Alleged Missing N19.63bn: Ihedioha Asks Court To Stop Probe By Imo Assembly

The immediate past governor of Imo State, Emeka Ihedioha, has filed a suit to stop the Imo State House of Assembly from investigating him over allegations of missing funds.

He filed the suit at the State High Court sitting in Owerri, the state capital.

In his prayers, the former governor sought a perpetual injunction restraining the lawmakers from probing him over the sum of N19.63 billion said to be missing from the Local Government account during his seven-month tenure.

Ihedioha, through an originating summon, also urged the court to grant him a perpetual injunction restraining the Imo State House of Assembly from inviting him and questioning him about the alleged missing fund.

Listed as defendants in the suit are the Imo State House of Assembly, the Speaker, and the Clerk of the House of Assembly.

The former governor filed the suit weeks after the Imo State Governor, Hope Uzodinma, announced that the sum of N19.63 billion was missing from the Joint Account Allocation Committee (JAAC) of the 27 Local Governments Areas of the state.

Governor Uzodinma had alleged that the money got missing under the watch of the immediate past administration led by Ihedioha.

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Imo had, however, described the allegation by the governor as mischievous and a deliberate scheme of his administration to loot the resources of the state.

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British PM Issues New COVID-19 Guidelines Ahead Of Lockdown Plan

 

 

  Prime Minister Boris Johnson issued new public advice on the coronavirus on Sunday ahead of his announcement on how to ease a nationwide lockdown, but warned he would proceed cautiously as the death toll in Britain, already the highest in Europe, continues to mount.

In a televised address to the nation at 7:00 pm (1800 GMT), Johnson is expected to extend most of the stay-at-home orders imposed in late March, although garden centres are set to reopen.

But in a sign of a gradual shift towards getting the country moving again, he tweeted new public advice for people to “stay alert”, to replace the current slogan to “stay home, save lives”.

It urges people to stay at home “as much as possible” and limit contact with others, a more lenient message than previous rules to only go outside where necessary and to meet nobody outside your household.

Johnson, who himself spent a week in hospital with coronavirus last month, has made clear he will proceed with “maximum caution” in easing the lockdown.

He is looking at a plan to contain infection rates in the longer term, with ministers considering imposing a 14-day quarantine on anyone coming into the country from abroad.

An alert system is also being developed to monitor the outbreak, which will inform when and how lockdown measures might be lifted — or tightened — at a national and local level.

– Don’t run too fast –

Johnson has been criticised for failing to take the outbreak seriously enough at the start, still shaking hands in early March and delaying the imposition of a lockdown.

Britain has now recorded more than 31,500 deaths among people who have tested positive for COVID-19 — the second highest figure in the world after the United States.

There are growing demands from his own MPs to lift the lockdown as it wreaks economic havoc — the Bank of England this week predicted a 14-percent slump in British GDP this year.  But in an interview with the Sun on Sunday newspaper, Johnson warned that now was “the most dangerous bit”.

“We’re past the peak now but we’ll have to work even harder to get every step right,” he said.

“Mountaineers always say that coming down from the peak is the most dangerous bit. That’s when you’re liable to be over-confident and make mistakes.

“You have very few options on the climb up, but it’s on the descent you have to make sure you don’t run too fast, lose control and stumble.”

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Governor Wike personally supervises demolition of Prodest Hotel, Eleme LGA

  

   Governor Wike personally supervises the demolition of Prodest Hotel, Eleme LGA, for violating a communicated order on hotel closure in Rivers.

Stay home and obey the orders!

Hold Buhari govt responsible if coronavirus escalates in Rivers – Wike cries out

Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State has told the people of the State and the entire Nigerians to hold the President Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government responsible if COVID-19 escalates in the State. Wike said this in his statewide broadcast on Friday, adding that nobody should be surprised if the coronavirus cases in the State rise in the coming weeks.

He said: “It has become imperative to alert the state and, indeed, the entire world to the fact that a dangerous escalation of COVID-19 pandemic in Rivers State looms large on our horizon due largely to the hypocrisy of the Federal Government and the continuous acts of willful sabotage by security agencies.”

 

He said for this reason, they cannot overstate the gravity of their present predicament, adding that “nobody should be surprised should Rivers State witness exponential increases in the infection and spread of COVID-19 cases in the days and weeks ahead as we begin intense testing.”

Wike said, however, that his administration was resolved and committed to remain strong and total.

He called on the residents of the State to see coronavirus as a matter of life and death by obeying the government’s directives to stay at home in order to protect themselves, their families and the state from the spread. He declared that staying at home and staying safe for now was not just mandatory, but the best available option in the prevailing circumstance.

The Governor said that borders of Rivers State are continually experiencing serial acts of sabotage by security operatives, who allegedly allow and, in some cases, personally aid persons with risky COVID-19 status into the state.

“Recently, we intercepted a lorry-load of livestock with 22 persons who bribed their ways into Rivers State from as far as Adamawa State despite the Federal Government’s claimed restriction on inter-state travels and our definitive closure of all entry routes into the state,” Wike added.

 

He said that another 8 trucks with 200 persons hidden in loads of grains were intercepted as they were being smuggled into the State from the Northern parts of the country.

The Governor lamented that the extent of sabotage was such that even a Deputy Commissioner of Police unilaterally appropriated and exercised “powers to illegally issue movement pass to individuals and companies indiscriminately in utter contempt and direct violation of the lockdown orders of the State government.”

REUBEN ABATI BLOG

New Emir of Bama, Umar Kyari turbaned in Borno

   

The New Emir of Bama, Umar Ibrahim Ibn Kyari has been turbaned by the king makers of Bama Town.  The occasion was witnessed by the Governor of Borno state amidst tight security. Bama is the 2nd largest Emirate in Borno state and had been a stronghold of Boko Haram terrorist who displaced the residents of the ancient town to different parts of the Region and beyond.

   Bama is at it’s recovery stage and the Borno state Government is reconstructing her infrastructure to ensure the return of civil authority to the town for ease of administration. The new Emir HRH Umar Ibrahim Ibn Kyari is the eldest son of late Shehu of Bama, Kyari Ibn Umar El Kanemi. Umar succeeds his late father who died recently from a brief illness.

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