The bust statue of the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has been destroyed by irate youths who stormed the Obio/Akpor council headquarters earlier Tuesday.

Some of the visibly angry youths, who spoke in a mix of the Ikwerre dialect and English, pulled the statue down while the others cheered him on.

The youths, who had invaded the council headquarters, claimed they were there to ensure the safety of council property following the expiration of the chairman’s tenure.

Wike, a former Chairman of Obio/Akpor, and former Rivers State governor, has been involved in a political feud with his former protege the governor of the state, Siminalayi Fubara.

President Bola Tinubu has said a change of value system is imperative for Nigerians to progress.

He, however, declared that no matter the challenge the country faces, he will never turn his back on her.

Tinubu spoke in Lagos when he received a delegation from the National Assembly (NASS) on Monday evening, who came to felicitate with him on Eid-el-Kabir. 

The delegation, led by the Senate President Godswill Akpabio, included the deputy Senate president, Jibrin Barau and the deputy speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Benjamin Kalu, among others.

The president said, “Good economics at a harsh time is the challenge we must face. As I said in my speech, no matter how challenging it can be, I will not turn my back on Nigeria.” 

The president, in a statement signed by his spokesperson, Ajuri Ngelale, charged the citizens to change their mindset about Nigeria if the nation is to overcome its current challenges.

“The need (for some citizens) to change the rent-seeking mindset and become more productive to the economy is a challenge -the need to stop smuggling and all economic sabotage. 

“Why should we have people removing rail tracks, stealing electric cables and sabotaging the economy? We must embrace the campaign to change our value system. We must tell our people that our challenge is changing our mindset about our country,” Tinubu said.

The president commended the leadership of the National Assembly for the support extended to his administration, which has resulted in some of the important developments recorded by his administration. 

“It is great pride for me to have the best of partners in the National Assembly. We have to drill down and be all-inclusive in our bid to satisfy our people. It is daunting, but we cannot run away from the fact that this country must survive the hardship,” Tinubu said.

He acknowledged the challenges and the task ahead, assuring the nation of his unwavering determination to turn things around.

“Yes, there is poverty; there is suffering in the land. We are not the only people facing such a challenge, but we must face it ourselves. We must find a way to eliminate banditry and terrorism so that farmers can bring out food from the farmland. If you do not have good roads to bring the food to the population, even if you grow the food and lose 60-70 percent to damages, you will pay the price,” Tinubu said.

In an interaction with journalists after the meeting, Akpabio said he came with the leadership of the National Assembly to pay homage and felicitate the president on the occasion of Eid-el-Kabir and to thank him for the purposeful leadership in the first year of his administration.

On what Nigerians should expect from the legislature in the days ahead, Akpabio said, “Looking forward, the National Assembly will tinker with some existing legislations to improve on the nation’s ease of doing business.”

After meeting with the leadership of the National Assembly, the president proceeded to a meeting with the Oba of Lagos, His Royal Majesty Oba Rilwan Akiolu.

The All Progressives Congress, APC, has dismissed allegation of promoting insurgency raised against the Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration by former.

former Governor of Kano State and 2023 presidential candidate of the New Nigeria Peoples Party, NNPP, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso.

The party equally faulted claim that the federal government was meddling in the Kano Emirate tussle.

National Publicity Secretary of the APC,

Felix Morka, in a statement on Tuesday said it was uncharitable to accuse a government doing all its best to restore security of lives and property of goading insurgents.

The statement reads in part: “The attention of the All Progressives Congress, APC, has been drawn to comments reportedly made by Senator Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso, former Governor of Kano State and 2023 presidential candidate of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), accusing the APC-led federal government of attempting to create a new breed of Boko Haram terrorists and insurgents in Northern Nigeria. Without any shred of evidence, he further alleged that certain individuals in APC fold were goading the federal government with the goal of reclaiming Kano State through a declaration of a state of emergency. Kwankwaso’s wild and unhinged comments were made with reference to the lingering Emirate tussle in Kano.

“We consider Kwankwaso’s comments to be disappointing, highly incendiary and unconscionable for an individual of his standing. As a former Governor and Minister of Defence, we expect Kwankwaso to demonstrate high grade discretion, and a better grip of the severe social, political and security implications of unguarded utterances capable of fueling tension and strife in the good state of Kano.

“It is disturbing that Kwankwaso would so casually accuse the federal government of attempting to create a new breed of Boko Haram terrorists and insurgents, the same Boko Haram that has inflicted unspeakable and despicable acts of terror that have destroyed the lives of innocent citizens and our heroic men and women in uniform. It is grossly insensitive, unwarranted, and unacceptable for Kwankwaso to bandy such a serious allegation in such a cavalier manner.

“In his unhinged bid to lash out, Senator Kwankwaso ignored the federal government’s glaring neutrality on the emirate crisis in Kano from the very outset. As a government that thrives on respect for the rule of law and constitutional liberties, the federal government has confidence in our courts to fairly adjudicate the matter that is already before them, and has no need or reason to side with any of parties in the emir-ship dispute.

“Unguarded accusations like these coming from the highest level of leadership of the NNPP such as that made by the Deputy Governor of the Kano state, Comrade Abdulsalam Gwarzo, against the National Security Adviser, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, which he has since retracted and apologized for, are utterly unhelpful in the delicate context of Kano, and must be avoided.

“The leader of our Party, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is a pan-Nigeria bridge builder for peace, security and unity in our land, and will not, cannot, must not be directly or remotely tainted with flimsy and unjustifiable allegation of promoting violent crisis in any part of our dear country of which he is the President and Commander-in Chief-of the Armed Forces.

“As a statesman, Kwankwaso should busy himself with exploring and exhausting all avenues for political and peaceful solutions to the royal impasse rather than amplifying the drums of strife and upheaval.

“The situation in Kano State calls for calm as the nation awaits judicial or political resolution of all outstanding matters. The good people of Kano deserve to live in peace, unity and security.”

No fewer than nine people reportedly lost their lives in 13 road accidents that occurred in Osun, Ondo, and Oyo states in the first three days of the Sallah holiday.

The Federal Road Safety Corps Command of Zone 11, which comprises the three states, added that 78 others sustained varying degrees of injuries in the crashes involving 21 vehicles and 128 people.

The Acting Zonal Commanding Officer for the Zone, Leye Adegboyega, who shared this information in a statement in Osogbo, stressed that those injured were taken to hospitals across the zone, while 41 other people were rescued without injuries during the period.

Adegboyega stated that the 2024 Eid El Kabir Sallah Special Patrol Operation is scheduled to be held between Friday, June 14th, and Friday, June 21st, 2024, across the country.

He revealed that in the major routes within his jurisdiction, the commission deployed a total of 3,018 personnel, 57 patrol vehicles, five ambulances, and two heavy-duty tow trucks during the period.

“Personnel from the command covered about 65 major routes across the zone daily to ensure good visibility and reduce avoidable speed-related crashes, while standby rescue teams were also stationed across all commands in the zone for quick response to distress calls from accident scenes,” Adegboyega said.

Zone RS11 Osogbo of the Corps, which comprises Osun, Ondo, and Oyo states, has aligned with the mission of the Operation, which is to ensure the free flow of traffic, minimize the occurrence of RTCs, provide prompt rescue services in the event of crashes, and ensure timely clearance of obstructions on all major roads and critical corridors across the three states of the Zone during and after the Sallah festivities.

To achieve the mission of the Operation, a total of 3,018 personnel (comprising 2,155 Regular Marshals and 863 Special Marshals), 57 patrol vehicles, five ambulances, and two heavy-duty tow trucks have been deployed across the component commands.

The roads covered daily include the following critical corridors: Ibadan-Lagos Expressway, Ibadan-Ife Expressway, Ife-Ilesa Expressway, Ilesa-Ipetujesa-Akure Expressway, Sagamu-Ore-Benin Expressway, and Ibadan-Oyo-Ogbomoso Expressway.

“In the first three days of the operation, we have achieved the following:

i. The arrest of 737 traffic offenders who were duly contravened for 766 various traffic offenses that may otherwise have led to avoidable RTCs.

ii. Execution of 219 various public enlightenment activities across the news media, motor parks, churches, mosques, and other public places to drive home the road safety message and create public awareness of the need for safety consciousness.”

“We provided prompt rescue services for the victims of 13 RTCs which involved 21 vehicles and 128 people, out of which nine unfortunately lost their lives and 78 others sustained varying degrees of injuries and were swiftly conveyed to hospitals across the Zone, where we maintain cordial relationships for treatment.

Forty-one other people were rescued alive without injuries and continued their journeys,” he concluded.

A three-storey building under construction in Abakaliki, capital of Ebonyi State, on Tuesday, collapsed with two persons trapped.

According to The Nation, the affected building allegedly belongs to a member of the Ebonyi Assembly

The collapsed building is located near the Alex Ekwueme Federal University Teaching Hospital Abakaliki.

At least one person was still trapped inside the collapsed building as of the time of filing this report, while one rescued person was rushed to the emergency unit of the Federal Teaching Hospital Abakaliki.

One of the labourers, who escaped from the collapsed building, told reporters he escaped because he went to wash his hands.

He said, “I was loading a bag of stones and the owner of the house was here with me, telling me to park it very well. He has finished paying us.

“Only one person, who is dumb was trapped inside and he is still there. One other who was rescued has been rushed to hospital.

“The building didn’t give any sign that it is about to collapse. I was lucky because my tools were inside. I just said let me wash my hands here before I will go inside the building to collect my tools.”

Rescue workers were still trying to rescue the trapped labourer.

Nvidia, a graphics card-making firm, overtook Microsoft to become the world’s most valuable company on Tuesday.

The American technology company saw its stock value rise by 3.5 percent to $135.58 a share — lifting its market capitalisation to $3.3 trillion.

Nvidia has dominated the technology market with its highly sought-after chips that help power data centres running complex computing tasks required by artificial intelligence (AI) applications. 

On its part, Microsoft is also seen as an early AI winner given its investment and partnership with OpenAI, which created ChatGPT.

Apple, which occupies the third position, has also seen its shares rally after finally unveiling a plan to use AI — a move Bloomberg reported appeased investors.

Also, Nvidia’s surging stock price has made Jensen Huang, co-founder and chief executive officer (CEO), one of the world’s richest people.

Huang’s net worth has climbed more than $70 billion since the beginning of the year to $115 billion, putting him in 12th place on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index — the highest gain among his billionaire peers.

The Labour Party (LP) and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate in the 2023 election, Atiku Abubakar, has slammed President Bola Tinubu, over his recent statement that Nigerians were not the only ones suffering from poverty.

The LP National Publicity Secretary, Obiora Ifoh, in an interview with Vanguard, accused Tinubu of mocking Nigerians with the statement.

He said the President needed to be reminded that he was in office to reduce, if not eliminate, poverty and not exacerbate it.

Ifoh urged Tinubu to halt the mockery and consider security, including the welfare of the populace, a priority.

He said, “We are disappointed but not surprised by the comments made by President Ahmed Bola Tinubu about the excruciating poverty his administration’s policies have unleashed on Nigerians since he took office over a year ago.

“It was to say the least, disheartening to hear Mr. President mock his citizens by saying Nigerians are not the only ones facing poverty.

“Assuming but not conceding that what he said is true, Nigerians who are at the receiving end of his harsh economic policies don’t need to be reminded about the pain and hunger they have been forced to live with by the very people who put them in that situation in the first place.

“May be this administration needs to be reminded that it was elected to reduce if not eliminate poverty, hunger and disease but what we have seen is an obsession with opulence.

“We are yet to get over the billions appropriated for the renovation of the President and Vice President’s lodges, now we hear they want new jets to join the Presidential fleet.

“Our schools and health institutions are on their knees, the same government claims it cannot afford to pay public servants a living wage but has enough to make itself comfortable at the expense of the suffering masses.

“Mr. President, we implore you to uphold the constitution you swore to protect. The constitution says the security and welfare of the populace shall be the primary purpose of the existence of your government. Enough is this mockery.”

Similarly, Atiku, while speaking through his Special Adviser, Paul Ibe, accused Tinubu of deepening the poverty in the country.

He further said President Tinubu and his administration are insensitive to the plight of the masses.

He said, “There are little or no values nurtured and promoted by Tinubu and his administration. What Nigerians are seeing it manifest is insensitivity, bigotry, nepotism, corruption, and wastfulness.

“For the President to speak about us finding a way to eliminate banditry and terrorism is an acknowledgement of failure.

“ What we expect to hear from him are the measures and the strategy to deal with the menace and not to regale us with the problems that we are all well aware of.

“The poverty in Nigeria is multidimensional. It was exacerbated by the policies of the Tinubu administration that does not priotise production and cutting costs.

“Policies that were not well thought out and are only aimed at pauperizing the citizens. Tinubu’s trial-and-error policies have continued to dig the country deeper into economic degradation.

“ His government is characterised by a lack of transparency and accountability. For example, his administration is paying for subsidy, contrary to the claims that it is gone for good.

“According to his minister of finance, last year (the very same year they allegedly stopped payment of subsidy), Tinubu paid a subsidy of N3.6 trillion and this year, he is projected to pay a subsidy of N5.4 trillion.

“Why are they lying about this other than to divert money away from the Federation Account. Truth be told, Tinubu is the one causing the deepening poverty in the country.”

Adewale Ayuba, the ace Fuji musician, has revealed why he relocated to America and converted to Christianity.

In a chat with Teju Babyface on Tuesday, Ayuba spoke about his new life in the United States, his religion, and his music career.

He disclosed that he and his band member travelled to America for their three-month summer show in 1995.

Ayuba said they could not return to Nigeria after their show ended due to threats from Sani Abacha, the late military head of state.

The singer said he was threatened after he released an album advocating for the freedom of political detainees, particularly the late Moshood Abiola.

Ayuba said after Abacha’s demise, he returned to Nigeria to perform at the Benson and Hedges Concert in 1998.

The singer said while in the US, he enrolled in school and completed his documentation to become an American citizen. He said he also met his wife in America.

“I left for America with my full band members in 1995 for a summer show and others. We came to America for about three months and then returned to Nigeria,” he said.

“I returned to Nigeria in 1998 when Abacha died. The three years I stayed in America were by the grace of God because he is a good planner.

“When I was in America, I realised that I could only perform shows on weekends. My Mondays to Fridays were free. So, I enrolled in school. That was where I met my wife.

“After that, I took part in a lot of activities. Doing so was like building another foundation in America. That was not easy. From there, I completed my documentation and became an American citizen.

“I don’t see myself continuing in Fuji music, I believe I have done well. This is America, there’s more to explore in life, trusting that God has a plan.”

Speaking about his decision to convert from Islam to Christianity, Ayuba revealed that he was unable to pray in Arabic.

This, he said, prevented him from practising Islam, adding that he would always invite clerics to pray on his behalf.

He also said he was inspired by verses from the Bible quoting Jesus Christ as saying “He is the way, truth, and life”.

Ayuba said he prefers to worship where he “feels closest to God,” adding that his choice to become a Christian “brings me happiness”.

“People claim Ayuba is a Muslim. Have they seen me in the mosque? If I were practising Islam, wouldn’t someone have noticed,” he said.

“Why is this an issue? Can they let me be? They say I should pray five times daily, but I’m not. My mother is an Alhaja, and although my father never went to Mecca, we practice Islam at home.

“So, my name is Ayub, which is Job in the Bible. It’s not that being a Muslim is good or bad. When I attempted to practice it, I had to summon some Alfas to help me communicate with God because I didn’t understand Arabic.

“I questioned whether I should continue despite all that God has done for me, needing others to intercede on my behalf.

“There isn’t an album of mine where I haven’t referenced Muslim words. We all worship God. To me, religion is akin to education.

“I chose Jesus Christ because he proclaimed, ‘I am the truth, the way, and the life’. This is my personal choice, and it brings me happiness.

“Many of my band members are Muslims, and we pray together. I was unable to attend Arabic school due to my profession. I prefer to worship where I feel closest to my God.”

Ayuba began his music career as a teenager and released his first album, ‘Ibere (Beginning)’ in 1986.

The 59-year-old singer is famous for albums such as ‘Bubble’, ‘Turn Me On’, ‘’Ijo Fuji’, and ‘Koloba Koloba’.

In 2015, Ayuba said the day he became a Christian was the happiest day of his life.

The United Kingdom, UK is grappling with a shortage of bricklayers and other construction workers, causing prolonged delays for homeowners seeking building services.

Since 2021, a staggering 415,000 people have experienced over a year-long wait to secure a builder, according to a national construction audit by Fix Radio.

The shortage extends beyond builders, with 301,000 households waiting a year for plumbers and heating engineers, 294,000 for roofers, and 274,000 for carpenters.

On average, the wait for a bricklayer over the past three years has exceeded three months, while landscapers, painters, and decorators have left customers waiting for two and a half months, per report from Daily Mail UK.

Industry experts highlight the severe impact of this skills shortage on major projects, including delays in completing the Co-op Live venue in Manchester.

To meet rising demand, an additional 225,000 skilled workers are to be needed by 2027 with economic repercussions significant as the UK is projected to miss out on £98 billion of growth by 2030 due to the skills gap.

The ageing workforce exacerbates the issue, with a fifth of construction workers now over 50 and a third planning to retire by 2030.

The Construction Industry Training Board’s Construction Skills Network estimates nearly one million tradespeople will retire in the next decade.

While migrant labour has somewhat mitigated the shortages, there is an urgent need to train more British workers.

Last year, bricklayers, plasterers, roofers, and carpenters were added to the Home Office’s shortage occupation list to address the deficit.

UK government initiatives aim to alleviate the problem, including cracking down on non-vocational university degrees and funding 100,000 apprenticeships. Both Labour and Conservative parties have focused on construction in their General Election campaigns, with Labour proposing new towns and Rishi Sunak promising to build hundreds of thousands of homes in major cities.

Clive Holland of Fix Radio emphasized the critical need for more builders, warning, “If political parties, irrespective of their stripe or colour, honestly believe they can address the housing crisis without having the serious conversation of addressing the skills deficit, we’re heading into a very dangerous position.”

A Fix Radio survey revealed that two-thirds of Britons felt insufficiently encouraged to pursue trades in school, and 18% of parents discouraged their children from entering the construction industry due to perceived low earnings.

Former Minister of Works, Babatunde Fashola said workers in Nigeria deserve reasonable adjustments to cope with the rising cost of living in the country.

Fashola stated this in a piece titled, ‘Minimum Wage Review – My Take Away’.

He stated, “When cost of living rises as they have now, the lowest and the highest income earners are impacted to varying degrees and therefore deserving of reasonable adjustments whether they earn wages or salaries.”

The former Lagos State governor faulted Section 4(1)(b) of the National Minimum Wage Act 2019 which exempted “an establishment employing less than 25 persons” from being bound by the provisions of the Act to pay the minimum wage.

The former minister said the exemption of such establishments “raises serious doubts about whether we have enacted a minimum wage Act if small businesses who barely have 25 employees but who employ the largest number of the most vulnerable people are exempted from the law as currently legislated. Who then is the law protecting?

Fashola, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), said item 34 of the 1999 Constitution as amended in the Exclusive Legislative list confers power on the National Assembly to prescribe a national minimum wage for the Federation and not a monthly salary.

He said though wages and salaries are common methods of compensation open to the employer, the former is a fixed annual amount, payable at weekly, bi-weekly or monthly subject to agreement, while the latter refer to payment based on an hourly rate and the number of hours the employee works.

“Therefore, it seems obvious from this definition that by making a law in Section 3(1) of the Minimum Wage Act that the minimum wage of N30,000 shall be paid monthly, the NASS may have acted unconstitutionally by legislating on a SALARY (monthly payment) when they only have power to legislate on WAGES, an hourly payment.

“This is important while the conversation on minimum wage is being had in 2024 because in Section 3(4), the minimum wage “shall be reviewed in line with the provisions of this Act” which includes Section 3(1) that has prescribed a monthly amount instead of an hourly wage.”

“Of course, if and when we decide as a country on the implementation of a proper minimum wage, we must then design a formula to review salaries of those who do not earn wages in order to assist them deal with cost-of-living challenges.

“This may yet be the most fruitful outcome of the dilemma of appropriate employee compensation as it may lay the foundation for national productivity, wealth creation and prosperity. The opportunity is too big to miss or waste,” he said.

The former governor urged experts in labour law and compensation matters to put their thinking caps on and seek help from the best faculties around the world.

“As we do this, we must be mindful of the need for a possible amendment to item 34 of the Exclusive list in the constitution to include salaries because it currently does not.”

After weeks of failed talks on a new minimum wage for workers in the country, the Organised Labour declared an indefinite industrial action on Monday, June 3, 2024. Businesses were paralysed as labour shut down airports, hospitals, national grid, banks, National Assembly and state assemblies’ complexes.

The labour unions said the current minimum wage of ₦30,000 can no longer cater to the wellbeing of an average Nigerian worker, saying government should offer workers something economically realistic in tandem with current inflationary pressures, attendant effects of the twin policies of petrol subsidy removal and unification of the forex windows of the current administration.

The labour unions also lamented that not all governors are paying the current wage award which expired in April 2024, five years after the Minimum Wage Act of 2019 was signed by former President Muhammadu Buhari. The Act should be reviewed every five years to meet up with contemporary economic demands of workers.

In January 2024, President Bola Tinubu inaugurated a tripartite committee to negotiate a new minimum wage for the country.

At the start of negotiations, Labour presented ₦615,000 as the new minimum wage but saw reasons to drop their demand to ₦497,000, and then to ₦494,000.

Also, in the beginning, the government and the Organised Private Sector proposed ₦48,000, ₦54,000, ₦57,000, and later ₦60,000, all four offers were rejected by Labour, prompting the strike.

In the heat of the impasse and the attendant consequences of the strike last Monday, June 3, 2024, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), George Akume, said the President was committed to a wage above ₦60,000, and that the government side of the tripartite committee would meet with labour for one week to agree on a wage.

The organised abour “relaxed” its industrial action on Tuesday, June 4, 2024, some 24 hours after the strike.

Both leadership of the Trade Union Congress (TUC) and the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) subsequently resumed talks with the representatives of the Federal Government, states, Organised Private Sector.

The President also directed Minister of Finance, Wale Edun, to present a template for a new minimum wage. Before the directive, the minister described as “unaffordable, the demands of labour.

The 36 state governors said labour’s demands was not sustainable. Local government administrations also described the demands of the NLC and TUC as unrealistic.

However, on Friday, June 7, 2024, the two sides (labour and the government) failed to reach an agreement. While labour dropped again its demand from ₦494,000 to ₦250,000, the government added ₦2,000 to its initial ₦60,000 and offered workers ₦62,000.

Both sides submitted their reports to the President who is expected to make a decision and send an executive bill to the National Assembly to pass a new minimum wage bill to be signed into law by the President.

In his Democracy Day speech on June 12, 2024, the President assured the Organised Labour that an executive bill on the new national minimum wage for workers would soon be sent to the National Assembly for passage.