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 ABUJA: Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed,  has urged  potential investors in Nigerian to take advantage of the Change agenda of the present administration to tap from the huge benefits inherent in the economy, describing Nigeria as a safe haven for foreign investors. The Minister made the call on Thursday when a delegation of Foreign Investors led by Dr. Shamsuddeen Usman, a former National Planning Minister visited her Ministry. The delegation of the Foreign Investors came from United States, United Kingdom, Middle East, China, France, South Africa etc under the auspices of Renaissance Capital Investments. The Minister who described Nigeria business climate as favourable, said “Our N6,08 trillion budget is designed to stimulate and reflect our economy, we are making conscious efforts at reducing barriers of doing business in Nigeria. Our government is heavily fighting corruption and insecurity challenges is almost successfully tackled’’

A former Political Adviser to the ex-Vice-President, Namadi Sambo, Abba Dabo, on Thursday told a Federal High Court in Abuja that he returned to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission the sum of N25m paid to him by the National Publicity Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party, Olisa Metuh, for the party’s media publicity works. Dabo, who was testifying as the seventh prosecution witness against Metuh, said he returned the money on his own volition in January 2016 due to media publications indicating that it was sourced from funds meant for procurement of arms. He said the N25m was paid to him through Metuh’s firm, Destra Investment Limited’s account, on December 16, 2014, five days after former President Goodluck Jonathan and Sambo emerged as the PDP’s presidential and vice-presidential candidates at the party’s nomination convention. The witness, who is a past newspaper’s editor and a former Chief Press Secretary to ex-President Shehu Shagari, said he decided

The Supreme Court on Wednesday affirmed the elections of Governor Udom Emmanuel of Akwa Ibom State and Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State. A seven-man bench, presided over by the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Mahmud Mohammed, unanimously affirmed the governors’ elections after upholding their separate appeals against the judgments of the Court of Appeal, which had ordered their removal from office. The decisions of the Supreme Court put paid to the legal actions initiated against Emmanuel and Ikpeazu, who contested the elections on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party on April 11, 2015, by their arch rivals. While Emmanuel’s election was challenged by the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, Mr. Okon Umana, that of Ikpeazu was challenged by All Progressive Grand Alliance’s candidate, Dr. Alex Otti. The Abuja Division of the Court of Appeal had nullified the Akwa Ibom State governorship election in the entire 31 local government areas of the state on Dece

Jacob Zuma offers to pay back some of the $20 million in state funds used to upgrade his private home For more than six years, South African President Jacob Zuma has been under pressure to reimburse the government for $23 million in state funds he used to make "improvements" to his private home near Nkandla, in KwaZulu-natal. Those upgrades include a swimming pool, an amphitheater and visitors' center. On Wednesday, Zuma finally relented and agreed to pay some of it back. But not everyone is impressed by Zuma's change of heart — Jonathan Shapiro among them. Better known as Zapiro, he is one of South Africa's best known political cartoonist. "It's not really a change of heart. What's happening is that a very big case brought by the main opposition, the Democratic Alliance, is coming to the Constitutional Court." Think America's Supreme Court. Zapiro says the court is likely to rule that President Zuma "benefitted unduly&quo