Gist Arena

Captain Sagir Kooli is an Intelligence Officer of the Nigerian Army serving at the 32 Artillery Brigade, Akure

 Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau vowed in a new video released on Monday that the group would defeat a regional force fighting the extremists in Nigeria's far northeast, Niger and Cameroon. "Your alliance will not achieve anything. Amass all your weapons and face us. We welcome you," he said in a 28-minute speech, one of three videos posted by the Islamists on YouTube. Troops from Nigeria have been backed by soldiers from Chad, Cameroon and Niger in recent weeks because of increased concerns about Boko Haram's threat to regional security. In the second of the latest videos, images of the leader of the Islamic State group, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, are shown along with archive footage and a voiceover recalling a battle between British colonial soldiers and fighters from the Sokoto Caliphate in northern Nigeria. Shekau has namechecked al-Baghdadi before but appears to be positioning Boko Haram in a wider jihadi context by showing the Sokoto Caliphate, w...

The All Progressives Congress and its presidential candidate, Muhammadu Buhari, have opposed the orders of a Federal High Court in Abuja, directing that they be served through substituted means‎ in the suit challenging Mr. Buhari’s eligibility to stand for the March 28 presidential poll. The Judge of a Federal High Court Abuja, Adeniyi Ademola, had in two separate suits challenging Mr. Buhari’s eligibility to contest the election, last week granted ex parte orders permitting the plaintiffs, Chukwunweike Okafor and Max Ozoaka, to serve Mr. Buhari and the APC through newspaper publications. The court had also granted an order of abridgment of time within which the defendants must respond to the suits. The lawyers of the two plaintiffs were in court to represent their clients in the separate suits in on Monday. The electoral empire, Independent National Electoral Commission, was also joined in the suit as defendants. Counsels to Mr. Buhari and the APC informed the...

Contrary to the blatant denial of former Minister of State for Defence, Musiliu Obanikoro, and the Governor of Ekiti State, Ayo Fayose, that they were involved in a meeting where strategies for rigging the 2014 Ekiti State governorship election were discussed, the Minister of Police Affairs, Jelili Adesiyan, who was also at the meeting, has admitted that the meeting actually took place. A recording of the meeting, which also featured other top officials of the government and Aliyu Momoh, a Brigadier General, was leaked last week. Mr. Adesiyan, however, said the conversation in the leaked tape was an altercation between Mr. Fayose and Mr. Momoh after the former accused the later of being bribed by the then incumbent governor of the state, Kayode Fayemi. “Fayose accused the General who supervised the Ekiti election of taking bribe from Fayemi and APC, that was two days before the election. They called me because they said the General disarmed policemen and I told him...

Last week, I told y'all about an accident that occurred on Ikorodu Road. (Read  here ). Here's the lady who lost her life. Her name is  Fadekemi Adetoro and she was  a student of Triple Cross secondary school at Wemco road, Ikeja. According to a family friend, Fadekemi aspired to study aeronautical engineering after her secondary school education. She was on an errand for her uncle before she met her untimely death that devastating day. So sad! May her soul rest in peace, Amen.

Following the postponement of the general elections, the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC, has extended the date of collection of Permanent Voters Card to March 8th. In a statement signed by the commission's secretary, Mrs Augusta Ogakwu and released today February 9th, the commission said it hopes the extension would enable people who haven't collected their PVC to do so “The Commission hopes that this extension will finally avail every registered person yet to collect his/her PVC the opportunity to do so in readiness for the general elections,” the statement read in part.

L agos state Governor Raji Fashola and Lagos APC Governorship candidate, Akinwunmi Ambode shared gifts to supporters as they campaigned in Alimosho Local Government today. More photos below

The APC Chieftain said the elections was postponed because GEJ feared he was going to lose. Find the statement below... What happened  Saturday  was actually not a postponement due to security or logistical reasons. What happened was the by-product of overt political interference undermining the independence of the election management body, INEC. The elections were postponed not because they could safely be held. They were postponed because one man, President Jonathan, feared that an election held on  February 14  would for him become an election lost. While the mouth was Jega, the words were Jonathan. He chose to place our democracy at risk than do what democracy demands by facing and risking the verdict of the people. That he would use our security agencies to provide his excuse only adds insult to injury. This act was one desperation of a man in fear of defeat. It was not done for the national good. It was the wrong thing done for th...

Nigeria's National Security Adviser, Mohammed Sambo Dasuki, says all known Boko Haram camps in Nigeria will be taken out within the six weeks so the country can have a safe election. Dasuki said this while responding to a question from AFP on the gains of the postponement of the 2015 general elections by INEC "All known Boko Haram camps will be taken out. They won't be there. They will be dismantled" he said. According to Mr Dasuki, the ongoing multinational task force launched against Boko Haram will work together to destroy all known camps of Boko Haram within the next six weeks. He said the new dates for the elections, March 28th and April 11th will not be shifted. While speaking at the London think-tank Chatham House in Jan. 2015, the NSA chief had proposed a postponement of the general elections on grounds of insecurity in the North East as well as irregularities in the distribution of permanent voters card.

The Boko Haram sect today released three new videos on Youtube (that have since been taken down) showing how a man accused of committing adultery was stoned to death. The sect members also amputated a man's hand for stealing. In one of the videos which was released in three parts, a man buried in the ground with only his head visible, is seen being stoned to death by a crowd. They accused him of adultery. Another part of the video showed a man's hand being amputated for 'stealing'. Young men were also shown being flogged for committing fornication. In one of the videos, the sect leader, Abubakar Shekau denied claims by Nigerian military that they repelled the December 1st attack on Damaturu in Yobe state carried out by the terrorist group.

Militants fighting for the Islamic State in Syria have publicly beheaded a man for allegedly practicing witchcraft - the latest in a long line of barbaric executions carried out by the terror group. The unknown man was photographed being killed by a masked executioner in a village just outside ISIS' stronghold and de facto capital Raqqa while a large crowd looked on. Precise details of the victim's so-called crime are not known, but the charge of witchcraft and 'invoking magic', and the use of an axe and wooden chopping block to carry out the beheading do little to counter claims that ISIS are little more than murderers with a Dark Age view of the world. The beheading of the man, who has a long grey beard, bald head and appears to be in his 60s, took place in a rural area named Aldbsa, to the west the city of Raqqa.  Photographs of the execution and the crowds who watched it were released by ISIS-affiliated media, and were reported b...

A Nigerian living in Houston, USA, Ike Obudulu, caught his wife cheating on him with a work colleague and put it on the internet for all to see. Obudulu revealed on video how his wife of over 10 years, Rosemary Ogonnaya Obudulu nee Nwankwo, a doctor in Houston, confessed to him of having an affair with Dr Ovie Ughwanogho. They had an affair when they were preparing to sit for their board exams. Here is what Mr Obudulu said in his own words. My wife Rosemary Ogonnaya Obudulu nee Nwankwo, a Nigerian physician in Houston, Texas, recently confessed that while she was doing her residency, she was going to the house of a single male resident who lived alone by name of Dr Ovie Ughwanogho also a Nigerian to have sex. When they started preparing for board exams she would go to his house to have sex and they would study after having sex. Even after the residency ended and Ovie Ughwanogho moved out of town three years of cheating with a coworker was not enough, ...

Pressure mounted by President Goodluck Jonathan’s loyalists and service chiefs on the Independent National Electoral Commission led to the postponement of the 2015 general elections, SUNDAY PUNCH has learnt. The polls were billed for February 14 (presidential and National Assembly) and February 28 (governorship and House of Assembly). Jonathan, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, is contesting against retired Gen. Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressive Congress and 12 other candidates at the presidential poll. Those who pushed for the postponement, despite the opposition from the All Progressives Congress and many Nigerians, include the Presidency; the Peoples Democratic Party Jonathan’s loyalists; the National Security Adviser, Colonel Sambo Dasuki; the Chiefs of Defence, Army, Naval and Air Staff, among others. Two weeks ago, Dasuki, while speaking at a forum at the Chatham House in London, asked INEC to postpone the elections, saying the shift ...

The relatives of the key political figures in Nigeria took to social media their opinions over the postponement of the polls for six weeks. Aisha Buhari, the wife of the presidential candidate from the main opposition party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), has asked Nigerians to accept the shift of Nigeria’s general elections in good faith. While addressing women’s groups in Zamfara state, Mrs Buhari said Nigerians should realise the importance attached to the upcoming general elections, and that they should not be dispirited by any change in the schedule. Buhari’s wife guaranteed that the extension would provide the opportunity for the party to seek more support ahead of the polls. Zahra Buhari, a daughter of the APC presidential aspirant, expressed her feelings on her Twitter page. She said that postponing the general elections has again proven President Jonathan’s level of indecisiveness. The young lady said: No matter what they do to rob GMB...

20 passengers who were returning from a market were reportedly abducted by Boko Haram members yesterday Feb. 8th in Adangadanga, Mayo- Moskota division of the far North region of Cameroon. They were taken to an undisclosed location. Cameroonian investigative journalist, Etahoben Bissong also said that one of the 35 Boko Haram members captured by the Cameroonian army after the last week's attack on Fotokol is a 16yr old boy who said he specializes in slitting peoples throat.  

No fewer than seven persons, including a pregnant woman, at the weekend in Onitsha, Anambra State, lost their lives, while about 15 others sustained various degrees of injuries in an auto crash. According to our investigation, trouble started for the victims when a 40-foot fuel-laden tanker that was descending the Akwa road in Onitsha lost its brakes and rammed into vehicles that queued up waiting for their turn to pass at the ABS/Akwa road traffic light junction. The driver, in a bid to avoid more destruction, tried to control the tanker, but to no avail and had to first crush a blue Mitsubishi bus that loaded passengers to full capacity and then hit four tricycles at a stretch, resulting in the casualties. An eye witness said: “The pregnant woman was standing at the bus-stop waiting for a commuter bus when she was crushed by the tanker. “Others were mostly passengers in the four tricycles that were hit in the multiple accidents.” The Onitsha Police ...