Author: admin@theprimetimes

With a few weeks to 2023 general election, there is a glaring decline in the number of youths contesting in the poll, even as young contestants are faced with challenges of trust, intimidation, finance and fear of vote buying. The Guardian gathered that of the 15,336 candidates on the ballot in the elections, 4,398 are youths, 1,899 of these are between 25 – 30 years. There is a noticeable decline in the percentage from 34 in 2019 to 28.6 per cent in 2023. For instance, in the House of Representatives, there is a fall from 27.4 per cent in 2019…

• Accept civil war ended 53 years ago, Obi urges Nigerians President Muhammadu Buhari, yesterday, led Vice President Yemi Osinbajo to lay wreaths at the National Arcade, Eagle Square, Abuja, in commemoration of the 2023 Armed Forces Remembrance Day celebration. The ceremony was the last major military assignment Buhari would be performing as Commander-in-Chief, as he prepares to exit office after two terms on May 29. Other dignitaries, including Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor, President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, Inspector General of Police Usman Alkali Baba, and Chief Justice…

• Court fixes February 13 for adoption of written addresses in trial within trial The trial of Chidinma Ojukwu, the alleged killer of Chief Executive Officer of Super TV, Usifo Ataga, could not continue, yesterday, due to the prosecution’s inability to respond to her written address. The defendant, an undergraduate student of the University of Lagos, is standing trial before a Lagos State High Court, for alleged murder of Ataga. She is also charged with stealing and forgery alongside her sister, Chioma Egbuchu, and one Adedapo Quadri. The court had on November 17, 2022, adjourned till January 11, 2023 for…

Our With just over a month to February presidential election, three of the main protagonists will next week mount the podium at the Royal Institute of International Affairs- Chatham House – to talk about their prospects and readiness. Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, kick starts the Africa Programme event series tagged “Nigeria’s 2023 elections” on Monday afternoon, when he will talk about “a vision for policy change and institutional reforms.” Tuesday will be the turn of Professor Mahmood Yakubu, the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). His brief is to discuss the electoral umpire’s “Preparations and priorities…

The Federal Government is constructing no fewer than 83 internal road projects across the nation’s tertiary educational institutions. Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, stated this yesterday while handing over 1.8km internal roads at the Federal University, Birnin Kebbi, Kebbi State. Fashola said the ministry had intervened and handed over 64 road projects in various tertiary federal institutions as at March 2022, 18 projects ready to be handed over, while attending to 19 roads in similar institutions across the country. According to him, this is consistent with their progressive ideal of improving the human condition as well as critical…

Civil rights advocacy group, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), on Wednesday, carpeted the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, for saying he won’t mind buying petrol at N300 a litre because other countries sell their products at higher prices than in Nigeria and N300 is nothing when compared or changed to the United States dollar and the British pound sterling. HURIWA’s National Coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko, in a statement said the comment of Sylva is crudely insensitive to the plight of Nigerians, who, for months, have been suffering unavailability and expensive cost per litre of Premium Motor…

Insists on state policing Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party and former Vice President of Nigeria, Atiku Abubakar has expressed concern over the recent attack on a train station in Igueben LGA of Edo State during which armed men kidnapped an undetermined number of people. On Sunday, a press release released by his media adviser, Paul Ibe, noted that the unfortunate incident “is the latest in a long condemnable line of security breaches previously unseen in our national history.” While commiserating with victims of the attack and their families, the presidential contestant said, “the thoughts of my family and…

Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation (AGF), Abubakar Malami, has denied any link with a “so-called disbursement of United Nations Grants.” This was disclosed, yesterday, in a statement signed by Dr. Umar Jibrilu Gwandu, Special Assistant on Media and Public Relations, Office of the AGF and Minister of Justice. The statement, entitled: ‘Attempt at defamation and blackmail’, reads in part: “Our attention has been drawn to a viral social media message on the so-called disbursement of United Nations Grants. “We have noticed that the aim of the message was crowd-sourcing, to persuade the gullible public, to perpetrate…

Three years after SBT, power supply stagnates at 3,500MW Stakeholders and electricity consumers have described as rip-off, the new increase in electricity tariff being implemented across the country by distribution companies (DisCos), despite worsening state of electricity supply in the country. Players in the industry have also accused the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) of secret dealings, insisting the process of tariff increase has remained opaque, instead of being transparent. In an order with the number NERC/336/2022, obtained exclusively by The Guardian and cited as December 2022 Minor Review of Multi-year Tariff Order, the order permitted the DisCos to increase…

President Muhammadu Buhari resumed office this year with his imprimatur on the Appropriation Bill, which should, in a normative sense, confer enthusiasm on his administration’s last fiscal cycle and set the tone for a positive 2023. The signing seemed to convey a strong sense of duty as well as the government’s commitment to breathing life into the economy, but nothing could be truer than the very opposite. The bill was passed by the National Assembly and transmitted to the President, at the most, two working days earlier. The original outlandish N21.51 trillion spending cap was increased by yet another N1.32…