News

15-yr-old Girl Dies In Akwa Ibom School

Published

2 years ago

May 25, 2023

The parents of late Miss Edima Umoh, an SSS3 student of Full Life Academy, on Airport Road, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, who died in the school hostel have asked the school authority to furnish them with full detail of events that led to their daughter’s untimely death.

The 15-year-old student of the school, who was writing her West African Examinations Council, reportedly died last Friday in her hostel at 4 p.m., after complaining of a headache.

But the parents in a letter through their lawyer, Edikan Lawrence, regretted that the school authority was yet to furnish them with a detailed account of what led to their daughter’s death.

The letter addressed to Proprietor, Full Life Academy, and copied the state Commissioner for Education and Commissioner of Police, read: “The saddest part of the entire story is that up to this moment, the school has not been able to give a full and detailed account of what transpired within your school campus that culminated into such a regrettable, untimely painful and unfortunate loss of an exceptionally bright, lively and intelligent girl of 15 years old in your custody and care, who died of ‘unnatural causes’.

“Predicated on the foregoing, we have our client’s instruction and indeed that of the entire Richard Umoh family, to demand a full disclosure and formal statement of all events, including the minutest details, leading to the death of Miss Edima Umoh, addressed to the family through our office within 48 hours of the service of this letter.

“Take notice that where you fail or refuse to act in terms of this demand within the time stated above, we have our client’s instruction to resort to other legal measures to ensure that justice is not only done but seen to be done in this case and this will be without further recourse to you.”

But while addressing newsmen, yesterday, on the matter, the management of Full Life Academy, through the Principal of the academy, Aniefonteabasi Victor-Williams, said: “We are fully aware of the demise of our student, Edima Umoh. She was in SS3, currently writing her final exams. She has been in this school from creche and was the only pioneer student remaining to graduate before the sad event took place.

“Everything happened quickly because by the time that I was called, I was already ministering in my husband’s church as I’m also a pastor. Shortly before we left school, she was healthy. We even sent her to call us another student from the hostel.

“We were told that she earlier complained of a headache and the nurse gave her paracetamol, during lunchtime, 2:30 p.m., and she was fine. She went to eat and even requested more because we run a very homely facility here. If a child is not satisfied, she has the right to get more meals.

“At the time I and the day-students left the school, the matron said Edima complained again that she was having a headache, the nurse wanted to initiate a malaria treatment, ‘Coaterm,’ so that the headache does not result in fever, but she rejected, saying she preferred her mother to come to the school with ‘Amatem’ drug.

“She asked the matron to call her mother, which she did immediately. She spoke with her mother and asked the mother to come to the school with Amatem and pepper soup.

“She also asked that the mother should pray for her three times but the mother felt like the daughter was over-panicking and kept responding that she should calm down, and that she would bring everything she mentioned.

“Shortly after speaking with her mother, she became calm, and asked the hostel parents and hostel prefect, who were there to allow her rest, and they felt it was proper to let her rest. The hostel parents assigned the school senior prefect, who is her classmate to stay with her.

“When we asked the head girl, she responded that Edima was calm and had slept, so she left her room to also sleep upstairs. Not long after, she started snoring, being that they knew her not to be snoring while sleeping.

“Another classmate came to ask who was snoring, and when her name was mentioned, she allowed her to rest because of her health.

“The hostel parents came back to check those on Prep if they were reading. That was when they saw a white substance mixed with blood coming out from Edima’s nose.

“That was when they raised the alarm and there was panic everywhere. By the time they carried her out of the bed, she had messed herself up, they cleaned her up and the nurse tried resuscitating her until the doctor arrived, we affiliate with Premier Clinic.

“My boss and other school leaders were called and they all ran down to the school immediately. I met them at the Premier Clinic, where the girl was on oxygen and we prayed, hoping she will respond. We also reached out to Jeconiah Specialist Hospital, the consultant said we should bring her, it was when we got there that she was confirmed dead.”

Asked whether the deceased had underlying health issues, the Principal responded: “The mother never told us. What we observed was that earlier this year, she had a headache that made her abstain from school for two weeks after which she started wearing glasses.

“She was a day student, so, the mother told the school that it was optical issues that led to the migraine headache and that it calmed after she was given the glasses.”

VANGUARD

News

Peter Obi Condemns Tinubu’s Saint Lucia Trip

Published

20 minutes ago

June 28, 2025

Editor

Labour Party leader and former presidential candidate, Peter Obi, has criticised President Bola Tinubu’s planned trip to Saint Lucia, describing it as poorly timed and lacking in sensitivity, especially amid Nigeria’s deepening economic and security challenges.

Tinubu is expected to leave Nigeria on Saturday for Saint Lucia and is also scheduled to attend the upcoming BRICS summit in Brazil.

In a post shared on X (formerly Twitter) on Saturday, Obi expressed dismay over the president’s travel, questioning the state of governance in the country.

Obi argued that Tinubu’s trip highlights a pattern of misplaced priorities by the administration, particularly at a time when citizens are grappling with widespread hunger and insecurity.

“What I have seen and witnessed in the last two years has left me in shock about poor governance delivery and apparent channelling of energy into politics and satisfaction of the elites, while the masses in our midst are languishing in want,” Obi stated.

He lamented the toll of rising insecurity across Nigeria, pointing out the country’s deteriorating safety situation.

“In the past two years, Nigeria has lost more people to all sorts of criminality than a country that is officially at war.

“Without any twilight, Nigeria ranks among the most insecure places in the world. Nigerians are hungrier, and most people do not know where their next meal will come from,” he wrote.

Obi said he was stunned when he learned of the President’s travel plans, especially following what he described as a recent holiday in Lagos.

“With such a gory picture of one’s country, you can imagine my bewilderment when I saw a news release from the Presidency announcing that President Bola Tinubu is departing Nigeria today for a visit to Saint Lucia in the Caribbean,” he said.

Quoting Saint Lucia’s Prime Minister, Philip J. Pierre, Obi noted that the visit comprises both official and personal segments.

“According to the Prime Minister’s announcement, ‘two of these days, June 30 and July 1, will be dedicated to an official visit, with the remainder of the trip set aside as a personal vacation,” he said.

Obi noted that he initially found the report hard to believe.

“I told the person who drew my attention to the Caribbean story that it cannot be true and that the President is just coming back from a holiday in Lagos.

“I didn’t want to believe that anybody in the position of authority, more so the President… would contemplate a leisure trip at this time,” Obi said.

He condemned Tinubu’s failure to visit disaster-stricken areas like Minna in Niger State, where over 200 people reportedly died and hundreds remain missing due to flooding.

“This is a President going for leisure when he couldn’t visit Minna, Niger State where over two hundred lives were lost and over 700 persons still missing in a flood natural disaster,” he said.

Obi also took issue with Tinubu’s recent trip to Benue State, claiming it was politically motivated rather than compassionate.

“The other state in crisis where over two hundred lives were murdered, the President yielded to public pressure and visited Makurdi… for what turned out to be a political jamboree than condolence as public holiday was declared and children made to line up to receive the President who couldn’t even reach the village, the scene of the brutal attack,” he said.

Drawing comparisons between Nigeria and Saint Lucia, Obi questioned the logic of prioritising a visit to the Caribbean nation over addressing pressing domestic issues.

“Makurdi is 937.4 Km², which is over 59% bigger than St Lucia, which is 617 km², and Minna is 6789 square kilometres, which is ten times bigger than St Lucia. St Lucia, with a population of 180,000, is less than half of Makurdi’s 489,839 and Minna, with 532,000 is almost three times the population of St Lucia,” the former Anambra governor said.

He concluded his post by stressing the urgent need for leadership that is grounded in empathy and focused on addressing the suffering of ordinary Nigerians.

He said, “I don’t think the situation in this country today calls for leisure for anybody in a position of authority, more so the President, on whose desk the buck stops.

“This regime has repeatedly shown its insensitivity and lack of passion for the populace…”

Obi added, “This very obvious indifference of the federal government to the suffering of the Nigerian poor should urgently be reversed.

“One had expected the President to be asking God for extra hours in a day for the challenges, but what we see is a concentration of efforts in the 2027 election and on satisfying the wealthy while the mass poor continues to multiply in number.”

News

World Bank Lists Nigeria Among 39 Nations Facing Rising Poverty, Hunger

Published

35 minutes ago

June 28, 2025

Editor

The World Bank has listed Nigeria among 39 countries where poverty and hunger are deepening as a result of conflict and instability.

In a report released on Friday, the bank said the economies, a mix of low- and middle-income countries, span all global regions. Among them are Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Libya, Mali, Nigeria, Sudan, Ukraine, and Zimbabwe.

The report, which assesses the economic impact of conflict and fragility in the post-COVID-19 era, revealed that 21 of the 39 countries are experiencing active conflict.

According to the findings, extreme poverty is rising more rapidly in these countries, taking a severe toll on economic development, worsening hunger, and derailing progress toward key development goals.

Since 2020, the report noted, the average per capita GDP of these economies has declined by 1.8 per cent annually, in contrast to a 2.9 per cent growth rate recorded in other developing countries.

The report partly reads: “This year, 421 million people are struggling on less than $3 a day in economies afflicted by conflict or instability—more than in the rest of the world combined.

“That number is projected to rise to 435 million, or nearly 60% of the world’s extreme poor, by 2030.”

News

Nigeria’s Public Debt Rises To N149trn

Published

37 minutes ago

June 28, 2025

Editor

Nigeria’s total public debt rose to N149.39 trillion as of March 31, 2025, according to the latest data released by the Debt Management Office (DMO).

The nation’s public debt represents the indebtedness of the federal and state governments, as well as the Federal Capital Territory.

The Federal Government owes N74.89 trillion, while the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) owe the balance of N3.87 trillion.

The figure represents about 4. 72 trillion or 3.3 percent increase over the preceding quarter, with a debt stock figure of N144.67 trillion.

The data showed that external debt rose minimally by 0.5 percent between the end of 2024 and the end of March 2025 (N344 billion).

Although the nation’s external borrowing has been quite low since the last quarter of 2024, the Naira depreciation has had a very negative effect on the stock.

Domestic debt stood at N78.76 trillion as of the end of the first quarter compared to N65.65 trillion in March 2024.