Chelsea has made a £105.6 million bid for Benfica midfielder Enzo Fernandez, which is close to reaching an agreement. Todd Boehly’s Blues want to pay the release clause fee in installments because doing so violates Financial Fair Play and has tax implications. Chelsea have been in talks to sign the Argentina World Cup winner all month, but Benfica have refused to do so unless Chelsea pay the €120 million (£105.6 million) release clause. Chelsea had offered players on loan and on permanent deals but the Portuguese side refused to accept anything except the release clause figure. The west London…
Author: meridianspy
The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has announced the immediate suspension of eTranzact from vending the 2023 UTME e-pins. The board broke the news in the latest edition of its weekly bulletin released on Monday. ETranzact is a multi-channel electronic transaction switching and payment processing platform. The platform has been one of JAMB’s major vendors over the years. But in the release, JAMB said the suspension of the platform followed the alleged “extortion of candidates” registering for the 2023 UTME. “Evidence available to the board showed that some of the agents of eTranzact such as Embassy Cafe have…
In a piece I wrote entitled “A o M’erin J’oba At Tinubu’s Colloquium” (1 April, 2018) I warned that the man who has now become the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Ahmed Tinubu, was making a strategic mistake in assuming that Buhari loved him. Or that he would probably want to relinquish power to him. Using a famous folklore rendered as a tale told by the moonlight in traditional African Yoruba, but which Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s minister of works and folklorist/writer, Joseph Odunjo, brought into vivid perspective in his Alawiye Yoruba literature series, I explained how…
A suicide bombing at a mosque in Pakistan on Monday left at least 34 dead and another 150 wounded in the city of Peshawar, according to officials. Most of the casualties were police officers. It was not clear how the bomber was able to slip into the walled compound, which houses the northwestern city of Peshawar’s police headquarters and is itself located in a high-security zone with other government buildings. Sarbakaf Mohmand, a commander for the Pakistani Taliban, claimed responsibility for the attack on Twitter. Peshawar senior police official Saddique Khan said rescuers are attempting to take wounded people to…
The Big Brother Titans, which comprised of Nigerian and South African housemates, held its first live eviction show on Sunday evening and two housemates were evicted. Sandra and Theo Traw, codenamed ‘Santheo’, became the first evictees for the show’s debut season. While Sandra is Nigerian, Theo Traw is a South African. After the first week of the show, the housemates were paired male and female. According to Big Brother, the paired housemates were to work together in the house, become Heads of House, and face nominations and evictions together. Each pair was asked to choose a codename and some pairs…
The Department of State Services (DSS) has apprehended members of organized syndicates involved in the sale of the newly redesigned naira notes. In a statement issued on Monday, DSS Spokesperson, Peter Afunanya also accused some commercial bank officials of assisting the crime. The statement read: “The Department of State Services hereby informs the public that it has intercepted some members of organised syndicates involved in the sale of the new redesigned naira notes. “In the course of its operations, in this regard in parts of the country, it was also established that some commercial bank officials are aiding economic malfeasance.…
Three House of Representatives members have defected from the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, to the opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP. According to POLITICS NIGERIA, the defectors also met with the PDP’s 2023 Presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, who officially welcomed them into the party on Sunday. The reps members are; Hon Ahmed Dayyabu Safana (Member Representing Safana/Danmusa/Batsari), Hon Hamza Dalhat Batagarawa (Member Representing Batagarawa/Rimi/Charanchi), and Hon Salisu Iro Isansi (Member Representing Katsina Federal Constituency).
The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Dr Zainab Ahmed, said the federal government will use POS agents for cash transfers during the National Social Safety Net Program Scale Up. She said this last week Friday while hosting the Executive Director, Angola, Nigeria, South Africa Constituency of the World Bank Group, Ms Ayanda Dlodlo, in Abuja. According to the finance minister, the programme will cost $800m and will take off in 2023 immediately after the National Assembly approves it. Her word: “There is already a programme for expansion of the social safety net programme. We call it the NASSP-Scale…
No fewer than 11 passengers were burnt to death in a fatal road accident, which involved a trailer and a Marcopollo bus, at Soka Bridge in Ore, the headquarters of Odigbo Local Council of Ondo State yesterday. The deceased whose identities were yet to be ascertained were passengers of the Marcopollo bus. According to an eyewitness, the accident was caused by the truck driver, who drove against traffic at excessive speed. The eyewitness who gave her name as Moyosore disclosed that the truck rammed into the Marcopollo bus, which was said to be coming from the Benin axis. She said:…
The All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council has raised an alarm over alleged move by the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, spread fake news to defame its presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, through social media influencers barely a few weeks to the election. The campaign council said a dedicated team for that sole purpose had already been constituted, “working day and night,” from the PDP headquarters in Abuja. In a statement issued on Sunday and signed by the Director of Media and Publicity of the APC Campaign Council, Bayo Onanuga, the PCC said the main opposition party had also “recruited many…
The President Muhammadu Buhari and the House of Representatives are on collision course over the deadline for the withdrawal of old naira notes. The CBN had before now, given January 31 deadline for the exchange of old naira notes of N200, N500 and N1000 with the new ones. But the President yesterday, on the request of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN approved a 10-day extension of the deadline for the withdrawal of old naira notes to February 10, 2023. A seven-day grace period, beginning on February 10 to February 17,2023, was also approved to enable Nigerians deposit their…
The governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, says N1.7 trillion worth of naira notes have been returned to banks so far,with N500 billion more to go. The bank on Sunday extended the deadline for the swap of the old notes for new ones at the commercial banks from January 31, 2023 to February 10. Those who still have the old notes after February 10 will enjoy a seven-day “grace period” to deposit them directly with the CBN. After February 17, the old notes will cease to be legal tender, the governor said. In a press…