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Obaseki Receives Royal Blessings From Otaru Of Igarra As He Kicks Off Campaign In Edo North

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The Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki on Monday kicked off his re-election campaign in Akoko-Edo Local Government Area, Edo North Senatorial District, promising to build on the good foundation his administration has laid in the last three years and eight months.

At the campaign, the Governor also showcased an economic blueprint that will address the challenges posed by the coronavirus pandemic.

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Receiving the governor in his palace, the Otaru of Igarra, Oba Emmanuel Adeche Saiki II, prayed God to guide the Governor and bless his plans for the state.

“We pray that God will guide you in all your ways. You should not be discouraged in advising the youths against violence and political thuggery, because the era of violence and thuggery is gone,” the Otaru said.

READ ALSO: Edo 2020: Edo Assembly Deputy Speaker, 4 others Endorse Ize-Iyamu’s Governorship Bid

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Responding, Obaseki said that with the challenges posed by the coronavirus pandemic, the people need a leader with focus, and one that is genuinely concerned about the well-being of the people of the state.

Edo State governor, Godwin Obaseki and PDP chieftains sitted at the campaign

On agriculture, the governor said that food production must be improved upon and taken more seriously as farming should be a priority, with the dwindling resources from Abuja.

What you have seen in the last three years and eight months is small compared to what we have planned for our second term. We have the experience that our opponent does not have.

“Our radical reforms have given us a solid foundation to build on. We will tackle security challenges in the state,” he said.

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READ ALSO: Obaseki Family Endorses Ize-Iyamu, Says Family Won’t Support Him

Obaseki assured that he will not disappoint the people who have stood by him since his assumption of office.

“I am seeking re-election because we have started a revolution of development in the last three years and eight months to make governance relevant to Edo people.

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“We pay civil servants and pensioners on time because we have prioritised their well-being and have trained our teachers to be digital teachers, and now our children are learning well. We have improved on infrastructure in Igarra land and we would do more.

READ ALSO: Edo 2020: Lawmaker Pledges Support For APC Governorship Candidate, Ize-Iyamu

“We have been working for Edo people with focus on the future of the youths in the state. We want to put more money in education. I want to complete the technical college here in Igarra, the Benin Electricity Distribution Company (BEDC) will soon be history as we have started working on electricity as I have made the son of this land to take charge of the electricity board. At the end of this year, electricity issue will be a thing of the past.

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“The role of government is to train the youths and build their capacity to enable them become employers of labour,” Obaseki added.

Also speaking, the Deputy Governor, Comrade Philip Shaibu thanked the people for their support in the last three years and eight months, just he sought their continued support and votes, in the September 19 election.

He noted that Obaseki is a man that doesn’t discriminate in the area of appointment as he appointed their sons to occupy the position of Interim Chief Press Secretary (CPS), Chief of Staff, Speaker, Edo State House of Assembly (EDHA), amongst others.

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READ ALSO: Edo Guber: Obaseki’s Ward Councilor, Six Others From Oredo LG Declare Support For Ize-Iyamu

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Elon Musk Puts Twitter’s Value At $20bn

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Elon Musk has put the current value of Twitter at $20 billion, less than half the $44 billion he paid for the social media platform just five months ago, according to an internal email seen by American news media.

The email to employees referred to a new stock compensation program in the San Francisco-based company and the allocation of shares to employees of X Holdings, Twitter’s umbrella company since Musk purchased it in late October.

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The compensation plan values the platform at $20 billion, slightly more than Snapchat’s parent company Snap ($18.2 billion) or Pinterest ($18.7 billion), both of which are publicly traded, unlike Twitter.

Musk, who is also the chief executive of Tesla Inc. and aerospace group SpaceX, said that Twitter would allow its employees to cash in shares every six months.

READ ALSO: Elon Musk Reinstates Suspended Twitter Accounts Of Journalists

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A query from AFP emailed to Twitter’s communications department generated an automatic response in the form of a poop emoji.

In the internal email, Musk describes the brutal contraction in Twitter’s value. He says the platform faced such grave financial difficulties that at one point it was on the verge of bankruptcy.

“Twitter was trending to lose ~$3B/year,” Musk said in a message posted Saturday on the platform.

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He cited a revenue drop of $1.5 billion a year and a debt-servicing burden of the same amount — leaving it with “only 4 months of money.”

Musk, Twitter’s majority shareholder, added simply: “Extremely dire situation.”

But he then said that “It looks like we will break even” in the second quarter of the year, with advertisers — many of whom fled the platform after the mercurial billionaire bought it — now beginning to return.

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READ ALSO: FG Speaks On Banning Twitter Again After Elon Musk’s Takeover

Since taking control, Musk has sharply cut the group’s payroll from 7,500 employees to fewer than 2,000.

He said in the email that he sees a “clear but difficult path” to a valuation of $250 billion, without specifying how long that might take.

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However, in another setback for the company, fragments of Twitter’s source code were published on the development platform GitHub, the latter told AFP on Sunday, confirming a report by the New York Times.

GitHub removed the files from its site at Twitter’s request, but their brief exposure could allow hackers to identify flaws in Twitter’s original software.

AFP

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Obasanjo’s Father Not Fully Yoruba, Might Be Igbo Man – Fani-Kayode

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Former Aviation Minister, Femi Fani-Kayode has expressed the belief that ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo’s father might not be a Yoruba man.

Fani-Kayode said Obasanjo’s ‘silence’ over a recent comment by Igbo businessman Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu that Yoruba people are “political rascals,” was an indication that the former president’s father was an Igbo man, not Yoruba.

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Iwuanyanwu said Igbo people had invested so much in Nigeria and were not going to yield to the pressure of people asking them to leave.

Speaking in Awka, Anambra State, on Saturday, Iwuanyanwu berated Yoruba people.

However, Fani-Kayode said he was disappointed that Obasanjo was silent over Iwuanyanwu’s anti-Yoruba comments.

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Taking to his Twitter handle, Fani-Kayode wrote: “The fact that our revered leader and one of the fathers of our nation, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, can sit there and say nothing when Emmanuel Iwanyanwu, who I have always respected, describes the entire Yoruba race as “rascals” that the Igbo “will DEAL with” tells me that the rumour that he is NOT a fully-fledged Yoruba man and that his father was an Igbo may well be true.

READ ALSO: Coup Comment: ‘I Was Asked To Report To DSS Everyday, Interrogation Challenging,’ Fan-Kayode Laments

“Whatever the case, this is not the OBJ I once knew, loved, defended and worked so hard for. Something has gone wrong. No one could have made a statement against ANY tribe in the presence of the old OBJ that we all knew and respected and got away with it.”

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Following the outcome of the presidential election, there was a face-off between Yorubas and Igbos in Lagos.

The fallout was due to the victory of the Labour Party, LP, presidential candidate, Peter Obi, in Lagos State.

Against the backdrop of Obi’s victory, Igbos were warned against voting during the governorship election in Lagos.

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Report Banks Not Dispensing Cash To State NLC’s Office — LABOUR

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The Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, has directed workers to report banks not dispensing cash to its state councils, ahead of planned strike over the scarcity of naira notes across the country.

This is even as leaders of NLC have scheduled a meeting of National Executive Council, NEC, meeting tomorrow to take a final decision on Wednesday’s planned nationwide strike.

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It gathered NLC gave the directive weekend after its NEC meeting on Friday where affiliate unions and state councils of NLC were directed to monitor the cash situation and how banks were dispensing naira notes to workers.

Speaking in an interview with Vanguard yesterday, President of NLC, Joe Ajaero, said: “Our affiliate unions and state councils were directed to monitor the situation. Workers have been directed to report banks not dispensing cash to NLC state offices.

”Our state councils and affiliates unions are to report back to us the prevailing situations in their states by Tuesday when we will hold another NEC meeting. The report we get from them will determine our next line of action.

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READ ALSO: NLC Gives FG 7-day-ultimatum Over Naira Scarcity

”In fact, the seven days ultimatum we gave will expire on Tuesday (March 28). The report will determine our final decision. As we speak, I am out on the streets of Abuja monitoring the situation.

”I am aware also that officials of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, were in Lagos on Saturday and Sunday to monitor the situation.”

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It was gathered that part of the decision was that “the nationwide strike will be a sit-at-home and picketing of the headquarters of the CBN and all its offices nationwide on Wednesday, March 29, 2023. If the strike commences, it would continue until cash becomes available to all Nigerians.”

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