• 2023 Elections: Tinubu is not ready to run for office or be in charge – Atiku
• We spent $100m feeding 10m school children — FG
• Prof Folasade Ogunsola emerges first female UNILAG VC
• Nationwide blackout looms as TCN staff plan to ground power sector
• Sacked Living Faith pastor sues Bishop Oyedepo, others for N350m

Across Nigeria’s 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, these are the five top Nigerian news stories you shouldn’t miss:

2023 Elections: Tinubu is not ready to run for office or be in charge – Atiku

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), stated that the All Progressives Congress (APC) and its presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, are unprepared for the election and governance.

In a statement released on Friday by his spokesman, Senator Dino Melaye, Atiku asked Nigerians to scrutinize the conduct and character of individuals and parties seeking leadership.

According to him, it is becoming increasingly evident that APC members are desperate to keep power.

The PDP candidate for president also said that the APC uses media propaganda to mislead Nigerians.

The statement read in part, “I once had a cause to describe the APC as an NGO and not a political party. Even now that it has managed to have a contrivance called party executive it remains formless, unstructured, uncoordinated and unorganised. It’s not surprising since as you may recall the coronation of the Chairman of the Party was a mere formalisation of the appointment approved by President Muhammadu Buhari, who is the lifewire, navigator, and camp commandant of the APC.

“As an indication of the unpreparedness of the APC to lead Nigeria, the party, in its nearly 10 years of existence, has no Board of Trustees. The Board of Trustees is usually referred to as the soul or the conscience of the Party. Without a soul, the party has remained rudderless, floundering, reactive and retrogressive. Before Ahmed Tinubu emerged as the flag bearer of the Party against the run of play, he had, in his usual entitled fashion, been addressed as the leader of the party. However, neither he nor any other was good enough to lead the BOT, so the structure remained sterilised.

“With the acephalic existence of the party, it could only function under a Caretaker Committee. Again, no one was worthy to lead the intervening contraption but a sitting Governor, who ordinarily should be preoccupied with the affairs of his state. As things stand, all the illegality committed in Buni’s era may be subjected to judicial interrogation. The shilly-shally continued until the Presidential Convention of Parties fell due.

“Again, the APC acted disjointedly, asking to be granted an extension of time by the Independent National Electoral Commission ( INEC). While PDP had conducted its Party Convention and Presidential Election convention as scheduled, INEC had to babysit and spoon-feed APC before it could hold its Party and Presidential primaries conventions. How the Party dilly-dallied before ending up with the contentious selection of a running mate for its presidential candidate is another lamentable story waiting to be told another day.

“Another evidence of maturational lag manifested during the Presidential Primaries. The National Chairman of the Party, acting for himself or a proxy expressed preference for a candidate, while majority of APC Governors had their own choice. Though President Buhari, sometimes humoured to be the leader of the Party, did not make any pronouncement, it is unlikely that the Chairman acted alone without the approval of the man behind the mask. Till today it has been a ding-dong between the National Chairman of APC and the flag bearer of the Party. Where is the time to think or act on the good of Nigeria in all these?

“Perhaps a more telling indicator of the gross unpreparedness of the APC for governance is in the constitution of its Campaign Council. In its unguided attempt to be at pace with the better organised and better-structured party like the PDP, the APC amateurs bypassed processes, ignored consultation, discarded vital inputs and ran to the press with a hurriedly hemmed list of Council members.

“As the joke goes, it is the matter they are still settling. The omission or commission arising from the composition has led to accusations and counter-accusations of usurpation of power, disregard for processes, violation of power boundaries, engagement of the dead and even the borrowing of names from other parties to make up numbers or profiles.

“The inauguration of the APC Campaign Council has since been postponed indefinitely! If the kick off of campaigns was unified by INEC APC would still have held PDP and other parties down from commencing their campaign, but Gentlemen, as you can see PDP is already up and running”.

We spent $100m feeding 10m school children — FG

As part of efforts to reduce the issue of child labor in the country, the Federal Government said on Friday that approximately $100 million was spent to feed 10 million Nigerian children through the National School Feeding Programme.

This was said by the Minister of Labor and Employment, Senator Chris Ngige, in his office while receiving the United States Ambassador to Nigeria, Mary Beth Leonard, and officials from the Department of State.

Ngige noted that the Nigerian government implemented the school feeding program as part of its social security initiative in an effort to get youngsters involved in child labor back into the classroom.

He stated that the Federal government also implemented social protection programs to combat poverty, which is the leading cause of child labor in Nigeria.

A statement by Olajide Oshundun, Head of Press and Public Relations, Federal Ministry of Labour and Employment quoted Ngige as saying, “We have introduced the National school feeding programme under our social security, to lure children back to school. As of today, we are feeding 10 million children across the country. We have spent nearly $10 million on this.

“We have also taken more schools into the areas prone to child labour and made education free in the whole country through the Universal Basic Education Act and the Child Rights Act.

“For the people with disability, we introduced Disability Peoples Commission to give them full and comprehensive aid so that they will not feel that they have any disability. If you don’t support someone with a disability, it is outright poverty.”

Previously, Leornard expressed concern that Nigerian children were forced to the harshest forms of child labor in quarries, grannies, and mines.

She affirmed that her country would continue to collaborate with the Nigerian government to combat the problem and urged the seven states that had not yet adopted the Child Rights Act to do so without further delay.

She stated that the U.S. government was glad to learn of a new project in Nigeria that gives vulnerable individuals with seed funding to pursue initiatives in regions with a high prevalence of child labor.

Prof Folasade Ogunsola emerges first female UNILAG VC

Professor of Microbiology Folasade Ogunsola has been named the 13th Vice Chancellor of the University of Lagos (UNILAG).

The scholar makes history by becoming the institution’s first female vice-chancellor since its founding in 1962.

Prof. Oluwatoyin Ogundipe, the outgoing and 12th VC, whose single five-year term ends on November 11 will be succeeded by Ogunsola.

Her competitors were Professors Abayomi Akinyeye of the Department of History, Faculty of Arts; Mathew Ilori and Adeyinka Adekunle of the Departments of Microbiology and Botany, Faculty of Sciences.

Ayo Olowe, Department of Finance, Faculty of Management Sciences; Timothy Nubi, Department of Estate Management, Faculty of Environmental Sciences; Imran Smith, Faculty of Law.

Ogunsola, who was born in 1958, is a consultant in clinical microbiology and infection control at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH).

Ph.D. in Medical Microbiology, MSc in Medical Microbiology with Distinction, and Diploma in Biomedical Techniques from the University of Wales College of Medicine, Cardiff.

She holds membership with the Royal College of Pathologists, the West African College of Physicians, the Nigerian Academy of Science, the Nigerian Academy of Medicine, and the Academy of Medicine Specialties.

Ogunsola was the acting Vice-Chancellor of UNILAG and the former Deputy Vice-Chancellor in charge of Development Services.

The professor was the university’s first and only female Provost of the College of Medicine.

She has served as a member of the governing council for three periods, longer than any other individual.

Ogunsola has received a number of honors from local and international organizations, has published 142 works, and has co-authored four volumes.

Eight doctoral students and 61 master’s students have been overseen or co-directed by the distinguished professor to date.

Nationwide blackout looms as TCN staff plan to ground power sector

The National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE) has threatened to close down the power sector.

On Friday, the National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE) instructed its members to prepare for significant industrial action if the government does not abandon its plan to privatize the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN).

The union threatened to shut down the power industry in response to the government’s claimed covert intention to privatize the TCN, the arm of the power sector that transports large supplies of electricity from various producing sites to distribution corporations.

The union stated that it has properly notified the federal government not to expect another notification for industrial action if the plan is executed.

It was also emphasized that privatization will have the effect of completely crippling the nation’s economy, thereby destroying the nation, if the government attempts to place its only bargaining authority in the hands of privatized individuals.

During the just-concluded fifth Triennial Delegate Conference of the National Union of Electricity Employees, Lagos Genco & Transco Administrative Council, which was held at the National Control Centre (NCC) Osogbo, Osun State, they issued the threat.

Comrade Anthony Agyake, Assistant General Secretary of NUEE Lagos, stated that the leadership of the union, having heard a series of rumors that the government is planning to privatize TCN, issued a joint letter to the Presidency revealing the implications of selling the only negotiating power the government has and urging that such an evil plan be abandoned.

Agyake stated that the Union would not be pleased to see another destruction of the Power sector and remained silent, highlighting that Nigerians are still suffering from the privatization of both generation and distribution businesses, however, the government has not learnt its lesson.

He lamented that Nigerians have not witnessed the positive effects of the privatizations that occurred roughly nine years ago and that if the government continues to make the mistake of putting TCN in the hands of private individuals, the entire country will be in jeopardy due to the security implications.

The union drew Nigerians’ attention to the damage and risk that would be incurred if the government sold TCN, adding that it is sad that the learned fellows (Professors, Doctors, and Lecturers) who could have assisted the government have been on strike for months.

According to him, “one of the paragraphs addressed to the Commander-in-Chief is that the Presidency should accept that letter as notice. Any day, any time we wake up and hear that TCN is privatized, government should not expect any other notice from anywhere because we will embark on industrial action. No 21 days notice. No two days notice. We will surely embark on industrial action”.

Sacked Living Faith pastor sues Bishop Oyedepo, others for N350m

Dominic Essang Winner, pastor of the Living Faith Church also known as Winners Chapel, Calabar, has claimed that the “cabal in the church” has been persecuting, mistreating, and irritating him, despite having spent two decades in the church and overseeing six branches.

He gave an interview in Calabar after filing a lawsuit against the church and its founder, David Oyedepo, for not following the mandate/operational handbook used by the ministry to dismiss errant employees.

Further, he said that the conspiracy and lies against him resulted to his dismissal as resident pastor of Palm Street Extension church in Calabar.

Therefore, he has brought the church to the National Industrial Court of Nigeria, Calabar Judicial Division, for the claimed illegal termination of his position.

In suit No. NICN/CA/25/2022 against the Founder of Living Faith Church Worldwide Incorporated, Bishop David Oyedepo, Adebisi Aboluwade, and two other defendants for N350 Million in damages, the dismissed pastor, a Maths Statistics graduate of the University of Calabar, said he was bitter not because he was fired, but because the church did not follow its own due process.

Essang was disappointed that the cabals thwarted his efforts to include the General Overseer of the ministry, Dr. David Oyedepo, in the problem.

Essang stated, “I was a member of that church for over a decade prior to pursuing pastoral training. At the very least, I have spent more than two decades in the ministry, which makes me a son to our General Overseer, Bishop David Oyedepo.”

According to him, the church cabal consists of Pastor Tamunotoye Chukunda and Pastor Adeolu Adewuma, the state pastor of LFCWW Cross River State.

“According to the Living Faith’s operational mandate, before a pastor is sacked, such would first be queried in writing and made to appear before a disciplinary committee. Thereafter, three more warnings before he can be issued a termination of appointment letter. In my case nothing of such happened.

“I was not given the opportunity to appear before any disciplinary panel to defend myself.

“As I speak to you, I can’t even pay my children’s school fees nor pay my rent, or afford food, clothings and medicine for my kids”, Essang lamented.

Reacting, State Administrative Officer of the Church, Den Taiwo denied the allegations, saying no section of the operational mandate was violated.

The matter comes up for hearing at the National Industrial Court on 25 October, 2022.