Author: Vincent Osuwo

The Department of State Services (DSS) has clarified why its operatives visited the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project’s (SERAP) Abuja office on Monday. In a statement posted on its website on Tuesday, the secret police said that, contrary to claims, its officers raided SERAP’s office, and the agents were assigned to routine investigations. The DSS said that the officers’ actions had been misunderstood as harassment and intimidation. The statement read, “The Department of State Services has been inundated with multiple enquiries on its alleged unlawful invasion of SERAP offices in Abuja and Lagos. “This narrative is inaccurate and misleading in…

Nigeria’s telecom sector is on the verge of shutting down after over 800 workers from the Private Telecommunications and Communications Senior Staff Association went on strike, threatening to cripple services across the country.  The organisation, which is mostly made up of contract workers, warned of severe disruptions to telecom operations if its demands were not granted, potentially leaving millions of users without access to communication. The strike began on Monday, and the union’s demands include, among other things, the reinstatement of some of its dismissed employees, union recognition, improved working conditions, and the payment of membership dues. “The strike has…

Hollywood actor Tyrese Gibson has been taken into custody after he failed to pay the monthly $10,000 child support payments a judge ordered him to make to his ex, Samantha Lee. Gibson, who shares five-year-old daughter Soraya with Lee, was held in contempt of court Monday morning during a hearing over the issue. Judge Kevin Farmer was dissatisfied with his unwillingness to make the monthly $10,000 child support payments that he was ordered to make beginning in April 2023. Farmer held Gibson in contempt of court on Monday. The bailiff then handcuffed the ‘Fast & Furious’ actor and took him…

No fewer than six people have been killed and several others abducted by bandits in Kallah Afogo Community, Kajuru Local Government Area of Kaduna State. According to locals, the bandits raided the area at 11:15 p.m. on Sunday, breaking into houses and abducting residents. According to reports, those killed in Kallah included Garkuwa Alfarma, Buhari Maidiga, Uba Auta, Yakubu Gaku, and Atabata Naallah. One of the locals who pursued the criminals through the jungle was slain and his body disfigured. The bandits made another attack on Bakin Pah in Maro Ward of the same council, killing one person and kidnapping…

Justice Hasfat Abdulrahaman, Chief Judge of Adamawa State, has released Saraya Silma, a sexagenarian who had spent ten years awaiting trial at the Yolde-pate Correctional Centre in Yola, the state capital. Silma, who appeared feeble, stated that she had been accused of witchcraft, which the complainant denied. The Chief Judge, after enquiring about the accused’s residence, gave her N12,000 to convey herself back to Cameroon. Rape: Two Nigerians found guilty of raping 17-year-old in UK Out of the 182 awaiting trial inmates presented to the Adamawa State Jail Delivery Committee, which is led by the state Chief Judge, 32 were…

Northampton Crown Court in the United Kingdom, UK, has found two Nigerians, Tosin Dada and Solomon Adebiyi, guilty of multiple rape charges. Northamptonshire Police confirmed this in a statement posted on its official Facebook page on Monday. This comes weeks after a Nigerian pilot, Olukayode Ojo, was convicted in a Texas court in the United States of making false statements to get a Federal Aviation Administration certificate. According to Northamptonshire Police, Dada and Adebiyi were charged with three charges of rape in connection with a March 2022 incident. It was gathered that the convicts had claimed they engaged in consensual…

The president of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Joe Ajaero, has been granted administrative bail by the Department of State Services.  He was released just a few minutes before the organised labour’s 12 a.m. deadline. Omoyele Sowore, a pro-democracy activist and presidential candidate for the African Action Congress, announced his release via Twitter on Monday night. “BREAKING: The fascist regime of @officialABAT has released the @NLCHeadquarters President Joe Ajaero from @OfficialDSSNG custody on bail,” he wrote on X. The Peoples Democratic Party, New Nigeria Peoples Party, and Social Democratic Party all criticised President Bola Tinubu’s administration on Monday in response…

The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project’s (SERAP) Abuja office has been taken over by officers of the Department of State Services, DSS. This was announced in a statement by SERAP on its verified X page on Monday. The rights group described the taken over of its office by operatives of the Service as “unlawful.” The DSS operatives demanded to meet with the organisation’s directors. The organisation had called on President Bola Tinubu to intervene and prosecute those responsible for the invasion of its offices. “President Tinubu must immediately direct the SSS to end the harassment, intimidation, and attack on the…

Human rights lawyer Femi Falana, SAN, has warned the federal government against unauthorised invasions of offices, particularly those of human rights defenders.  Falana was reacting to the illegal invasion of the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project’s (SERAP) Abuja office by men from the Department of State Services (DSS). Chronicle NG reports that DSS operatives invaded the Abuja office of the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP). SERAP said the DSS officers were asking to see the rights group’s directors. It described the action as an ‘unlawful occupation’. However, in a statement on Monday, Falana criticised their actions and advised Tinubu…

Months after detaining Okuama community leaders, soldiers invaded the community on Monday morning in four gunboats and 11 speedboats, shooting randomly and killing three youths before looting food stores.  The soldiers also took away a big granite canoe, a sand dredger, and generating sets needed by the returning inhabitants. A neighbourhood teenager who spoke with Vanguard after returning from his hideout described how the soldiers arrived in four gunboats and 11 speedboats, shooting intermittently. They then arrived on land via the Okoloba community, having previously used drones to observe the community on Sunday. The soldiers reportedly executed three youths, Ojeh…