BREAKING NEWS

The Australian government today announced a travel ban on all flights from West African countries, including Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia. Thankfully, Nigeria is not included. Making the announcement, the Australia's Minister of Immigration, Scott Morrison said under the new travel ban, no new visas would be issued to intending travelers from these countries and that all temporary visas would be cancelled, this is all i a bid to stop the spread of the deadly Ebola virus. He also said all passengers with permanent visas that have to travel to Australia from these countries will be subjected to 21 days of isolation in their countries of departure and upon arrival in Australia will be subjected to all kinds of test. He also announced the suspension of all its West African and Humanitarian programmes. culled from  linda ikeji

Folorunsho Alakija, a billionaire oil tycoon, fashion designer and philanthropist from Lagos, is a big investor in the London market Wealthy African buyers are spending almost £4million on London property every week as they look to snap up exclusive investments in the UK, it has emerged. Super-rich oligarchs are taking their vast resources and investing them in the safe haven of London property - with more than £600million spent in the capital in the past three years. A mixture of traditional reasons combined with increased terrorism and the outbreak of Ebola is said to be behind the dramatic influx of African money to the capital. The third reason is education, with King's School Canterbury, Wycombe Abbey, Cheltenham Ladies College, Eton, Harrow and Bradfield are among the favourite private schools for wealthy families from Africa. According to the Nigerian embassy, Nigerian nationals spend more than £300million-a-year on tutoring, accommodation, fees and equ...

Nigerian oil tycoon  Femi Otedola , who reportedly became at least $398 million richer between March 3 and June 2 this year, is on the cover of  Forbes Africa ‘s November 2014 issue.Forbes Africa Magazine describes Femi Otedela as  ‘The Billionaire Who Bounced Back’  and he covers the magazine wearing his signature white Nigerian traditional attire.Inside the November 2014 issue of Forbes is also a look into one of Africa’s trending vacation spot – Mauritius.  By  Desola Ade-Unuigbe

Chude Jideonwo and Debola Williams  Red Media co-founders and Future Awards Africa organizers  yesterday evening October 23rd, won The Young Business Leader of the Year category in the CNBC All Africa Business Leaders Awards 2014 which held at the Oriental Hotel in Lagos.

A Nigerian man named Raphael Agha and his wife welcomed Octuplets (8 children at once) in a hospital in Pretoria, South Africa recently. Above is the pic of 6 of the Agha children inside their incubators. The other two babies were not responding well so they moved them to a better equipped facility in Johannesburg.

Oscar Pistorius has been sentenced to 5 years in prison by Judge Thokozile Masipa. The following was what she considered before imposing her sentence.  1. Culpable homicide - 5 years in prison 2. For the Tasha shooting which he was found guilty for - 3 years in prison, wholly suspended for 5 years with conditions. The two sentences will run concurrently. His family is not planning to appeal. He will serve a minimum of 10 months in jail, after that, he'll be sent home to serve the remainder of his sentence under strict supervision controls. 

New governor of Ekiti state Ayo Fayose has accused former governor Kayode Fayemi of spending a whooping N50million on beds in his and his wife's bedroom at the Ekiti State Govt House which they recently vacated. (one of the beds pictured above). The new governor claimed that between Fayemi and his wife, what was spent on their bedrooms, toilets and bathrooms will be in the region of N100m Fayose made this accusation in a statement that was released yesterday October 20th by his Special Assistant Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka. The new governor described the newly built Government House in the state as a show of wickedness to Ekiti people, many of whom cannot afford to feed once a day. See photos of the Government House and an official statement sent to LIB after the cut...

You got your domain and you have your content ready and you are thriving to get visitors to your website. You must notice that you have some visitors visiting your website but unfortunately they leave the site quickly without looking into the further. You must be annoying to see horrible website stats? What’s the big deal? Of course they didn’t get anything that attracts them, and, even your website looks pretty amazing. Hmm! It is quite sure that your content needs to be more engaging and compelling or you need to put little more efforts in making your content copies more readable and interesting for your readers. Most experts’ points out that a pretty website is not all you need – you need killing content too. If this is where you are at then this blog post would help you! I am going to explain you few tips to create high quality, engaging website copies that you will be greatly pleased to: Do I Need SEO Optimization? Yeah! You must need SEO optimization to rank Web Copies higher ...

Lagos State is set to join the league of oil producing states in the country come next year as the joint venture partners on the Aje Field offshore Lagos have taken the final investment decision on the exploration of the field. A group led by Yinka Folawiyo Petroleum Company Limited took the FID to develop the first phase of the Aje shallow water oil field for $220m. The aim of the first phase is to produce 10,000 barrels per day of oil from two target wells in the Oil Mining Lease 113 area. A re-entry of Aje-4 will form the first producer, while drilling of Aje-5 is expected to be the second. The plans include the use of Rubicon’s Front Puffin floating production, storage and offloading vessel, which produced oil from the Puffin field in the Timor Sea. The vessel will be brought up to specification soon, while the procurement of subsea equipment and the contracting of a drilling rig are progressing. The Aje field’s first stage is scheduled to be brought on stream at t...

Nigeria on Thursday sacked Stephen Keshi as national team coach, despite home win against Sudan that kept them in the running to defend the African title. The Nigeria Football Federation said after an emergency meeting that former coach Shuaibu Amodu would take temporary charge before a foreign manager is appointed. The Super Eagles were rock bottom of Group A in qualifying for next year’s Africa Cup of Nations after winning just one point in three matches but a 3-1 win against Sudan in Abuja on Wednesday lifted them to third. Speculation about 52-year-old Keshi’s future has refused to go away since the end of the World Cup finals in Brazil in July, where Nigeria reached the knock-out stages of the competition. Keshi’s three-year deal ran out after the return from South America while he lost the support of players after much-publicised rows with the likes of Emmanuel Emenike, Peter Odemwingie and Ikechukwu Uche.

                                          credits: www.nigerreporters.com A General Military Court Martial set up by the authorities of the Nigerian Army have arraigned 59 soldiers on a two-count of criminal conspiracy to commit mutiny and murder in Abuja on Wednesday. The accused soldiers comprise two corporals, nine lance corporals and 48 private soldiers belonging to the 111 Special Forces Battalion, Maiduguri, Borno State. A charge sheet signed by the Commander of the Army Headquarters Garrison, Brig. Gen. B.T. Ndiomu, the convening authority for the court, stated that the offences of mutiny and the conspiracy to commit mutiny were punishable under Section 52(1)(a) of the Armed Forces Act Cap A 20 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004. The offence of mutiny carries the death penalty. The Lead Counsel for the accused soldiers, Mr. Femi Falana, said that the arraignm...

N igeria's Finance Minister and Coordinating Minister for the Economy Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has been named African Finance Minister of the year 2014 by leading investment & international group, African Investor. Dr Okonjo Iweala is pictured above right with her husband Dr. Ikemba Iweala. Okonjo-Iweala was announced winner today October 10th from a shortlist which included Finance Ministers of Kenya, Angola , Rwanda, Liberia, Seychelles, Zambia and Kingdom of Morocco.

China has toppled America to become the biggest economy in the world, according to figures from the International Monetary Fund. The US has been the global leader since it overtook Britain in 1872, but has now lost its status as top dog. The latest IMF figures show the Chinese economy is worth £11trillion compared with £10.8trillion for the US. China – whose wealth has accelerated in recent decades amid rapid industrialisation – is expected to extend its lead, with the IMF estimating its economy will be worth £16.7trillion in 2019.

What you are about to read is quite long…and chilling! I wasn’t going to share this info in public but after I showed it to some family members and a few friends who came to the house this morning, everyone agreed that I need to share this, that you all need to read this. You see, what happened with my blog wasn’t about beef. It wasn’t because I showed off my new SUV. It wasn’t about plagiarism, or copyright infringement. It was something deeper, very personal and maybe even more dangerous. Some would call it obsession. Please continue...

The Minister of Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, on Wednesday said Nigeria had already donated $3.5m as part of its intervention in the affected countries. Chukwu said the sum was made up of $500,000 to each of the countries and the balance to the common ECOWAS Fund for the disease. He also said 591 health practitioners had volunteered to join the international force that would go to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea to help in the containment of the Ebola Virus Disease. He said the volunteers registered with his ministry at three points in Lagos, Abuja and Port-Harcourt. Chukwu said this while speaking with State House correspondents at the end of the weekly Federal Executive Council meeting presided over by President Goodluck Jonathan. He said that he had already told a recent meeting of the United Nations General Assembly on EVD of Nigeria’s readiness to help the three countries.

It reported earlier that Linda Ikeji had  issues with a blogger, Mr. Aye Dee and  Google over copyright material, a case which  Google had already begun to look into.  Things took an interesting twist when the  gossip blogger released personal  information about the man who she  believed was witch hunting her. She wrote a  post dedicated to that, shunning him as  someone who was against her progress.  As at when we visited her site, we saw the  screen above.  Interestingly, her mobile site is still  functional as at the time of this update. Linda  Ikeji, on the other hand, has taken to twitter  to reassure her ardent readers:  culled from thatyorubaboy.com

Here is the top 10 richest pastors in the world as of 2014. 10) Joseph Prince - Net worth: $5 Million (Singapore) 8) Chris Okotie - Net worth: $10 Million (Nigeria) 8) Matthew Ashimolowo - Net worth: $10 Million (Nigeria) 7) T.B. Joshua - Net worth: $15 Million (Nigeria) 6) T. D. Jakes - Net worth: $18 Million (United States) 5) Billy Graham - Net worth: $25 Million (United States) 4) Creflo Dollar - Net worth: $27 Million (United States) 3) Benny Hinn - Net worth: $42 Million (United States) 2) Chris Oyakhilome - Net worth: $50 Million (Nigeria) 1) David Oyedepo - Net worth: $150 Million (Nigeria)

ABUJA—For the second time this week, pandemonium reigned in the House of Representatives, yesterday, following allegations of a $50,000 bribe to members of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to suppress a house inquest into the alleged $9.3 million cash seized by the South African Government. *House of Representatives members in session The House went into a near riot following the admission by a member of the House, Rep. Ali Madaki, APC, Kano to the leakage of the story of the alleged bribe to the PDP members. Madaki, however, confessed that the bribe amount was $20,000.00 and not the $50,000 as reported by a national newspaper, yesterday. The PDP deputy leader in the House, Rep. Leo Ogor, however,  yesterday, described the allegation as an embarrassment, unparliamentary and an act of blackmail. The House nevertheless directed its committee to investigate the fresh scam allegation and report within two weeks. The controversy Controversy started at the resumed p...

•Joe Odumodu, SON director-general In the last few months, there has been another brewing war over cement in the country. This time around, the issue has to do with the 32.5mpa grade which a few stakeholders claim is responsible for the frequent building collapse in Nigeria. Curiously, it is the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), which had consistently maintained that all the cement produced in or imported into the country, met international standards that prescribed the reviewed standards of cement. Quite interestingly, only Dangote Cement, the dominant cement manufacturer in Nigeria, supports the SON’s review because it already has a headstart as it produces mainly the 42.5mpa cement. Others can hardly catch up. Cement comes in three grades, 32.5mpa, 42.5mpa and recently, 52.5mpa.. The new policy prescribes the use of the 52.5mpa for the construction of bridges; 42.5mpa for the casting of columns, slabs and moulding of blocks and the 32.5mpa for plastering only. Hitherto...

#1 Roger Federer Total earnings: $56.2 million Prize money: $4.2 million Endorsements: $52 million Federer holds the records for most singles Grand Slam wins (17) and career prize money ($84 million). His endorsement portfolio is filled with long-term deals with blue-chip companies like Nike, Rolex and Credit Suisse, who collectively pay him more than $40 million annually. Worldwide tennis sponsorship spending is expected to hit $739 million in 2014, according to IEG, and no player secures a bigger piece of the pie than Federer. His loaded endorsement portfolio includes 10 brands like Nike, Wilson, Credit Suisse, Mercedes-Benz, Gillette and Moet & Chandon. They collectively pay him more than $40 million annually to pitch their wares. Federer’s strong performance and good health has kept him playing deep into tournaments almost year-round for more than 10 years. He is as reliable as the watches of his sponsor Rolex and provides great value for his partners. The wo...

Danny Welbeck joined his Arsenal team-mates on Thursday for the first time since his £16million move from Manchester United as Arsene Wenger’s side trained at London Colney. Arsenal face Manchester City on Saturday afternoon at the Emirates after an international break that saw Welbeck take the plaudits for England’s 2-0 win in Switzerland. Welbeck scored twice for Roy Hodgson’s side in the Euro 2016 qualifier in Basle, giving hope to Gunners fans that he will be the man to lead the line with Olivier Giroud out injured. Wenger confirmed his initial priority was to secure a season-long loan with an agreement to buy next summer. That position is understood to have shifted when United insisted on a permanent transfer, with Tottenham also in discussions to sign the England striker.

Apple's website collapsed under increased traffic early Friday morning after eager customers waited until midnight to order the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. Users logging onto the online Apple Store at midnight — when the new iPhones were scheduled to go on sale — reported slow load times and a long delay in the devices becoming available to purchase.  Some service appears to have been restored after about 30 minutes. But later Friday morning, the store was down for some users. Its availability appeared to be intermittent. Some customers reported that the iPhone was available on carrier websites and the Apple Store app but not the desktop site. There were reports that the iPhone 6 had sold out through some carriers, though when we checked on Apple.com, the iPhone 6 was available. The iPhone 6 Plus is not shipping for seven to 10 business days, or longer depending on the model you want.

According to the POLL conducted by Sky Sport on their twitter page, Danny Welbeck  is likely to score more goals this season.He was chosen among Radamel Falcao,Wayne Rooney, Robin Van Persie.

Oscar Pistorius’s former girlfriend has spoken of her ­terrifying ­relationship with the 'angry and possessive' Paralympian.20 year old Samantha Taylor (pictured above) said she feared he would kill her and revealed she once hid his gun after he flew into a rage at her.Oscar was cleared of killing his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp yesterday, but Samantha said: “It could have been me.” Samantha said she was left with bruises and scars after the Blade Runner bit and pinched her, but she was also tortured mentally by him during the 18-month relationship. Continue to see more picture...

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has announced it will be donating $50million (N8billion) to support the efforts of Nigeria and other West African countries hit by the Ebola Virus outbreak in containing the spread of the deadly virus. Announcing this in a statement issued today September 10th, the foundation said the money will be immediately released to the United Nations agencies and international organizations that are involved in the Ebola fight to enable them and national governments purchase needed supplies and scale up emergency operations. Continue...

                      Man Utd v QPR, 3.30pm, Sunday If you’re a neutral then Man United are the team to watch this season. They will let in goals because they’re nowhere near good enough at the back, but they could be as good as anybody going forward if all the players click. Robin van Persie and Radamel Falcao are both out-and-out centre-forwards and like playing up front on their own, so if he plays them both you might see them running into each other. Then you’ve got Wayne Rooney, Angel di Maria and Juan Mata – can you play all three of them? Louis van Gaal is getting paid a lot of money to make those decisions, but I do wonder why they sold Danny Welbeck for £16m when they’re buying wing-backs for £30m?

Singer 9ice is dead serious about his political career. He was at his state of origin, Ogbomosho, Oyo state Tuesday September 10 for awareness campaign and to identify with the electorate. Making a powerful speech to the crowd at the Town hall in Oja Igbo, the singer promised his people that if elected to represent Ogbomoso Federal constituency 1, he will use his salary to do developmental projects in the constituency. We earlier reported that 9ice declared his intentions to go into politics back in August. He plans to contest for House of Reps in 2015. by Joan Ngomba

Records are there to be broken, or so they say, but the current Nigeria squad will surely be devastated that the Super Eagles’ proud history of resilience at home fell on their watch. For 33 long years the West African giants hadn’t lost a competitive match on their own patch. 1981 was the last home defeat, invincibility ever since….few of the continent’s nations could have made claims greater than that…until now. The Republic of Congo strode into town behind Claude Le Roy, a wily, savvy veteran who knows how to forge resilient, yet offensive-minded teams. He hasn’t always succeeded, but he did on Saturday, dethroning the African champions with unforgettable aplomb. Historically, statistically, few can argue that it was not a shock to see Nigeria not only beaten at home by one of the continent’s mid-ranked sides, but also concede three (the defence, after all, was the last to be breached at the recent World Cup.)

Serena Williams allowed herself a moment to savour a third straight US Open win on Sunday, but only a moment,  Reuters reports. Just three hours after securing her 18th Grand Slam title with a dominating 6-3 6-3 win over Denmark’s Caroline Wozniacki, the world number one soaked up the accolades and applause and then admitted that she was already thinking about number 19 and third spot on the all-time list now held by Helen Wills Moody. “I am thinking 19,” said Williams, who shares fourth on the list with Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova. “Hasn’t even been three hours and I have already mentioned 19. Oh, gosh, but not 22. “I’m taking it one at a time.” Williams will celebrate her 33rd birthday later this month and clearly has plans to celebrate many more grand slam titles as she climbs further-and-further up the rankings. Moody, at number 19, is the next target but just ahead sits Steffi Graf on 22 and just ahead her is the great Margaret Cour...

The recently released video of Baltimore Ravens player Ray Rice punching his then fiancée and current wife Janay in an Atlantic City elevator, then dragging her out unconscious, prompted many red flags — about the NFL’s handling of the incident, about the Ravens’ ill-advised defense of their player and about how domestic violence is handled in general. But one of the main questions doing the rounds was directed at Janay Rice (formerly Janay Palmer) was why she married him in spite of the abusive relationship. Well, Twitter provided the answer, with the hashtag #WhyIStayed. by Rishi Iyengar

The 2014 Aquafina Elite Model Look Nigeria competition which took place on Saturday 6th September 2014 was one of the most glamorous events on the Lagos scene this year. We cannot wait to bring you all the juicy red carpet action. The focus of the day was the female and male model competition. It was a fierce battle but in the end, Mayowa Nicholas was chosen as the 2014 Elite Model Look winner for Nigeria (Female) while Victor Nwigwe was the top male model. by bellanaija.com

Those who are hoping that Christ Embassy Head Pastor Chris Oyakhilome and his estranged wife Anita Oyakhilome will resolve their issues and get back together, shouldn't hold their breath as the woman is said to have vowed to divorce the pastor Chris.. Speaking with Premium Times through her lawyers, Mrs Oyakhilome said her relationship with her husband had terribly degenerated that there is no room for any reconciliation or out-of-court settlement. Find the full report after the cut... Premium Times had contacted Mrs. Oyakhilome through her lawyers, Attwaters Jameson Hill Solicitors, after news broke that she had filed for divorce, to enquire whether any out-of-court settlement option was being explored.

Yara International ASA (YAR), the largest publicly traded nitrogen-fertilizer seller, said it plans to build a $2.5 billion plant in west or east Africa once gas projects come on-stream toward the end of the decade. Yara has held initial talks with governments in countries such as Tanzania, Angola, Ghana, Nigeria and Mozambique about building a “considerable and world-class” urea factory to produce for African and foreign markets, Chief Executive Officer Joergen Ole Haslestad said in an interview yesterday in Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa. “We would very much like to participate in greenfield fertilizer production developments,” he said. “This is probably three to four years down the road before it will materialize.”

The experimental drug developed by a Nigerian in diaspora for the treatment of Ebola is expected to arrive the country , the Minister for Health, Onyebuchi Chukwu, has said.   The drug, called “Nanosilver”, has been approved for use by the World Health Organization (WHO) as an experimental treatment ethical in the case of the Ebola epidemic. The Federal Govt  approved the use of experimental drugs in the treatment of the deadly virus.

The Chief Executive Officer of the Dangote Foundation, Mrs Adhiambo Odaga announced this at a media briefing at the Ministry of Health, Abuja on Monday. She said the money will be available for the establishment of an Ebola emergency operation centre in Lagos. “After bilateral discussion with the honourable minister and his team, Dangote foundation has funded the establishment of the Ebola emergency operation in Lagos, that is being done through grant from the foundation of just a little over N150 million,” she said. Continue...

World soccer governing body, FIFA has again ordered the return of the impeached president of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), Alhaji Aminu Maigari. FIFA in a letter ad- dressed to NFF scribe (which Daily Sunsports is in possession of) stated that the sacked NFF boss must preside over the August 26 congress. While regretting the confused state of Nigerian football, FIFA stressed that all the actions taken by the exco of late including the sacking of Barrister  Chris Green and Yusuf Ahmed Fresh, as well as the sacking of the electoral committee should be set aside. The FIFA letter stated in part: “It is regrettable that the situation has turned so confused while elections are planned for August 26….the recent decisions of the executive committee are highly question- able…furthermore, we advise that President Maigari must preside over the NFF congress on 26 August.

However, BlackBerry sales are still way off what they were a year ago BlackBerry CEO John Chen’s strategy might be showing a  little bit of traction. After three consecutive quarters of sequential decline, shipments BlackBerrys  rebounded slightly in Q2 of this year from the previous quarter, market research firm IDC reported Thursday in a report on smartphone shipments. It shipped 1.5 million units in the quarter ending June 30. On the other hand, for the same period a year ago it shipped 6.7 million smart phones. In this year’s Q2 it accounted for one half of one per cent of all smart phone sales. By comparison 7.4 million Windows Phones shipped — although that was a drop from 8.2 million in the same period a year ago. Apple shipped 35.2 million iPhones in Q2 this year — a drop of 12,7 per cent over the same period a year ago. BlackBerry saw improvement within one of its key markets, Asia/Pacific, as well as some gains among enterprise users wit...

US company sends all available supplies of experimental drug ZMapp to Africa as other potential drugs move rapidly towards clinical trials. Geneva (AFP) - The World Health Organization (WHO) has authorised the use of   experimental   drugs to fight Ebola as the death   toll   topped 1,000 and a Spanish   priest   became the first European to   succumb   to the   outbreak .   The  declaration  by the WHO, the UN's health  agency , came Tuesday after a US company that makes an experimental   serum  called ZMapp said it had sent all its  available  supplies to hard-hit west Africa.  UN  chief  Ban Ki-moon announced plans to  step up  the  global   response  to the  outbreak , while urging governments to "avoid  panic  and fear" over an easily-preventable  disease .  The  epidemic , the worst since Ebola was first  discovered ...