Anambra tribunal clears Obiano of multiple registration
Latest blog entries
Anambra tribunal clears Obiano of multiple registration
Reprieve came the way of the Governor-elect of Anambra State, Chief Willie Obiano, on Tuesday when the Election Petitions Tribunal ruled it could not entertain issues relating to his alleged involvement in multiple registration.
The tribunal also struck out the petition of Dr. Chike Obidigbo, who is contesting the All Progressives Grand Alliance ticket with Obiano at the tribunal.
While Obiano emerged on the platform of the Victor Umeh-led faction of APGA, the Maxi Okwu-led faction produced Obidigbo.
The tribunal held in its ruling on an application in which Obiano asks the tribunal to strike out aspects of the petition, including the paragraph on the said multiple registration, filed by governorship candidate of the People’s Democratic Party, Mr. Tony Nwoye, that the issue of multiple registration had already been determined by a High Court in the state, which bars the tribunal from reopening the matter.
The panel said the Electoral Act states that multiple registration is a criminal offence. But in the case of Obiano, he had not been convicted over the offence and therefore it could not be held against him.
It said supplying false information to the Independent National Electoral Commission was not enough to disqualify a person from contesting an elective position unless a court disqualifies the person.
Justice Akintola Akiniyi, who read the ruling, said the issue of multiple registration and that of underage registration and voting were pre-election matters and the tribunal had no jurisdiction to entertain them.
“Consequently, that paragraph of the election petition relating to pre-election matters, the said affected paragraphs are hereby struck out,” the panel held.
Obidigbo had prayed the tribunal to let him be joined as a respondent in all the petitions filed against the election of Obiano.
But the tribunal ruled that apart from the issue of time limitation catching up with the applicant, Obidigbo was not found in any of the bodies of all the petitions before the tribunal.
Read More
Lack of funds to police threatens 2015 elections -Senate
The senate committee on police affairs on Tuesday raised the alarm that the decrease in the budgetary allocations to the Nigerian police in the 2014 budget proposal may threaten the 2015 general elections.
Specifically, the committee said the development could affect the state of the preparedness of the police to carry out a smooth conduct of the polls.
Chairman of the committee, Senator Paulinus Nwagwu, who stated this during the budget defence by the Police Affairs ministry, also expressed fears that the policemen may resort to strike actions if their salaries were not paid.
Nwagwu observed for instance that allocation for personnel cost nose-dived from N292bn in 2013 to N279 bn in 2014.
He also said the allocation for overhead cost for the police commands and formations equally took a downward turn from N7.6 bn to N5.4 bn in the current fiscal year.
The senator said, “As I am talking to you, this quarter, the police is unable to pay salaries, don’t forget that we are the people who oversee them and we meet with them from time to time.
“I don’t want a situation where police officers may go on strike. Things that are not supposed to happen in this country is happening because of our enemies or perceived enemies of government.
“We in this committee will not sit back and be looking at it happen like that. The issue of their salary is key. Personnel cost is key in government and it has to be corrected immediately otherwise, it will delay your budget.
“If last year when we did not have any major election, the police formation and command was given N7.6 bn as overhead cost and if you look at the proposal of 2014 budget it is N1.2 bn less than what was given to the police last year.
“Looking at the year we are, the election year when we expect the police performing in all the states of the federation in making sure they provide enough security for Nigerian to have a free movement, is there any assurances to Nigerians that you are ready to provide security to them for the elections.?”
The supervising Minister of Police Affairs, Ms. Jumoke Akinjide, who led the management team of the ministry for the budget Defence told the lawmakers that already her ministry has led a delegation to the minister of finance to complain about the shortfalls in the ministry’s budgetary allocations particularly as regards the drop in personnel costs.
She said, “It is something that worries us and we have made a representation to the ministry of finance. There is no reason to justify the decrease, at worse, we should maintain last year’s amount. The ministry is looking at it and I believe this will be rectified very soon.”
The minister also put the current strength of the Nigerian police force at about 370,000 men and women and told the lawmakers that her ministry was muting the idea of making additional recruitment into the force.
She assured that the police was ready for the 2015 elections, stressing that, “we are ready to deliver on a free, fair and credible elections because it is a cardinal policy of the President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration.”
The minister also explained why there was zero budget for police reform programmes, noting that at the National Economic Council meeting chaired by the Vice Prsident and attended by all the 36 states governors.
She said it was agreed that one per cent of the consolidated revenue funds would be devoted for the funding of the police reform programmes, which would be distributed in the proportion that is due to the three arms of government.
Read More
UN condemms anti-homosexuality law in Uganda
UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ms Navi Pillay, have kicked against the anti-homosexuality bill, signed into law in Uganda on Monday.
A UN statement issued on Tuesday in New York stated that the law criminalises and imposes life imprisonment on same-sex marriage, homosexuality and aggravated homosexuality.
Ban said the law violates basic human rights and endangers Lesbians, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) people in the country.
He said he was seriously concerned about the negative impact of the new law and shares the UN High Commissioner’s view which states that the law violates human rights.
The UN scribe added that the law would institutionalise discrimination, restrict the vital work of human rights activists and could trigger violence.
He insisted that it would also hamper potentially life-saving efforts to stop the spread of HIV.
The UN chief appealed for complete and universal decriminalisation of homosexuality, which is now a criminal offence in some 76 countries.
Ban stressed that human rights must always trump cultural attitudes and societal strictures.
On her part, Pillay said disapproval of homosexuality by some could never justify violating the fundamental human rights of others.
She said the law institutionalised discrimination and was likely to encourage harassment and violence against individuals on the basis of their sexual orientation.
She added that it was formulated so broadly that it might lead to abuse of power and accusations against anyone, not just LGBT people.
She said Uganda was obliged, both by its own constitution and by international law, to respect the rights of all individuals and to protect them from discrimination and violence.
Pillay said the law violates a host of fundamental human rights, including the right to freedom from discrimination, to privacy, freedom of association, peaceful assembly, opinion and expression and equality before the law.
The high commissioner expressed concern that the law might also threaten the critically important work of human rights defenders in the country and urged the Ugandan government to take immediate steps to ensure that LGBT people were not prosecuted for their advocacy. (PANA/NAN)
Read More
Indian Neurosurgeon Arrested For Practicing Without Licence
Indian Neurosurgeon Arrested For Practicing Without Licence
— February 25, 2014
The Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria (MDCN) has arrested an Indian Neurosurgeon, Dr. Raju Bhuvaneswara for operating without a practice licence.
The council who went with policemen from Apo resettlement Division on Monday in Abuja, arrested the 53 years old doctor at Asokoro District Hospital in the Federal Capital Territory.
He was said to have been conducting Neurosurgical operations at Asokoro District Hospital for more than a year without licence from MDCN, the regulating agency for doctors and dentists in the country.
Basina was performing a Craniotomy (brain surgery) in an operating theatre when police and MDCN’s inspectorate officials led by Dr. Henry Okwuokenye arrived at the Hospital for his arrest.
The team was also accompanied by President of the Guild of Medical Directors, Dr. Tony Phillips.
The Chief Medical Director of Asokoro Hospital, Dr. Ahmadu Abubakar, had to prevail on officials of MDCN to wait for him to finish his surgery before thy could pick him up.
Okwuokenye who is Head (Inspectorate Unit) of MDCN, told journalists that investigations have revealed that Basina had already been working as a Doctor at Asokoro Hospital for many months before eventually applying for a licence in August last year.
He said, “The MDCN is yet to process Basina’s application while response from our counterpart in India’s medical regulating agency is pending.
But Basina has continued to work on contract, insisting that he had applied.
According to him, mere application did not constitute the temporary licence meant for Doctors who are trained outside Nigeria adding that Basina should have waited for response before practicing.
“We wrote a letter to India to tell us about the status and license of Basina but they are yet to get back to us.
Although he claimed to have applied, mere application is not a license to practice.
When we asked him of a Doctor could practice in India without license, he said No. Why then is he practicing in Nigeria? Time has come for us to sanitize the system, Nigeria is not a banana Republic where anything can happen”, Okwuokenye stated.
Among documents Basina filed in his application are photocopies of credentials from Nazims Institute of Medical Sciences and Rangaraya Medical College.
As at the time of this report, it was not clear if Basina has been granted bail by the police.
During talks with regulation officials at the Hospital, Basina insisted he trained in the United States among other places, but added that getting a practice licence in Nigeria was too long and inconvenient.
At a point, he insisted that practicing licences were easily ordered “over the phone” in India or took “less than two days” in the US.
“Can I do this in India? I go to india, I apply, and while waiting for them, I start practising?”, Okwuokenye queried.
Okwuokenye insisted that an “application was not equivalent to licence”, pointing out that there were other Indian and foreign doctors practicing in Nigeria with due licensing.
He said the MDCN was committed to clamping down on undue practice by persons claiming to be Doctors in new crackdown ordered by its Registrar/CEO, Dr. Abdulmumini Ibrahim.
At least three separate cases involving improper licencing are facing prosecution in court, the council revealed.
Basina is in his second one-year contract at the Hospital but his arrest questions how his contract was renewed, his services hired or posted to Asokoro DH without a practice licence
The FCT Administration, through its establishment unit and Health Secretariat, centrally hires and posts Doctors to its district hospitals, managed by the Hospitals Management Board.
« Previous Article
Ihejirika Challenges Jaji Students To Evolve Mechanisms On Funding Military
Read More
Comments
Post a Comment