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An explosion has occurred at a major shopping mall, Emab Plaza, in Wuse 2, Abuja. A witness said the explosion ‎occurred at about 4p.m. Emab Plaza is a busy shopping mall in the highbrow area of Nigeria’s capital city, on Aminu Kano Crescent. The explosion apparently occurred at the gate of the busy plaza. This is the third deadly explosion in the Nigerian capital in two months. The extremist Boko Haram sect claimed responsibility for the two explosions in April and May in Nyanya, a suburb of the capital. Liveblog 17.21 At the Maitama General Hospital, officials are now referring new victims to the National hospital, in the Central Business Distric, few kilometres away. At least nine victims have been referred. But Four ambulances are waiting outside the hospital, apparently rendering first aid. The hospital is flooded with victims and sympathizers causing another security scare. But armed soldier arrived moments ago are are trying to disperse the hospital of the cr...

An explosion has occurred at a major shopping mall, Emab plaza, in Wuse 2, Abuja. A witness said the explosion ‎occurred at about 4pm. Emaba Plaza is a busy shopping mall in the highbrow area of Nigeria’s capital city, on Aminu kano crescent. The explosion apparently occurred at the gate of the busy plaza. many cars are still ablaze. Emergency workers are still arriving the scene. Fire Service is yet to arrive the scene our reporter on grounds said. 16.30 Emergency officials arrived without adequate material. "Tell Joseph to come with enough dead body bags," an emergency official tells colleagues. Soldiers arrived in large numbers. Clearing the place. Traders in tears. 16.25 Fire Service have arrived the scene of the blast. There are frantic attempts to extinguish the burning cars. Traders in the plaza said the blast apparently went off in a car that was driving into the mall. 16.23

Mubarak Bala has been held up at a mental institute in Kano state since June 13th despite being given a clean bill of health because he declared he does not believe in God.  According to the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU) Bala is being held against his will and forcibly medicated at the Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital, where he has been kept since June 13. The chemical engineering graduate is allegedly being held on the grounds of a “personality change” because he declared himself an atheist despite being raised in a Muslim family in Kano, which is a mainly Muslim state. The organisation says that when Mr Bala told his family he did not believe in God, they took him to a doctor and asked if he was mentally ill. Continue... When this doctor found him to be fit and well, the family are then believed to have taken him to a second doctor who claimed he was suffering with a personality disorder. The family allegedly told this doctor he also made...

A zonal pastor of Redeemed Christian Church of God, Mr. Victor Edo, said he had to donate his blood in exchange for money to satisfy his urge for heroin, cocaine and some other hard drugs. Victor said this on Tuesday, during a visit to Christ Against Drug Abuse Ministry in the Araga, Epe area of Lagos by officials of the National Drug Enforcement Agency. The pastor, an alumnus of the CADAM, told our correspondent that his 13-year journey as a drug peddler and addict started in 1985 in Lagos when he started selling drugs. He said, “ At a point, I started taking them. I was the kingpin of Ikeja Cocaine Triangle that media were writing about sometime in 1987. NDLEA eventually arrested me. “I sold my blood just to satisfy my urge. My father and my relatives rejected me, but eventually I came to CADAM in 1998. Today I am an ordained pastor.” A woman in the rehabilitation centre, Steven Ufom , told  PUNCH Metro  that the demise of her husband turned her to a drinker. ...

The police have arrested a member of the Lagos State local security outfit, Neighbourhood Watch, Jelili Falana, for the murder of a woman, Afolashade Salami. The police also accused the defendant of hiding Salami’s corpse inside a pit in a bid to cover up the crime. Our correspondent learnt that the incident happened at the vigilante office in Agege, Lagos State. Salami, who sold drugs to people in the area, was said to have visited Falana on Sunday at the office for a chat. The duo was said to be discussing when the 34-year-old suspect brought out a single-barreled gun he had recently seized from some armed robbers. Falana, who is also said to be a member of the Odua People’s Congress, reportedly mishandled the gun and fired a shot which killed the deceased. Our correspondent learnt that in an attempt to cover up the crime, he took the corpse out of the office and hid it inside a pit. But his boss, Mr. Adekunle Adegoke, who was said to have been jolted by the sound o...

The Abia State Police Command says it has arrested a man for allegedly raping a female passenger who boarded his bike late in the night. Commissioner of Police, Adamu Ibrahim, who said this in a statement, added that the incident took place around 9pm at the Ntigha area of the state. According to the police, the female passenger boarded the bike marked, AB 5023 TB, at Ntigha Junction and was heading for Umukalu Ntigha. They said the motorcyclist, however, diverted her to a farm on the way where he allegedly raped her. The police said the randy suspect also dispossessed the victim of N850 after raping her. The suspect, according to police, will soon be charged to court as soon as investigations are over. In a related development, the police said it had arrested one Nnenna Ohaja of Ogbodiukwu Umuokpara in the Umuahia North Local Government Area, for allegedly “keeping custody of two boys, aged five and seven, suspected to have been stolen.” Ibrahim said the suspect had c...

Cash said to be running into several hundreds of millions of naira was snatched on Tuesday by armed robbers from a bullion van at Ubulu Okiti, Delta State. One policeman was feared killed while many of his colleagues and other residents of the area were injured in the incident that occurred at the Ubulu Okiti portion of Asaba-Benin Expressway. A shootout occurred during the attack on the bullion van conveying the money from Asaba. Witnesses said the gun battle ensued as the robbers made to escape with the money. The Delta State Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Celestina Kalu, who confirmed the robbery, said nobody was killed. She said, “Several of our men and civilians were injured and are receiving treatment in hospitals.” She added that the robbers escaped with the money in the bullion van but, declined to name the amount

Alongside Karachi Zoo's enclosures for elephants and deer, hidden behind a curtain in an ornate pavilion, there is a creature the likes of which you won't find in the wild. It is the home of Mumtaz Begum - a mythical half-fox, half-woman chimera - who has been the zoo's top attraction for generations. From her languid repose inside a specially designed bed, she delights visitors on their days out to the zoo, in Pakistan's commercial capital, with her wit and wisdom. 'The people, who visit here, go away happy. And knowing that they feel happy makes me happy too,' Mumtaz told Reuters. 'There is a bond of love between me and them. Life is very short; it should be spent spreading smiles.' In addition to witty conversation, Mumtaz is also known as a fortune-teller. Students come to her with questions about their examination results, while concerned mothers consult her about their daughters' prospects for marriage. 'I feel very good...

The militant Islamist sect, Boko Haram, gives out abducted young girls and women to its members as wives,   the 2014 Trafficking in Persons Report, has stated. It said that through forced marriages, the women and girls are subjected to sex slavery, domestic servitude and forced labour. The report, which covered 2013, noted that the sect recruited   children as foot soldiers, was obtained from the United States Department of State on Tuesday. The report was posted on www.state.gov on June 20. “International observers had reported in 2013 that the terrorist group, Boko Haram, recruited and used child soldiers as young as 12-years-old, as well as abducted women and girls some of whom were subjected to domestic servitude, forced labour, and sex slavery through forced marriages to its militants,” a part of the report read. It observed   that the Federal Government had yet to fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of human trafficking. But the ...

Cameroon’s military has arrested 40 suspected Boko Haram militants in the north of the country.   Soldiers have also sealed off a market where they suspect Boko Haram may be hiding arms for use in the insurgency over the border in Nigeria. Col. Nyemeck Pierre, who led the military raid, told VOA that the central government ordered the military action as part of its fight against Boko Haram incursions into Cameroon. “It is the duty of the military to filter the population so that enemies do not infiltrate into Cameroon,” he said in French Language. He added that the matter was complicated because along the border there were Nigerians and Cameroonians “who belong to the same families and soldiers have to try to distinguish who is a militant. Also, a state radio broadcaster in Cameroon also announced that, “A gendarme [military] raid on the Maroua Central Market has led to the arrests of over 40 people. “The arrests are in connection with the ongoing investigations into t...

A Federal High Court, Abuja, on Tuesday adjourned indefinitely a suit filed by the Peoples Democratic Party seeking an order directing some governors of the All Progressives Congress to vacate their seats. The PDP wants the court to order the removal of the governors on the account of their defection from the party which sponsored them into office to the APC before the expiration of their tenure. The affected governors are AbdulFatah Ahmed (Kwara), Rotimi Amaechi (Rivers), Murtala Nyako (Adamawa), Aliyu Wamako (Sokoto) and Rabiu Kwankwaso (Kano). But Justice Gabriel Kolawole on Tuesday adjourned the matter sine die (indefinitely) on the grounds that the court processes were not properly served on the defendants. The court, in a ruling on Tuesday, set aside the earlier service on the governors through APC’s new office at 14, Blantyre Street, Abuja. Justice Kolawole held that the PDP fell into the trap set by the governors, which enabled them to justifiably claim that they w...

Osun State Governor, Mr. Rauf Aregbesola, has said that the All Progressives Congress lost the Ekiti State governorship polls due to fraud but maintained that it was impossible to rig him out in the August 9, 2014 governorship election in Osun. The governor spoke in Ikirun on Tuesday during the continuation of his campaign which was held in the town. Aregbesola, who was obviously excited by the large turnout of his supporters at the campaign, said that it was impossible to oust him from power in Osun State because he still enjoyed the support of the masses. The candidate of the APC, who spoke in Yoruba language, urged the people of the state to vote and protect their votes from being manipulated. He said, “They perpetrated fraud in Ekiti but we are looking at them. They said that my days in office remain 43 days and I just laughed. What they did in Ekiti is not possible here in Osun. Osun is different and they know it. In 2011, all Yoruba states voted for Peoples Democratic ...

This is totally unacceptable. What was he thinking? A police officer identified as Aurthur Okeke with force No: 453255 was caught on tape violently attacking a heavily pregnant woman in Bar Beach in Lagos. The woman is said to be in a very bad shape as a result of her pregnancy and she is now in hospital. The police officer went ahead to tear the woman's clothes. See video of the incident below...

HAS Nigeria degenerated to the extent that a minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria would regret that his ministerial position was standing between him and a public brawl? He sounded as if the shackles of office distressed him in the matter. Minister of Police Affairs, Alhaji Abduljelili Adesiyan, one of the President’s newest ministers is the one in question. His opponent would be the former Governor of Osun State, Senator Isiaka Adeleke. The minister promised a physical fight with Adeleke whenever he leaves office as a member of the Federal Executive Council, FEC. We do not share in Adesiyan’s pain. It is a scandal that a Minister still wants to rely on physical combat to settle disputes. How would he resist the temptation to use the police to beat up his opponents until he is able to do so himself? Why would a minister threaten anyone, the type of conduct unexpected of ordinary people? Adesiyan and Senator Adeleke had a disagreement during a stakeholders’ meeting of th...

ENUGU—THE crisis in the Assemblies of God Church Nigeria, with its polarising effects, took a dangerous dimension, yesterday, as members of the two camps clashed leaving some people wounded. An attempt by the faction loyal to the Assistant General Superintendent, Rev. Chidi Okoroafor, to hold anti-Paul Emeka meeting at Isiagu Street, Achara Layout branch of the church was the major cause of the clash. The embattled General Superintendent of the church, Rev. Paul Emeka, and some top members of the church had engaged in a protracted dispute over issues relating to lack of accountability and conspiracy in the church’s leadership. The anti-Emeka members of the church’s executive committee had slated a meeting yesterday to review the crisis that engulfed the church, following the purported suspension of the General Superintendent by a group in the church. The District Pastor incharge of Isiagu street branch of the church, Pastor Isaac Ochu, who is in the anti-Emeka faction, acce...