News
Victims of NAF Accidental Airstrike In Yobe community Get N10,000 As Compensation
The residents of Buhari Village in the Yunusari Local Government Area of Yobe State who were attacked by a fighter jet of the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) on September 15 have been given N10,000 each as compensation.
According to The Cable, Dauda Busari, the chairman of Yunusari LGA, and Musa Dambari, the lawmaker representing his constituency, gave the injured victims and families of the deceased N10,000 each.
The tragic incident, according to Edward Gabkwet, NAF director of public relations and information, happened when the jet was targeting members of the Islamic State in West African Province (ISWAP).
He said the jet mistakenly attacked the village, which has about 1,000 residents.
Residents of the community who spoke with this newspaper, however, said they had not experienced any attack from insurgent groups in the past three months, and that at the time they thought their community was free of insurgents’ activities.
Another resident, Musa Goni who lost his brother in the incident said, “There was no Boko Haram in the town at the time of the incident and no sign of insurgents. And for the past three months, there have not been activities of the insurgents in our community.”
Goni, from the hospital bed, said he lost his brother, Mustapha, a 31-year-old farmer, who was in search of what to have for breakfast when the airstrike took his life.
“My elder brother died as a result of the incident, and my daughter, who was two years old, sustained injury and she is currently in the hospital receiving treatment,” Goni narrated his predicament.
Yasarumat, their mother, said Hauwa, her granddaughter, was severely injured in the airstrike, adding that the death of her son was very painful and unbearable.
“He died in the morning when he was about to go get his breakfast,” she said as she sat on the hospital bed next to Hauwa Goni Mustapha, the daughter of the deceased who was also injured in the attack.
Also speaking about the incident, Haruna Musa, a resident, said he lost two of his brothers, who were in a tricycle when the strike hit the village.
Musa said he was on the farm when the incident occurred but Mohammed and Ibrahim Audu, his brothers, were in transit when they were struck by the military airstrike.
Confirming the number of the victims, Musa said “nine people were killed and 24 people injured.”
Musa, therefore, said the monetary compensation brought to the villagers was not enough to bring back the dead or return their ruined properties, adding that the government needs to do more than that to compensate them.
“I was on the farm when the blast happened. There are people that died in my family. In the town, nine people died and in my family alone two people died. We are of the same mother and father. Their names are Mohammed and Ibrahim Audu,” he said.
“They were in a tricycle when the incident happened. Politicians came to the hospital and gave N10,000 to the victims and families of the people that died.
“The local government chairman, Dauda Busari and Ahmed Musa Dabouri are the politicians that came to share the money.
“The N10,000 they gave us is not enough to treat those that were injured and can’t return the lives of the dead. We want them to do more for us because we lost lives and properties.
“My house was destroyed and my two camels and cows were killed in the incident.”
This is not the first time communities in the north-east would be accidentally hit by military airstrikes.
NAF’s misfiring of January 17, 2017, in Rann, Borno state, left 126 aid workers and refugees dead.
NAF said it set up a board of inquiry to “thoroughly” investigate the circumstances of the incident in Yobe.
In his reaction, Mai Mala Buni, governor of Yobe, directed government hospitals in Geidam and Damaturu to provide free medical services to those who sustained wounds in the disaster.
A mobile court in Oshodi has sentenced a man simply identified as Paul to nine months imprisonment for not using a pedestrian bridge and assaulting personnel of the Lagos Environmental Sanitation Corps.
According to the State Commissioner for the Environment and Water Resources, Tokunbo Wahab, who revealed this information through a post on his X handle on Thursday.
Wahab wrote, “Paul was apprehended on April 16 for not utilizing the pedestrian bridge at Agbado Oke Odo, during which he assaulted and injured the enforcement personnel of LAGESCOfficial (KAI).
The mobile court in Oshodi delivered a nine-month jail sentence on him.”
The Ministry recently cautioned residents about avoiding pedestrian bridges, labeling the act of pedestrians crossing major highways in the state as illegal.
According to PUNCH’s report on Tuesday, the state government apprehended and charged 76 individuals for ignoring pedestrian bridges in the Ojota, Ladipo, and Oshodi regions.
In a March report, it was mentioned that a 22-year-old woman named Fasia Ajoke was sentenced to seven months and three weeks in prison for assaulting a female LAGESC officer while on duty.
Ajoke was also found guilty of resisting arrest and refusing to use the pedestrian bridge.
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has vowed to arrest the immediate past governor of Kogi State, Yahaya Bello, and bring him before the Federal High Court Abuja for arraignment to answer to the charges preferred against him.
This came on the heels of Bello’s counsel, Abdulwahab Muhammed, SAN, refusing to be served in the place of his client who is on the run from the EFCC.
The anti-graft agency, while addressing a Federal High Court, Abuja on Thursday through its team of lawyers led by Kemi Pinehero, SAN, stressed that operatives would execute the arrest warrant against the former governor even if it has to be done by the use of force.
He said, “We have to arraign him in court even if we have to use the military. Immunity is only attached to a person and not the building.
“The law allows to break down walls to arrest an evading defendant. Section 284 says all persons are to obey the service of charge.”
Details later…
Heritage Bank’s Head Office has been shut down over the sack of over 1,000 workers.
JomogNews Nigeria reports that the National Union of Banks, Insurance and Financial Institutions Employees (NUBIFIE), has shut down Heritage Bank’s head office in Lagos following the sack of over 1000 personnel by the management of lender led by Mr. Akinola George-Taylor without following due process.
The union said it had resolved to continue with the picketing until the management of the bank decides to do the needful by ensuring the sacked workers get their legitimate severance package.
The aggrieved ex-staff of the bank has locked the gate and prevented anyone from going in or out of the bank’s head office located at 143 Ahmadu Bello Way, Victoria Island, Lagos.
Recall that in October 2023, less than one year after assuming office as Heritage Bank’s chief executive officer, Mr. Akinola George-Taylor forcefully booted out over 70 senior staff members of the bank, while a number of others were asked to resign plunging the bank in further crisis. More worrisome was the fact that the affected staff were disengaged without paying them their accrued entitlements and allowances.
JomogNews Nigeria gathered that there has also been an internal crisis allegedly instigated by the bank chief in an attempt to rid the bank of those suspected to be loyalists of some board members and employ his own people. The move, sources disclosed, was unconnected with the new bank chief’s plan to oust some board members who are said to be at loggerheads with him, from the bank. The bank’s chief was said to be enjoying the support of a top shareholder of the bank whom sources say is allegedly determined to solely take over the bank and get rid of the owners.
When contacted by our reporter, Ozenna Utulu, the head of Corporate Communications of Heritage Bank promised to get back to our reporter but never did as at the time of filing this report.
Man Jailed Nine Months For Assaulting Lagos Official, Crossing Highway
Just In: EFCC Threatens To Involve Military In Arresting Yahaya Bello
Heritage Bank In Crisis! Shut Down Over Mass Sack, Undue Process
DNA: Court To Serve Mohbad’s Wife Via Substituted Means
Fish Out Sponsors Of Oyo Secretariat Invasion – YWC Tells Security Agencies
AltBank Walks Against Hunger, Advocates for Education
Probe: Kaduna Speaker Warns Bello El-Rufai Against Threatening, Intimidating Lawmakers
CBN Not Defending Naira With Foreign Reserves — Cardoso
Naira Abuse: Cubana Chief Priest Arrives Court For Arraignment, Pleads Not Guilty
Black Market Dollar (USD) To Naira (NGN) Exchange Rate Today 17th April 2024
-
News6 hours agoHeritage Bank In Crisis! Shut Down Over Mass Sack, Undue Process
-
News11 hours agoDNA: Court To Serve Mohbad’s Wife Via Substituted Means
-
Entertainment2 days agoCubana Chiefpriest Breaks Silence Following EFCC Impending Arrest
-
News1 day agoBlack Market Dollar (USD) To Naira (NGN) Exchange Rate Today 17th April 2024
-
News5 hours agoJust In: EFCC Threatens To Involve Military In Arresting Yahaya Bello
-
Politics13 hours agoProbe: Kaduna Speaker Warns Bello El-Rufai Against Threatening, Intimidating Lawmakers
-
Politics1 day agoYoruba Nation Agitators Pretenders, Against South-West Interest – Omitola
-
News1 day agoNaira Abuse: Cubana Chief Priest Arrives Court For Arraignment, Pleads Not Guilty