Some security experts on Saturday warned motorists against reckless driving in desperate bids to make profits.

The experts gave the warning in separate interviews with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Saturday in Abeokuta.

Mr Paul Ayeni, former Commandant of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps ( NSCDC), urged commercial drivers to desist from overloading.

Ayeni said that overloading, using prevailing fuel scarcity as an excuse, was not an option.

” It should be avoided by all means,” he said.

The Founder, Useful Youth Vision Concepts (UYVC), Mrs Adetokunbo Shonibare-Ayantunji, pleaded with motorists not to engage in excessive speeding.

Shonibare-Ayantunji said that according to the third quarter statistics on road accidents by the Ogun Traffic Compliance and Enforcement Corps (TRACE), the most common cause of road traffic crashes is excessive speeding.

” The statistics said excessive speeding is responsible for 52 per cent of the road traffic crashes,” she said.

She urged the corps to impose the use of speed detectors by commanding drivers to enforce speed reduction.

A Human Rights advocate, who is also a government official, Mr Sunday Olowoyobiojo, urged the Ogun government to increase the workforce of the corps for effective monitoring

He further urged the state government to purchase extra patrol vehicles to patrol the corridors for constant monitoring patrol to reduce carnages.

The police in Borno on Friday recovered eight unexploded devices from the Dala and Gwange areas of Maiduguri.

A statement by ASP Grace Michael, its spokesperson, said that the recoveries followed a distress call about some unidentified objects suspected to be explosives near an uncompleted building in Dala-Abuja Talakawa Area, Maiduguri.

“Our Explosive Ordnance Disposal and Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear (EOD-CBRN) Base 13 team responded swiftly, recovering six projectiles and one unexploded mortar bomb, which were safely relocated to a secure site.

“Later that day, at about 1 p.m., another report was received from the Gwange area regarding a suspicious object along the riverbank. The EOD-CBRN team was deployed to the scene and recovered an unexploded hand grenade.

“Preliminary investigations suggest that the ordnance were displaced and washed ashore by recent devastating floods in the state,” she said

The police, she said, had conducted an Explosive Ordnance Risk Awareness (EORE) training for residents of both communities, educating them on safety measures.

She quoted the Commissioner of Police in the state, Mr Yusufu Lawal, as reaffirming the command’s commitment to ensuring public safety.

Michael urged residents to remain calm, vigilant and to promptly report any suspicious objects or activities through the emergency lines – 0806 807 5581 and 0802 347 3293. 

Yobe State Governor, Mai Mala Buni, has approved a N70,000 minimum wage for workers in the state civil service.

According to him, the payment of the new wage will take effect from December 1, 2024.

The Director-General, Press and Media Affairs, Mamman Mohammed said on Friday in Damaturu: “The minimum wage committee recommended a reconciliation of Local Government Finances.”

Mohammed added that this will ensure a hitch-free transition process for the 17 local councils from the existing salary structure to the new wage.

“The reconciliation process is expected to be concluded for approvals and eventual enrolment of council employees into the minimum wage.”

Buni, therefore, expects civil servants in the state to reciprocate the government’s gesture by ensuring effective and efficient service delivery to the people.

Islamic morality police in the northern Nigerian city of Kano are to resume their crackdown on betting shops after a Supreme Court ruling on gambling.

The Nigerian Supreme Court quashed a 2005 law Friday that established a national lottery commission and legalised sports betting and gambling.

The court ruled gambling regulation is a matter for state governments.

Kano State is one of 12 predominantly Muslim Nigerian states in which Islamic sharia is used alongside federal law.

“We will resume our clampdown on betting shops with renewed determination since betting is illegal under Kano state sharia law,” Abba Sufi, director general of the Kano Hisbah, told AFP.

The Hisbah is a state unit that polices Sharia law in Kano, northern Nigeria’s biggest city.

Last month, Hisbah operatives raided and closed dozens of football betting shops across the city, which they said were promoting gambling, which is prohibited under sharia.

Raids were halted after the National Lottery Commission protested that betting on football was legal under Nigerian federal law under the 2005 Lottery Act, Sufi said.

“With this verdict, the controversy on who should be in charge of lottery legislation between the federal government and state governments has been settled,” Sufi added.

“We in Kano have frowned at the lottery law… because it gave legal backing to gambling, which is clearly prohibited in Islam.”

There are around 200 betting shops across the city with television screens where customers watch international soccer matches and horse races and place bets, Sydney Emeafu, head of the National Union of Gaming and Lottery Workers (NUGLOW) in Kano, told AFP.

According to Sufi, the raids followed repeated complaints by parents of children whose love of football teams had led them into gambling.

“And the harsh economic climate is pushing more people into this football gambling, hoping to make easy money and becoming hooked to the vice,” Sufi argued.

The Lagos State Environmental and Special Offence Taskforce on Thursday arrested nine persons for illegal street trading in Ikotun.

The Lagos State Commissioner, Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources, Tokunbo Wahab announced their arrest on Friday morning in a post he shared on his official X account.

“The taskforce on Thursday monitored compliance and carried out enforcement at the Ikotun BRT bus station, which has been taken over illegally by street vendors for commercial purposes,” Wahab said.

“Nine suspects were apprehended during the exercise and they will all be charged to court accordingly.”

He explained that all items and wares displayed at the unauthorised location were seized.

Wahab added that the bus station and its surroundings were sanitized of menace caused by the activities of vendors who have converted the bus station and the public road for commercial purposes.

Hafizu Inuwa, Chairman of the Jigawa Tanker Explosion Investigation Panel, has said that 209 lives were lost and 99 others injured in the accident.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) recalls that on Oct. 14, a fuel tanker exploded in Majiya town killing hundreds and injuring several others.

Sequel to this, Gov. Umar Namadi constituted a 25-member investigative panel to unravel the causes of the accident and recommend measures to avert future occurrences.

Inuwa said this during the presentation of the committee’s report on Wednesday in Dutse.

He said the accident claimed 209 lives, 38 injued persons were still on hospital admission and 61 others discharged while 167 families affected.

“It was further discovered that the inferno resulted in the destruction of properties worth millions of Naira,” he said.

Inuwa attributed the accident to a number of factors, including damaged speed-breaker and potholes located near the scene.

He said the committee also identified night driving and speeding as contributory factors to the inferno.

“The inferno was possibly ignited by combined factors, including but not limited to friction of metallic containers with hard surface or other containers, as victims were scooping the spilled fuel”.

The committee, he said, recommended regular inspection and enforcement of safety protocols by petroleum transporters and other articulated vehicles.

Others include upgrade of emergency response centres, establishment of a trauma and burns units in health facilities, as well as establishment of a road traffic control agency.

“Where the victims or their relatives are seemingly old and vulnerable, government should provide them with social protection and enroll the most vulnerable victims and their relatives into the Danmodi Care Programme,” he said.

The chairman further lauded the state government for its empathy, moral and psychological support to the affected community as well as the timely response to the disaster.

Responding, Namadi promised to implement the recommendations of the committee, to ensure safety and welfare of the citizens.