Saturday Edition
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Saturday, APRIL 5, 2014 Vol. 1 No. 46
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Nigeria’s most authoritative newspaper in politics and business
YEMI ALADE
OJB JEZREEL
MY SURVIVAL STORY IS AN INSPIRATION p.19
POP’S NEW SENSATION p.21
$7m bounty on Shekau still valid - US officials lNasarawa killings: Civilians killed not insurgents, says Al-Makura Ndubuisi Ugah and Muhammad Ahmad Lafia
I
ndications have emerged that the $7 million reward offered by the United States (US) for information leading to the location of the leader of the outlawed Boko Haram sect, Abubakar Shekau, who was declared dead by the Joint Task Force (JTF), almost 10 months ago may still be subsisting, the New Telegraph can reveal. Investigations revealed that the US position on the reward was premised on
the fact that it cannot readily confirm the true status of Shekau on whose head the federal government also placed a N50 million bounty. Controversies had continued to trail the circumstances surrounding the death of the sect’s leader, whose activities have claimed more than 700 people this year alone, and nearly 500,000 displaced from their homes. Worse hit in the renewed attacks were women, children and schools which have been closed severally after a series of massacres and
school burnings. In August 2013, the JTF had issued a statement where it claimed Shekau may have died of gunshot wounds he received in an encounter with JTF troops at the Sambisa Forest on June 30, 2013. The then spokesman for the JTF in Maiduguri, Borno State, Lt. Col. Sagir Musa, had in the statement, said Shekau was mortally wounded in the encounter and was sneaked into Amitchide, a border community in Cameroun, for treatment from which he
never recovered. He said the sect’s leader might have died between July 25 and August 3, 2013. But in response to an email inquiry on why the US Rewards for Justice (RFJ) has yet to revise its $7 million pledge for anyone with information that leads to Shekau’s capture, the Information Officer of the US Embassy in Abuja, Ms. Rhonda Ferguson-Augustus, said: “Although we cannot confirm Shekau’s status at this time, the RFJ reward offer remains valid.
Court remands suspected killer of ex-magistrate - ‘Yes, I killed her,’ defiant accused tells court Kunle Olayeni Abeokuta
A
Chief Magistrate’s Court sitting in Abeokuta, Ogun State yesterday re-
manded a 21-year-old man, David Uche Idah, in prison custody for the killing of a retired senior magistrate, Mrs. Olufunmilayo Timeyin. CONTINUED ON PAGE 5
CONTINUED ON PAGE 2
Immigrations hit by passport shortage lApplicants pay between N40,000 and N55,000 Oluwatosin Omoniyi
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igerians wishing to acquire new international passports or the e-passport from the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) are in for a hard time. The agency is currently battling with unavailability of lamination materials
needed for the passport. As a result, a privileged few pay between N50, 000 to N60, 000 to have their documents processed. Others, who cannot afford such amounts will have to wait for weeks before they could be given after the capturing process. But even at that, New
Telegraph gathered yesterday that a small quantity of materials brought in to the Festac Office of the NIS on Thursday was stolen by some junior officers. A senior official of the Festac office confirmed to our correspondent yesterday that the plans by the office to issue fresh passports to
Nigerians who had done their capturing for some weeks now were shattered early Friday morning when it was discovered that the materials were missing. “There’s nothing much we can do today again. The little material brought in yesCONTINUED ON PAGE 2
Discordant tunes trail apc congress... amosun, osoba make peace p.3
Martin Agbaso
‘MY REGRETS OVER SUPPORT FOR OKOROCHA’ }45