7 year old handless girl wins handwriting contest

anaya Ellicks

According to BBC, Ellick beat up 50 other competitors to get the special-needs category prize at the National handwriting contest. This category rewards students with an intellectual, physical or developmental disability. The beautiful young girl who is from Chesapeake in Virginia, does not use artificial limbs. Instead, Ellick stands to get the proper angle, holding a pencil between her arms. Her principal, Tracy Cox from Greenbrier Christian Academy, described her as an “inspiration.” “She does not let anything get in the way of doing what she has set out to do. She is a hard worker and has some of the best handwriting in her class,” Cox said. Competition director, Kathleen Wright, told ABC News that her “writing sample was comparable to someone who had hands.” Sponsors of the contest Zaner-Bloser said they planned to award each student $1,000 (£690). What an inspiration!

We can’t implement 2016 budget fully –FG

The Federal Government has ruled out the possibility of full implementation of the 2016 Appropriation Act signed into law by President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday.

The Minister of Budget and National Planning, Senator Udo Udoma, stated this while briefing journalists shortly after Buhari signed the budget at the President Villa, Abuja.

Udoma was joined at the briefing by the Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed.

Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Hajiya Zainab Ahmed

The minister admitted that having been signed late into the year, it would be impossible to achieve full implementation of the budget.

He said, “Our own will always be 100 per cent implementation. We know that because we started late, we may not achieve it but that is our aim.

“We will start off with that aim because the budget is a law so we will try and implement it as faithfully as we can. However, the reality is that we may not (achieve it) because we started late.

“In subsequent years, we will start earlier to give us a better chance of implementing the budget in full. But we will do our best.”

The minister also said the government would work hard to ensure that the National Assembly gets the 2017 budget proposal by October so that it could be passed before the end of the year.

This, he said, would afford the government the opportunity of implementing from January to December.

The minister said, “Two weeks ago, the ministry presented a memo to the Federal Executive Council and got approval for a timetable for the budget. So, as we are finishing with this budget, we are starting on 2017.

“Our intention is that the budget should reach the National Assembly early in October to give them enough time to pass it before the end of the year.

“The most important time for road construction is the dry season. So, if you can get the budget in December, you can now start early to implement. Our intention is to get us back to a situation where we can have a full January to December implementation for the budget.

“We are working hard on the timetable to achieve this. It is also going to be much more extensive consultation with the National Assembly prior to the budget being presented, extensive consultations with non-governmental organisations NGOs that will help us to speed up the process of getting the budget approved.”

Giving more details on the signed budget, Udoma said the budget size that the legislature came out with was just slightly lower figure than the one submitted by the executive.

He said the revenue assumption from the budget as passed by the National Assembly was the same, having adopted the same $38 crude oil price.

The minister also said the size of the budget and size of the deficit were about the same.

According to him, the budget puts the production figure at 2.2million barrels per day.

Ahmed on her part recalled that two weeks ago, the Federal Executive Council approved a monitoring and evaluation framework which was meant to guide the implementation of the budget.

She said, “We have developed a specific implementation guideline for the 2016 budget which will be submitted to all the ministries departments and agencies.

“This will be vigorously monitored and reported upon on quarterly basis to the FEC. There are some checks in that implementation plan and we intend to follow through with the plan as fast as possible.”

shocking how this Okada rider looks like Obasanjo (photo)

The guy was spotted somewhere in Asaba today. He does resemble former President Olusegun Obasanjo....right? Up close photo after the cut...

P

finally the long awaited budget has been signed.

Photos: President Buhari signs the 2016 Budget

President Buhari signed the 2016 budget into law at the Presidential Villa today, Friday 6th of May. Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, Senate President Bukola Saraki & Speaker Yakubu Dogara were present at the signing. More photos after the cut...

NIGERIAN ARMY RAIDS UNIPORT STUDENTS

It appear the end is not in sight to the current pandemonium in the
University of Portharcourt.As at exactly 6pm yesterday the Management
served a memo ordering evering students who stays in the School Hostel
to vacate as the school have shutdown indefinitely.Neglecting the fact that
some students doesnt stay in state or far from were the school is
located,living them to stay back till the following morning.As at 12am,the
Nigeria Army came in to all the hostel and start brutalizing these innocent
and armless student. Here is what really went down in the last few hours..
We were manhandled by the soldiers last night....we were treated like
common criminals ...we were kicked out of our hostels around 12 am this
morning and were punished for no just cause ...we were flogged ...made
to sit on dirty ground ...we were paraded round the school and made to
sit on the ground at convocation arena...it was a horrible night at the
hands of the men of Nigeria army. Voice of maltreated female Uniport
student, all because of LALE! The Nigerian Army paraded the hostels in
abuja campus and arrested all the boys in their room and took them to
the barracks. All the girls were beaten up and taking to arena this morning
please what have we Nigeria students done to lale to receive this message

NIGERIAN FORCES KILL A UNIVERSITY STUDENT

Tragedy stroke when students  of uniport came out to agitate for their right to sit for their exams, as the school management came up with a new policy  of "No Schoolfees, No exams". The protest was going peaceful  until a SARS personel fired directly at a student who happens  to be the President of Management  which led to his death. According  to our source  who happens to be an eye witness, the shooting happened  at Agofure park, when a fair SARS personnel wearing shorts  came to challenge the students with this statement,
"Shey una no wan get sense abi, i go shoot una oh" and got a brave reply from Peter (Faculty of Management President).
Angry that he was challenged back, he took up his gun and fired directly at Peter, leaving  him with a bullet on his chest and his stomach. He was rushed to Lulu briggs but could not survive the shot.
Why would the so called military personnel that supposed to protect students start to kill them. Why would a VC be the reason for the death of students We need answers and we need it fast.

president Buhari gives EFCC go ahead to probe jonathan

EFCC gets presidency's nod to probe ex-president Jonathan
-President Buhari’s assistants say he did not ask for exemption of Jonathan for probe

– They add that the president is not with hunting with his probe

– Ex-president Jonathan may soon be probed


President Muhammadu Buhari may have given the EFCC the nod to arrest and probe former president, Goodluck Jonathan over corruption allegations.

President Muhammadu Buhari may have given the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) the nod to probe ex-president, Goodluck Jonathan.

According to The Punch, President Buhari’s special assistant on media and publicity, Femi Adesina, in a chat on Friday, March 11, noted that there was no secret agreement between the present and past presidents to exempt Jonathan from the list of corrupt people to be probed by this administration.

“The President does not teleguide the EFCC in any way,” Adesina said while answering questions on whether the EFCC would seek the consent of President Buhari before probing Jonathan

Speaking in the same vein, Garba Shehu, the senior special assistant to the president on media and publicity, told The Punch that, “there is no secret pact between President Buhari and any past President.

“If you know or understand him, President Buhari is not the kind of person who will go into secret agreements. He is open about everything he does.


“The war against corruption is open-ended. Nobody knows how it will end.”

Shehu explained further that the war against corruption in the country is not a witch hunt.

He said: “But the President is not on a witch hunt. If you remember his acceptance speech after being announced as the winner of the 2015 general elections, he said without any equivocation that he would not victimise or subject anyone to witch hunt.

“One thing very clear from the way he has carried on with the war against corruption is that past officials of government have a window to return looted funds to avoid investigation and trials which may be drawn out and sometimes inimical to the exercise.

“People can help themselves and help the country without being noisy about anything.

“The President is aware that he is under watch, locally and internationally, in his handling of the war against corruption.

“Whatever international support he will get will depend on how open and effective his government is in carrying out the anti-graft war.

“To that extent, the war against corruption knows neither friend nor foe.”

The body language of the anti-graft agency had initially suggested that they may be reluctant to bring in ex-president for questioning over multi-billion dollar corruption allegations, especially the $2.1billion arms deal.

This report also comes on the heel of Chief Olisa Metuh’s call for the probe of erstwhile president, Jonathan, as he ordered most of the payments being made by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

The PDP spokesperson, who has been standing trials over his involvement in the $2.1bn arms deal scam, was released on bail in January, 2016 after initially spending some nights at the Kuje prison.