The Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, has said his government is committed to the development of a new airport in Auchi, after it got tentative approval from the Federal Government.
Briefing journalists in Auchi, Obaseki noted that the government was working with aviation experts to finalise the survey of the airport project.
He said;
“The charting of the airport is already ongoing to ensure the safety measures required for approval of the airport project as safety is the main consideration. We want to make sure that the approaches for landing on the airport runway are clear and safe for landing and will not endanger the aircraft.
“These are the final reports and studies that are being conducted and as soon as we get final approval, we will break ground and commence construction of the Auchi Airport.”
He added;
“This is not a political project. Between Benin City and Abuja on this axis, which is more than 600 km, there is no airport. From the transportation standpoint, it makes a lot of commercial sense to have an airport in Edo North.
More importantly, there are emerging businesses, particularly in the areas of mining and academia. There are two cement companies producing over six million tonnes of cement on this axis. There are a lot of activities to support an airport in this area.”
The Edo State government, yesterday, said seven persons, including two traditional heads, have been arrested over the Igueben train kidnap in the state, while the last two victims have been rescued.
Edo State Commissioner for Communication and Orientation, Chris Nehikhare, who addressed newsmen after the first weekly State Executive Council meeting of the year, said:
“We are pleased to announce that the last two victims have been rescued and seven suspects are in custody, including two village chiefs. We thank the press for the support they have given in the last few weeks.”
Nehikhare, flanked by the Special Adviser to Governor Obaseki on Media Projects, Crusoe Osagie, decried the neglect by the Federal Government on the recent outbreak of Lassa fever prevalent in about three local government areas of the state and appealed to international donor agencies and groups to come to its aid.
Nehikhare also announced a deadline for all those involved in sound making activities especially those closed to schools and residential areas to install sound proof systems in their facilities.He said:
“The state government has tried everything within its powers to check this Lasser fever outbreak. We have reached out to Federal Government but to all intents and purposes, Federal Government has abandoned the Edo State government and its people on this issue.
“As of today, we have over 50 people infected with this disease in Edo and we have a five percent case fertility rate, which is very high compared to COVID-19.
“With all pleads and entreaties to Federal Government on this challenging issue, they apparently just fell on deaf ears and this particularly is disheartening, especially as the current Minister of Health is from Edo State.
“Having hit a brick wall, we are constrained to reach out to international intervention agencies such as World Health Organisation, WHO; United Nations Children Fund, UNICEF and any other international organisation that have the mandate to intervene in infectious diseases outbreak.
“As a government, we have written several letters to the Ministry of Health to the Centre for Disease Control, to all the people involved in health issues to come and intervene and join the state to fight this outbreak but unfortunately they have abandoned us.
“We want the international agencies to intervene quickly before the situation gets worse. We have reached out to some of these agencies and we thank them for the efforts they are providing right now.”
The President of Igueben Area Customary Court, Mrs Precious Aigbonoga, was kidnapped on Monday morning in Ugoneki, on her way to court in Igueben Local Government Area, Edo State.
In a press release by the Nigeria Bar Association Publicity Secretary, Festus Usiobaifo, he said the NBA was working closely with the Edo State Police Command to ensure Aigbonoga regained her freedom from the kidnappers.
The statement read;
“The President of Igueben Area Customary Court, Mrs Precious Aigbonoga, was kidnapped on Monday morning around Ugoneki area, on her way to court in Igueben Local Government Area, Edo State.
“She is the wife of our colleague, Mr. Afebu Aigbonoga, the Peoples Democratic Party candidate, Etsako West Constituency 1.
“The Chairman of the Lion Bar, Chief Nosa Edo-Osagie, is deeply saddened by this news and condemns, in strong terms, the worrisome insensitivity of these bandits in kidnapping Mrs. Precious Aigbonoga; an easygoing, gentle, and hardworking judicial officer.
“The executive of the NBA is in close touch with the Commissioner of Police, Mohammed Dankwara. By the grace of God Almighty, His Honour shall be rescued unhurt, and the bandits brought to book, Amen.
“Let us keep His Honour in our prayers, please,” the statement added.
The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has arrested a 25-year-old pregnant woman, Haruna Favour, with 82 pinches of methamphetamine in Auchi, Edo state.
Favour was arrested on Friday, September 9, with methamphetamine and various quantities of Loud, Arizona, and Colorado variants of cannabis and codeine-based cough syrup.
The Director of Media and Advocacy of NDLEA, Femi Babafemi, confirmed the arrest on Sunday, September 11.
Also, in Kogi State, a suspect, Paul Ali, aged 47, was arrested on the Okene-Abuja highway with 1,404 bottles of Codeine based syrup weighing 190.94kg and 2,040 ampoules of pentazocine injection coming from Onitsha, Anambra State to Sokoto State.
The Edo State Governor, Mr Godwin Obaseki, has said the government will begin the arrest and prosecution of parents and guardians of out-of-school children from the next academic session which begins on September 12, 2022.
Obaseki told journalists in Benin on Monday that arrangements had been concluded for the enforcement.He said,
“If we find any child under the age of 18 years being used for manual labour, such parents will be prosecuted.
We thank the Chief Judge for providing special courts which will be used to prosecute any offender who perpetrates violence against any child or involves in sexual defilement or physical abuse in our school system.
“From September 12, when school resumes, any child found loitering or hawking during school hours will be arrested and the parents or guardians will be prosecuted and seriously dealt with.
We have specially trained people to observe and watch over our children to ensure no child is abused in Edo State.
“School resumes on Monday, September 12, 2022, and teaching must commence the same day. I will send out a special squad to monitor schools across the State; I will also monitor the schools myself, alongside with the Commissioner of Education.”
Harping on the infrastructure development in schools across the state, Obaseki said,
“I have instructed the Ministry of Education to demolish all dilapidated buildings in our schools.“For those schools that are dilapidated, we will move the students to other schools and rebuild the schools.
“We will be spending a lot of resources to ensure no child sits on the ground to learn. By the time the Commissioner of Education will be completing her term, no Edo child should sit on the ground to learn.
“Commencing from September 12 when the new school calendar will start, I have also directed the Ministry of Education to set up a cleanup system to clean all Edo Schools.”
Operatives of the Edo State Police Command have rescued a kidnapped woman and killed a suspect in Uzala Forest, Egba Community, in the Benin area of the state.
The Deputy Police Public Relations Officer, Jennifer Iwegbu, who disclosed this in a statement on Tuesday, August 23, said the rescue operation was successful due to vital information given to the police by the victim’s husband, Aisosa Moses.
“The Edo State Police Command in its continuous fight against heinous crimes especially kidnapping, on August 22, 2022, rescued a kidnapped victim,” the PPRO said.
“This feat was achieved following a complaint by one Mr Aisosa Moses of Ayaen Community, Edo State. He stated that while returning home with his wife and daughter, two hoodlums suspected to be kidnappers ambushed them at the entrance of their house and whisked away his wife into the bush.
“Operatives of the command immediately mobilised and embarked on intensive bush combing for possible arrest of the kidnappers and rescue operation.
“The operatives trailed the kidnappers to their hide-out at Uzala Forest where the suspects, on sighting the team of operatives, attempted to escape through the bush, but the battle-ready and vigilant operatives, neutralised one while the other escaped with gunshot injuries, abandoning the victim who was rescued unhurt.”
Iwegbu said the state Commissioner of Police, Abutu Yaro, urged residents to go about their daily businesses and appealed to them to continue to collaborate with the command to rid criminals and their cohorts in the state.
With the controversy generated over the discovery of 20 mummified bodies in Benin still on, Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki has called for calm and has given the police seven days to carry out a comprehensive investigation to unravel the ownership and purpose of the facility.
Obaseki stated this at a joint press conference with the police at the headquarters of the Edo State Police Command on Friday.
Represented by his Special Adviser on Media Projects, Crusoe Osagie, Obaseki said the public would continuously be briefed on the progress of the investigations.
He said:
“We want to call for calm from the public. We don’t want to preempt the outcome of police investigation but the police are actively doing their investigations.
There are a lot of speculations going around; some people suspect that the place is a quack morgue or a place for ritual purposes.
“People have been apprehended and they are undergoing questioning. Some people are still being looked for. The governor has given seven days for them to come back to us with the details of what they have found out. Was it just a morgue or is there any ritual involved? No conclusions have been reached yet so police will be allowed to do its work.
“We are going to continuously brief the public and we are also taking measures through the Ministry of Health to ensure that there is no public health crisis in that area. Edo is safe and there is no evidence yet that anything ritual is involved until the police are through with their investigation.”
On his part, the Deputy Commissioner of Police, SCID, Olawore Oluwole who is handling the investigation assured that the police would do a thorough job.
He said, “Based on credible intelligence, a bungalow located at Asoro was found to have some dried bodies and some items like generator, gas cylinder, oxygen cylinder.
Five suspects were arrested and they are Chimaobi Okoewu and Samuel Okoh both from Ebonyi State, Gideon Sunday from Akwa-Ibom, Victor Obeche from Anambra and Yusuf Lawal from Katsina State.
“So far, we are still looking for one of the suspects and efforts are being made to get him and his name is Otu Chukwu who is alleged to be the owner of the bungalow.
I want to appeal to all members of the public to remain calm as the command is assuring that everything will be done to ensure that all hidden facts are unraveled,” he added.
There was a mild drama, on Thursday, August 18, when one Osaro Nappiar, ‘identified his mother’s corpse’ at the recently discovered ritualist den where 20 mummified bodies were recovered in an uncompleted building at Ekenhua road in Benin City.
Recall that on Wednesday, August 17, the state police command uncovered the building which residents described as a den of ritualists.
Speaking with journalists at the scene on Thursday, the command’s spokesperson, SP, Chidi Nwabuzor, said the man told the police that he actually deposited his late mother’s corpse at a mortuary ran by one Chukwu Otu as he was looking for funds for a befitting burial.
“The man clarified that the owner of the place who is on the run (Otu) was operating somewhere at 1st East Circular Road, Benin City where his mother’s corpse was deposited.”
Nwabuzor said Nwabuzor said Nappiar told the police that his mother died at a hospital at Uselu last year so he took the corpse to Otu’s because he had no money for the burial.
Nappiar said when he raised the money, he went to the place but was told Otu had relocated to Ekenwan road, Asoro area, and when he got there, they asked him to produce evidence of the corpse deposited there, but he was not with a card earlier given to him.
“As he was unable to produce the card, they asked him to come on another day and that was why he came down here.
He has produced the card and that card is now with the police” he said.
Nwabuzor said four suspects who were arrested have been helping the police in their investigation.
Meanwhile, one of the suspects, Gideon Friday, denied any involvement in the alleged ritualistic act. He said he only came to check whether his application for the position of a driver had been granted.
“So when I got there to ask for the director, some community people came and started beating me without listening to my story and later took me to the station.”
However, SP Nwabuzor said such a place could not have been a mortuary, as a mortuary ought to have a signboard, not a shrine stained with blood.
Gunmen have kidnapped five grassroots female footballers and owner of Itugbe Queens football club, Precious Agbajor in Uronigbe, Orhiomwon Local Government Area of Edo State.
The victims were kidnapped at the border town between Edo and Delta State while returning from a football tournament at Owa-Alero in the Ika North-East Local Government Area of Delta State on Friday, August 12, 2022.
A source from the locality, who confirmed the incident, said that the abductors had contacted the families of the victims, demanding a sum of N5m ransom each for the victims.
“They (footballers) went to Owa-Alero to play a football match. On their way back, they were kidnapped at the Uronigbe area, the boundary between Delta and Edo states,” the source disclosed.
“The victims include Mrs Precious Agbajor, one Abraham, Nancy, Beatrice, and the driver. They are six in number that are in the kidnapper’s den. The matter has been reported to Uronigbe police station. The kidnappers have contacted the family of Agbajor and asked them to pay N5 million for his wife”, the source added.
Spokesperson of the Delta State Police Command, DSP Bright Edafe, confirmed the kidnapping incident, adding that the abduction happened in Edo.
But his Edo State counterpart, Chidi Nwabuzor, when contacted, said from the record available at the State Command, that there was no information about the incident.
“You know, we transmit our records to Force Headquarters everyday. There is no record of that before us. From the Command’s record, no such incident happened yesterday (Friday), so the police will not give an account of anything unreported.” said Nwabuzor.
Deputy Governor of Edo State Philip Shaibu has kicked against the bill seeking to switch the Minimum Wage from the Exclusive Legislative List to the Concurrent List.
In an interview with reporters on Thursday, March 4, in Benin, Shaibu advised the sponsor of the bill to step it down.
According to him, rather than sponsor such a bill, the lawmaker should move motions and sponsor bills that will support programmes geared towards finding lasting solutions to the problems of insecurity in the country.
He said: “Let us all discuss the issue of insecurity and make our cities, communities, and country secure.”
The deputy governor highlighted the need for lawmakers to legislate on issues that would unite the country rather than those that would further divide it and bring about chaos.
He noted that this was not the time to bring up issues as contained in the bill.
He, therefore, urged the National Assembly to concern itself with the issue of insecurity.
According to him, the issue of the economy is all about security, and no investor will come to your land if he is not sure of the safety of his investment.
He said: “The economy of this country needs to work.
“That is why all of us, the legislative and the executive arms, need to actually come together to fashion a way forward, to deal with the issue of insecurity.
“For me, when you seek first all the indices that make an economy work, then prosperity will be the order of the day and all other smaller issues will be dealt with.
“But when your economy is in shambles, then obviously, poverty will reign supreme”.
Ripples Nigeria had reported that the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has scheduled next Wednesday for a national protest against the bill, which had already passed through the first reading at the National Assembly
Public primary schools in Edo State are to resume unfailingly by February 1, 2020, the state government has announced.
The government warned that any teacher who fails to resume will be sanctioned.
The Secretary to the State Government, Osarodion Ogie Esq., disclosed this in a statement while adding that the “government has activated the No Work, No Pay policy.”
The statement read, “This is to inform all parents, teachers and the general public that all public primary schools in Edo State shall resume full activities on Monday 1st February 2021.
“Parents are expected to make their children and wards ready for resumption on this date. The Edo State Government wishes to reemphasize that all public school teachers and head teachers are required to be present in their various schools.
“Failure to resume work would be considered a forfeiture of salary as the government has activated the No Work, No Pay policy.”
Ogie further said, “Head teachers and teachers who are desirous of staying away from work in support of the sponsored strike action by certain elements of the Edo State Branch of the National Union of Teachers, are required to hand over all school property in their custody to their respective Education Secretaries.
“The Edo State Government through the Edo State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) is collaborating with the relevant security agencies to ensure the protection of all public schools and any willful destruction of government property will be met with criminal prosecution to the fullest extent of the law.”
The directive followed the planned protests by the Nigeria Union of Teachers in the state on February 1.
The Union says the state government has failed to meet its 10-points demands.
Governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo has said that schools in the state will remain closed until Feb. 1, as the state grapples with the second wave of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Obaseki stated this at a news conference on Friday in Benin, as most states across the federation gear up to reopen schools on January 18.
”We have decided that schools will not reopen for now; this situation will be reviewed by Feb. 1. ”We will like our own schools to reopen on Feb. 1, depending on the situation at that point in time.
“Between now and that time, we will be going round to make sure that these schools have running water. “We want to ensure spacing for the children are in place and we want to ensure that they have temperature checks at the entrance of each school. “Each classroom should not hold more than 30 per cent of the students; all of that is being worked out by the Ministry of Education and the Edo State Universal Basic Education Board (EDOSUBEB).
Obaseki
“Within the next two weeks, we should be able to finalise plans to allow children go back to school. “In the meantime, we will reactivate EdoBest at home. You will recall that during the first wave, we were able to creat over 9,000 virtual classrooms for these children to learn,” Obaseki said. The governor expressed hope that the children would not stay at home longer than was expected. He said that there was the possibility of introducing break after every hour to enable students to go out and get fresh air.
“We will not relocate markets as we did in the first time. We will work with market associations to ensure that we continue fumigation of the markets on an ongoing basis. “All markets and shops must ensure they have running water, soaps and hand sanitiser at the entrance. We are working on alternative opening days for stores in the markets. “We will introduce no-face-mask, no-entry policy in every market and store in Edo.
“Anybody found not complying with these protocols will be subjected to community service, no matter how highly placed, and he or she will become an ex convict. “We have also seen 10 and a half increase in the number of older people who are infected with the virus. ”Research has also shown that more children and youths are infected by this virus at this point in time. “As at yesterday, we had 46 new cases, bringing the total number to 3,189 confirmed cases,” he stated.
According to him, in the last 46 days, Edo has recorded 493 new cases, 214 recovery and 12 deaths. He said that the non compliance to COVID-19 safety protocols had been largely responsible to the wide spread during the second wave. The governor noted that in view of that, 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew had been reactivated in the state, adding that the state had the logistics and human capacity to respond to the pandemic.
He appealed to all worship centers to ensure that children under 12 and the elderly were not allowed to attend services, following the prevalence of the disease. “Religious gathering should not last for more than one hour. Where there are more than one service, there should be an hour interval to allow for decontamination. “Event centers should not admit more than 30 per cent of their capacity, while hotels should shut down their swimming pools and restaurant operators should encourage take away,” he said.
Speaking during the news conference, the state Epidemiologist, Dr Greg Oko-Oboh, called on anybody with fever to go to the nearest center for screening. Also speaking, the Deputy Governor, Mr Philip Shaibu, called on passengers to put on their face masks before boarding vehicles. He said that failure to do so would attract sanctions to both the drivers and the passengers.
A 70-year-old Edo chief, Clement Garuba, has urged the state panel of inquiry for into police brutality to compel the police to compensate him after tear gas left him blind on January 13 this year.
Garuba stated that life had been difficult for him since he became blind due to the negligence of the police officers.
He said, “We were having a meeting in our village in Ekpesa community, in the Akoko-Edo Local Government Area when some policemen stormed the gathering and shot tear gas into my eyes. “The police also arrested my fellow chiefs and I and took us to the station where we were detained for three days.
“Before the incidents, I was seeing with my two eyes, going to the farm and taking care of my nine children and my wife but now, I can’t. I am suffering.”
He said he decided to approach the panel for compensation, as well as invite the police officers who detained him and his fellow chiefs, so that they could face the full wrath of the law.
A tragic incident was recorded in Benin, Edo state’s capital ,Nigeria on Friday October 9, as 7 members of a family died of food poisioning.
The Nation reported that the incident occurred at Number 4k0, Otete Street, off Textile Mill Road, Ogida Quarters, Benin, in Egor Local Government Area of Edo state.
Mrs Christy Igbinadolor whose apartment is opposite the house of the victims, said the corpses were discovered shortly after a man came to ask her about the victims while she was studying the Bible. She told him to knock on the door and report to a nearby police station if he gets no response.
After the man returned with the police and broke down the door, some of the victims were found dead while others who were unconscious were rushed to the Edo state government-owned Central Hospital Benin.
The head of the family said to be an evangelist who lost his pastor wife five days earlier (last Sunday), was not at home at the time of the incident but returned when alerted.
It was gathered that man’s children were the ones staying in the house. Among victims of the incident were two of the man’s children who stay elsewhere, but decided to return to Benin to mourn their late mother.
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