Barcelona must win Real Madrid or forget title – Luis Enrique

Barcelona manager, Luis Enrique has stated that his side must win against Real Madrid in Sunday’s Clasico or kill any hope of winning the La Liga title.

The Catalans have recently suffered defeats at Deportivo La Coruna and Malaga, losing ground on league leaders Madrid, who begin this weekend with a three-point cushion at the top of the table.

A defeat on Sunday could, therefore, leave Barca six points adrift of Zinedine Zidane’s side, having played one game more and with just five matches of the season left to play.

Enrique told news conference, “It’s special because of the moment of the season and also because it’s a game against out great rival, who are top of the table.

“The aim is to stay loyal to our style — it would be ridiculous not to. Any result but a win would do us no good whatsoever.

“It’s a Clasico which could decide the league, but it could also open it up again.

“It’s like a final for us and we have to go out and look for the win.

“After the result, we’ll see what it means. Until it’s mathematically over, no team gives up — we certainly don’t — but with the end of the season so close, it could be decisive.”

He added, “I’m preparing for the game with and without Neymar — the club are right to do what they’re doing with the appeal.”

JAMB: CBT owners hack Airtel system, conduct illegal UTME registration

No fewer than five people have been arrested by the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) for various registration infractions in the ongoing 2017 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) to be conducted by the Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board (JAMB).

Hide quoted text

The fraudsters were nabbed from various location of the country where they were perpetuating their nefarious activities.

They were arrested from Oyo, Ogun and Maiduguri by officers and men of the NSCDC and brought to Abuja where startling revelations of their operations were made.

JAMB spokesman, Fabian Benjamin, in a statement, said in the presence of the Commandant General, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, Abdullahi Gana Mohamadu, the fraudsters confessed to numerous registration infractions.

The statement reads: “Some of these registration thieves are Computer-Based Test (CBT) centres owners licensed by JAMB to conduct registration exercise for the candidates planning to take the forthcoming UTME.

“More worrisome is the massive investment by E-Kindle CBT centres to penetrate the Airtel system we are using to perpetrate all forms of wholesome practices. They register candidates without proper biometric which means such candidates will have problems with their details during examination.

“From investigation at the headquarters of the NSCDC, it was clear that they had powerful men backing them to thwart the efforts of JAMB. If not, how will you justify them spending over N20 million to construct a radio platform just to hack into the Board’s registration exercise if not to destroy the entire system and put JAMB in bad light?

“JAMB had given access code only to accredited CBT centres to partake in the registration exercise but these operators in turn used the privilege information at their disposal in connivance with Honey Comb centre and Bright International for pecuniary motive and create confusion for the examination body.

“In Maiduguri, the Board discovered that their router meant for Abia was being used in Maiduguri to register candidates. Unknown to them, the access codes are personalised coupled with features to detect abuses aimed at circumventing the registration process.

“They fraudulently tried to manipulate the system to give a semblance of the Board platform to deceive candidates as if a valid registration have been carried out.

“These registration thieves deployed fake biometric capturing mechanisms and super-imposed registration slip just to satisfy the curiosity of innocent candidates that their registration was successful and on the day of examination such candidates data would either be edited,or not found on the JAMB data base”.

Buhari plotting soft-landing for Lawal, Oke through Osinbajo panel – CACOL

The Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership, CACOL, says presidential committee investigating the discovery of $43.4m in Lagos and the award of contracts under the Presidential Initiative on the North East, is a ploy by President Muhammadu Buhari to give those in question a soft-landing.

The duo of Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Babachir David Lawal and the Director General of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA), Ambassador Ayo Oke, are being probed by the committee.

The committee, which has requested certain documents from Lawal and Oke, is headed by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo. Attorney-General of the Federation Abubakar Malami and National Security Adviser Babagana Monguno, are members.

CACOL in a statement by its Director, Debo Adeniran on Saturday, said while it commends action of the Federal Government for showing interest in tackling corruption, the committee was a waste of time.

CACOL lamented that the AGF has not really impressed many Nigerians by his shoddy handling of issues concerning the issue of the SGF in the past, especially in his conclusions that misled the presidency to believe that Babachir Lawal was not given fair hearing by the Senate committee.

The statement added: “This is where it was of public knowledge that Lawal only sent his secretary to the senators when he was invited and when given the second opportunity, he went to obtain court injunction against Senate invitation.

“It is our belief that if Babachir has any good defense for his action he would have been in a hurry to meet with the Senate committee to clear his name. But we think this is another chance for the AGF to redeem his image by proving critics wrong that he is capable of doing thorough job.

“The body language we are getting from the FG of recent is of a government now buckling down to serious business. We trust that the Vice President, as a man of proven integrity himself, must have assembled a team he believed would midwife foolproof investigation and come up with impeccable findings.

“The country is at the edge of a precipice and I don’t think this government has the time to elongate keeping those who are not in same spirit with it in office.

“There’s no need for the Yemi Osinbajo’’s Panel since the agencies established by the Nigerian laws are available and capable of handling the cases at hand.

“The trio of VP, CJN, NSA all have works of national importance to do; the VP for example has a lot of executive roles to play in supporting the President who is aged and cannot do much runnings around.

“The AGF has a lot of work to do prosecuting cases for the FG, supervising the Anti-Corruption Agencies and other Law Enforcement bodies too and advising the executive on legal cum judicial issues.

“The NSA on the other hand has a lot of security issues to monitor and tackle like the Boko Haram insurgency, Southern Kaduna killings, Militancy in NigerDelta, Ogun and Lagos States, Herdsmen invasion of several communities and several other security issues he needs to monitor and advise the FG on.

“However, while we hopeful of a thorough job, we call on government not to delay in dispensing justice when the crimes are established by the first-instance detectors; in this case, Independent Corrupt Practices and other related Crimes, ICPC for the former SGF and Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC for the former DG NIA.

“The case of Ambassador Femi Oke is both an Economic and a Financial Crime, so his case is expected to be transferred to the EFCC.

“Babachir Lawal’s case on the other hand should be handed to the ICPC because his case bothers on Conflict of Interest, nepotism and misappropriation of Funds.”

“The Presidency should not use bureaucracy of the panel to buy time for these suspected Criminals of the Federal Republic to perfect their strategies of evading justice nor give anyone a soft landing benefits.

“If such is the reason for Osinbajo panel, it will rubbish the whole anti-corruption fight that the Buhari-led Administration is known for as well as the name and records the President, Vice-President and other cabinet members involved have built for themselves over the years.

DSS raids PenCom office in Abuja as Anohu-Amazu goes into hiding

The operatives of the Department of State Service has raided the office of the National Pension Commission (PenCom) in Abuja.

The action followed the refusal of the former Director General of the commission, Mrs Chinelo Anohu- Amazu, to hand over to her successor.

Anohu-Amazu was on Wednesday sacked by President Muhammadu Buhari.

According to reports, the ex-PenCom DG was still in charge as of Friday despite her disengagement.

Daily Times reports that when the DSS operatives stormed the PenCom office Saturday morning, Anohu-Amazu evaded arrest and went into hiding.

However, the DSS had ordered that she appears in the office on Monday.

More to come…

Buhari congratulates Peterside on his election

President Muhammadu Buhari has congratulated the Director General of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency, (NIMASA), Dr. Dakuku Peterside, on his election as the new Chairman of the Association of African Maritime Administrators (AAMA) at the end of the Third Annual Conference of the continental organization in Abuja on Friday.

Peterside succeeds Mr Sobantu Tilayi, who is presently the Acting Chief Executive Officer of the South African Maritime Administration.

The President notes that Peterside’s unanimous election is not only a personal honour and affirmation of confidence in his ability to lead AAMA, but also places Nigeria in a pivotal position to rally other maritime administrations in collaboration with the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) towards safer global maritime activities.

His spokesman, Femi Adesina, in a statement said President Buhari believes that given NIMASA’s encouraging performance under Dr. Peterside especially in the fight against sea piracy through inter-agency cooperation, he has no doubt that his new position provides him with even bigger platform to forge ahead in doing the nation proud by meeting the objectives of AAMA.

The President, while wishing the new Chairman of AAMA a successful one-year tenure, expressed confidence that within this period, the Federal Government’s renewed focus on growing the Nigerian economy through increased maritime resources will be further enhanced.