Gunmen suspected to be bandits dressed in military uniforms have kidnapped 31 villagers in a coordinated attack carried out in Tashar Nagule village of Batsari local government area of Katsina State.

A credible source in the area disclosed that the armed men in large numbers appeared in military uniforms inside the community on Sunday night and seized both women, children and men, numbering 31.

He explained that the assailants had first besieged the community before sending some of their men through the main entrance to kidnap the villagers, while their motorcycles were left outside the community.

“I was sitting outside with some of my friends around 9pm when we first heard gunshots. We stood up to run from the place but the terrorists shouted that we should stop because they were security agents sent to protect us.

“They knew that when they said they were policemen or soldiers sent to protect us, we will believe them, and that was what happened,” the source narrated.

The source reiterated that residents were deceived and began to gather at the village square, not knowing that the intruders, some of whom wore military camouflage, were not security operatives but bandits.

He said, “When the terrorists had circled the residents, they told them to follow them into the forest. That was when I knew they were not security agents. I slipped out of the group and ran back into my house.

“As of now (Monday morning), we have counted 31 people who had been taken away. Some of them were abducted when they ran outside into the bush because several terrorists were stationed outside the village to lay ambush.”

Batsari LGA and its environs have been under constant attacks of bandits recently, forcing many residents of the area to flee their homes to seek refuge elsewhere in more urban centres.

Meanwhile, Katsina State Police Command was yet to make any official statement regarding the latest attack as the time of this report.

Leadership

Families of hostages held in Gaza storm Israel's parliament meeting demanding deal for release

Dozens of family members of hostages held by Hamas stormed a committee meeting in Israel’s parliament Monday, demanding a deal to win their loved ones’ release, as European foreign ministers joined growing international calls for Israel to negotiate on the creation of a Palestinian state after the war.

The developments showed the increasing pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has dug in on both fronts. He has insisted to the Israeli public that pursuing the devastating offensive in Gaza is the only way to bring the hostages home. At the same time, he has rejected the United States’ vision for a postwar resolution, saying he will never allow a Palestinian state.

The dispute over Gaza’s future pits Israel against its top ally and much of the international community. It also poses a major obstacle to plans for postwar governance or reconstruction of the coastal territory, large parts of which have been left unlivable by Israeli bombardment.

As fears grow that Israel’s war in Gaza will spark a wider regional conflict, the U.S. and British militaries bombed eight locations in Yemen used by the Houthi rebels. It’s the eighth time the U.S. has bombed Houthi sites since Jan. 12, U.S. officials said late Monday, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a military operation. The Iranian-backed Houthis have attacked shipping in the region’s waterways, saying they aim to end the Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip.

In southern Gaza, Israeli strikes and shelling intensified in and around the city of Khan Younis, sending Palestinian families fleeing south in pickup trucks and donkey carts loaded with possessions.

In the city, which has been a battle zone for weeks, people dug graves for the dead inside the yard of Al-Nasser Hospital as staff struggled to deal with dozens of newly killed and wounded, including children. Health care workers said strikes hit at least four schools sheltering displaced people on the city’s western edges, including two inside a coastal strip that Israel had declared a safe zone for people fleeing.

Gaza’s internet and phone networks collapsed again Monday for the 10th time during the war. The repeated blackouts severely hamper distribution of aid that’s essential for the survival of the territory’s population of 2.3 million, U.N. officials said. The loss of service also prevents Palestinians from communicating with each other and the outside world.

Netanyahu has vowed to continue the offensive until “complete victory” over Hamas and to return all remaining hostages after the Oct. 7 rampage in southern Israel that triggered the war. In that attack, some 1,200 people were killed and Hamas and other militants abducted around 250 people.

Israelis are increasingly divided on the question of whether it’s possible to do either.

Around 100 hostages were freed under a weeklong cease-fire deal in November in exchange for the release of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. Around 130 remain captive, but a number have since been confirmed dead. Hamas has said it will free more captives only in exchange for an end to the war and the release of thousands of Palestinian prisoners.

Netanyahu has ruled out such an agreement, but anger is rising among hostages’ families. Relatives and other protesters set up a tent camp outside Netanyahu’s residence in Jerusalem, vowing to remain until a deal is reached.

On Monday, dozens of family members of the hostages stormed into a gathering of the Knesset’s finance committee, holding up signs and yelling, “You won’t sit here while they are dying there!”

“These are our children!” they shouted. Some had to be physically restrained, and at least one person was escorted out.

OVER 25,000 KILLED IN GAZA

Israel’s offensive has killed at least 25,295 Palestinians in Gaza and wounded more than 60,000, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. The ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but says around two-thirds of those killed were women and children.

Residents in Khan Younis reported bombardment on all sides of the city. At Nasser Hospital, Ayman Abu Abaid, the head of surgery, told Al Jazeera TV early Monday that at least 50 dead and more than 100 wounded had been brought to the facility.

Ashraf Al-Qudra, spokesman for the Health Ministry, said Israeli troops had stormed Al-Khair Hospital and detained the medical staff, the latest hospital that troops have seized during the conflict. The hospital is just inside the safe zone at Muwasi, a rural coastal strip west of Khan Younis, where the Israeli military had said it would not carry out operations.

Volunteers with the Red Crescent said strikes hit four schools west of Khan Younis — two of them inside the Muwasi zone — causing an unknown number of casualties. They said the organization’s ambulances couldn’t reach the sites.

Families streamed out of Khan Younis along the coastal highway, some walking, some loading blankets and possessions into vehicles. They headed toward Rafah, the tiny sliver at the extreme southern end of Gaza where well over 1 million people are already crowded, many living in tents that have filled the streets.

As he fled Khan Younis with his family, Ahmad Shurrab said he had been displaced multiple times. “Where should I go? Should I go to Rafah? Rafah is like one street. What do they want from us?” he shouted.

Some 85% of the Gaza population has been driven from their homes by the war. U.N. officials say 1 in 4 people in Gaza is starving as the fighting and Israeli restrictions hinder the delivery of humanitarian aid. Only 15 bakeries are working across the Gaza Strip, all of them in either Rafah or the central town of Deir al-Balah, the U.N. said.

The Israeli military says it has killed around 9,000 militants in its offensive, without providing evidence, and blames the high civilian death toll on Hamas because it operates in dense residential areas.

The war has also stoked tensions across the region, with Iran-backed groups in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen attacking Israeli and U.S. targets.

NETANYAHU UNDER MOUNTING PRESSURE

Netanyahu, whose popularity has plummeted since Oct. 7, faces pressure from the U.S. to shift to more precise military operations and do more to facilitate humanitarian aid into Gaza.

The United States is also calling for a reformed Palestinian Authority to govern Gaza after the war and for negotiations to start on a two-state solution. The authority currently governs pockets of the Israeli-occupied West Bank and was ejected from Gaza in 2007 when Hamas took power.

Netanyahu has rejected both the entry of the Palestinian Authority and the creation of a Palestinian state. His governing coalition is beholden to far-right parties that want to step up the offensive, encourage the emigration of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from Gaza and reestablish Jewish settlements there.

At a meeting in Brussels, European Union foreign ministers added their voices to the calls for a Palestinian state, saying it was the only way to achieve peace.

French Foreign Affairs Minister Stephane Sejourne said Netanyahu’s rejection of statehood was “worrying. There will be a need for a Palestinian state with security guarantees for all.”

“Which are the other solutions they have in mind?” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said of Israel. “To make all the Palestinians leave? To kill them off?”

In an interview with CNN late Sunday, Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister, Prince Faisal bin Farhan, said the kingdom will not normalize relations with Israel or contribute to Gaza’s reconstruction without a credible path to a Palestinian state. His comments were notable because before the war, the U.S. had been trying to broker a landmark normalization agreement between Saudi Arabia and Israel.

The Palestinians seek a state including Gaza, the West Bank and Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem, territories Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war. Peace talks broke down nearly 15 years ago.

AP

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Ukraine's Zelenskiy hails diaspora, proposes dual citizenship

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy thanked Ukrainians abroad on Monday for their support during Russia's invasion, and proposed changing the constitution to allow dual citizenship.

Zelenskiy said he was submitting legislation to parliament on dual citizenship, in what appeared a symbolic gesture on Unity Day, the anniversary of the shortlived 1919 unification of eastern and western Ukrainian lands in an independent state.

Zelenskiy also marked the day by issuing a decree protecting the rights and identity of some 4 million ethnic Ukrainians in Russia -- by far the largest diaspora group.

Ukraine's constitution does not give Ukrainian citizens the right to dual citizenship, so millions of people of Ukrainian origin who live abroad are unable to hold Ukrainian passports.

"Today I am submitting to the Verkhovna Rada a key draft law that will allow the adoption of comprehensive legislative amendments and the introduction of multiple citizenship," Zelenskiy said in a video address.

"And it will allow all ethnic Ukrainians and their descendants from around the world to have our citizenship. Of course, except for citizens of the aggressor country."

Ukrainian officials often refer to Russia as the aggressor country following its full-scale invasion on Feb. 24 2022 and occupation of swathes of Ukrainian territory.

Zelenskiy has frequently underlined the need for unity as Russia's war in Ukraine drags on, with Kyiv heavily dependent on military and financial aid from abroad.

Thanking the diaspora for its support, including those who had come to fight for Ukraine, Zelenskiy said the words "I am Ukrainian" carried a special meaning, and hailed the "indomitability of our people."

Changes to the constitution need the approval of parliament, a process that could take about a year, and the authorisation of the Constitutional court.

The presidential decree applying to ethnic Ukrainians in Russia called for an action plan to help preserve their identity, documentation of "crimes" committed against them and efforts to counter "misinformation" aimed at them.

The decree listed parts of Russia deemed to be historically populated by Ukrainians, including regions along the joint border and areas in and near Krasnodar on the Black Sea coast.

Official figures show up to 4 million ethnic Ukrainians -- both permanent and temporary residents -- living in Russia, making it by far the largest diaspora group.

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Kremlin condemns Kiev’s deadly attack on Donetsk market as 'monstrous act of terrorism'

The Kiev regime continues to demonstrate its savageness by carrying out strikes against civilians, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists, referring to Sunday’s shelling attack on a public market in Donetsk.

"The Kiev regime continues to demonstrate its savage face; they are striking civilian infrastructure, striking people, civilians," the Kremlin spokesman said.

"The strike perpetrated yesterday on a marketplace in Donetsk is a monstrous act of terrorism because indiscriminate weapons are being used, which caused casualties on such a scope," Peskov emphasized.

He pointed out that Russia strongly condemns the attack. "Of course, the special military operation will continue in order to protect our people against this danger," Peskov said.

He also noted that "the [Russian] Defense Ministry, air defense systems, and other relevant agencies are taking the necessary measures to ensure protection against this kind of terrorist attack."

A market in Donetsk came under artillery shelling by Ukrainian troops on Sunday. Ukrainian forces used 152 mm and 155 mm artillery systems, Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) Head Denis Pushilin said. According to the latest updates, 25 people were killed and at least 20 were injured, including two children. Shortly after the strike, Russian First Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations Dmitry Polyansky said that Ukraine’s strike on Donetsk would be discussed at a Russia-requested meeting of the UN Security Council.

Reuters/Tass

Nigeria beat Guinea-Bissau 1-0 to progress to the last 16 of the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations at Stade Felix Houphouet Boigny yesterday. 

Nantes winger Moses Simon powered down the left flank before playing a cross in search of Victor Osimhen, but the pass was intercepted by Opa Sangante, who then sent the ball into the roof of his own goal to give Nigeria a 1-0 win.

Nigeria had the ball in the back of the net a second time through Osimhen, but the goal was ruled out for a handball after the Napoli striker appeared to handle the ball just before tapping home.

Osimhen had the clearest chance of the second half but failed to convert from a pin-point Ola Aina cross, sending his header just wide of goal.

Guinea Bissau thought they had secured an equaliser against the run of play when Franculino Dju beat Stanley Nwabali with a powerful effort, but the goal was ruled out for offside.

The same fate befell Nigeria seconds later, as Ola Aina had the ball in the net following a saved shot by Osimhen, but the goal was also ruled out as the Napoli forward was offside.

Jose Peseiro’s side finished second in Group A behind Equatorial Guinea, who beat hosts Ivory Coast 4-0.

The Super Eagles will face the second-placed side from Group C, which will be Senegal, Guinea or Cameroon, in the last 16 on Saturday.

Daily Trust

Two weeks ago, this column in a piece entitled “Neither at War Nor in Peace” lamented that Nigeria has entered a new normal. We are neither a nation at peace or in a declared war. Instead, we are perennially in a state of psychological and physical siege. Even in that state, our government continues to live in perennial denial, behaving as if they are presiding over a normal democratic state. That hybrid status puts us in a unique category among troubled nations of the world.

Side by side with a count of Nigerians who have recently been killed, abducted, kidnapped or just missing, we have entered a new category of a nation with more hostages than those at war.  When Hamas militants and hotheads attacked Israel on  October 7, 2023, they took a little less than 250 hostages. That led Israel to the ongoing Israel-Hama war whose end we do not yet know. Today in Nigeria, kidnappers and bandits are holding any number of Nigerians as hostages as we speak. No one, not even the police, knows exactly Nigeria’s total hostage population, where exactly they are being held, who is holding them and for what reasons beyond ransom. We have hostages of bandits and terrorists dating back to the president Jonathan days and stretching to the present. When Buhari handed over to Presdient Tinubu, I am not so sure he handed over the precise number of hostages held by different criminal groups allover the country!

Those Nigerians kidnapped or abducted are hostages of an adversary without a face and without a name. Worse still, those that are killed by these criminals are victims of a nameless evil. An enemy without a clear identity has entered the fray of Nigerian’s insecurity. They invade, fiercely assault, collect hostages, execute innocent people in cold blood and disappear into thin air. They then make contact with the families of their hostages to demand huge sums as ransom. The negotiations are mostly between the affected families and the bandits, hoodlums and terrorists all wearing interchangeable badges. The final onus is on government to take over from there. But the government seems to be in quandary. It does not know exactly the identity and character of whom to negotiate with in these many instances of serial and viral kidnapping. With each new instance of kidnapping or abduction, the faceless enemy shows a different colour. Government is comfortable in the thinking that it is dealing with crime control. I am not so sure.

One question that has not been addressed is whether we are dealing with random bands of criminals and killers or a concerted force with a larger political purpose. The instances of kidnapping and abductions are many and widespread. They seem to wear differential regional badges. The ones in the North East tend to be inspired by ISWAP, Boko Haram and retail versions of Sahelian jihadism. In the North-west, they tend to be sundry opportunistic criminals originally bred by residues of geo-ethnic  and religious animosities but now fired by poverty and economic desperation. Further south, in the mid section of the nation, the crisis of killings and kidnappings takes on a more sectarian and occupational character. Angry migrant herders, mostly Moslem, against equally angry impoverished settlers farmers who are presumably Christian.

In the South-east, what began as separatist anger has blossomed into an enterprise of criminality powered and controlled by political and business moguls. In the cities of the South-eest and Lagos, urban criminal gangs and cults carry out opportunistic attacks to kidnap for quick cash or in quest for victims for the more gruesome harvest of body parts to fuel a thriving trade in rituals for money.

This national canvas of internal warfare has been with us for the better part of the last eight years. We have just entered a new phase in both the magnitude and geographical location of kidnapping and abductions. In the past one month, many incidents have occurred in and around the Abuja area. Families have been thrown into tragic mourning and anxiety as bandits have routinely abducted many members of families and executed some without even waiting for the requested ransom. In the Abuja kidnappings, the quantum of ransom sought has tended to be so huge as to befit the reputation of the capital city as the home of huge free cash.

In one celebrated instance, a friend of an affected family said to be a minister in the immediate past Buhari government disclosed that he had to come up with a princely N50 million to free remaining members of a family even after the innocent girl, Nabeeha, was executed by her captors. As families and concerned citizens try to grapple with existing cases, the criminals are at work with new exploits, new abductions and more dastardly killings especially in the Abuja area.

While the ring of kidnappings closes more on Abuja, the time has come to ask whether there is a larger political purpose to the latest onslaught of bandits and criminals on Abuja. Yes, Abuja is attractive to all manner of criminal enterprises. Some see it as the centre of a criminal tradition of government in which there is a disproportionate relationship between work and reward. Politicians and their hangers on enter Abuja literally as destitutes only to emerge a few months down the road as mega billionaires. Some who came to Abuja by night bus have been known to fly home a few months later in their personal private jets. Such gold rush reputation can attract mega criminals who convert vulnerable innocent people into merchandise and hostages of greed in order to get a share of the city of gold. Beyond the economic ecosystem of Abuja, there remains a perennial political question mark about the city in the geo ethnic and sectarian calculus of those interested in Nigeria’s future. To this extent, I want to insist that the latest spate of kidnappings, abductions and killings in and around Abuja constitute a clear and urgent to Nigerian politicians.

At the highpoint of the fundamentalist assault on Nigeria, Abuja was the scene of some of the most severe terrorist attacks. The United Nations offices, the Police Headquarters, churches in neighbouring areas, the facilities of THISDAY Newspapers and sundry other places were hit by a gale of terrorist bombings. The terrorists took direct responsibility for the attacks. Therefore, the interest of forces seeking to destabilize Nigeria through attacks on Abuja has never been hidden.

In the later parts of the Buhari administration, criminals and armed zealots became intensely interested in Abuja.  Followers of then imprisoned Shiite leader, El Zakzakky, carried their war for his freedom into Abuja city center. They engaged security forces in days of sporadic episodes of gunfire right in the centre of Abuja. Further down the line, a horde of ISWAP and Boko Haram foot soldiers invaded the precincts of an Abuja maximum security correctional facility and freed nearly every inmate including numerous dangerous terrorists. Still further the road of tragedy, fanatic terrorists mounted an assault against the centre of power, engaging soldiers of the presidential Guards Brigade in a fire fight that led to the death of a number of officers. At some point, schools and major institutions in the outskirts of the city had to be shut or evacuated for fear of terrorist invasion. So, Abuja has been a place of interest to a competing avalanche of criminals and armed factions with diverse interests and motives.

But for the rest of us, the city is our national capital. It is the seat of the federal government. It is home to all major diplomatic missions in the country.  In response to the repeated instances of security threats on Abuja, nearly every major diplomatic mission in Abuja has issued frightening travel advisories  warning their citizens against unnecessary travels to nearly all parts of the country. In the latest one in later 2023, the United Nations warmed all its staff in Nigeria to avoid nearly every state in Nigeria for fear of being kidnapped or abducted. The Nigerian government itself has repeatedly tacitly admitted the state of universal siege around the country by agreeing that combined military and police security operations are ongoing in all of our 36 states.

Ironically, until the last one week, the new Tinubu government had feigned indifference to the threat of massive insecurity in and around Abuja. Understandably, it is hard to pay attention to personal security when you are surrounded by armed goons of state security and elite wings of the armed forces. So, both the presidency and the FCT administration had feigned indifference until a week ago. While the spate of kidnappings, abductions and killings raged, Mr. Nyesom Wike, Federal Minister of the FCT, was to be found more in Port Harcourt, capital of his home state of Rivers where he is waging an endless war of political attrition against the state governor, Mr. Fubara, his now rebel surrogate. At last, both Mr. Wike and his boss the President have finally thought it necessary to summon meetings with security chiefs on the bad situation in Abuja. If tough talking and grand standing could end insecurity, we probably would not have any more kidnappers and bandits left in Nigeria by now.

There is now an urgent need to interrogate the existing approach and machinery of internal security in the country. The existing system has not worked. Nothing indicates that Tinubu’s approach to the problem is in any way different from that of his predecessor. The popular myth was that Buhari as a former soldier with combat experience would end insecurity as he himself publicly undertook to do. But instead, after his eight years in office, the insecurity around Nigeria has graduated into a nightmare emergency situation. There is therefore little hope that Tinubu who literally does not know the difference between a rifle and a pistol will fare any better.

He has appointed new service chiefs and decorated them with new ranks and many shiny medals. He has appointed a familiar ex-police man as NSA.  But the problem is not that of appointments and fancy titles. It is one of resources and strategy. The old strategy of throwing money and armed men in Hilux vans allover the place has not quite worked.

The government has recently bought a few helicopters from Turkey and the United States in addition to a consignment of Super Tucano jets from the United States. Many experts argue however that you do not wage a low intensity internal security war among your own citizens with the instruments of an all out war as if you were out to conquer an external adversary. Unintended collateral casualties and human rights violations are bound to result, thereby deepening the internal bitterness among the populace and making resolution harder. We already have had quite a few of these, regrettably.

Budgetting for an increase in defence and security spending in a season of galloping inflation is futile. It leaves less money for actual security spending. In addition, much has been said about leakages  and corruption in the administration of Nigeria’s security business. Our insecurity has been around for so long that it has bred an industry of its own corruption enterprise in a country where government is seen as a criminal enterprise.

More importantly, in all the instances of kidnapping, abductions, terrorist attacks and other security breaches around the country,  the staging theatres have been the ungoverned spaces. Our vast forests, bushes, savannahs and farmlands have been the favourite hiding places for bandits and criminals. The criminals strike the governed and inhabited areas and take their hostage into the ungoverned spaces from where they demand and negotiate ransom. Admittedly, the manpower available to the armed and security forces is inadequate to man these ungoverned spaces.

That creates the imperative of employing available technologies to ensure effective coverage of the entire national space. This calls for increased investment in areas like satellite surveillance and coverage of the entire Nigerian space including night vision scoping. The use of drones needs to be guided by proven know how to avoid the kind of ‘accident’ that led to avoidable loss of innocent lives in Kaduna State recently.

In all of this, we cannot diminish the overwhelming place of social factors associated with poverty in the epidemic of new crime from that we are witnessing. The ultimate long term situation is for government to ameliorate the prevailing poverty while taking effective active security measures  to make crime and criminality  unattractive for citizens.

If someone tells you, “Come up with a great idea,” your mind might go blank. It can be an overwhelming request.
But it doesn’t have to be. There’s a simple framework used by designers that can apply to any problem requiring a creative solution, says Allison Butler, a psychology professor and director of the Innovation and Design Experience for All program at Bryant University. 

Whether you want to impress your boss, invent a new product or start a successful business, Butler recommends a five-step method called “design thinking.” Executives at companies like Apple and Google have used this process, she says, and it can help anyone be more innovative. The steps include:
1. Research
2. Define
3. Ideate
4. Prototype
5. Test
Start with empathy by researching the person or people you’re aiming to help, Butler says. Try to get a better understanding of what they need from you in order to define the problem.
Next, brainstorm possible solutions and begin developing your idea. Create a “prototype,” or an initial concept, and ask other people for their thoughts and feedback to help hone it. Finally, test it out in the real world and see what happens.

For example, if your boss asks you to help address an issue, start with the first stage of design thinking: empathy. Get a clearer picture of their goals and frustrations in order to define the core problem. Then follow the steps with an open mind and be ready to iterate on what you find.
It’s “like a checklist,” says Butler. “Watch people, learn from them, craft insights, brainstorm great ideas [and] start to prototype.”  

CNBC

The newly introduced passport automation applicants’ processes may have created more problems for Nigerians willing to obtain fresh passports or even renew their expired international passports, THISDAY’s investigation has revealed.  

Most affected are Nigerians in the Diaspora who returned for the Yuletide but cannot use the opportunity to renew their international passports.  

Some of them who spoke to our correspondents at the weekend, cried out to President Bola Tinubu to wade into what they described as an an “ill-advised and ill-timed” passport automation process recently introduced by the Minister of Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo.

It was further gathered that in some selected passport offices in different geopolitical zones, thousands of Nigerians were stranded as the new system foisted on the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) by the minister, has made the process worse and indeed very unfriendly to the applicants.It was gathered that in the three passport offices in Lagos, namely Ikoyi, Ikeja, and FESTAC, applicants were running from pillar to post, trying to make their payments online and upload their photos and documents by themselves as the new system made it impossible for applicants to be assisted by the immigration officers.

For instance, in the Abuja head office and Gwagwalada offices, some officers said they welcomed the innovation to make the passport process less tedious and more seamless but complained that some aspects of the technological development were counterproductive.

At the immigration office in Gwagwalada, one of the applicants lamented that “someone should help us tell the minister that we don’t know the meaning of ICAO, let alone knowing its standard for passport applications. What exactly is the meaning of an ICAO standard passport?” he asked. An immigration officer also said that “asking applicants to upload their photos based on ICAO standard without explaining what exactly it means to upload photos on ICAO standard, is a major challenge to those seeking new international passports or those seeking to renew their expired international passports.”

The officer regretted that such a good idea from the minister was only introduced to the officers for one week before it came on stream, adding that the officers are also helpless and can’t even guide the applicants who are equally frustrated as most of them lack access to scanners and devices to upload their birth certificates, state of origin certificates, NIN and ICAO-standard passport photos.  

It was learnt that in the Enugu and Owerri passport offices, the officials only recorded two or three applicants per day as against 50 to 60 applicants daily before the new automated system because applicants were not able to achieve the desired results in uploading all the required information, especially photos. Some Diaspora applicants wondered if the government really considered them before introducing the new system, given the fact that most of them who returned during the Yuletide, usually had less than two weeks to return abroad.  

They queried the reason for the rush to introduce a novel idea when half of the passport centres had less than four hours of steady power supply per day. They also wondered if this new system would not take NIS back to 20 years ago when non-Nigerians had access to the old passports. Due to the difficulties encountered by Nigerians in the new automated passport system, a woman who returned from the United States for Christmas was sighted at the headquarters of the passport office in Abuja, wailing because her flight was in two days and she could not renew her passport.  

Also, the process of acquiring a new passport makes it mandatory for all adults to obtain the 10-year booklet which costs about N85,000.

Before the introduction of the new system, citizens had the option of either the five-year passport, which cost N35,000, or the 10-year option for 85,000.

According to a senior officer in the Abuja office, “automation is good, but it needs some weeks or even months of training and sensitisation, with the right support system in place, like steady power supply and uninterrupted internet access.”

The NIS officer, who faulted the new automated international passport system, said: “With the current automated system introduced by the minister, there will be no screening of applicants to know who is a foreigner, who is adopting a child, who is trafficking someone’s child, who is a terrorist.”  

Some of the applicants interviewed at the passport office in Gwagwalada office said both the service providers and the leadership of the NIS are too scared to tell the minister the truth.

A source from one of the service providers told our correspondent that “new ideas need time to be test-run before you can roll it out for public purposes.”  

According to him, “When the e-passport was launched in 2007, we told the then President, Olusegun Obasanjo, that he must give us one year to be sure that everything was okay before we can launch the e-passport.  And as a wise leader, the President accepted the professional advice.”

When contacted, the Acting Service PRO,  Kenneth Kure, an Assistant Comptroller of Immigration, said he was not allowed to comment on policy issues without express permission.

Thisday

Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) has kicked against plans by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) to relocate their offices to Lagos.

The ACF, in a statement yesterday by its National Publicity Secretary, Tukur Muhammad-Baba, described the plans as a ploy to further under-develop northern Nigeria.

The CBN had, in a circular issued on January 13, notified its staff about the plan to transfer its key operational directorates to Lagos to “decongest” its headquarters. “This initiative aims to ensure compliance with building safety standards and enhance the efficient utilisation of our office space.

“The action plan focuses on optimising the utilisation of other Bank’s premises. With this plan, 1,533 staff will be moved to other CBN facilities within Abuja, Lagos and understaffed branches.

“Our current occupancy level of 4,233 significantly exceeds the optimal capacity of 2,700 designed for the Head Office building. This overcrowding poses several critical challenges,” the circular read in part.

But the ACF, after a meeting of its leadership with Aliyu Wamakko yesterday, declared its strong opposition to the moves by the two federal government agencies.

The Northern Elders Forum (NEF) had on Friday flayed the plan, and said it would widen economic disparity between the North and the South.

Two days after the CBN announced its office relocation plan, Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, via a memo dated January 15, 2024 and signed by the Managing Director of FAAN, Olubunmi Kuku, ordered the relocation of the agency’s headquarters from Abuja to Lagos.

The ACF, while expressing its opposition to the idea yesterday, said that while it is easy to ignore such planned actions by the CBN and the FAAN, it is impossible to fail to see in them as a clear pattern of thinly disguised marginalisation of the North.

It said the CBN’s decision “fits into a disturbing pattern of antagonistic actions” often taken by certain federal administrations against the interests of northern and other parts of Nigeria.

“The CBN’s announcement was followed by another from the Federal Ministry of Aviation’s Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria’s (FAAN) plans to also relocate to Lagos due to shortage of office space and claim of the volume of air traffic handled by Lagos. The proposed actions of the two agencies, i.e. CBN and FAAN are precipitous and mala fide. Still on the Ministry of Aviation, only 8 of 40 directors recently appointed are from the North!

“As if deliberately designed to be made public in drip-drip fashion, a leaked letter to the Minister of Aviation from a contractor, AVSATEL, became public, wherein the company sought permission to relocate the project for refurbishing Airport Rescue and Fire Fighting Vehicles (ARFF) from Katsina to “the south” or Abuja, but sneakily mentioning Lagos, Ibadan or Enugu. AVSATEL sought to rationalise its suggestion on issues that must have been in the scope of the works when the company bided for the job but which it clearly ignored then,” the forum stated.

The ACF said the planned actions by the two agencies were a grand strategy that was not entirely new.

The forum recalled that former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s first action in office in 1999 was to order the relocation of the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA) from Abuja to Lagos.

It noted that almost all agencies and institutions responsible for the marine economy and especially the sea ports are today concentrated in Lagos, “which retains undisturbed monopoly over port operations and sea traffic in and out of Nigeria, even as Calabar, Uyo and Port Harcourt offer as much, if not better facilities.

“When, therefore, the public condemns such obsession with relocation to Lagos, it is clearly reacting against a disturbing pattern of swindle perpetrated by some federal government officials against sections of the country,” the ACF said.

It said northern Nigeria in particular had long lived under the shadow of these threats, and had endured a series of calamities as a result.

The ACF said it was only the successful discovery and exploration of oil along the Kolmani River in Gombe State that discredited the propaganda that oil does not exist in the North.

“The vile propaganda was to discourage the investment of resources looking for oil up North. Sadly, such has also been the case with a number of other federal projects meant to be located anywhere in the North, such as dredging of rivers Niger and Benue (so that the North remains landlocked), Mambila Hydroelectric Dam (Kainji and Shiroro are dams too many to be up North!), grazing reserves for the development of the livestock sub-sector, to list but a few. For decades, certain powerful interests within the federal government, who seem scared of the North, have refused to allow the projects to be undertaken,” it further stated.

The ACF said it remained unconvinced that the government agencies trying to relocate to Lagos would be doing so on any noble grounds.

It called on the federal government and the National Assembly to call on those agencies to retrace their steps and apply other honest means of addressing the alleged over-crowding in offices.

“Against the situation in Lagos, there is plenty of land in the Federal Capital Territory for expansion of office and other infrastructural facilities and such factors should not be used to obfuscate sinister motives.

“Katsina remains the location of the ARFF, as in the original scope of works. AVSATEL should not try to hoodwink the FGN with untenable drivels designed to short-change the North.

“ACF wishes to remind all concerned that decades ago, the seat of the capital of the Federal Republic was moved from Lagos to Abuja for reasons that remain valid, it is constitutional even more so today, constitutionally so, although, of course, a section of the country never liked the decision,” the forum said.

Daily Trust

The Red Sea, a vital shipping lane, is under attack – what are the alternatives?

You can see exactly where the drone attack hit. Just look for the grisly black scorch marks staining the ship's white paint. On 17 January, the MV Genco Picardy, a US-owned bulk carrier, became the latest victim of Houthi rebel assaults on commercial ships sailing through the Red Sea. One of the world's busiest shipping lanes is now, surely, the most dangerous.

Since November, Yemen's Houthi rebel group has targeted vessels passing through the strait of Bab al-Mandab, a 20 mile (32km) wide channel that splits north-east Africa from Yemen on the Arabian Peninsula. They claim to be targeting vessels with connections to Israel following the start of the war in the Gaza Strip.

They've used everything from heavily armed hijackers to missiles and drones. For seafarers caught up in the chaos, it must be terrifying. A tanker, for example, could carry around one million barrels of highly flammable oil. The crew of the MV Genco Picardy – which was carrying phosphate rock – were unharmed and were able to extinguish the fire caused by the incendiary drone.

It's not a situation anyone would envy, says Michelle Wiese Bockmann as she describes counting no fewer than 300 ships entering the most dangerous stretch of the Red Sea one day earlier this week.

"Every one of those 300 vessels has between 15 and 25 people on board," says the principal analyst at global maritime experts Lloyd's List Intelligence. "It's like a bus carrying passengers sailing straight into what, for them, is a warzone. They have no say in whether they do that."

An estimated 12% of global trade passes through the Red Sea every year, worth more than $1tn (£790bn). But many shipping firms have begun avoiding the area altogether. Hundreds of giant container ships, some of them more than 300m (984ft) long, are now choosing a lengthy detour around the continent of Africa instead of heading up the Red Sea and through the Suez Canal on voyages from Asia to Europe. But rerouting such large vessels is no easy task – the logistics involved can be enormous and time consuming.

Elsewhere, the severe drought afflicting the Panama Canal and the war in Ukraine – which has curtailed grain shipments via the Black Sea – are also strangling global supply chains. There is an urgency to adapt and reroute, though it comes with serious financial and environmental consequences.

In November last year, the Houthis hijacked a car carrier and released a video of the incident to the world. Their explosive weapons have also struck container ships, bulk carriers and narrowly missed a Russian oil tanker – the latter targeted, apparently, by mistake. US and UK military operations intended to protect ships and deter the Houthis have also entered the fray. (Read more about why the Houthis are attacking Red Sea shipping.)

Besides the threat to life and limb, sailing into such a maelstrom means higher insurance premiums, possible legal problems and unpredictable delays. The cargo carried by these vessels can be worth millions to hundreds of millions of dollars. So, it's no surprise that shipping companies have decided, in many cases, to send their vessels elsewhere.

Steering clear of the Red Sea and taking the lengthy detour around the Cape of Good Hope, however, adds around 3,500 nautical miles (4,000 miles/6,500km)and 10-12 days sailing time to each trip. This requires extra fuel (an additional $1m/£790,000's worth according to some estimates), possibly finding alternative ports of call, adjustments to delivery timetables, and rising costs. But many companies are making that choice rather than risk attack by missiles and hijackers.

Container lines have been left scrambling to rent enough ships for the lengthened journeys their vessels must now take to avoid the Red Sea, and there are fears that the crisis could have widespread economic impacts, pushing up prices of goods and delaying deliveries of high-value products by weeks or perhaps even longer.

Lloyd's List Intelligence's Wiese Bockmann says the Houthis have become increasingly indiscriminate, echoing comments by officials at the US National Security Council.

Someone else who has been watching the crisis unfold is Anna Nagurney, an economist at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. There were already significant choke points in global trade, including reduced flows through the drought-stricken Panama Canal, which connects the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic.

"A lot of [China's] ships were rerouting and not using the Panama Canal but starting to use the Suez Canal," she says. "So now that's going topsy turvy."

Taking a detour around the Cape of Good Hope seems extreme but shipping firms have done it before, for different reasons. In this case, there aren't really any alternatives given the huge volumes of cargo involved, says Nagurney. A spokesman for Maersk, one of the world's largest shipping companies, insists that there are limits to how much cargo can be moved from shipping to rail and air transport, because of the sheer amount that cargo ships can carry.

However, the harsh weather conditions sometimes encountered by vessels navigating Africa's southern tip mean that this option is not without risk itself, adds Nagurney.

Companies involved in shipping and logistics are highly experienced in getting cargo to where it needs to go, one way or another, and global supply chains are actually highly resilient, says Wiese Bockmann. She says the current Red Sea crisis should not be viewed as "Armageddon" for the shipping industry.

A case in point is how the Ukrainians have adapted to the threat posed to their grain ships by the Russian navy in the Black Sea. Nagurney and her colleagues have studied the extraordinary response to this problem, which has resulted in Ukraine moving millions of tonnes of grain along alternate corridors – such as up the Danube River or over land to sea ports in Romania, which are currently safer for departing vessels than ports in Ukraine.

That's not to say that all this rerouting of huge cargo ships does not have serious consequences. There are already reports of increased costs that will likely get passed on to consumers. Eddie Anderson, a professor in supply chain management at Imperial College London, suggests that the cost of shipping containers around, for one thing, is not likely to reach the extraordinary levels that it did during the worst of the Covid-19 pandemic. High fees certainly aren't a barrier to the manufacturers reportedly choosing to send their products and components by air freight at the moment, rather than risk delays to their supply lines.

A key question is how long the Red Sea crisis will go on for. Shipping firms and experts have already suggested it could last for months. Anderson agrees: "You're certainly talking about months. I don't imagine it's going to be years – but who can say."

There's also the environmental impact to think about. Sudden increases in shipping traffic can lead to dramatic changes in underwater noise that can affect local fish stocks and marine mammals.

Plus, ships sailing thousands of miles more than they otherwise would use up far more fuel and emit more carbon into the atmosphere to deliver the same cargo. In 2023, the International Maritime Organization set goals of reaching net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and reducing emissions by at least 20% by 2030.

"If this continues, shipping won't be able to reach reduction of emissions this year," says Rico Luman, a transport economist at banking and financial services firm ING. He points out that oil tankers are covering significantly more miles than they were prior to the war in Ukraine because sanctions targeting Russia have led to the reshaping of many shipping routes. So ships of certain kinds are already emitting more, per unit of cargo, than they were previously.

What is clear, though, is that the Houthi assault on global trade will not scupper supply chains. It is a severe threat nonetheless – and all the more so for the seafarers whose lives remain at risk.

BBC

Palestinian death toll in Gaza surpasses 25,000 while Israel announces the death of another hostage

The Palestinian death toll from the war between Israel and Hamas has soared past 25,000, the Health Ministry in the Gaza Strip said Sunday, while Israel announced the death of another hostage and appeared far from achieving its goals of freeing more than 100 others and crushing the militant group.

The war’s deaths, destruction and displacement are without precedent in the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The war has divided Israelis while the offensive threatens to ignite a wider conflict involving Iran-backed groups in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen that support the Palestinians.

Furious with the Israeli government and demanding the release of remaining hostages, relatives and others set up a tent camp outside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s residence in Jerusalem and vowed to stay until a deal is reached.

Netanyahu, in a defiant new statement, said he stressed in his conversation Friday with U.S. President Joe Biden that he rejects Hamas demands for a cease-fire, Israeli forces’ withdrawal and the release of Palestinians held by Israel in exchange for the remaining hostages. He said that agreeing means another devastating Hamas attack “would only be a matter of time.”

Netanyahu also rejects calls from U.S, its closest ally, for postwar plans that would include a path to Palestinian statehood. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called the refusal to accept a two-state solution unacceptable.

“The Middle East is a tinderbox. We must do all we can to prevent conflict igniting across the region,” Guterres added. “And that starts with an immediate humanitarian cease-fire to relieve the suffering in Gaza.”

GAZA DEATH TOLL CLIMBS

The war began with Hamas’ attack in southern Israel on Oct. 7. Palestinian militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took about 250 hostages back to Gaza.

Israel’s military announced the death of 19-year-old Sgt. Shay Levinson, who was among the hostages. His date of death was given as Oct. 7, but there were no further details. According to Israeli media, his body is still in Gaza.

Israel has responded to the Oct. 7 attack with a bombing campaign and ground invasion that laid waste to entire neighborhoods in northern Gaza and spread south, striking some areas where it told civilians to seek refuge. Ground operations are now focused on the southern city of Khan Younis and built-up refugee camps in central Gaza dating to the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation.

“The plumes of smoke from tanks, artillery and the planes of the air force will continue to cover the sky over the Gaza Strip until we will achieve our goals,” Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said.

Since the war started, 25,105 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, while another 62,681 have been wounded, the Health Ministry said. The toll included the 178 bodies brought to Gaza’s hospitals since Saturday, Health Ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qidra said.

The overall toll is thought to be higher because many casualties remain buried under rubble or in areas that medics cannot reach, Al-Qidra said.

The Health Ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in its figures but says about two-thirds of the people killed in Gaza were women and minors. The ministry is part of the Hamas-run government, but its casualty figures from previous wars were largely consistent with those of U.N. agencies and even the Israeli military.

The Israeli military says it has killed around 9,000 militants, without providing evidence, and blames the high civilian death toll on Hamas because it positions fighters, tunnels and other militant infrastructure in dense neighborhoods. The military released footage of a tunnel under a residential neighborhood in Khan Younis where the army believes at least 20 hostages were kept at different times.

Israel’s military said the demolition last week of a key building at Israa University in Gaza was under review, and asserted that preliminary findings indicated Hamas had used the compound for military purposes. The university has said the “attack” came weeks after Israeli forces occupied the building.

The war has displaced some 85% of Gaza’s residents, with hundreds of thousands packing U.N.-run shelters and camps in the south. U.N. officials say a quarter of the population of 2.3 million is starving as a trickle of humanitarian aid reaches them because of the fighting and Israeli restrictions.

Israel said 260 trucks of aid entered Gaza on Sunday, the highest number since the war began. About 500 entered daily before that, according to the U.N.

“Bread does not suffice for one hour,” said Ahmad Al-Nashawi, who accepted donated food at a tent camp in the southern city of Rafah. “You can see how many children we have other than women and men. What matters most for a child is to eat.”

ISRAELIS INCREASINGLY DIVIDED

At the new protest camp outside Netanyahu’s Jerusalem residence, hostages’ families urged the government to act.

“It’s not logical that you’re telling us the war must continue, and you keep saying that because of military pressure we will release them, but we don’t see a single one released because of this pressure,” said Gilad Korengold, the father of hostage Tal Shoham.

Some top Israeli officials have begun to acknowledge that Netanyahu’s goals of “complete victory” over Hamas and returning the remaining hostages might be mutually exclusive.

A member of Israel’s War Cabinet, former army chief Gadi Eisenkot, said last week that the only way to free the hostages was through a cease-fire.

But Netanyahu’s far-right coalition partners push him to step up the offensive, with some calling for the “voluntary” emigration of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from Gaza and the re-establishment of Jewish settlements there.

Hamas is believed to be using the hostages as shields for its top leaders. Israel has rescued one hostage, and Hamas says several have been killed in Israeli airstrikes or during failed rescue operations.

Hostages’ families want an exchange like the one during a weeklong November cease-fire. Other Israelis are frustrated by the security failures ahead of the Oct. 7 attack and by Netanyahu’s handling of the war.

Near the site of an Oct. 7 massacre during a music festival, families of Israeli victims planted trees.

“What happened after 109 days? Nothing. We’re just still waiting,” said one father, Idan Bahat.

AP