Confession: I am not a gymnast.

Gymnastics has always been one of my favorite sports to watch, and I’m not sure many people know this about me. As a kid, I idolized the Olympic gymnasts. There was always something incredibl…

Source: Confession: I am not a gymnast.

Rain of first class degrees

A total of 178 out of the 5,472 students graduating from the University of Lagos (UNILAG) during the institution’s convocation ceremony holding this week are graduating with First Class degrees. Vice Chancellor of Unilag Prof. Rahman Bello disclosed this at a pre-convocation press briefing in Lagos. The convocation ceremonies are scheduled to commence tomorrow, March 1. A total of 10,907 graduating students will receive degrees, diplomas and certificates at this year’s convocation. While 5,472 of the figure will be awarded first degrees, 5435 graduating students will receive postgraduate degrees.
The high number of first class degrees with which students are graduating from Nigerian universities in recent years is raising serious concerns about the credibility of our universities’ examination processes. Besides Unilag, other universities have also awarded excessive numbers of first class degrees in recent times. They include Covenant University in Ogun state which awarded 140 graduating students with first class degrees; Babcock University also in Ogun state which awarded first class degrees to 52 students out of 1,059 graduating students; Adeleke University in Ede which awarded first class degrees to 10 per cent of its 125 pioneer graduating students; and Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti which awarded first class degrees to 65 graduating students.

When the proliferation of first class degrees was first noticed at our private universities, the trend was believed to be a ‘recompense’ for the huge tuition fees charged by such institutions. However, the trend has become more disturbing now that public and first generation universities have joined the bandwagon of the first class degree rain. For instance, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria at its 38th convocation ceremony which held recently awarded 89 graduating students with first class degrees.
Before now, first class degree from a university was a rare honour bestowed upon very deserving graduating students whose intellectual capacities are beyond reproach. There were fewer students (whose total number rarely exceeded one digit) graduating with first class degrees at a time when universities in Nigeria had well-equipped libraries and laboratories, adequate number of high quality lecturers who were committed to teaching and research, comfortable classroom and hostel accommodations, and stable academic calendar. In the past, many universities had convocation ceremonies that were without one first class degree graduate.

In those glorious days, a brilliant student who never missed his lectures and who presented his facts in tests and examinations in a particular course still ended up with a ‘C’ grade, equivalent to Second Class Lower Division. A student earned a ‘B’ grade which is equivalent to Second Class Upper Division if he or she, in addition to what a ‘C’ grade student did, further read textbooks for more facts of knowledge. An ‘A’ was an exception student who impressed and dazzled the examiner with his grasp of the subject matter.

It is thus amazing to find more students graduating in the first class division now that most Nigerian universities suffer from poorly equipped libraries and laboratories, poorly educated lecturers and very unstable academic calendars frequently disrupted by long periods of strike action by the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU). The main reason advanced by ASUU for many of its strikes was dearth of teaching and learning facilities in the universities. Employers of labour have equally complained of the relatively poor quality of graduates from Nigerian universities these days. It is therefore amazing that a rain of first class degrees should accompany this situation.
To give credibility to the degrees awarded by Nigerian universities, there is need for the institutions to strengthen examinations and results processing procedures. Like the examination questions, results for every course should be duly subjected to internal and external moderations by competent hands. Departmental and faculty examination boards as well as Senate members in universities should sincerely be seen to uphold the trust bestowed upon them by the ethical principles of their profession.  We call on the National Universities Commission (NUC), which is the regulatory agency, to ensure that first class degrees awarded by universities do not contradict the realities of the human and material resources that obtain in the institutions.

Pipeline vandalism: Nine men jailed for 24 years

Justice Okon Abang of the Federal High Court on Monday sentenced nine men to 24 years imprisonment over pipeline vandalism and murder of nine policemen in Arepo area of Ikorodu.

But the judge however discharged and acquitted 11 others of the offence on the grounds that the prosecution failed to establish a case against them.

The accused men were charged by the police on 14 counts bordering on pipeline vandalism, illegal transportation and sale of refined petroleum products as well as murder of nine policemen.

The convicts include: Felix Yayu, Yakubu Ebiwei, Augustine Ebiwei, Owei Atile, Atinuke Odewale, Ijoufaya Legbe, Ahmed Bashorun, Odewale Waheed and Tuesday Filatei.

Justice Okon sentenced them to a term of 10 years imprisonment on count 1 and a term of 12 years on count 2, 3 and 4 respectively while he discharged them of counts five to 14. The sentences according to him are to run concurrently.

“The seed of wrong doing maybe in secret but the harvest cannot be hidden; Today is the day of harvest for the convicts,” he said.

While reviewing evidence in the matter, the judge said” I came to the conclusion that the convicts have no sympathy for the corporate existence of this country and her citizens. In spite of the genuine efforts made by federal government and the Lagos state government to protect NNPC pipelines, they felt that vandalizing the pipeline and killing the policemen sent to guide pipeline, was best.”

“The facts of this case are miserable, sordid, shameful to remember and ghastly to believe; Even though they have not been convicted of killing the nine policemen, it is not in doubt that they all conspired to do so in cold blood”

“I hereby sentence the convicts Felix Yayu, Ijoufaya Legbe, Yakubu Ebiwei, Augustine Ebiwei, Owei Atile, and Tuesday Filatei, to a term of 10 years imprisonment on count one and a term of12 year’s imprisonment on counts 2, 3 and 4 with effect from today.

“The convicts, Ahmed Bashorun, Atinuke Odewale and Odewale Waheed are sentenced to a term of three years imprisonment on counts one to four with effect from June 1, 2014,” the judge said.

In the charge, the accused were said to have committed the offence on May 24, 2014, at Arepo near Ikorodu, Lagos, by breaking oil pipeline and engaging in illegal transportation and sale of refined petrol, as well as maliciously setting ablaze the pipeline.

Emir Sanusi exonerates emirate over abduction of 14-yr old Bayelsa girl Read more at http://www.dailytrust.com.ng/news/general/emir-sanusi-exonerates-emirate-over-abduction-of-14-yr-old-bayelsa-girl

The emir of Kano Malam Muhammadu Sanusi II has exonerated himself and the emirate council from the purported abduction of a 14-yr old Ese Oruru allegedly by one Yunusa Dahiru Kura.

 Oruru was allegedly abducted in Opolo, Yenagoa Local Government Area of Bayelsa State, by Yunusa Dahiru of Kura local government area of Kano sometimes in August, 2015.

 Reacting to the issue for the first time, the emir said, he had since September last year directed Kano State Shari’ah Commission and the office of Assistant Inspector General of police, zone 1 to commence process of reuniting the girl to her family.

 A copy of the emir’s letter to the Shari’ah Commission, obtained by Daily Trust, reads in parts: “I am directed to draw your attention that Aisha Chuwas was recently converted to Islam through the Chief Imam of Kura local government and God so kind one Mallam Yunusa Dahiru intends to marry her as agreement was reached between the two of them.

 “In view of the foregoing, His Highness the emir of Kano Muhammadu Sanusi ll is directing your good office to investigate the issue,” concluded the letter signed by Hamisu Garba Disu on behalf of secretary of the Kano emirate council.

 While briefing the emir on the issue in his palace Monday, the District Head of Kura, Alhaji Bello Ado Bayero, said as of four days ago, the girl in question was still with Dahiru.

 He said: “When I inquired from the village head of the area four days ago, he confirmed to me that the girl is still with Yunusa Dahiru in Kura local government area of Kano state.”

 When contacted on phone, the Police Public Relation Officer in the Zone 1, ASP Rabilu Ringim told Daily Trust that the AIG will brief newsmen on the issue tomorrow.

Here’s How To Turn Up Your 2016 Style (Without Overdoing It)

While the start of a new year is exciting and seems like the perfect opportunity to overhaul your life, the allure of major changes rubs off once you return to your everyday life. The thing is, though, you don’t have to entirely change what you wear and how you do your makeup — you can easily incorporate new looks into the ones you have mastered already.

Fortunately, Girl Code’s Nessa and beauty and style guru Sierra Furtado are here to help navigate the waters. In this episode of “Got You Covered,” the duo highlight new trends you should dedicate your attention to — hi, colored cat eyeliner — and those you should avoid — bye, farmer style.

Revisiting The Four Oscar Ceremonies In Which Leonardo DiCaprio Tragically Lost The Gold

Leonardo DiCaprio’s struggle to win an Oscar is our modern-day Book of Job. He’s Sisyphus rolling a boulder up a hill. He’s trapped in Jean-Paul Sartre’s hellish world of No Exit. Since the night of March 21, 1994, when he lost Best Supporting Actor to Tommy Lee Jones, Leo has been thirsting for that golden statuette. Now, on the eve of the 88th Annual Academy Awards, for which Leo is nominated for Best Actor in Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s The Revenant (and for which he will most likely take home the trophy), let’s revisit the four fateful ceremonies in which the Oscar tragically slipped out of Leo’s hands and see if, knowing what we know now, he deserved to win any of them.

Paramount Pictures

1994 ACADEMY AWARDS — BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Leo’s Nomination: What’s Eating Gilbert Grape
Oscar Winner: Tommy Lee Jones, The Fugitive
The Other Nominees:
Ralph Fiennes, Schindler’s List
John Malkovich, In the Line of Fire
Pete Postlethwaite, In the Name of the Father

After a few appearances in iconic films like Poison Ivy and Critters 3, Leo fired shots as a major Hollywood player in the making with his turn as the developmentally disabled Arnie, brother to Johnny Depp’s Gilbert in 1992’s What’s Eating Gilbert Grape. The film, awarded four stars by Roger Ebert at the time, oddly received no other Oscar nominations despite Depp and Mary Steenburgen turning on some of the best work of their careers. The film itself hasn’t stood the test of time as far as a cultural milestone, aside from Leo’s nomination. It’s certainly a fine, well-made film. But it’s easier to see why Leonardo would have lost to Ralph Fiennes in a flashier, still-referenced film like Schindler’s List … except he didn’t. He lost to Tommy Lee Jones in The Fugitive.

Look, The Fugitive is a fine movie. But if you’re awarding Jones an Oscar for that, there’s no reason Ashley Judd shouldn’t have one for Double Jeopardy. This was clearly a case of awarding Jones the Oscar he didn’t get two years earlier for JFK. (Jack Palance won that year for City Slickers. Um, what?) John Malkovich and Pete Postlethwaite are great actors, obviously, but their two movies with similar-sounding names have been mostly lost to time. Who remembers any of these, except for maybe Daniel Day Lewis’s In the Name of the Father performance? Even then, Lewis lost to Tom Hanks for his role in Philadelphia — an Oscar that should’ve gone to Laurence Fishburne for What’s Love Got to Do With It, the second injustice of the night. (The first obviously being that Angela Fucking Bassett didn’t win for What’s Love Got to Do With It and Holly Hunter did for The Piano, BUT I DIGRESS.)

Leo’s only real competition this year should’ve been Fiennes. Still, I think Leo should’ve taken this one home.

Miramax

2005 ACADEMY AWARDS — BEST ACTOR

Leo’s Nomination: The Aviator
Oscar Winner: Jamie Foxx, Ray
The Other Nominees:
Don Cheadle, Hotel Rwanda
Johnny Depp, Finding Neverland
Clint Eastwood, Million Dollar Baby

2005 was one of the years the Academy remembered black people exist. Jamie Foxx won for Ray. Morgan Freeman won for Million Dollar Baby. Foxx was nominated a second time for Collateral. Don Cheadle got a nomination for Hotel Rwanda. Don’t worry, they made up for it the next year by awarding Best Picture to Crash, a terrible movie about race. But during 2005, it was like Gangsta’s Paradise up in the Oscars. Leo didn’t stand a chance. But should he have?

Short answer: Not really. The Aviator is a pretty great movie. It’s long as fuuuuuuuck, but it’s still pretty dope. The reason why it didn’t win Best Picture, however, rests on Leo’s shoulders. He was really too young to be playing Howard Hughes, for one. Watching it now, it operates more like a dry run for his portrayal of Jay Gatsby nine years later. But here, he’s a bit like a freshman who got a lead role in the school play opposite a graduating senior. Cate Blanchett acts circles around Leo (as Hughes’s onetime lover Katharine Hepburn) and picked up an Oscar for her trouble. Second, Leo’s accent is ATROCIOUS. It’s not his worst film accent ever (that one’s coming up next), but it’s certainly not good, either. If Some Like It Hot were set in Texas, you still couldn’t come up with whatever combination of Roaring-’20s-meets-fast-talking-country-boy accent Leo was attempting. By the time Hughes is an aged eccentric pissing in jars, you end up wishing they’d just recast the older version.

As good as everyone else in the category was, Foxx pretty much disappeared into his role as Ray Charles. It’s his greatest performance and every bit worthy of the Oscar — if only because Tom Cruise wasn’t nominated for Collateral, a movie for which they both could’ve won awards if the Academy had given Foxx Best Supporting Actor instead of Best Actor.

Warner Bros.

2007 ACADEMY AWARDS — BEST ACTOR
Leo’s Nomination: Blood Diamond
Oscar Winner: Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland
The Other Nominees:
Ryan Gosling, Half Nelson
Peter O’Toole, Venus
Will Smith, The Pursuit of Happyness

As I already mentioned, this is the worst accent to ever escape Leo’s lips. He’s supposed to be South African in Blood Diamond, but I’ll be damned if that’s what he’s doing here with his voice. It’s some odd combination of French and British and Leo, What the Fuck Are You Doing, Stop Doing Movies Where You Have To Do Accents. The accent, however, is hardly the worst part of this movie; the movie is the worst part of this movie. Blood Diamond is not good. In fact, I would go so far as to suggest that it is a bad film, with dialogue from screenwriter Charles Leavitt like “You know, in America it’s bling bling, but out here it’s bling bang.” But what did you expect when two white people (Leavitt and director Edward Zwick) team up to make a movie about the diamond trade in Africa and cast Leonardo DiCaprio as a South African?

If even Djimon Hounsou couldn’t win for his supporting role in this film, there was no way Leo was going to win. Especially considering his competition: He could’ve easily trounced Ryan Gosling, sure, back when Hollywood was actually in love with him. (Leo seems to have been largely forgotten at this point. And Half Nelson may actually be Gosling’s best performance, even if it is a bit too Dangerous Minds for my liking. He could’ve beat Will Smith as well, because I was surprised to find out that Tyler Perry wasn’t responsible for the general mess that is The Pursuit of Happyness. I don’t recall anything about Venus and I’ve seen Venus, so it’s safe to assume it wasn’t one of Peter O’Toole’s most memorable performances. No, Forest Whitaker had this in the bag. His performance in (the otherwise underwhelming) The Last King of Scotland was a tour de force. He earned that golden statuette. http://giphy.com/embed/KySymGAt2SJmE

via GIPHY

2014 ACADEMY AWARDS — BEST ACTOR

Leo’s Nomination: The Wolf of Wall Street
Oscar Winner: Matthew McConaughey, Dallas Buyers Club
The Other Nominees:
Christian Bale, American Hustle
Bruce Dern, Nebraska
Chiwetel Ejiofor, 12 Years a Slave

Is anyone still talking about Dallas Buyers Club? This movie dominated the awards-season conversation leading up to the 2014 ceremony, but does anyone remember it fondly? (Besides Jared Leto fans, because he also won this year for his portrayal of a trans woman.) Other problems in this category include any nomination for American Hustle, which should’ve been the first David O. Russell film shut out of the Oscars before people wised up and said “nah” to Joy this year.

Bruce Dern is great, but Nebraska is in black-and-white and I won’t abide that nonsense. Leo’s real competition here should’ve been Chiwetel Ejiofor in 12 Years a Slave. It’s oddly surprising he didn’t win, actually, but that’s just about how much the McConaughey campaign was working overtime. Hollywood usually bends over backward to award a golden statue to a black man who gets whipped and called the n-word for 70 percent of a film (Samuel L. Jackson sadly did not get whipped in The Hateful Eight, so he got no nomination this year). Ejiofor’s performance is powerful and moving, but I am of the opinion that we should not reward black actors for handing over a pound of flesh. Though 12 Years is incredibly important — and very necessary since white people keep forgetting slavery existed until we remind them (then we’re talking about it too much!) — I would rather Chiwetel win an Oscar for a film like The Wolf of Wall Street. Leo fully transformed into a MOVIE STAR with this role. Exuberant, joyful, and living in every bit of pulp Martin Scorsese infused into the film, this is a role we’ll remember for years to come. If he didn’t win for Gilbert Grape, this should’ve been Leo’s Oscar moment.

What’s Eating Gilbert Grape and The Wolf of Wall Street were definite awards oversights for Leo — but there’s actually an even bigger one. Sure, maybe he should’ve been nominated for The Basketball Diaries, Catch Me If You Can, and The Departed. There might even be a case to be made for Titanic. But this is utter insanity…

2013 ACADEMY AWARDS — NOT NOMINATED

Leo should’ve gotten Best Supporting Actor in 2013 for Django Unchained. Yes, Christoph Waltz was great, but he was much better in Inglourious Basterds. Leo was the true star of Django, with his wickedly fun turn as the evil Calvin Candie, but the role earned him only a Golden Globe nom, not an Oscar nod. Instead, the Academy played some real games with their nominations that year — Tommy Lee Jones for Lincoln? Why is he always taking my man Leo’s spot?

All Leo’s life he’s had to fight. He’s had to fight Tommy Lee Jones. He’s had to fight Jamie Foxx. He’s had to fight Forest Whitaker. He’s had to fight Matthew McConaughey. And now, goddamit, even if it’s for The Revenant — he’s got to win.

JAMB: 1.5m candidates write exam tomorrow

The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) said a total 1,589,175 candidates that applied for the 2016 the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) will start exams tomorrow.
JAMB Registrar Dibu Ojerinde made the remarks in a statement yesterday.

He said the examination which will hold simultaneously in 521 centres in Nigeria and 8 foreign centres.

The foreign centres are: Accra in Ghana; Buea in Republic of Cameroun; Cotonou in Republic of Benin; London in United Kingdom; Jeddah in Kingdom of Saudi-Arabia; Johannesburg in Republic of South Africa; Addis Ababa in Ethiopia and Abidjan in Cote d’Ivoire is expected to last 14 days.

He said the minimum cut-off points approved by the policy committee chaired by education minister was 180 marks but “institutions are at liberty to go higher than 180 depending on their peculiarity and this does not in any way infringe on the powers of the Board.”

Senate orders Lamorde’s arrest over N1tr fraud

The Senate committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions yesterday recommended the issuance of a warrant of arrest on a former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mr. Ibrahim Lamorde, over alleged diversion of N1trillion recovered stolen funds.
The Chairman of the Committee, Senator Samuel Anyanwu (PDP, Imo East) made the recommendation while delivering the report of his committee on the petition written by one Mr. George Uboh on the alleged diversion of the recovered stolen funds.

Uboh had in his petition laid on the floor by Senator Peter Nwaoboshi (PDP, Delta North) accused Lamorde of diverting 95 percent of EFCC’s recoveries in foreign currencies.
He also alleged that EFCC under Lamorde colluded with real estate companies to undervalue seized assets before they were sold.
According to him, half of the assets seized from suspects by the EFCC were not reflected in the commission’s exhibit records.
Anyanwu said Uboh has appeared before his committee to defend his claims but that the former EFCC boss has refused to appear.
He said having waited for the appearance of Lamorde since November 24, 2015, his committee concluded that the former EFCC boss wanted to evade investigation.
“Consequently, the committee reasoned that the way to get the former EFCC chairman, Mr. Ibrahim Lamorde to appear before it was to invoke the powers of the Senate in section 89 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and compel his attendance.  Unless this is done, the National Assembly might be drawn into consequential disrepute in the future,” he said.

Oliseh resigns as Super Eagles coach

Nigeria national football team Super Eagles coach Sunday Oliseh has resigned his appointment.

 

Oliseh had been having a running battle with his employers, the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) over poor match results and unpaid wages.

The former captain of the Super Eagles who was appointed coach a little over seven months a go announced his resignation on Twitter.

“Due to contract violations, lack of support, unpaid wages, benefits to my players, assistant coaches and myself, I resign as Super Eagles Chief Coach,” he announced on his Twitter handle.

Apart from a spat with Nigeria’s most capped goal keeper Vincent Enyeama, which forced him to resign from the national ‎team, Oliseh’s outing at the CHAN in Rwanda in January where the national team (home based players) were eliminated in the first round led to a drop in his rating by the NFF.

 

Dear Other Dude at the Playground…

Dear Other Dude at the Playground on Saturday – I couldn’t fight the need to write you about an incident between our kids.Remember me? I was the dad with the son wearing a pink dress. B…

Source: Dear Other Dude at the Playground…