The Ottoman Empire Strikes Back

This comment was selected by Mod KL  from the  post “Foreign Policy Diary – Turkey Seeks to Become New Ottoman Empire”. The moderator believes it gives an additional brief overview of Turkey’s real ambitions. It reveals more pieces of the puzzle, regarding Turkey’s true  intentions by projecting its power well beyond its borders – yet again.

NLC Hails Oshiomhole Over Payment Of December Salary, Urges Others Governors To Emulate Him

The Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, in Edo State has hailed the state governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, for paying civil servants in the state December salary.
The union described the state as lucky, unlike some other states in the country where they spent the Christmas without salary.
Chairman of NLC in the state, Emmanuel Ademokun, in a statement, described Oshiomhole’s seven years reign as a huge success, pointing out that the governor’s efforts in blocking leakages in the ministries had yielded fruit.

Expect Real Change In 2016 – Anyaoku Assures Nigerians

Former Commonwealth Secretary General, Chief Emeka Anyaoku, has called on Nigerians to expect the change they voted for in 2016.
Anyaoku gave this assurance in a statement issued on Monday in Abuja.
According to him, the pervading insecurity in the country would be brought under control.
He also expressed hope that corruption which had remained the greatest bane to national development would be effectively tackled.
“The infrastructural deficit in power supply, transportation including roads, education and health will receive attention.

US Opts To Buy Nigeria’s Crude, Says Kachikwu

Minister of State for Petroleum Dr. Emmanuel Ibe Kachukwu has raised Nigerians’ hope about the dwindling oil revenue, with the news that the United States will now buy some crude from Nigeria.
“Post the President’s visit, there has been an overture from them to say they want to buy limited quantity of Nigerian oil to support the market. We are still ongoing on that,” he said.
Kachikwu allayed fears over the return of the U.S. to oil export, stressing that the country’s sale of oil does not foreclose its tendency to buy crude at the same time.
According to him, the volume of oil that the US intends to do is little and it is for her internal consumption.

Ekweremadu: My Re-Emergence As Deputy Senate President, Act Of God

•Saraki extols his virtues
Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki has described his Deputy, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, as a man who has the interest of Nigeria at heart.
This is even as Ekweremadu described his re-emergence as senator and Senate deputy president as an act of God.
Saraki stated this on Sunday, at a civic reception in Mpu, Ekweremadu’s hometown, shortly after a special thanksgiving service, where he rededicated himself to the service of Nigeria and mankind.
Speaking on behalf of the Senate, Saraki described Ekweremadu as a man who every Nigerian politician should look forward to working with.

6 Essential SEO Strategies to Incorporate in 2016

SEO is truly vital on the off chance that you are into web promoting. Many who maintain their organizations online don't know how to utilize this apparatus and the individuals who are educated, additionally falter now and again in executing their SEO services to get sought results.  Famous web indexes like Google use complex calculations and various positioning components in deciding the most pertinent sites for specific pursuit terms. The hardest part is to make content for your site to improve its rankings. For this you need to basically depend on expert SEO services.

Here are a few ways you can adopt as your  your SEO techniques for 2016:

Continue after the jump break.

How Pirated Biafra Radio Chief Kanu Was Arrested In Lagos, By DSS

The Department of State Services (DSS) has given details of how its men apprehended the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and Director of Radio Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu. Nnamdi Kanu at the federal High Court in Abuja today Sahara Reporters Media
The DSS said but for the tenacity of its men, Kanu, who lodged in a Lagos hotel under a fictitious name, would have escaped arrest.

Muhammed Hassan Loses 5 Ribs To Boko Haram

The Senator representing Yobe South Senatorial District, Muhammed Hassan, has revealed how he was attacked by Boko Haram, which resulted into five of‎ his ribs being broken during electioneering in Yobe State. The Vice Chairman of Senate Committee on Federal Capital Territory, while speaking in an interview, added that his closest confidant was killed during the attack on his convoy by Boko Haram.

'Newly Awakened' Russian Navy Has Pentagon Shaking in Its Boots

In the fight against Daesh in Syria, Russia has demonstrated its state-of-the-art naval prowess. According to a new Pentagon report, the proven effectiveness of the Kremlin’s fleet has Washington worried.

In October, the Russian military launched 18 Kalibr-M cruise missiles from warships stationed in the Caspian Sea. Travelling over 1,500 miles, these projectiles struck terrorist targets in Syria, destroying key components of Daesh, also known as ISIL/the Islamic State.

Nigeria’s Budget Without Oil Realisable – Fayemi

The Minister of Solid Minerals and a former Governor of Ekiti State, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, has said the N6.08tn 2016 budget proposed by President Muhammadu Buhari is realisable.
The minister also said the budget was not bogus despite the dwindling revenues from crude oil.
The Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose, while criticising the budget, had said that, “It is only in a confused and clueless economy that government will plan to spend more when revenue has reduced by more than 50 per cent.”

Boko Haram Attacks Maiduguri, Killing 50

Boko Haram Islamic extremists struck the northeastern Nigerian city of Maiduguri for the first time in months Monday with rocket-propelled grenades and multiple suicide bombers, witnesses said. At least 50 people were killed and the death toll could go higher.
At least 30 were killed and more than 90 wounded in overnight blasts and another 20 were killed at Monday’s mosque bombing, said Muhammed Kanar, coordinator for the area’s emergency agency.
The military said there were multiple attacks at four southwestern entry points to the city, including a woman suicide bomber who killed one other person and injured 13 gathered outside a mosque after dawn prayers Monday.

In another blast, two girls blew themselves up in Buraburin neighbourhood, killing several people, according to civil servant Yunusa Abdullahi.
“We are under siege,” Adullahi said. “We don’t know how many of these bombs or these female suicide bombers were sneaked into Maiduguri last night.” He said some residents have found undetonated bombs.
The attack appears to be a challenge to President Muhammadu Buhari’s declaration last week that Boko Haram has been “technically” defeated, capable of no more than suicide bombings on soft targets.
Acting on information provided by a captured insurgent, Nigerian troops “intercepted and destroyed” 13 suicide bombers and arrested one female suicide bomber in repelling the attackers, Maj. Gen. Lamidi Adeosun, the commander prosecuting Nigeria’s war against Boko Haram, told reporters.
Maiduguri, the city under attack, is the birthplace of Boko Haram, which emerged as a much more radical entity after Nigerian security forces launched an all-out assault on their compound in the city, killing 700 people in 2009.
Militants firing indiscriminately from the back of three trucks attacked the outlying village of Dawari, soldiers engaged them, and as people were fleeing, a woman ran into the area yelling “Boko Haram, Boko Haram.” When people gathered, she detonated herself, according to village head Bulama Isa.
A rocket-propelled grenade then exploded, setting alight grass-thatched huts, and a second woman blew herself up, according to Isa. Among those killed was the village chief and 10 of his children, according to residents Ahmed Bala and Umar Ibrahim.

A soldier said the insurgents fired rocket-propelled grenades into four residential areas on the outskirts of the city. Soldiers fired back, and many civilians were caught in the crossfire, according to the soldier, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorised to speak to journalists.
Three suicide bombers blew themselves up at a home near Bakassi Estate, killing 18 people Sunday evening, another soldier told The Associated Press.

A nurse at Maiduguri Specialist Hospital said dozens of critically wounded, mainly children and women, may not survive. The nurse, who spoke on condition of anonymity because she is not authorised to speak to reporters, said the hospital was so overflowing with patients that some had to be cared for in the maternity ward. About 60 people had wounds from bullets and shrapnel from explosive devices, she said. Other wounded people had to be sent to other hospitals in the city.
Among them was a baby found dead, still tied to the back of her mother, who survived after being hit by shrapnel, the nurse said.

It was hard to do a body count because so many had been blown into pieces, she said, describing torsos and dismembered arms and legs.
Maiduguri, a city of about one million people, now hosts almost as many refugees, among 2.5 million people driven from their homes in the 6-year-old uprising. About 20,000 people have been killed in Nigeria and hundreds others elsewhere as the insurgents have carried their conflict across its borders into Cameroon, Niger and Chad.
Source: AP

Ribadu In Surprise Visit To Bisi Akande, Says Politics Not Reason To Cut Off Ties

A former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Nuhu Ribadu yesterday showed up at the Ila-Orangun country home of a national leader of the All Progressives Congress for what he called a “catch up visit to a father and elder statesman”.
Mr. Akande was the interim chairman of the ruling APC and was the national chairman of the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria, under which Mr. Ribadu vied for Nigeria’s presidency in 2011.
Mr. Ribadu, who arrived at Mr. Akande’s compound at around 1:30pm along with a friend, Kashim Imam, went straight into a closed-door session with the APC chieftain.
However, not long after they went in, the trio emerged into a meeting of some local APC officials who had gathered for a Christmas visit to Mr. Akande.

INTERVIEW: Oil Workers Will Resist Fuel Subsidy Removal – PENGASSAN President

The national president of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, PENGASSAN, Francis Johnson, tells PREMIUM TIMES how workers view the proposed deregulation of the petroleum sector by the federal government.
PT: Deregulation of the petroleum industry means different things to different people – government, investors, marketers, etc. What does it mean to oil workers?
Johnson: Deregulation is a universal economic concept that promotes free market enterprise. When the regulator relaxes regulation and permits market forces to determine the means of production and distribution of an economic product, deregulation is achieved.

President Muhammadu Buhari To Block all leakages in revenue

President Muhammadu Buhari has assured Nigerians that by blocking all leakages in revenue generation and eliminating waste, the country will generate enough revenue from internal sources to finance the N6 trillion budget he submitted to the National Assembly last week.
President Muhammadu Buhari.

S’South Not Part Of Biafra, Kokori Tells MASSOB

Human rights activist and former labour union leader, Chief Frank Kokori, has berated the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra for saying that the South-South is part of the struggle for the creation of a Biafra Republic.

MASSOB had said in a statement on Sunday that “anybody who says that Akwa Ibom, Rivers, Bayelsa and Cross River states are not part of Biafra is deceiving himself.”
It said the listed states were Biafran territories and that Biafra comprises all the states of the former eastern region, including the Anioma community in Delta State.
“It has been part of the Federal Government’s policy of divide and rule to tell the world that only the Ndigbo want Biafra; but this is false,” MASSOB said in the statement.

Boko Haram Attacks Maiduguri With Female Suicide Bombers

The terrorist sect, Boko Haram has left people in troubled Maiduguri anxious and frightened after unleashing female suicide bombers on the Borno State capital. Over 60 persons have been killed in attacks by the insurgents in the last 24 hours on the town. Many of the attacks were from female suicide bombers smuggled by the insurgents into the town after confrontations with the military believed to be a decoy.

I Didn’t Plan To Lose Boko Haram War –Jonathan

Former President Goodluck Jonathan has said he did not plan to lose the Boko Haram war as is being suggested by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Jonathan spoke on Sunday in reaction to an interview Buhari granted the Hausa Service of the British Broadcasting Corporation.  In the interview, Buhari accused the Jonathan administration of deliberately provoking Nigerian soldiers into mutiny by its actions and turning round to arrest and prosecute the soldiers.

He said the past administration, while fighting terrorists, sent soldiers to the battlefield without arms and ammunition.

Obasanjo Advises Rich Nigerians On Job Creation

A former President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, has called on well-meaning Nigerians to give back to the communities where they hail from, in order to stem the tide of rural-urban migration and unemployment among youths.
He also said this would engender rural development in the country.
Obasanjo made the call while delivering his goodwill message at the 2015 edition of the Ibogun-Olaogun Day held on Saturday at Ibogun- Olaogun Village, in Ifo Local Government Area of Ogun State.

Top 10 Most Vibrant Senators of 2015

The year 2015 has come and almost gone, yet the 8th Senate has recorded significant progress, as well as faced a number of challenges.

The distinguished Senators of the 8th National Assembly, under the leadership of Senate President Bukola Saraki have all in one way or the other contributed immensely to the successes and achievements of the 8th Senate thus far and most importantly to the growth and development of Nigeria as a whole.

US Plot to Evacuate its Top tier 2 ISIS Jihadis From Ramadi Uncovered

A US plot to evacuate Daesh leaders from the strategic city of Ramadi in central Iraq has reportedly been disclosed by a volunteer forces commander.


An Iraqi volunteer forces commander has revealed US plans to evacuate Daesh (ISIL/ISIS) leaders from the central Iraqi city of Ramadi, according to the Iranian news agency FARS.
The disclosure comes as the Iraqi army and popular troops are attempting to secure victory over the jihadist group in Ramadi.

Week Twelve of the Russian Intervention in Syria: Zag!

This colums was originally written for the Unz Review: http://www.unz.com/tsaker/week-twelve-of-the-russian-intervention-in-syria-zag/

In last week’s review of the Russian military intervention in Syria I wrote that Kerry had lost every single negotiation he ever had with the Russians and that he had a record of agreeing to A only to come back to the US and then declare non-A. This time again, the Americans did not change their modus operandi, except that it was Obama himself who declared, yet again, that Assad must go, resulting in some commentators speaking of a “White House Schizophrenia”. Others, however, notedthat this could be simply a case of face saving denials. Personally, I think that both of these explanations are correct.

ISIS Defeated In Ramadi

The Iraqi forces have effectively liberated the last ISIS stronghold in the city. The Iraqi forceshave taken control of the last stronghold of ISIS in the town of Ramadi. As per the representative of the forces Sabah al-Numani, the following step is to guarantee that there are no fighters left in the town.

NEMESIS! Man Electrocuted Trying To Steal Electric Cable In Kaduna

An unidentified middle age man was electrocuted at the early hours of Sunday while trying to steal electric cable at a power supply installation in Kaduna.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the incident happened at Accra Crescent by LEA Primary School, Unguwar Rimi.

The traditional ruler of teh area, Dan Iyar Unguwar Rimi, Alhaji Muhammad Gidado, confirmed the incident.

Gidado said that the corpse of the vandal was evacuated from the scene by the police from Unguwar Rimi Division.
According to him, the vandal was unknown to them in the area and urged law enforcement agencies to step-up patrol as the community has suffered from the activities of vandals lately.

Jesus Was Not Born On December 25 - Femi Aribisala

Jesus was born on the Feast of Tabernacles. He was not born on “Christmas Day.”

Jesus was not born on December 25. That is the date of a pagan festival of the sun god Tammuz merged with Christianity under Constantine. However, the evidence is overwhelming that Jesus was born during the Feast of Tabernacles.
Coming of Elijah

Appeal about the fate of Ana Belen Montes

To  all our American progressive friends:

We are writing this note to you from Cuba with a heartfelt desire to let you know about the formation of the Cuba Committee, which presently  manages the campaign for a better treatment and a possible pardon for Ana Belen Montes