Video - Nigeria’s Lookman the hero as Atalanta stun Leverkusen

Ademola Lookman scored a stunning hat-trick as Atalanta beat Bayer Leverkusen 3-0 in the Europa League final to win just the second major trophy in their 117-year history and end the German champions’ remarkable unbeaten streak.

Lookman, who struggled to establish himself in the English Premier League with Everton, Fulham and Leicester City before reviving his career in Italy under Atalanta coach Gian Piero Gasperini, struck twice inside the first 26 minutes before sealing the win 15 minutes from full-time on Wednesday night.

The victory ended Gasperini’s own two-decade-long pursuit of major silverware as his side totally outplayed Xabi Alonso’s Leverkusen – or ‘Neverlusen’ as they had been dubbed after going an incredible 51 games unbeaten.

But just as they did against Premier League heavyweights Liverpool and three-time finalists Olympique de Marseille in the previous two rounds, Atalanta didn’t give their opponents a sniff and marked their first European final with a famous victory.

“We needed to be attacking. It was not enough just to defend. We know these teams are great at attacking. Everyone was extraordinary,” Gasperini told Sky Sports Italia, referring to the teams his side beat to become the first Italian winners of the competition since Parma 25 years ago.

“The way we did it was the most important thing. We deserved it without a shadow of a doubt against such a strong team. Winning the Europa League is an extraordinary achievement.”

Leverkusen started the game looking decidedly unsure of themselves and some uncharacteristically sloppy play handed the first chance of the game to Gianluca Scamacca, who didn’t get enough on his header from a fine Matteo Ruggeri cross.

It was an early warning shot, and the purposeful Italians struck within minutes when Davide Zappacosta was allowed far too much space down the right before Lookman beat a flatfooted Exequiel Palacios to the cutback to stroke home the opener.

Lookman was mobbed by his teammates and substitutes who were in dreamland 14 minutes later.

Another Leverkusen error gifted possession to the Nigerian forward, who skipped past one defender and curled a beautiful right-footed shot into the bottom-right corner from just outside the box.
‘One of the best nights of my life’

The stunned Germans showed brief flashes of how quickly they could turn it on in attack, but little came of it – and it was Charles De Ketelaere who came closest on the break as Atalanta did not show a shred of debut final nerves nor any effects from the absence of injured captain Marten de Roon.

Leverkusen swapped defender Josip Stanisic for top scorer Victor Boniface at halftime, but it changed little as both sets of travelling fans continued to create the kind of Aviva Stadium noise matched only by some of the Irish rugby teams’ famous wins or memorable international football nights of years gone by.

Leverkusen had only failed to score once during the run that featured 42 wins in all competitions and 17 goals scored in or after the 90th minute, but there was no such comeback on Wednesday against the resolute Atalanta backline.

“The normality is not to get defeated in the 52nd game. Normally it happens much earlier in the season. It’s been quite exceptional what we have achieved, and we have to be really proud,” Alonso told a news conference.

“We were missing many things for sure. It’s very demanding to play against Atalanta, a lot of dual situations, very physical … It happens, it’s football, today wasn’t our day. They were better.”

Lookman, who completed his hat-trick with another stunning strike into the top corner, this time with his left foot, became the sixth person to score three goals in a major European final and first since Jupp Heynckes’ for Borussia Monchengladbach in the 1975 UEFA Cup.

He was flung into the air by his teammates when the final whistle blew, and the Bergamo club ended the 61-year wait since their 1963 Italian Cup triumph.

“It’s one of the best nights of my life,” Lookman, who cradled the match ball as he collected his winners’ medal, told TNT Sports.

“It was an amazing performance from the team. We did it … We made history tonight.”

Al Jazeera

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Court in Nigeria adjourns Binance, executives' tax evasion trial to June 14

A Nigerian court has adjourned a tax evasion case against Binance to next month for possible arraignment of the cryptocurrency exchange and two of its executives after a trial stalled on Wednesday, the judge said.

The matter stalled because authorities failed to bring Tigran Gambaryan, a U.S. citizen and Binance head of financial crime compliance, to court. No reason was given for Gambaryan's absence in court.

On Friday, an Abuja court ruled that Gambaryan could stand trial in the tax evasion case on behalf of Binance.

The CEO of Binance Richard Teng in May accused Nigeria of setting a dangerous precedent after its executives were invited to the country and then detained as part of a crackdown on crypto. The company is challenging the trials on charges of tax evasion and money laundering.

Binance and its executives Gambaryan and Nadeem Anjarwalla, a British-Kenyan who is Binance's regional manager for Africa, face four counts of tax evasion, including failure to register with Nigeria's Federal Inland Revenue Service for tax purposes.

Anjarwalla escaped custody in March but is still listed on the case, without indicating he was 'at large' - a factor that could stall trial given that Nigerian law requires that parties must be served before the case can proceed, Gambaryan's lawyer Chukwuka Ikwuazom said.

The revenue service lawyer Moses Ideho said Gambaryan was supposed to have been produced in court by Nigeria's prison service and that he did not know why he was not in court.

Judge Emeka Nwite adjourned the possible arraignment of Binance and Gambaryan to June 14.

In addition to the tax evasion trial, Binance and the executives have also been charged with laundering more than $35 million by Nigeria's anti-graft agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). A money laundering trial will be heard on Thursday.

Binance has said it is working closely with Nigerian authorities following the detention of Gambaryan. 

By Camillus Eboh, Reuters 

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Generator fumes choke students to death in Nigeria

At least seven university students have died after apparently inhaling fumes from a generator in a music studio in Nigeria's oil-rich Bayelsa state.

The young men are said to have worked late into Monday night and fell asleep in the locked studio with the generator still running.

They are suspected to have suffocated from carbon monoxide emissions but police say investigations are ongoing.

Many businesses and households in Nigeria rely on diesel- or petrol-powered generators because of inadequate power supply.

Six bodies were discovered on Tuesday morning, while one of them, who was found unconscious, was rushed to a nearby hospital but later died, local media reported.

Residents of the area raised the alarm when they peeped through the window of the studio and saw the bodies sprawled on the floor.

Police arrived and cordoned off the area after moving out the bodies in the Amarata area of Yenagoa - the Bayelsa state capital.

“Investigations are being carried out but based on what we have seen, carbon monoxide poisoning due to generator fumes is a possible cause,” police spokesperson Musa Mohammed told the BBC.

The victims were undergraduates from the state-owned Niger Delta University (NDU) in Amassoma, who were involved in the music recording business to support their education.

This is not the first time generator fumes have killed people in Nigeria, Africa's top oil producer.

In 2009, at least 13 family members, including four children, died after inhaling noxious fumes from their power generator while they slept in a remote village in south-eastern Imo state.

Nigerians rely on backup generators to cover about 40% of their electricity needs, according to a recent report by the International Energy Agency (IEA).

Grid power supplies are often erratic in Nigeria, despite its role as a major oil and gas producer.

President Bola Tinubu recently ordered all government agencies to purchase only vehicles and generators powered by natural gas as part of the country's efforts to transition to cleaner energy and cut high fuel costs.

By Mansur Abubakar & Wycliffe Muia, BBC

 

Nigeria Taps Tinubu’s Ally to Build a $13 Billion Highway

Nigeria’s federal cabinet last week approved construction work on the second section of a $13 billion highway awarded to an ally of President Bola Tinubu, a project that’s ignited a political firestorm in Africa’s most populous country.

The 700-kilometer (434 miles) Atlantic coastal road linking the commercial hub of Lagos to Calabar in the oil-rich Niger Delta has been mired in controversy since being awarded in September to Hitech Construction Company Ltd., a business owned by tycoon Gilbert Chagoury, who was listed by the government as Tinubu’s “confidante” when part of Nigeria’s delegation at last year’s COP28 climate conference in Dubai. The government has been forced to hold a series of public meetings, press conferences and speeches to defend the project, while surrogates have been sent to explain its position on television.

Authorities have demolished dozens of houses and buildings, including sections of the popular Landmark beach complex in the Lagos district of Victoria Island. That’s led to protests from businesses and residents in the area, home to many of Nigeria’s richest people and local headquarters of TotalEnergies SE and Standard Chartered Plc. Nigeria is littered with ambitious projects that are abandoned after huge amounts of money have been spent, and those that are completed often experience lengthy delays.

Chagoury, 78, has been a fixture of Nigerian politics and business for decades. In 2000, he was convicted in Switzerland of laundering money for Sani Abacha, the notoriously corrupt Nigerian dictator, and has admitted to making illegal campaign contributions in the US. The Chagoury Group didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Hitech has built a number of major infrastructure projects, including the privately developed Banana Island luxury housing estate and the 10-square-mile Eko Atlantic development — both on land reclaimed from the sea. The firm has constructed two highways in Lagos that are 16 miles and 31 miles long, but critics question its capability for large-scale projects.

“We don’t feel like we caught the best deal,” Lagos opposition politician Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour said by phone. “Because this whole project did not go through the Senate, did not go through the regular due process and we’re just being stuck with the bill that seems extremely overbloated.”

The bidding process for the contract wasn’t conducted publicly, which has also drawn criticism from civil society groups and opposition politicians.

Works minister Dave Umahi told journalists that the government approved a “restrictive bidding” round for the project, without elaborating on what other companies were involved or why it wasn’t made public.

“People say it was not listed in the 2024 budget,” he said during a May 14 speech at the presidential villa in Abuja, the seventh time he has addressed the controversy around the highway since April. “Yesterday, I quoted the budget number and so everything about coastal road followed due process.”

This year’s budget contains two line items for the project totaling 1 billion naira, a fraction of the 2.6 trillion naira ($1.8 billion) approved so far, according to the version posted on the website of the budget office in January.

“It is curious that the terms of such an audacious project continue to be shrouded in secrecy,” opposition leader Atiku Abubakar, who lost to Tinubu in last year’s presidential election, said in a statement. “It is no secret that both Tinubu and Chagoury are business partners.”

The president’s office didn’t respond to a detailed list of questions, instead referring to an April 8 statement that called the highway an “economic gamechanger.”

Tinubu, who was governor of Lagos from 1999-2007, has long been dogged by allegations of corruption, which he denies. He was being investigated by Nigeria’s anti-graft authorities as recently as June 2021, two years before he was elected president. In 1993, he forfeited $460,000 to resolve a lawsuit in Chicago after US federal authorities said bank accounts in his name held the proceeds of heroin trafficking. Tinubu’s lawyers have said he was never charged over the matter.

Nigeria ranks among the world’s most graft-ridden countries, according to a Corruption Perceptions Index published by advocacy group Transparency International, a key reason why the economy is mired in crisis. Since coming into office, Tinubu has talked about enhancing transparency in government and vowed to fight corruption. In April, he described corruption, self-interest and fraud as “an enemy” of the country.

The task of completing the coastal road project will extend beyond Tinubu’s first term, and cost more than Nigeria’s 9-trillion naira budget deficit for this year. Civil society groups and opposition leaders have questioned the rationale behind spending so much on a highway while ordinary Nigerians battle a cost-of-living crisis and citizens have died in stampedes to get food.

“With the cost involved, you can see that it’s an inflated contract that has been given simply because some people believe that they will make money out of it,” said Auwal Rafsanjani, Nigerian head of Transparency International. Lack of transparency around Nigerian projects like this is “the reason why we are not making any progress in terms of improving transparency and accountability in public sector.”

23-Year Plan

Estimated at 15 trillion naira, the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway is part of Nigeria’s 23-year plan to improve the nation’s infrastructure. The project was first designed as a railway under President Goodluck Jonathan and awarded to the China Civil Engineering Construction Corp. for $12 billion, but fell apart when he left office in 2015.

The following year, the plan was revived by President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration for $11 billion and given a timeline of three years, which expired without significant progress.

Minister Umahi then announced the project had been resurrected once again, but as a coastal highway alongside some rail, and this time awarded to Chagoury’s Hitech.

As much as 30% of the funding for the highway is expected to come from the government, with Hitech sourcing the rest, according to Umahi. The road will also be tolled, costing as much as 3,000 naira to use for a one-way trip — the equivalent of two day’s salary at the current national minimum wage.

By Nduka Orjinmo, Bloomberg

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Video - Over 350 abductees rescued in Nigeria’s Borno state

Some of those rescued were kidnapped 10 years ago. Most of the victims were women and children.

CGTN

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