The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on Friday said it received nominations from 79 political parties for the 2019 presidential election and 6,352 for the National Assembly.

According to INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu who disclosed this while addressing newsmen in Abuja on update on the implementation of activities for the 2019 general elections, the commission received 1,856 nominations for the 109 Senate seats, and 4,496 nominations for the House of Representatives with 360 seats.

“However, INEC did not receive any submission from APC Zamfara state. I will not say more than that because the matter is still in court,’’ he said.

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The Nigerian Army on Friday said it has discovered a shallow grave where the immediate past Chief of Administration (Army), retired Major General Idris Alkali, was buried

General Officer Commanding 3 Division, Major General Benson Akinroluyo, who disclosed this at a press briefing on Friday in Plateau, said Major General Alkali was killed and buried in a shallow grave in an area popularly known as, “No man’s land” in a community on the outskirt of Jos metropolis.

He alleged that the late military officer who was travelling alone in his black Toyota Corolla car from Abuja to Bauchi via Jos was assaulted and killed on September 3, 2018 by hoodlums who blocked the Eastern Bypass in protest of an attack on their area that saw 11 people killed, adding that his body was moved to somewhere else while his car was driven and pushed into an abandoned mining pit filled with water.

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A London based news magazine,The Economist Magazine has predicted that President Muhammadu Buhari will lose the 2019 Presidential elections to the candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar.

The prediction was contained in its latest country report on Nigeria, provided by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), the research unit of the Magazine, less than two months after it had predicted that Buhari would lose the election.

“With the vote likely to be split in the North, Abubakar will find it easier to garner support from the country’s south, which has traditionally been a safe haven for the PDP. This gives Abubakar an edge, as does popular frustration over the rise in joblessness and poverty (two of the biggest voter concerns) on Mr. Buhari’s watch, as well as growing insecurity in central Nigeria,” the report read in part.

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The opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) has challenged President Muhammadu Buhari to submit his academic credentials to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) ahead of the 2019 general election, “rather than seek ways to short-circuit the system.”

In a statement on Friday by its spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan, the PDP “charged President Muhammadu Buhari to show proof of his vaunted integrity by presenting his academic documents if he has any, to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and put to an end his certificate saga.”

“Moreover, President Buhari and the All Progressives Congress (APC) must realise that even their followers, that were beguiled in 2015, are currently not prepared to accept ‘NEPA bill’ as WAEC certificate in the 2019 elections,” the statement read.

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Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, says the Economic Management Team would be meeting with state governors on Monday to harmonise positions on the ongoing negotiation with labour unions over the implementation of a new national minimum wage, for which the organized labour  has threatened to embark on an industrial action from November 6.

Ngige, who spoke to State House correspondents after the closed-door meeting at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, where he briefed President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo on the issue, said the federal government as the leader of the three tiers of government was inviting them to be briefed on steps taken so far.

“So, on Monday, we will have a very useful discussion before the tripartite committee will come and submit its report,’’ he said.

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