Ekiti

Teachers working in Ekiti public schools on Monday defied the state government by shunning the Teachers’ Development Needs Assessment(TDNA) examination.

  The examination, which was postponed thrice over disagreements with the teachers, was supposed to commence with a training session between 9:am and 12 noon.

However, investigation indicated that all the examination centres were empty with only a few supervisors, Area Education Officers of councils and security men in sight.

Investigation also revealed that rumour had been milling around Ado-Ekiti, the state capital, since Sunday that all the 39 designated centres had been laced with fetish substances.

FCT

An Abuja Senior Magistrates’ Court on Monday sentenced one Collins Kelechi of Ako Estate, Abuja, to eight months’ imprisonment for damaging the property of one Mrs Ipole Chinwe of the same address. He was sentenced on a two-count charge of wrongful restraint and mischief.

The Presiding Magistrate, Aliyu Shafa, said the sentence followed the convict’s confession that he committed the offence. He sentenced the convict to two months’ imprisonment with an option of N2000 for the offence of wrongful restraint.

Shafa also sentenced the convict to six months’ imprisonment for the offence of mischief with an option of N2000 fine and ordered that the sentences should run concurrently.

Earlier, the Police Prosecutor, Paul Anigbo, had told the court that the case was reported by Chinwe on June 17, 2010.

Jigawa

Some residents of Dutse in Jigawa have observed that the environment has become filthy since the commencement of rainy season and called for an immediate action to clear it.

A cross section of residents in Dutse on Monday said that many places in the town were stinking due to heaps of waste.

A resident of Gidan-dubu, Malam Sule Adamu, complained that the streets were littered with polythene materials and drains with refuse and other garbage.

Another resident, whogave his name as Rabiu Sabo, said faeces carelessly disposed in polythene bags was polluting the environment.

Sabo expressed fears that, if such wastes continued to be disposed indiscriminately, inhabitants would be exposed to diseases.

Katsina

The Katsina State Commissioner for Education, Prof. Aminu Gado, said on Monday that the State Government has ordered the recruitment of 200 casual workers to serve as security guards in schools.

Kado made the disclosure when he paid a courtesy call on the state’s Commissioner of Police, Alhaji Abdullahi Magaji, in his office in Katsina.

He said the measure had become necessary to stop rampant cases of stealing of facilities in the 56 secondary schools in the state.

Kado also directed each of the 36 Local Government Areas in the state to post four security guards to its schools and praised the state’s police command for recovering items worth millions of naira stolen from the 56 secondary schools.

Kebbi

The Kebbi Government has inaugurated an 18-member committee to prepare a position paper on the review of the 1999 Constitution.

The Deputy Governor, Alhaji Ibrahim Aliyu, inaugurated the committee in Birnin Kebbi on Monday.

He  urged the committee to deliberate on wide-ranging issues, adding that the committee’s proposals would be expected in two weeks.

“Among the issues to be deliberated are devolution of powers, creation of states, role of traditional rulers, fiscal federalism, immunity clause, rotation of executive offices as well as residency and indigene provisions.’’

Kogi

The Kogi Government has appointed Prof Olugbenro Jegede, the pioneer Vice Chancellor of National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN), as the Secretary to the State Government.

Jegede, whose appointment is contained in a statement issued in Lokoja on Monday, replaced Alhaji Musa Ahmadu, who held the office since 2005.

The statement, signed by the Special Adviser to the Governor on Media and Strategy, Mr Jacob Edi, said the appointment of Jegede, an indigene of Ogori in Kogi Central Senatorial District, took immediate effect.

Jegede is the Secretary -General of the Association of African Universities with headquarters in Accra.

Kwara

The Kwara Government on Monday blamed its late payment of salaries of government workers on the delay in the release of statutory allocation from the Federation Account.

Mr Demola Banu, the state Commissioner for Finance, told newsmen in Ilorin that the Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) was supposed to meet on 13th of every month while disbursement of funds to states was to be made within a week.

“The money will be transferred to the respective states so that they would be able to meet their commitments, but the meeting for sometime now has been held on 20th, 28th at times. “ This had been causing delay in the payment of salaries,’’ the commissioner said.

The delay, he added, was responsible for the late payment of pension.

He also explained that the state had a major challenge in the payment of local government staff in May, saying:

Nasarawa

The Nasarawa State chapter of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has criticised Gov Umaru Almakura over his plan to build a N1 billion airport in Lafia.

The state Chairman of the party, Mr Yunana Iliya, made the criticism while addressing newsmen, shortly after an expanded executive meeting of the party in Lafia on Monday.

He said the airport project was elitist as it would serve the interest of only about 1 per cent of the state population.

“As far as PDP is concerned, we wish to lend our voice to the cry of our people who oppose the construction of an airport in Lafia. “This is an elitist project; those who will use the airport will constitute less than 0.01 per cent of our population,” he said.

Iliya said that in a state, such as Nasarawa State, where most of the people were peasant farmers, the money for the proposed airport would be more useful in the improvement of agriculture and construction of rural roads.

Oyo

The Under-Secretary in charge of African Affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Amb. Adamu Abas, says some state governments in the North are not doing enough to combat the effects of climate change.

   Abas said in Ibadan that such states ought to do more because the effects, especially that of desertification, was more pronounced in the North.

He, however, commended Lagos which, though a southern state without problem of desertification, had planted four million trees.

Abas said the Federal Government had carried out many initiatives across the country to curb the effects of climate change.  “What we need to do now is to encourage the states to do more, “ Abas said.

Plateau

The police in Plateau on Monday confirmed that two bombs were discovered in the premises of a hostel at the University of Jos on Sunday.

The Police Commissioner, Mr Emmanuel Ayeni, said the officers were able to detonate one of the bombs while the second exploded, injuring no person.

He said: “when my officers and men with the Anti-Bomb Squad arrived in the scene, they were able to detonate the second bomb and luckily, the one that exploded did not harm anybody or cause damage to the hostel block.’’

Ayeni said that although the police had begun investigation, no suspect had been arrested, describing the incident as criminal.

Yobe

The Yobe Youth Network for Justice (YYJ) has challenged Senators representing the three senatorial districts in the state to emulate Sen.Ahmed Lawal, of Yobe North in the execution of development projects.

The group’s Chairman, Bashir Tahir, who made the remark in an interview on Monday in Damaturu said that the state was proud of Lawal’s performance in debating issues on the development  of the state, especially the creation of shelter belt and proposed constructions of earth dams.

“ We have also acknowledged his outstanding role as Chairman, Senate Committee on Public Accounts in the National Assembly,” he said.

The chairman, however, listed the award of scholarship to150 students of tertiary institutions, execution of water projects in 56 villages and 900 Youth Empowerment Projects as some of his excellent achievements in the state.

Zamfara

The Zamfara House of Assembly has passed 10 bills and 29 resolutions since its inauguration in June last year, the Speaker, Alhaji Sanusi Rikiji, said, at a news conference to mark one year of the assembly.

He said the house also adopted reports of 16 committees set up to investigate some aspects of the state administration.

He said some of the bills were those for the enactment of laws for the establishment of the state agency for the control of HIV/AIDS, debt management, cotton development agency and the 2012 budget.