Video - Dr. Richard Ajayi sets up Nigeria's first IVF clinic

After studying in the UK, Dr. Richard Ajayi returned to Nigeria in 1999 to set up the country's first IVF treatment clinic.

President Goodluck Jonathan orders military to take over Jos security

Following the unending bloodletting in Jos, President Goodluck Jonathan has directed the Chief of Defence Staff, Air Vice Marshall Oluseyi Petinrin, to take over full charge of security matters in Plateau State.

With this directive, the military will effectively take control of security in the state, but Presidency sources maintained Monday night that it was not a backdoor declaration of a state of emergency.

Over 100 persons including two families have been killed in the last two weeks following a dispute over the venue of Eid prayers by an Islamic sect after the Ramadan.
Thousands of lives have also been lost in the crises spanning over a decade.

At the last Council of State meeting, the National Security Adviser, General Owoye Andrew Azazi, had said Jonathan directed him to bring up the Jos issue at the next meeting, but apparently because of the spate of killings, the president is acting before then.

A statement from the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, said the president further directed the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, to bring up all pending reports of recent committees set up by the Federal Government on the issue for immediate review and implementation.

Jonathan, who is billed to meet with Governor Jonah Jang today, further directed the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) to move in immediately to provide succour for internally displaced persons in the troubled state.

In a broadcast Monday to state citizens, Jang said the recent events “have again confirmed that terrorism is here with us and they are expanding their frontiers and posing a greater security challenge. And it must therefore be tackled with all the might at government’s command”.

He said “the bombing of the United Nations building in Abuja shows that these terrorists have no regards to not only life, but any course for humanity which the United Nations symbolises,” adding that the terrorism challenge which manifests across the nation “is real and should not be politicised but approached with all sense of decency”.

Meanwhile, speaking on the Presidential Media Chat on national TV and radio Monday night to mark his first 100 days in office, President Jonathan said the Jos crisis is essentially an economic problem but that religion is being used to fan the flames.

He expressed optimism that Nigeria would not disintegrate.

He said the issue of security problem in Jos was more of a problem with the people but pushed by religion and assured Nigerians that the government was on top of the situation and would soon bring the problem under strict control.

He comprehensively responded to American diplomatic cables published by the Wikileaks website and dismissed it as “beer parlour gossip” that is unreliable given the circumstances under which such information was either given or assumed.

Jonathan was particularly miffed that his wife, Dame Patience, was reportedly arrested with $13.5 million, pointing out that his wife never travelled within the period under reference and wondered how such amount would be raised by the wife of a Deputy Governor.

“It is like beer parlour gossip and associated to the former US Ambassador and some of them said that they discussed with people and what they claim was discussed cannot be verified. It is unreliable and unfortunately people tend to believe it.

“The recent one about me and one of my aides who was alleged to have said that I contributed to the poverty of the people and belongs to the old order is bad. I was just 12 months in office when they said the issue in reference or were they referring to when I was Deputy Governor. So how did I bring poverty to the Niger Delta and how was I part of the old order?

“Maybe people have different wikileaks now. How can my wife get $13.5 million? Do people know what $13.5million is? I think that is rubbish. Those gossips that are being published are what I cannot comment, they are gossips. My wife never travelled so where did they catch her? If your name is mentioned in such a thing you cannot keep quiet but you should not castigate someone about it,” he said.

On the single tenure, he said the people should have waited for him to bring out the details of the proposed amendment but wondered how even legal luminaries kept on commenting on what they had not seen and likened such comments to rumour.

He, however, said for a stable economy to be achievable, there has to be stability in the polity, pointing out that Nigeria started out with countries like Singapore which has now progressed beyond Nigeria due to the stability in their polity.

He noted that even in Africa, Nigeria has the shortest political gestation of four years which was too short and costly for the economy. Added to the social and political upheavals that attend such elections, he said, for an investor to have confidence to invest in the economy, he must see consistency in policy that would protect his investments.

He also said that due to the short period, just when people settle down to offices, they start thinking of second term and some even stay less when they win at tribunals a few months to the end of their tenure.

“The cost of conducting elections cannot be good for us every four years. We spent about N130 billion on INEC alone and we are talking about roads, water etc. Nigeria is the only country in Africa with four years. South Africa is five years and Liberia is seven years and both have two terms. In Africa, elections lead too civil strife.

“I have no regrets about proposing a single tenure of say seven years for Governors and president and six years for Assembly members who may want to spend the rest of their lives there because it will stabilise the polity. People are opposing it out of sentiments but one day, Nigerian will decide. Now it is like a rumour,” he said.

This Day

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Pro Gaddafi fighters flee to Nigeria

Some members of former Libyan leader, Col. Muammar Gaddafi's regime have reportedly stormed parts of Northern Nigeria, just as the Interpol yesterday issued arrest warrants for Gaddafi and two others.

A report monitored on the Hausa Service of Hamada Radio International from Kaduna yesterday said while that some members of the Gaddafi regime have crossed over to parts of northern Nigeria, others were heading towards Burkina-Faso.

According to the report, the fugitives crossed over to Nigeria on Thursday night when convoy of trucks slipped and headed towards the north-west state of Katsina.

The report said: "There have been series of security co-coordinating conferences between Nigeria and Niger on how to fashion out containment strategy of the Libyan crisis. "Some members of the Libyan military have maintained close family ties with Northern Nigeria. "Gen. Youssef Dbiri, who headed Gaddafi's security service has his maternal root in Nguru, Yobe State from North-Eastern Nigeria.

"According to security service sources in Niger Republic, the fragile ceasefire between the Tuqreg rebels and Niamey will be tested in the coming weeks if attempts are made to give outright support to Special Forces from France, UK, USA and Jordan in the Gaddafi hunt.

"Another fear is the solidarity and sympathy which the fleeing Gaddafi supporters might get from Southern Niger, in the Maradi-Damagaran axis, and the outer fringes of Northern Nigeria where al-Qaeda affiliated to Boko Haram is lately seen as a potent forces".

"More than 200 Nigerians were arrested in Libya by the TNC, while about 20 were executed last week on allegations of supporting Gaddafi, as mercenaries."

Meanwhile, as Interpol issued arrest warrants for the former Libyan leader and two others yesterday, reports came from Niger of a new convoy of high-ranking Libyan officials arriving across the desert.

In Lyon, France, Interpol said in a statement that it had issued so-called red notices calling for the arrests of Gaddafi, his son, Seif al-Islam and Abdullah al-Senussi, the chief of the former leader's intelligence agency.

There was no suggestion that Col. Gaddafi or the two other wanted men were known to be among those who arrived in the latest convoy to Niger.

The country has been under intense international pressure to turn over any former officials of the Gaddafi government who arrive there.

Yesterday, an official in Niger said the government would respect the Interpol notices and hand over the fugitives should they cross the border, Reuters reported.

Despite an international manhunt, the whereabouts of Libya's top officials have been uncertain since rebels took the capital, Tripoli, last month.

Since then, Col. Gaddafi and his son have taunted the transitional rebel government in audio messages and urged their loyalists to continue fighting.

In the desert town of Bani Walid, among the last strongholds of support for Gaddafi, fighters lobbed mortar shells and fired rockets yesterday as a deadline for their peaceful surrender was set to expire today (Saturday).

There were no reports of casualties. Rebel negotiators have so far been unable to end the standoff, raising the prospect of a battle there over the weekend.

The Interpol notices, which were requested by the International Criminal Court at The Hague based on allegations of war crimes committed by the three men, require any of Interpol's 188 member nations to arrest the suspects and turn them over to the court.Among the member nations is Niger, which borders Libya on the south and has received a number of convoys of loyalist officials fleeing overland. So far, no high-ranking figures in the former government have been confirmed to be accompanying them.

Yesterday, 14 Gaddafi loyalist officials arrived in the northern Niger city of Agadez, including Gen. Ali Kana, who is said to be a Tuareg in charge of Colonel Qaddafi's southern troops, according to a Reuters report.

Tuareg tribesmen, who live on both sides of the Libya-Niger border in the Sahara, have been major supporters of the Gaddafi government.

The group also included another general, Ali Sharif al-Rifi, the commander of the Libyan air force, and two other top officials, who were said to be staying at the Etoile du Ténéré hotel in Agadez, according to the news agency. The hotel is said to be owned by Gaddafi.

Niger's justice minister, Marou Amadou, confirmed that the two generals were in Agadez and were "being well guarded" but were not "in a building belonging to the state."

Gaddafi "is a fugitive whose country of nationality and the International Criminal Court want arrested and held accountable for the serious criminal charges that have been brought against him," said Interpol's secretary general, Ronald K. Noble, in a written statement.

"Interpol will cooperate with and assist the ICC and Libyan authorities represented by the interim Transitional National Council of Libya" to apprehend him.

Arresting Colonel Qaddafi "is a matter of time," the Interpol statement said, quoting the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Luis Moreno-Ocampo. who had requested the Interpol action on Thursday.

Late last month, two of Gaddafi's sons and his second wife fled to Algeria, which granted them asylum on humanitarian grounds, leading to vigorous criticism from Libyan rebel leaders. Algeria is also one of Interpol's member countries, as are all of Libya's neighbours.

Residents of Tripoli planned to converge on Martyrs' Square yesterday night to protest against people who had supported Gaddafi until the very end and then switched sides.

Protesters who gathered in the late afternoon said they did not want such people to retain or gain positions in government.

"Where, where is he?" chanted hundreds of doctors and nurses in hospital scrubs and the colours of the Libyan flag, taunting Gaddafi as they marcheds toward the square.

The doctors carried signs with pictures of other doctors and medical workers killed during the rebellion. They also objected to the Transitional National Council's Minister of Health, Naji Barakat. They said he was a holdover from Gaddafi's time and that he was still acting as authoritarian as before.

Barakat could not be reached for comment, but transitional council officials have said many of Gaddafi's officials had been retained until a new government had been formed to keep essential services functioning.

 Daily Champion

Related stories: Video - Nigerians mistaken by Libyan rebels to be mercenaries for Pro-Ghadafi forces

Nigeria closes Embassy in Libya

Human traffickers are killing Nigerians in the desert

For many years now, there have increasing cases of Nigerians' illegal migration to Europe via the desert as victims of human trafficking and sex slavery.

Despite the fact that only a few of the thousands that embark on the journey come back to tell their stories, the misinformation and the desperation for economic empowerment which Europe may represent have continued to lure more Nigerian youths and their counterparts from other African countries to continuously fall into the trap of a cartel said to be involved in the dastardly act.

Over 2,000 Nigerian youths who embark on this journey every month, according to reports, face near death situations while some die after being stranded in the desert and the women among them forced into prostitution.

Many who make it to Europe work in exploitative conditions while others take on menial jobs under despicable conditions just to survive.

Recently, one of the victims, Mr. Osita Osemene, a graduate of industrial mathematics and a native of Ubulukwu, Aniocha South, Local Government area of Delta State, narrated his ordeal to Sunday Vanguard as part of the activities to mark one year anniversary of his return and that of his organisation, Patriotic Citizen Initiative, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) focusing on discouraging youths from desert traveling.

It all started when Osita could not secure employment three years after graduation from the University of Benin and the car business he was introduced to collapsed in the hands of debtors. As a young man desperately dreaming to have a better life, he decided to go to Europe for greener pastures through any available means without any inclination of what such journey holds in store for him.

The facilitators made him to believe that, through the desert, he and his seven other colleagues would make the trip to Europe in five days. But the journey lasted 91 days and, apart from Osita, no one seems to know the whereabouts of the seven others till date.

According to Osita, the emotional trauma he experienced when he lost his car business to debtors and visa racketeers were nothing to compare with the desert journey.

Before he met his desert migration link-man, Osita paid N250, 000 to a visa racketeer for two years London visa but the visa was discovered to be fake by security agents at the Lagos airport.

Osita was still in the heat of the crisis when a friend told him that his brother in Spain could help him get a job in Europe since he was determined to leave the country. He was able to recover some of the money he paid to the visa agent and, with the help of his family members, he got a little above N200,000 for the journey.

Osita said from the Kano connecting house, they travelled all through the deserts of Zindern, Agadez, Douruku in Niger Republic and Tegery to Gatron and finally to Tehrinmata in Libya.

Throughout the journey, he said, scores of people were dropping dead from the ramshackle truck in which they were travelling in.

When they eventually ran out of water, they were forced to beg for urine from women they met and that of camel for survival.Nigerians stranded

According to him, many Nigerians are stranded in the desert because "once you get to Kano, you are stripped off all your money. I am alive today, because I refused to give them all my money when we got to Kano. Once they collect your money, you may end up stranded in the desert of Niger Republic without food or water. It was there I got the clue that it was pure business. There is no job anywhere."

Osita, who explained that the cartel has a very strong network along the desert routes, said that at each connecting border, there is a connecting house and inside it not less than 2,000 Nigerians had been left stranded. Asked to hazard a guess on the number of Nigerians in all the connecting houses, he said they may not be less than 50,000 excluding the numbers that die on daily basis.

Osita, claiming to have become inquisitive at one of the connecting houses at Agadez, a transit route, said many stranded Nigerians whom he spoke to told him they were stranded as their link-men abandoned them.

"We spent seven days in Agadez and many Nigerians stranded there had lost hopes of returning home. Many were dying on daily basis due to attacks by rebels. I was supposed to go to Morocco but we were told that rebels were killing a lot of people along the route; so we diverted to Libya."

On how he was able to keep his money, he said: "It was an experience I can never forget. I inserted my money into my anus and passed it out through faeces anytime I needed it".

He said the worst happened when the truck conveying them from Douruku to Libya got spoilt in the desert. According to him, they trekked day and night for four days before they got to a place called Tegery where he said 250 Nigerians had died due to lack of water.

"While on our way from Tegery to Gatron, we were attacked. We finally made it to Tripoli but I could not muster the courage to travel through the Mediterranean sea in a ramshackle boat to Europe. At this point, I spoke to four other Nigerians that we should return home and they agreed. I was able to pay their way to Kano where they put a call to their families."

Asked about the lesson learnt, he said human trafficking has devastating effects on the victim. "We drank our urine and that of a camel for survival while in the desert on our way to a non-existing Europe. Many of us who survived it were forced to do all kinds of menial jobs for survival".

Osita called on the Federal Government to check desert migration by young Nigerians even as he urged government to urgently commence the rehabilitation of the 1,750 returnees from Libya.

He hinted that the UK government was in the process of bringing back about 16,000 illegal Nigerian immigrants back to the country.

Vanguard

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Samson Siasia proud of Eagles defeat

Argentine players celebrating their goal

Samson Siasia says he is proud of his players despite a 3-1 loss to Argentina in a friendly match on Tuesday.

"We don’t want to give excuses, but the fact is that the boys were tired.

"We played against Madagascar on Sunday on a very bad pitch, then flew 14 hours to get here and played two days later. It was very difficult for some of the players, especially the ones who played 90 minutes in Madagascar.

"But it was a good game, and we tried our best but we lost."

Lionel Messi was the major inspiration, setting up two of the goals as the South Americans won a difficult contest and Siasia had nothing but praise for the two-time World Player of the Year, reports kickoffnigeria.com.

"He made the difference today. But we shut him down in the second half."

Argentina midfielder, Javier Mascherano agreed with the Nigeria coach about how hard the game was.

"It was a difficult game against a very strong team.

"The names today were different from the team at the World Cup and they made it hard for us." 

This Day

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