Olumide Fafore's Blog: June 2014

Monday, 30 June 2014

Nigeria: Missing girls, silent government:

Parents of schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram are frustrated by the lack of progress in rescuing their children

Boko Haram abducted more than 200 students from schools in northeastern Nigeria in April

Families of the hundreds of Nigerian girls kidnapped in April by the hard-line Boko Haram group are distressed over fading public attention and the government's apparent lack of communication amid a growing insurgency.
As they wait for news of the girls, many people in Nigeria's northeastern Borno state live in fear, trying to protect their children as Boko Haram carries out its deadliest attacks yet, including attacks in Chibok, from where the girls were abducted.

Paralympian Oscar Pistorius does not suffer mental defects that could influence his behaviour, prosecutor Gerrie Nel told the High Court in Pretoria on Monday.

He was summarising the findings of a panel of three psychiatrists and a clinical psychologist who observed the murder-accused athlete for 30 days at Weskoppies Psychiatric Hospital following a court order. Pistorius was a day patient.
"The panel has provided reports and they will be handed over to court. A mental disorder did not affect his ability to distinguish between right or wrong," said Nel.

Davido won the 2014 BET Awards Best African Act! Congrats Davido. More pics after cut...

The extremist group battling its way through swaths of Iraq and Syria declared the creation of a formal Islamic state Sunday, building on its recent military gains and laying down an ambitious challenge to al-Qaeda’s established leadership.
In an audio statement posted on the Internet, the spokesman for the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria announced the restoration of the 7th-century Islamic caliphate, a long-declared goal of the al-Qaeda renegades who broke with the mainstream organization early this year and have since asserted control over large areas spanning the two countries. Another pic after cut...

Tiwa Savage Keke Palmer Ashanti.

More pics after cut and list of winners

Mahmud Aliyu Shinkafi, the former governor of Zamfara State, Nigeria over the weekend shared bags of Strategic rice to his people for Ramadan, making sure to let them know that he's contesting again come 2015. Happy Ramadan to our Muslim Viewers.

Sunday, 29 June 2014

Newly-wed couple killed in public over love marriage in Pakistan

The suspects first subjected the couple to severe torture and tied them up, thereafter they cut off their heads with choppers in full public view.

A newly-wed couple was brutally killed in full public view by the family members of the girl for marrying a 'man of her choice' in Pakistan's Punjab province. According to an FIR, Muafia Bibi (23) of Satrah village of Daska tehsil, some 100km from Lahore, married Sajjad Ahmed (27) of nearby village Hasanabad on June 18.

"Muafia eloped with Sajjad on June 18 and they married in the court after her parents refused the marriage proposal of Sajjad," it said. On Friday, the family of the girl came to know that the couple had returned to Hasanabad. Seven members of Muafia's family, including her father Dilshad, attacked Sajjad's house and overpowered the couple and took them to the main chowk of their village.

Professor Russel Botman, Rector and Vice-Chancellor of Stellenbosch University

Professor Russel Botman, Rector and Vice-Chancellor of Stellenbosch University, was on Saturday hailed as an inspiration following news of his death.

The university said in a statement that Botman died in his sleep at his home in Stellenbosch on Friday night.

The University of the Witwatersrand praised Botman for his contribution to education and South African society.

"Professor Botman has been an influential and inspiring figure in the higher education landscape, leading one of our top universities through important periods of growth and transition," it said in a statement.

International HipHop star Davido is presently in LA hanging with other celebrities for the BET Awards coming up tonight 29 June 2014. Hope Davido will be presented again with several awards tonight. More pics after cut....

Oscar winning actress Lupita Nyong'o

Kenyan Oscar winner Lupita Nyong’o, Somalia’s Barkhad Abdi, “Happy” songster Pharrell Williams and Irish-German star Michael Fassbender are among 271 actors newly invited to join Hollywood’s Oscar-bestowing Academy, organizers said Thursday.

Other non-US invitees include Britain’s Sally Hawkins and Steve Coogan, as well as Japanese animation master Hayao Miyazaki and Israeli-born Palestinian director Hany Abu-Assad.

Italy’s Paolo Sorrentino, whose “The Great Beauty” won this year’s foreign-language Oscar, will also join the illustrious Hollywood body, as will Canadian “Dallas Buyers Club” director Jean-Marc Vallee. Another pic after cut....

Nigeria coach Stephen Keshi, right, speaks with his player Mikel John Obi during a training session at the Arena Pantanal in Cuiaba, Brazil, Friday, June 20, 2014.

With a row over bonus payments resolved after presidential intervention, the focus of Nigeria's World Cup squad was back on football Saturday as all 22 available players took part in training ahead of the second-round match against France.

Victor Moses had been the main injury concern for the Nigerians but the Chelsea winger trained under bright sunshine in the Brazilian capital. Only midfielder Michael Babatunde, out with a fractured right wrist, didn't practice.

In this Sunday, June 1, 2014 photo, Maimuna Abdullahi sits outside her school in Kaduna, Nigeria. Maimuna wore the scars of an abused woman anywhere: A swollen face, a starved body, and, barely a year after her wedding, a divorce. But for Maimuna, it all happened by the time she was 13. Maimuna is one of thousands of divorced girls in Nigeria who were married as children and then got thrown out by their husbands or simply fled.

By the time she ran away, she bore the scars of an abused woman anywhere - a swollen face, a starved body, and, barely a year after her wedding, a divorce. But for Maimuna Abdullahi, it all happened by the time she was 14.

Maimuna is one of thousands of divorced girls in Nigeria, who were forced into marriage and have since run away or been thrown out by their husbands. They are victims of a belief that girls should get wed rather than educated, which led Boko Haram terrorists to abduct more than 200 schoolgirls two months ago and threaten to marry them off. More pics after cut...

The Taliban has massed hundreds of fighters in Helmand province in its most ambitious attempt this year to seize ground as the U.S. combat mission winds down in Afghanistan, according to Afghan officials.

The fighting has gone on for nearly a week in the southern province, a former Taliban stronghold, demonstrating the insurgency’s ability to mobilize against much improved, but still inexperienced, Afghan security forces.

As of Saturday, the exact toll from the violence remained unclear, but at least several dozen civilians, soldiers and police officers had been killed, Afghan officials said.

Eskinder Nega, Ethiopian journalist branded a 'terrorist' and locked up for 18 years wins 2014 Golden Pen of Freedom

ESKINDER NEGA

An Ethiopian journalist branded a "terrorist" and currently serving an 18-year prison sentence has been awarded the 2014 Golden Pen of Freedom.
Eskinder Nega (pictured) has been jailed on at least seven occasions in his country. On the latest occasion, he was locked up for challenging the laws used against him and speculating that the Arab Spring uprisings could be repeated in Ethiopia. He wrote on these subjects despite already having had his journalism 'licence' taken away from him.

Free Zone 9 Bloggers banner. Original design by Hugh D'Andrade, remixed by Hisham Almiraat.

It has been 69 days since six members of the Zone Nine blogging collective [am] and three journalists believed to be associated with the group were arrested in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The group formed in 2012 in an effort to report on and increase public discussion about political and social issues affecting a diverse cross-section of Ethiopian society.

On their Facebook page, they describes themselves as young Ethiopians seeking to use fact-based reporting and analysis to create a new, more nuanced narrative of life in Ethiopia today:

Popular Nigerian music duo, P-Square are back with yet another international music collaboration with American rapper and record producer, Clifford Joseph Harris, Jr, popularly known as T.I.

Information has it that the top Nigerian music acts shot the music video with T.I, on Wednesday, 25th of June, 2014, in Atlanta, USA. More pics after cut...

The film is directed by Biyi Bandele and stars Chiwetel Ejiofor and Thandie Newton.

Half of a Yellow Sun, the film adaptation of Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's critically acclaimed novel of the same name, will be screened at next month's Durban International Film Festival, despite it being "banned" in Nigeria.

The programme for the 35th edition of the film festival, was released yesterday [Wednesday].
A week ago, the National Film and Videos Censors Board (NFVCB) in that country, denied banning the film - it said that according to the law "a decision on a film shall ensure that such a film is not likely to undermine national security".
The distributor, according to the report, was asked to "expunge/edit some clearly stated objectionable aspects of the movie", before a rating of the film is released.

A tourist jokes in front of an advertisement with the portrait of Uruguay's forward Luis Suarez at Copacabana beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on June 26, 2014. Sportswear giant Adidas said Thursday it would stop using Luis Suarez, one of its key promotional stars, for World Cup adverts after his four-month ban from football activities for biting Italian Giorgio Chiellini.
More pics after cut...

In a cross-sectional study of affairs of the heart - in both biological and sentimental terms - researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have linked cardiovascular health to marriage.

"Growing evidence suggests that the quality and patterns of one's social relationships may be linked with a variety of health outcomes, including heart disease," says Dr. Thomas Kamarck, professor of psychology and Biological and Health Program Chair in the University of Pittsburgh Kenneth P. Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences.

A file photo taken on April 1, 2014 shows staff of the “Doctors without Borders” (‘Medecin sans frontieres) medical aid organisation carrying the body of a person killed by viral haemorrhagic fever, at a center for victims of the Ebola virus in Guekedou.

It begins in the morning. The victim awakens feeling unwell. They’re without appetite. Their head aches. Sore throat. Fever. Chills.
What’s happening to the victim’s body isn’t dissimilar to other diseases that attack the body’s immune system but substantially more aggressive. “Exactly when and where you caught Ebola virus is unclear,” writes Lancaster University lecturer Derek Gatherer. “It can take anywhere between two and 21 days from initial infection to the first symptoms. What is more certain is that you are now infectious yourself. Your family, friends and anyone in close contact with you are now in mortal danger.”

http://www.informafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/African-Union.jpg

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Africa is making progress towards a regional military force by the end of next year, a senior African Union official said on Wednesday, as local leaders urged less reliance on foreign intervention.
Delays in implementing the African Standby Force (ASF) forced African states to request French intervention to tackle crises last year in Mali and Central African Republic.
African officials have voiced scepticism that the 5,000-strong force, under discussion for more than a decade, would be ready by next year's delayed deadline, prompting African leaders to approve a stop-gap rapid reaction force last year.

People lay blast victim Suleiman Bisalla, to rest after he died in a explosion in Abuja, Nigeria, Thursday, June 26, 2014. The National Hospital spokesman says a victim wounded in the bomb blast at a mall in Nigeria's capital died overnight. The government says soldiers shot and killed one suspect as he tried to escape, and police detained a second suspect.

Nigeria's intelligence agency said it has been warning shopping complexes in Abuja for two weeks that Islamic extremists might attack them in the capital, where a blast at a mall killed 22 people this week.
The increased security may have prevented even more carnage as witnesses said a security guard stopped a car bomber from entering the mall moments before the massive explosion on Wednesday.
More pics after cut...

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Beyoncé and Jay Z have kicked off their joint On the Run tour in Miami. And it's expected to be the second highest grossing trek of all time, making $5 million per show. That's just behind U2's 360 tour, which raked in nearly $7 million per show.

President Jonathan this morning visited the scene of the bomb blast that rocked Emab Plaza in Abuja on Wednesday June 25th, killing 21 people and also visited the Maitama District Hospital to see some of the blast victims recieving treatment. The President had to abort his visit to Malabo for the 23th Extra-Ordinary meeting of the African Union as a result of the bomb blast. More pics after cut..

Before he was diagnosed with stage 4 liver cancer in May,Rowden Go Pangcoga was planning his dream wedding to Leizl and the union was set for July.

His brother Hasset who posted the video which went viral, said his brother's dying wish had been to marry Leizl and, 'after 12 hours of preparations, his dream was fulfilled'.:

'Unable to take him outside the hospital, we brought the church to him.'Just 10 hours after their celebrated their marriage with family and friends, Rowden lost his fight against cancer. More pics after cut...

The Super Eagles did not come out for their scheduled work out on Thursday with players preferring to negotiate for their qualification bonus after advancing from Group F

The Nigeria squad at the World Cup have missed a scheduled training session in a row over money.

BBC Sport understands the players believe they are each $15,000 short of the bonus they were expecting for reaching the last 16 in Brazil.
They refused to train in Campinas on Thursday and officials later confirmed the session had been cancelled.
Nigeria are scheduled to play France in the knockout stages on Monday having finished as runners-up in Group F.

Uruguay will appeal against FIFA's nine-match ban imposed on striker Luis Suarez for biting an Italy defender in a World Cup group match, Uruguay's FA president said on Thursday.

Suarez was also suspended from any football-related activity for four months and fined 100,000 Swiss francs ($111,000) for biting Italy's Giorgio Chiellini on Tuesday, soccer's world governing body said in a statement on Thursday.
"We are working here on the appeal with the lawyer, we are going to appeal today," Uruguay FA chief Wilmer Valdez told media outside Copacabana Palace hotel in Rio de Janeiro.

The African Progressive Congress have decided to challenge the results of the just concluded elections in Ekiti State in court describing the election as largely faulted. Rising from its National Working Committee meeting, the APC in a statement signed by its National Publicity Secretary, Lai Mohammed, said some of their members were harassed by military men before and during the election and this in no small measure affected the performance of their Party during the elections. Read APC statement after cut..

Iyiola Omisore in a rural area in Osun state in continuation of his door to door campaign

As the 9 August governorship election in Osun State draws near, the leading governorship candidates, incumbent Governor, Rauf Aregbesola of the All Progressives Congress, APC, and Iyiola Omisore of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, are locked in a war of words over who has the better credential to run the state.

While Aregbesola lambasted Omisore at a campaign rally in Ikirun in Ifelodun Local Government Area of the State, warning him not to over-step his boundary, Omisore fired back at the governor, describing him as a half-educated person.

Do richer women have better sex?

A Spanish study suggests that richer women have better sex lives.

After prying into the sex lives of Spaniards, a team of researchers have concluded that richer people -- particularly women -- report higher rates of satisfaction in the bedroom.

Overall, it appears that Spaniards are happy with the quality and quantity of their time in the bedroom: a whopping 90% of men and women said they were either quite or very satisfied with their sex lives in general.

But after digging through 9,850 interviews taken from the country's first national sex survey in 2009, researchers from the Barcelona Public Health Agency also found a correlation between socioeconomic status and sexual satisfaction, particularly notable among female respondents.

KNYSNA TO KNIGHTSBRIDGE: Caspar Lee spends much of his time in London now

Caspar Lee, 20, is SA's YouTube prince, turning lo-fi videos into fame & fun.

Fast forward nine years and tons of YouTubers with their own channels (DStv, eat your heart out) are getting cheques in the mail. "Thousands" of them are making six figures.

Now 20, Caspar Lee was 16 and living in Knysna when he started making YouTube videos for fun, then boom: he's on the red carpet, some lackey adjusting his hair.

So sad, together we can win the war against terror. More pics after cut..

Fire fighters try to put out a fire after a bomb exploded in a crowded shopping centre in Nigeria's capital Abuja.

The bomb blast that killed more than 20 people in the Nigerian capital of Abuja yesterday was the third violent attack on civilians in the country this week.

While the explosion seemed to have been timed to Nigeria's World Cup match against Argentina, the Boko Haram terrorist group that is presumed responsible has been attacking citizens regularly since before the Cup began; earlier this weekmore than 90 women and children were kidnapped and at least eight people were killed at a medical school in separate incidents.

Iraqi Shiite fighters raise up weapons as they show their willingness to join Iraqi security forces in the fight against Jihadist militants on June 23, 2014 during a gathering in the southern city of Basra.

Like many others in this country, I lie awake at night, thinking about the chaos in Iraq, as that sad nation rushes into a full-blown civil war, with consequences hard to predict. Should we intervene? Is there any intervention that would do more than help to rearrange the rubble?

Rand Paul is an odd duck, but he was right last week to suggest that we created a terrible vacuum in Iraq by arming the Shia without taking into account the delicate balance of competing claims for legitimacy in this complex region. Paul also said that ISIS—the militant group now seizing villages and cities, as well as oil wells, and marching toward Baghdad for a showdown with their Shia rivals—isn’t planning to send ballistic missiles to the United States. They probably have other things to think about.

Defying the turmoil roiling their nation Libyans vote in parliament elections, the third nationwide balloting since the toppling of longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi, at a polling station in Benghazi, Libya, Wednesday, June 25, 2014. The vote is a key step in transition for the oil-rich Libya, embroiled in deep political chaos and instability mainly because of the absence of a strong military and police force. Heavily armed militias, born out of the rebel groups that toppled Gadhafi, now are the main power in the country.

With turnout low amid violence and frustration, Libyans voted Wednesday for a new parliament they hope can bring some stability after three years of dizzying chaos in the North African nation, which has hardly had a functioning government and has been plagued by rampant militias and Islamic extremists since the ouster of Moammar Gadhafi.

When Han Hye-kyung finished high school and got a job at Samsung, her family celebrated with a barbecue. But within two years, she stopped menstruating. And then she couldn’t walk straight. And then doctors found a brain tumor, something she and her family claim came from toxins at a factory run by the South Korean tech giant.

Han and her mother are among a small group of Koreans who say there’s a dark side to this country’s most iconic conglomerate. They say conditions at a Samsung Electronics production plant caused hundreds of rare diseases over the past two decades, some fatal, with most victims in their 20s or 30s.

Video: Prof Wole Soyinka On Boko Haram In Nigeria

Top Nigerian Comedienne Helen Paul Grabs Glo, GoTV Deals

Top Nigerian comedienne, Helen Paul is now a Glo ambassador. She has now joined the league of celebrities who are brand ambassadors of the telecommunications giant.

The deal, according to a statement made available by her publicist, Bayo Adetu, was penned in May 2014, but was officially announced earlier this week. It is “worth several millions of naira,” the statement revealed.

“Yes, Helen Paul is now a Globacom ambassador and she is extremely happy about it, just as anybody in her shoes would be. Glo is a massive brand everybody loves to be associated with,” Adetu hinted.

The Emir Of Kano, above, paid a visit to victims of the bomb blast at the Kano School of Hygiene Gida, Murtala road in Kano. The victims who are receiving treatment at the Murtala Mohammed Specialist Hospital are in dire need of blood, doctors say. Yesterday students of the Kano School of Hygiene were seen at the hospital coming to donate blood for their colleagues.

What's causing sudden deaths of black men in South Africa?

Eddie Zondi.

From Morning Live presenter Vuyo Mbuli, who died at the age of 46, to the recent death of 47-year-old Metro FM host Eddie Zondi, more and more South African black men are succumbing to lifestyle diseases.

According to destinyconnect.com, the recent sudden deaths of four prominent black South African men, all in their forties, has put the spotlight on lifestyle diseases, which have infiltrated black society.

Morning Live presenter Vuyo Mbuli died from a pulmonary embolism, while Metro FM host Eddie Zondi complained of chest pains before his death.

President Jacob Zuma (@SAPresident) is Africa's third most followed leader on Twitter, according to the 2014 Twiplomacy report by PR company Burson-Marsteller.

The most followed African leader is Uhuru Kenyatta (@Ukenyatta) with 456,209 followers, and Rwanda's Paul Kagame (@PaulKagame) is in second with 404,332.

Zuma shouldn't feel too bleak about his performance though - despite the fact that he only has 325,733 followers the South African presidency itself (@PresidencyZA) came in fourth with 243,115.

Syrian government aircraft bombed Iraqi military targets held by the Sunni militant group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, even as the first batch of 90 U.S. military advisers landed in Iraq Tuesday.

The latest airstrikes were conducted in the western province of Anbar, which is the largest governorate in Iraq geographically and shares a border with Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. And while Iraqi state media had initially reported that the attacking aircraft were U.S. drones, Washington denied the claims and a U.S. government official told ABC News that the strikes were believed to be conducted by Syria.

Fans hold a sign in support of more than 200 Nigerian schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram at the Group F football match between Iran and Nigeria on June 16, 2014.

From the outset, it was probably inevitable. What was once an international army of protesters that spanned both continents and the Twitterverse has dwindled.

Nearly three months have passed since Boko Haram kidnapped more than 200 schoolgirls from a dormitory. Boko Haram is suspected of kidnappingapproximately 60 more women and girls. And #Bringbackourgirls has, by nearly every measure, failed.

It’s not surprising. Internet activism has a finite life span. In a matter of days, it blinks into existence, then blinks into oblivion.

Photos: YELOTO FOUNDATION brings succour to the under privileged.

Smiles, joy and hope was the underlining objective as YELOTO AFRICAN CHILDREN FOUNDATION spent the 2014 children’s day celebration with pupils of Children Centre(an orphanage) Idi Araba, Lagos.

Gift items, music, games, refreshments and fun packed activities werelined up for the children aged between 5 and 10 years to enjoy their day.

Dr. Oluyemi Olawaiye, founder of YELOTO foundationsays “it’s an opportunity to invest in the development on the Nigerian child, as it seeks to positively impact lives of impoverished children through provisions of health care needs, nutrition and education”.

YELOTO CHAIRMAN, DR JARAMIDE ONAKOYA

In similar developments, cheques were presented to children and adults with surgical problems to cover expenses of their operation at the Lagos State Teaching Hospital (LUTH) Idi Araba. This is the second year running the foundation will be involved in such humanitarian gesture.

Chairman of Yeloto foundation, Dr.Jaramide Onakoya reteriated the fact that the foundation goals are met through orphanages, children’s homes and educational programs. She said “ our programs will enable the children to achieve their maximum potentials in life through educational success and increased self-esteem.

Below are the pictures of the Children’s day celebration and presentation of cheques for surgical patients at LUTH.

Released Sudan death row woman Meriam Ibrahim 're-arrested'

Meriam Yahia Ibrahim Ishag, a 27-year-old Sudanese woman sentenced to hang for apostasy

Meriam Ibrahim gave birth to a baby daughter in prison

A Sudanese woman freed from death row on Monday has been arrested with her family at Khartoum airport, sources have told the BBC.

Meriam Ibrahim was sentenced to hang in May for renouncing Islam, sparking widespread outrage at home and abroad.

About 40 security agents detained Mrs Ibrahim - along with her husband, Daniel Wani and two children - at the airport, the sources said.

On Monday, Mr Wani said the family intended to leave for the US.

Mrs Ibrahim was released from prison after an appeal court annulled the death sentence imposed on her.

Photos: Ekiti PDP Celebrates Victory At Governorship Polls

Video: Edo Lawmakers Engage In Free For All Fight

Five years after death,Micheal Jackson's fortunes blooming, makes £411m ($700m) since death

Michael Jackson fans will place flowers on his grave in Los Angeles this week to mark the fifth anniversary of his death, but half a decade on, the pop icon's financial fortunes are positively blooming.

The self-proclaimed King of Pop was struggling to avoid bankruptcy when he died on June 25, 2009.

At the time, he was in rehearsals for a series of comeback shows he hoped would resurrect his earlier jaw-dropping wealth.

But in five years since, the Michael Jackson Estate -- which runs his affairs on behalf of Jackson's mother and three children -- has earned over $700 million, according to a new book about the singer's business empire.

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