Author: Opalim Lifted

US intelligence agencies found no direct evidence that the COVID-19 pandemic stemmed from an incident at China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology, a report declassified on Friday said. The four-page report by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) said the US intelligence community still could not rule out the possibility that the virus came from a laboratory and had not been able to discover the origins of the pandemic. “The Central Intelligence Agency and another agency remain unable to determine the precise origin of the COVID-19 pandemic, as both natural and laboratory hypotheses rely on significant assumptions or…

The senator representing Delta North, Ned Nwoko, has expressed his grief over the loss of his close friend and business partner, Hamish Harding, who died alongside four others during a submersible expedition to visit the ruins of the Titanic ship. He said he would have been part of the trip because he was invited, noting that in 2020 he and Harding embarked on an expedition to Antarctica together. He shared on his official Instagram account, “Nwoko shared, “I have lost a very dear friend and business partner, Captain Hermish Harding. We both went on a very dangerous expedition to South…

An event last week is nudging me back to a subject I have avoided for a long time in my sports discourse: Nigerian football. The Teranga Lions quietly created history last week in Lisbon, Portugal. The world has been in a state of awe and shock, stunned by the transformation of the Senegalese national football team. The team that struggled to hold the lowly Squirrels of Benin Republic to a 1-1 draw in Cotonou became giant conquerors a few days later, last Tuesday. I have not read many analysts do a forensic analysis of the friendly match of the Lions…

The average retail price for refilling a 5kg Cylinder of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (Cooking Gas) declined by 6.07% on a month-on-month basis from N4,642.27 recorded in April 2023 to N4,360.69. In May 2023. On a year-on-year basis, this rose by 11.20% from N3,921.35 in May 2022. On state profile analysis, Bayelsa recorded the highest average price for refilling a 5kg Cylinder of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (Cooking Gas) with N5,016.67, followed by Zamfara with N5,000.00 and Abuja with N4,900.00. On the other hand, Ondo recorded the lowest price with N3,795.83, followed by Nasarawa and Edo with N3,800.00 and N3,837.14, respectively. In…

Popular video streaming platform Netflix has rewarded content creator Ikorodu Bois with special gift boxes for their remake of the ‘Extraction 2’ trailer. The Ikorodu Bois made this known on their Instagram page on Friday. Sharing a video of them unboxing the gifts, Ikorodu Bois wrote, “#Netflix You guys are the sweetest. It’s the message in the card for us! We love youuuuu! #netflix #Extraction2” In the video, the child group got school bags, shades, vests, and other items in their boxes, along with a customised note. The note read, “Dear Ikorodu Bois, we are absolutely blown away by your…

Relatives and colleagues mourned on Friday the deaths of five people who died when their submersible imploded in the North Atlantic during a deep dive to the Titanic wreck, triggering questions about safety rules for such adventures into the ocean depths. Debris from the Titan submersible, missing since Sunday, was detected on Thursday by a robotic diving vehicle deployed from a Canadian ship as part of an international rescue effort. Remains of the submersible, which lost contact with a surface ship about 1 hour and 45 minutes into a 2-hour descent, were discovered on the seabed about 1,600 feet (488…

Several residences in the TradeMoore area, Lugbe, Abuja, have been trapped by flooding as a result of hours of heavy rain. Floods kill nine, ruin homes and wreck farms in Italy The rain, which started in the early hours of Friday, June 23, 2023, led to the area being overtaken by floods, which prohibited residents from going about their businesses. In a video clip making the rounds on social media, the area located along Airport Road in the FCT was enmeshed by swamping as a result of heavy rainfall that persisted for hours. It will be recalled that in September…

Borno State Governor Babagana Zulum frowned at restrictions and delays for farmers at security checkpoints along the Mafa-Gaboru road on the outskirts of Maiduguri Metropolis. Chronicle NG reports that farm products are perishable, and as such, any form of transportation impediment affects their quality before storage. Four years after incessant attacks in the Lake Chad area, the Borno State government, alongside the military, has reopened the 137-kilometre Maiduguri-Dikwa-Mafa-Gamboru Ngala Road for motorists. During the tape-cutting event held on Friday, Governor Babagana Zulum commended the military and local vigilantes for securing the region and urged the road users to be law-abiding…

The Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) has shared a total sum of N786.161 billion with the federal, state, and Local Governments. It represented their share of the May 2023 Federation Account Revenue, according to the communiqué issued at the end of the FAAC meeting in Abuja yesterday. The FAAC meeting was chaired by the new Accountant-General of the Federation, Dr. Oluwatoyin Madein, according to the Director of Press and Public Relations, Mr. Bawa Mokwa. The N786.161 billion total distributable revenue comprised distributable statutory revenue of N519.545 billion, distributable Value Added Tax (VAT) revenue of N251.607 billion, Electronic Money Transfer levies…

Terrorists set to attack worship centres during Eid-el-Kabir – DSSTerrorists are reportedly intending to assault places of worship and entertainment on Eid-el-Kabir, according to the Department of State Services (DSS). This was mentioned in a statement released on Thursday by DSS spokesman Dr. Peter Afunanya. Afunanya urged owners and users of public spaces, particularly markets, and malls, to exercise caution and alert the appropriate security services to any suspicious activity or people. He said that during a coordinated operation by the department and its sister security agencies, the service had recovered primed Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) from suspected terrorists. He…