Wednesday, May 28, 2014

Photo of the Month: Brave Borno Women Take Up Arms Against Boko Haram

Brave women of Borno state in north eastern Nigeria have decided to take up arms to fight against Boko Haram terrorists who have attacked and killed thousands of people and also kidnapped hundreds of school girls, including the 276 female students kidnapped overnight on April 14-15, 2014 from their dormitory at the Government Secondary School in the town of Chibok in Borno State.

Tuesday, May 27, 2014

#BringBackOurGirls: Why Hashtag Activism Has Its Critics

Photo Credit: SKY NEWS.

The social media campaign is raising awareness but also raising criticism over what's been dubbed "hashtag activism" from the West.

UN Imposes Sanctions on Terror Group Boko Haram

LONDON, 22 May 2014 / PRNewswire Africa / - Foreign Secretary welcomes addition of Boko Haram on UN sanctions list.

On 22 May, the UN Security Council's Al Qaida Sanctions Committee approved the addition of Boko Haram to its list of groups subject to financial and arms sanctions. The UK has shown its strong support for securing the listing and co-sponsored Nigeria's proposal.

Under the terms of the sanctions list it is now an offence for any individual or entity to provide financial or material support to Boko Haram, including the provision of arms or recruits.

The Foreign Secretary, William Hague said:
I welcome the listing of Boko Haram by the UN Security Council's Al Qaida Sanctions Committee. Boko Haram is an inhumane organisation who have no respect for religion or belief or a persons' right to decide their way of life. Attacks by these violent extremists are causing suffering in communities across Nigeria.
Britain was the first country to proscribe Boko Haram and was pleased to support Nigeria's demand that the UN take action. At the Paris Summit on Security in Nigeria, Nigeria's neighbours, the UK, US and EU all agreed to pursue sanctions against Boko Haram at the UN. This demonstrates the international community's support for Nigeria's efforts to tackle terrorism.

SOURCE UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office

Boko Haram, Nigerian group that kidnapped schoolgirls, put on UN terror sanctions list

NEW YORK, 23 May 2014 / PRNewswire Africa / - The United Nations Security Council has added Boko Haram, the Nigerian militant group that has claimed responsibility for the abduction of more than 200 schoolgirls in mid-April, to its list of Al-Qaida associates subject to financial sanctions and an arms embargo.
In its designation, the Council's Al Qaida Sanctions Committee listed the Islamist group, the name of which roughly translates as “Western education is a sin,” as an affiliate of AQIM, the Organization of Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, and named its leader as Abubakar Shekau.

In addition to targeting schools such as the one in Chibok where the girls were abducted, raising a global outcry, Boko Haram has carried out numerous attacks in recent years against police, religious leaders, politicians and public and international institutions, indiscriminately killing civilians and sacking entire towns.
The UN has prepared an integrated support package for the victims and families of the mass abduction, following the visit of a high-level representative of the Secretary-General to Nigeria from 12 to 15 May.

SOURCE UN News Centre

Top News

Posted at 15:19 WAT NEAH GES Announces Lead Sponsorship of the West Africa Oil & Gas Security Summit in Lagos, Nigeria on the 18th-19th of June 2014

Happy Children's Day Message: Save Our Children

May we give our children a brighter and greater future wherever they are and no matter the circumstances of their birth on earth.

Photo Credit: Chido Onumah.

Sunday, May 25, 2014

Clarion Chukwura, Chika Anadu, Teco Benson and Bob Manuel Win 2014 AMAA Awards

Accomplished Nigerian actress Clarion Chukwura was the reigning diva in the constellation of stars Saturday night at the 10th Africa Movie Academy Awards (AMAA) as she won the coveted award for Best Actress In A Leading Role for her role in “Apaye”. The event held at the Dr. Gabriel Okara Cultural Centre in Yenagoa, the capital city of Bayelsa state. Another top Nollywood actress Patience Ozokwo won the Award for Best Actress In A Supporting Role for her role in “After the Proposal.” Emerging young Nigerian filmmaker Chika Anadu, Breakthrough Award winning first feature “B for Boy” won two awards for Best Film In An African Language and Best Film For Women Empowerment. One of the best directors in Nollywood, Teco Benson’s new movie “Accident” won the Bayelsa State Government Endowed Award For Best Nigerian Film. One of the foremost actors in Nollywood, Bob Manuel won the 2014 AMAA Lifetime Achievement Award.

South Africa won most of the awards, including the most coveted 2014 Award For Best Film with Of Good Report by Jamil X.T Quebeka that also won Award For Achievement In Screen Play, Award For Best Director and Award For Best Actor In A Leading Role for Mothusi Magan.

The following is the full list of winners.

EFERE OZAKO AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST SHORT FILM: Dialemi – Gabon

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST ANIMATION: Khumba – South Africa

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST DOCUMENTARY: Hamu Beya- The Sand Fishers – Mali and Potraits of a Lone Farmer – Nigeria/Denmark

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST FILM IN AN AFRICAN LANGUAGE: B for Boy – Nigeria

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST DIASPORA SHORT: Passage – Bahamas

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST DIASPORA DOCUMENTARY: Through the Lens Darkly : Black Photographers and the Emergence of a People – USA

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST DIASPORA FEATURE: Kingston Paradise – Jamaica

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR ACHIEVEMENT IN PRODUCTION DESIGN: Northern Affair – Ghana

AMAA 2014 ACHIEVEMENT IN COSTUME DESIGN: Ni Sisi – Kenya

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR ACHIEVEMENT IN MAKE-UP: Once Upon A Road Trip – South Africa

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR ACHIEVEMENT IN SOUNDTRACK: Onye Ozi

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR ACHIEVEMENT IN VISUAL EFFECT: A Mile From Home

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR ACHIEVEMENT IN SOUND: The Forgotten Kingdom

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR ACHIEVEMENT IN CINEMATOGRAPHY: The Forgotten Kingdom

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR ACHIEVEMENT IN EDITING: Potomanto

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR ACHIEVEMENT IN SCREEN PLAY: Of Good Report

AMAA 2014- BAYELSA STATE GOVERNMENT ENDOWED AWARD FOR BEST NIGERIAN FILM: Accident

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST CHILD ACTOR: Lebohang Ntsane – Forgotten Kingdom

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST YOUNG/ PROMISING ACTOR: Petronella Tshuma – Of Good Report

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE: Thapelo Mofekeng – Felix

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE: Patience Ozokwo – After the Proposal

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE: Mothusi Magano – Of Good Report

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE: Clarion Chukwura – Apaye

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST FIRST FEATURE FILM BY A DIRECTOR: Harrikrishna & Sharvan Anenden – The Children of Troumaron

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST DIRECTOR: Jamil X.T Quebeka – Of Good Report (South Africa)

AMAA 2014 AWARD FOR BEST FILM: Of Good Report – South Africa

MADIBA Award: Ni Sisi – Kenya

BEST FILM FOR WOMEN EMPOWERMENT: B For Boy – Nigeria

SPECIAL JURY AWARD: New Horizon – Nigeria

LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT: Bob Manuel

COMING SOON

Saturday, May 24, 2014

Lest We Forget, They Are Only Repeating History

(Emir of Kano Ado Bayero (R) welcomes President Goodluck Jonathan during his visit to the northern city of Kano January 22, 2012, following bomb attacks that took place on Friday. REUTERS/Stringer).

Ignorance kills
Defiance kills.

The widespread violence destroying lives and properties in the Middle Belt and Northern Nigeria is caused by general ignorance, because the victims are ignorant and not vigilant after several recurrent attacks by the same terrorists who are only repeating the terrible atrocities of their predecessors.
These people have not changed the script of their mission and only modified it.

What most people did not know and more people still don't know today is the fact that the first military coup led by mostly young Igbo - officers on January 15, 1966 was meant to stop a jihad.
Northern Nigerian Muslims had planned a jihad on the same day of the coup. And the massacres of the Christian Igbos in the Middle Belt and northern Nigeria would have happened whether the bloody coup of Major Patrick Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu, (1937–1967) took place or not.
And the counter- coup on the 29th of July, 1966 that claimed the life of General Aguiyi Ironsi was just part of their script in the jihad they had planned.

We must be prepared for every chapter of their script and the solution is we must not be ignorant of them, because they have caught us unawares many times when we allowed Satan to get an advantage of us: for we have been ignorant of his devices.
We must be ready and be vigilant 24/7.

We must comb all motor parks and other terminals, markets, shopping malls, schools and other places used by mostly non-Muslims.
Monitor the movements of their people and whenever you notice that they have been keeping away from these same places, then beware of them.
They are more vigilant than us, and that has caused us collateral damages of innocent lives and destruction of our properties worth billions of dollars since 1966 to date.

Friday, May 23, 2014

Yoweri Museveni Mocks Nigeria's Failure to Deal With Boko Haram

President Yoweri Kaguta Museven of Uganda.

“I have never called the United Nations to guard your security. Me, Yoweri Museveni to say that I have failed to protect my people and I call in the UN….I would rather hang myself. We prioritized national security by developing a strong army, otherwise our Uganda would be like DRC, South Sudan, Somalia or Nigeria where militias have disappeared with school children."

PS: Uganda was once besieged by Joseph Kony's Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), which operated in northern Uganda like the Boko Haram is currently on rampage in northern Nigeria.

Top Reports

Posted at 02:49 WAT UN's West Africa envoy strongly condemns double bombings in Nigeria
Posted at 02:25 WAT NIGERIA: CORRUPTION AND INSECURITY
Posted at 01:59 WAT Canada Deeply Concerned by Growing Acts of Terrorism in Nigeria
Posted at 01:47 WAT Statement attributable to the Spokesman for the Secretary-General on recent attacks in Nigeria

Thursday, May 22, 2014

Nigeria Versus Boko Haram: Is This The Second Nigerian Civil War?

Boko Haram soldiers.

Nigeria is at war, whether you accept this reality or not.
The first Nigerian civil war was caused by military coups and secession of the Eastern region. The rest of the Federal Republic of Nigeria against the united Igbo nation of Biafra. And lasted for three years. And it was a conventional war. But the current civil war is a different kind of war with an army of guerrillas of the Congregation of the People of Tradition for Proselytism and Jihad (Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati Wal-Jihad) popularly known as Boko Haram sponsored by those opposed to the election and administration of President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan. And as foreign mercenaries were recruited to fight for Biafra, foreign mercenaries are also being recruited to fight for the Congregation of the People of Tradition for Proselytism and Jihad (Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati Wal-Jihad) with the mission to institute an Islamic Republic governed by Sharia Laws in northern Nigeria if they fail to have their own Hausa Fulani or Kanuri Muslim leader as the next President of Nigeria.

The political momentum of Boko Haram started with the widespread violence following the presidential election of 16th April 2011 won by President Goodluck Jonathan of the ruling People's Democratic Party (PDP) whom the tribal and religious bigots in the predominantly Islamic north wanted to handover the government to another northern Muslim leader to complete the remaining tenure of the late President Umaru Yar'Adua in the rotation of political power between the Muslim north and Christian south in the lingering north-south dichotomy.
The fact is if President Goodluck Jonathan had not contested that presidential election, and simply allowed only northern Muslim leaders to contest and take over power, there would not have been violent protests by the Muslims in northern Nigeria and the insurgency of the Boko Haram would not have been ignited.

The aggrieved Muslim political leaders encouraged the Boko Haram with unpatriotic threats that motivated thousands of Islamic fundamentalists in the northern states to become willing recruits of the Boko Haram to make Nigeria ungovernable for the administration of President Jonathan. In fact, the immediate former National Chairman of the People's Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Bamanga Tukur called the Boko Haram terrorists "freedom fighters" fighting for their rights. Such contradictory utterances and nonchalant position of prominent Muslim political leaders have exposed their neutrality or complicity in the escalations of the incessant attacks of the Boko Haram terrorists in the northern region and Middle Belt of Nigeria that is fast becoming like the Middle East with horrifying and terrifying bombings and raids claiming thousands of lives and destroying properties worth billions of naira.
How many northern Muslim leaders and Islamic clerics have you heard or seen condemning these horrific terrorist attacks?

Nigerian Army going to the war front.

Many northern Muslim soldiers have been found among the Boko Haram terrorists and over nine military generals are under investigation for suspicious unpatriotic activities. The Nigerian government and the United States have confirmed the complicity of several elements in the Nigerian Armed Forces. Therefore, there is no longer a united Nigerian Armed Forces to fight for the rest of the country against the rebellion of the Boko Haram forces of northern Nigeria.

An Open Message and Challenge To Abubakar Shekau and Boko Haram

If Abubakar Shekau and his army of terrorists really hate Western Education, then they should not use Western weapons, vehicles, phones and clothes.
They should reject everything of Western Civilization.
But as their photograph shows, they cannot do without using products and instruments of Western Education. And this is a contradiction of the mission of their jihad. So, they are not honest to God by condemning Western Education, but are using Western civilization to destroy innocent lives and properties. They are contradicting the hadiths of Islam.
May the Allah they believe in do unto them and their people what they are doing to other people. For God will surely treat us as we treat others; for we reap whatever we sow. For this is the law of harvest according to the prophets.

Two Parents of Missing Chibok School Girls Die of Heart Attack

Two of the parents of the over 267 Chibok school girls kidnapped by Boko Haram terrorists have died of heart attack caused by grief.
One of the parents, a father of eight, whose two daughters were among the over 200 schoolgirls abducted in Chibok, Mr. Mutai Hona, died of heart attack as a result of high blood pressure, BP.
Another parent, Madam Mary Lalai of Mbulabam village in Chibok Local Government Area died earlier of heart attack on hearing the news of her daughter’s abduction.

The news of Mr. Hona’s death was announced by his brother, Mr. James Yama. Yama, in an interview with newsmen in Maiduguri, said the deceased who was hale and hearty died last Sunday of psychological trauma when he realised that none of his two abducted daughters were among those shown in the video clip earlier released by the sect leader, Abubakar Shekau.

Late Hona, aged 56, survived by two widows, has been buried in Chibok.
Yama disclosed that most of the parents were neither eating nor sleeping due to psychological trauma.
He said: “We are suffering in silence. One of my brothers, Mr. Mutai Hona, whose two daughters were among those abducted, died last Sunday as a result of heart attack.

“Since the incident, he had not been eating well, before he developed high blood pressure.
- See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2014/05/48-killed-fresh-borno-attacks/#sthash.sWFr1Cg0.dpuf

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