overseer, Senior Prophet Temitope Balogun Joshua, which occurred on 5th June, 2021. These past three months have surely been challenging, but we thank you all for remaining strong and for keeping the faith as we had been trained, built, instructed and taught by God's servant himself that trials are the soil upon which faith flourishes. We salute your faith. Today, like always, is a new dawn in The SCOAN. As we all know, Prophet T.B. Joshua fought the good fight of the Kingdom and finished strong, to the glory of God. We have now commenced the journey from where our father left the baton. He had already prepared us all for this new phase, and we must rise up to the occasion as a team under the command of...

  A mother allegedly killed her own son because of m issing SD card,  Prosecutors said that on Saturday morning, Fallon Harris, 37, confronted her son, Kaden Ingram, 12, about the location of SD card she had removed from her car on Friday night. Video from inside their home in the  South Chicago neighborhood   reportedly shows Harris threatening him with a gun. When he could not give her the card, she shot him once. He was left conscious and crying. She then went to answer the phone, and walked back to her son, asked for the card again, and when he said he didn't know where it was, she shot him again, prosecutors said. This shooting is caught on video. Kaden collapsed on the kitchen floor and died a short time later. She allegedly told police that she had killed her son and showed them the silver revolver she had used to do it.

US President Joe Biden has urged unity as his country remembers the victims of the 2001 11 September attacks. In a video released on the eve of the 20th anniversary, he paid tribute to the 2,977 people who lost their lives. "We honour all those who risked and gave their lives in the minutes, hours, months and years afterwards," Mr Biden added, speaking of the emergency workers who responded to the attacks. Commemoration events are due to take place on Saturday. Joe Biden will begin with a ceremony at 08:30 (12:30 GMT) in New York at the site where the World Trade Center's Twin Towers once stood. He is not expected to deliver any speeches, but in his address on Friday, he said: "No matter how much time has passed, these commemorations bring everything painfully back as if you just got the news a few seconds ago." He acknowledged the "darker forces of human nature - fear and anger, resentment and violence against Muslim Americans" which followed the atta...

  Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, has signed into law a bill granting the state government to collect Value Added Tax (VAT). The Commissioner of Information and Strategy in Lagos, Gbenga Omotoso, proclaimed that in a statement on Friday. “The governor signed the ‘bill for a law to impose and charge VAT on certain goods and services’ at about 11:45am today, after returning from an official trip to Abuja. “By this act, the bill has now become a law,” said Omotoso.

The Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association (MACBAN) says its members are not ready for the Lagos State Government ban on open grazing. On Monday, the ‘Prohibition of Open Cattle Grazing Bill’ passed second reading at the House of Assembly.   The bill seeks to ban open grazing, the trespass of cattle, illegal entering into farmlands, among others. On Wednesday, Miyetti Allah’s Zonal Secretary in South-West, Maikudi Usman said the body needs more time to enlighten herders. He spoke at a one-day public hearing organised by the state legislature. Usman stated that herders are not used to breeding cattle in one place. “When we say we will keep cattle in one place, the owner of the cattle will not have funds to feed the animals in one place. “They (herdsmen) depend on going from one place to another because during the rainy season, we have where we settle down, and we also have for the dry season. “We are pleading with the state government to give us more time to tell our people and t...

  🎧  Briefing audio file of the press conference. The Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore has asked the National Assembly to stop the enactment of the open-grazing laws by some governors in the country. Miyetti Allah National Secretary Saleh Alhassan made the call in Nasarawa State on Monday. He claimed that the law was targeted against Fulani pastoralists. He said that the law would undermine the relative peace and stability currently enjoyed in the local communities, threaten the social order and exacerbate cattle rustling. Alhassan noted that the anti-open grazing laws would destroy livestock production and send millions of people depending on the livestock value chain into poverty. He appealed to the National Assembly to rescue the pastoralists by resuscitating and passing the Grazing Reserves Commission Bill and other livestock management bills initiated by the previous assemblies. He said that the review of the Land Use Act was long overdue to accommodate the interest of all land...

The Taliban on Monday claimed total control over Afghanistan, saying they had won the key battle for the Panjshir Valley, the last remaining holdout guarded by  The National Resistance Front (NRF) in Panjshi, the anti-Taliban militia and former Afghan security forces  .  The Talibans' Leaders warned against any further attempts to rise up against their government, but encouraging former members of the security forces to join their regime’s ranks. “With this victory, our country is completely taken out of the quagmire of war,” chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said. “Anyone who tries to start an insurgency will be hit hard. We will not allow another,” he later added at a press conference in Kabul. The Taliban published a video of their flag being raised over the governor’s house in Panjshir — underscoring a historic win that has seen the anti-Taliban bastion defeated for the first time during 40 years of conflict. It remained in the hands of resistance fighters during Sov...

  On September 11, the president and First Lady Jill Biden will “honor and memorialize the lives lost 20 years ago,” according to the White House statement. They will take part in commemorations in New York, where the twin towers of the World Trade Center destroyed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania and the site of a crash of a plane hijacked by four jihadists as well as  Arlington, Virginia, where the Pentagon was attacked. The 20-year anniversary of the fatal attacks that claimed about 3,000 lives on U.S. soil comes less than two weeks after the end of the War in Afghanistan, which lasted for almost two decades. The United States invaded the country weeks after the 2001 terrorist attacks to retaliate against the extremist group  al Qaeda , which plotted the commercial plane hijackings, leader Osama bin Laden later admitted. "We must never forget the enduring pain of the families and loved ones of the 2,977 innocent people who were killed during the worst terrorist attack...

The Edo State Police Command  has confirmed the killing of Felix Olajide Sowore, brother of Sahara Reporters Publisher,  Nigerian activist and former presidential candidate  by kidnappers around 6:00 a.m. on Saturday. The pharmacy student at the Igbinedion University Okada was killed along the Lagos-Benin expressway when gunmen kidnapped about five persons travelling on the route. The Police spokesperson in the state, Kontongs Bello said his body has been deposited at the Igbinedion University Teaching Hospital (IUTH) mortuary while search and rescue operation is ongoing for those abducted.

The Kogi State government has threatened to take legal action against the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). Commissioner of Information and Communication in the state, Kingsley Fanwo, gave a warning on Thursday while briefing reporters at the Kogi Liaison Office in Abuja. He accused the EFCC of a deliberate attempt to malign the integrity of the state governor, Yahaya Bello, over an alleged N20 billion salary bailout funds said to be in fixed deposit at a commercial bank. The commissioner described as false and malicious the claims by the anti-graft agency that the governor did not disburse the said bailout funds released by the Federal Government in 2019 for payment of salary arrears owed civil servants in the state. Rather, he informed reporters at the briefing that the state government disbursed the said funds since October 2019. Fanwo’s briefing comes two days after the Lagos Division of the Federal High Court issued an order freezing the Kogi State Salary Bailout Ac...