Nigerian gets 20 years for sex slavery

Nigerian gets 20 years for sex slavery

Published: Oct. 29, 2012 at 10:10 PM

CANTERBURY, England, Oct. 29 (UPI) -- A court in southeastern England has sentenced a Nigerian immigrant to 20 years in prison for trafficking teenage African immigrant girls into prostitution.

The court in Canterbury sentenced 42-year-old Osezua Osolase after his conviction on seven counts of trafficking young girls, rape and sexual activity with a child, the regional Kent Online report said.

Three unidentified Nigerian girls ages 14, 16 and 17 testified they were lured to Britain via Italy and Spain with a promise of education, but instead were forced to work in the sex trade, the report said.

Court heard Osolase told the girls he had magical powers and had cast a spell on them.

In sentencing Monday, Judge Adele Williams called Osolase "a very, very dishonest man, arrogant and manipulative, devoid of conscience, and devoid of any compassion for your victims."

Prosecutors also recommended deportation at the end of his sentence. He was deported once before in 2007 but married a German woman in Nigeria and was permitted to return to England.

After his conviction Friday, prosecutors began proceedings to seize all of his assets, the report sai

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 http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2012/10/29/Nigerian-gets-20-years-for-sex-slavery/UPI-16481351563028/#ixzz2AkzqNsP8

Nigerian Stowaway Dies in Arik's Undercarriage

BY CHINEDU EZE, 27 OCTOBER 2012

The dead body of a young Nigerian man was discovered Friday in the wheel well, the undercarriage compartment of an Arik Air aircraft, after it returned from a flight to New York, United States.

One of the airline's officials who spoke to THISDAY said the deceased might have hidden himself in the wheel well for days and was crushed to death while the flight was airborne to the JF Kennedy Airport, New York, from the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos.

The official who spoke to THISDAY said the dead body was found during a check on the aircraft panel as it was being prepared for another flight and that the undercarriage compartment of the Airbus A340-500 is big enough to accommodate a person, besides the space for the tyres.

"He probably might have hidden himself there some days and died while the aircraft was on its way to New York. We found him when we were doing checks on the panel; the aircraft probably came back with him dead," the official said.

The source said that it is out of ignorance that people hide in the wheel well and plan to stowaway because "the compartment is not pressurised like the cabin of an aircraft and it is not heated, so survival is rare even if the person is not crushed by the wheels."

Pilots and aeronautical engineers familiar with the wheel well compartment said it is roomy enough to contain a human being, but it is highly unlikely that any one who hid there would come out alive after a flight that took several hours due to lack of oxygen.

The official attributed the incident to porous security at the airport, noting that "if having access to the airside is stringently prohibited, anybody that is not an official of airlines, handling companies and Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria would not gain access to the tarmac."

Another source said: "The security at the airport is very bad and that explains why somebody can gain access to the airside and inside the aircraft and no one will know.

Security around the cargo area is even worse and from there anybody can take anything into the tarmac. Now, it is a human being that is smuggled in; one day a dangerous object will be smuggled in."

THISDAY investigations revealed that stowaways connive with ground handling companies to access the airside and the wheel well.

"The handling company workers and the security operatives indulge in a lot of illicit activities at the airport and over the years there have been efforts to put a check on such excesses but every effort has so far failed," said another source.

In March 2010, a Nigerian, Okechukwu Okeke was found dead in the nose wheel compartment of the United States carrier, Delta Airline, Boeing B777 aircraft parked on the tarmac of the Lagos airport

.http://allafrica.com/stories/201210280107.html

 

Soyinka Backs Achebe on Civil War Memoir

Soyinka Backs Achebe on Civil War Memoir

17 Oct 2012

Prof. Wole Spyinka

Ike Abonyi with agency report

Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, has backed his literary colleague, Prof. Chinua Achebe, in the raging controversy over the roles of some prominent Nigerians during the Nigerian civil war.

Soyinka, in an interview published in The Telegraph of London, but obtained by THISDAY yesterday, said the Igbo were victims of genocide during the three-year civil war, which was fought to break up Nigeria.

Achebe had stirred the hornet’s nest in his civil war memoir, “There Was A Country”, when among others, he accused wartime Head of State, Gen. Yakubu Gowon and the then Finance Minister, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, of carrying out a genocide against the Igbo.
The claim has generated considerable controversy, with many commentators accusing Achebe of re-writing history.

Soyinka, however, justified the secession bid and described Biafrans as “people who’d been abused, who’d undergone genocide, and who felt completely rejected by the rest of the community, and therefore decided to break away and form a nation of its own.”

He also condemned religious militancy, saying now is the time to tackle Boko Haram, the insurgent group that has visited terror on the North, killing over 1,500 since 2009.
According to him, what Boko Haram is doing is not religion, but criminality.

He said: “All religions accept that there is something called criminality. And criminality cannot be excused by religious fervour. Let me repeat something I first said at the meeting organised by UNESCO a few weeks ago, which was prompted by the recent film insulting the religion of Islam and depicting the Prophet Mohammed in a very crass way.
“The first thing to say is that we do not welcome any attempt to ravage religious sensibilities. That can be taken for granted. But you cannot hold the world to ransom simply because some idiots chose to insult a religion in some far-off place which most of the world has never even heard of. This for me is a kind of fundamentalist tyranny that should be totally unacceptable.

“So a group calls itself the Boko Haram, literally: ‘Book is taboo’, the book is anathema, the book is a product of Western civilisation, therefore it must be rejected.

“You go from the rejection of books to the rejection of institutions which utilise the book, and that means virtually all institutions. You attack universities, you kill professors, then you butcher students, you close down primary schools, you try and create a religious Maginot Line through which nothing should penetrate.

“That’s not religion; that’s lunacy. My Christian family lived just next door to Muslims. We celebrated Ramadan with Muslims; they celebrated Christmas with Christians. This is how I grew up.

“And now this virus is spreading all around the world, leading to the massacre of 50 students. This is not taking arms against the state, this is taking up arms against humanity.”
He said the unrest in Nigeria following the Boko Haram insurgency had attained a critical mass and criticised the way the Federal Government was handling the terror war.

“The president of Nigeria is making a mistake in not telling the nation that it should place itself on a war footing. There’s too much pussyfooting, there’s too much false intellectualisation of what is going on, such as this is the result of corruption, this is the result of poverty, this is the result of marginalisation.

“Yes, of course, all these negativities have to do with what is happening right now. But when the people themselves come out and say we will not even talk to the president unless he converts to Islam, they are already stating their terms of conflict,” he added.
Soyinka said if religion were to be taken away from the world, he would be one of the happiest people in the world.

http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/soyinka-backs-achebe-on-civil-war-memoir/127912/#.UH41NBGVanA.facebook

Balli e amicizia: i nigeriani di casa nostra

 Vittorio Rotolo

C’è il «tamburo parlante», strumento largamente diffuso ed utilizzato durante le cerimonie ufficiali per salutare i re. Ed ancora i costumi dai colori sgargianti, le musiche coinvolgenti, i balli mescolati al profumo della grigliata di carne, piatto tipico della tradizione popolare. 

 

A Parma è un giorno di festa per la comunità nigeriana degli Yoruba, la tribù più progredita e numericamente più sviluppata dell’intero continente africano. Una storia, la loro, cominciata un millennio fa ad Ileife, importante centro culturale ed universitario che si trova nel sud-ovest della Nigeria. Una comunità che, con il trascorrere degli anni, si è tuttavia ramificata in diverse altre parti del mondo, compreso nel nostro territorio. 

Basti pensare che, su un totale di quasi mille nigeriani attualmente residenti nel Parmense, circa 400 sono proprio Yoruba. Una sessantina di questi fanno parte della locale associazione «Egbe Omo Yoruba» che ieri pomeriggio, negli spazi della parrocchia di San Pancrazio, ha dato vita ad un momento di condivisione e di gioia collettiva, accogliendo pure altri esponenti della stessa comunità che vivono in diversi centri dell’Emilia Romagna e del Veneto. «La nostra tribù crede fermamente nel valore dell’educazione, nell’amore verso gli altri e nella cultura del lavoro, caratteristiche che in questi anni abbiamo avuto modo di riscontrare ed apprezzare anche nei parmigiani» racconta Olufemi Iyanda, portavoce dell’associazione «Egbe Omo Yoruba», presieduta in città da Olufemi Oloye Ayibola. «Questa occasione di festa, aperta a tutti, diventa utile per far conoscere le bellezze della nostra terra e gli elementi di folklore che animano questo popolo, esaltandone l’orgoglio ed il senso di appartenenza alla comunità Yoruba – prosegue Iyanda –; molti dei nostri figli sono nati in Italia e non hanno ancora avuto la possibilità di recarsi in Nigeria. Per questi bambini la giornata di oggi assume un significato ancora più rilevante, proprio perché consente loro di respirare il clima di quei luoghi e toccare con mano le proprie radici».

 

 Giornalista, una laurea conseguita nel suo Paese, in Italia Iyanda si è adattato ad un lavoro che non è proprio il suo. Una storia comune a quella di tanti altri suoi connazionali. «Ma mi reputo un uomo fortunato – spiega –: a Parma ho trovato una città pronta ad accogliermi, ho una casa ed un impiego che mi consente di mantenere la mia famiglia. Certo, la Nigeria non la dimentico ed un giorno ci tornerò...».

http://www.gazzettadiparma.it/primapagina/dettaglio/10/153929/Balli_e_amicizia%3A_i_nigeriani_di_casa_nostra_.html

Lagos won’t allow other states’ number plates –Govt

October 4, 2012 by Sesan Olufowobi

Lagos State Government on Wednesday said it would no longer allow the use of vehicles with number plates from other states of the federation for commercial transportation in the state.

 

It also advised residents with private vehicles to change to the state’s number plates to reflect the fact that they are living in Lagos.

The Director, Vehicle Inspection Office, Mr, Gbolahan Toriola, said the measure was meant to achieve “sanity, standard, safety and security” as stipulated by the road traffic law.

 

Toriola spoke at the vehicle inspection safety campaign organised by the Ministry of Transportation in conjunction with the Political and Legislative Bureau for commercial drivers in Ikeja.

He said, “There is nothing wrong in bringing commercial buses from other states. But if you must use it in Lagos, you have to change the colour and re-register it with us so that we have your information in our database.

“This is a standard procedure. As a matter of fact, it you have lived in a state for about three months, you are no longer a visitor and therefore you must change your number plate to reflect the state. It is done in America and other developed nations.

 

“Of course, this provision did not affect inter-state vehicles carrying passenger from other state. But we don’t expect them to pick or drop passengers at every bus stop. There are dedicated bus stops and parks for inter-state vehicles. If they violate this and we get them, they will face our law.

“You must put waste basket in your buses; there must be first aid box; you must carry extra tyres. These are what our law stipulates.”

The VIO boss who highlighted the provisions of the traffic law, advised them to cooperate with the government to ensure security in the state.

A director in the ministry, Mr. Bola Matanmi, also advised the drivers not to turn themselves to traffic officials, but instead apply to the ministry so that they would be given a Special Marshall status.

 

He added that the union would be given the privilege to choose the colour of the uniform for drivers and conductors.

Special Adviser to the Governor on Political and Legislative Affairs, Mr. Muslim Folami, said the traffic law, which has 43 sections and four schedules was for the interest of Lagosians. He urged the drivers to submit to the law for sanity and safety.

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