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Military moves NEWS Page 4 command to Borno
•How Senate President, Speaker will emerge today •Protests rock Akure as Mimiko okays new Deji of Akure •Alleged N8b fraud: Eight accused back in prison •Ikere women kick against ‘imposition’ of monarch
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VOL. 10, NO. 3240 TUESDAY, JUNE 9, 2015
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TR UTH IN DEFENCE OF FREEDOM TRUTH
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Saraki dumps APC to run with Ekweremadu Bloc votes plan collapses Ex-Kwara governor shuns Ndume, Goje, others From Yusuf Alli, Onyedi Ojiabor and Sanni Onogu, Abuja
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LANS to get Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) senators-elect and members of the House of Representatives-elect to vote en bloc for principal officers during today’s inauguration of the Eighth National Assembly collapsed yesterday. There was also a split among the PDP governors on who to support between Senator Ahmed Lawan and Senator Bukola Saraki for Senate president. But The Nation learnt this morning that at a meeting of PDP Senators-elect in Abuja, 28 agreed to back Saraki/Ike Ekweremadu ticket; 17 agreed to back Lawan/Akume ticket. That was after Saraki decided to work with PDP in a desperate move to win the race. Some senators and members-elect rejected the suggestion by Ekiti State Governor Ayodele Fayose that PDP senators should vote Saraki. Lawan at the weekend emerged the choice candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) after a mock election by the party’s senators-elect. But the Saraki camp rejected the straw poll and vowed to contest for the position on the floor today. The APC is the majority party in the Senate, with 59 senators-elect. The PDP has 49 senators. It was learnt that at a meeting held by the PDP caucus on Sunday night in former Senate President David Mark’s residence in Apo, Abuja, the divided PDP senators-elect and their governors were said to have threatened to draft one of them into the race if the APC failed to agree on a consensus candidate. Continued on page 4
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WILL THE CHIBOK GIRLS KIDNAPPED ON APRIL 15, LAST YEAR EVER RETURN?
•From left (front row): Obama, Hollande, Buhari, Cameron. Behind them (from right): World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, International Monetary PHOTO: REUTERS Fund (IMF) President Christine Largarde and others...yesterday
is clearly no religious basis for the actions of the group. Their atrocities show ‘There that members of the group either do not know God at all or they don’t believe in Him ’
G7 leaders back Buhari’s battle against Boko Haram
NEWS Page 4
Obama, Hollande, Cameron, Merkel want terrorism to end fast
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