Ronke’s autopsy report’ll shock everyone – Source

As everyone awaits the result of the autopsy on the late Ronke Shonde, Saturday PUNCH has learnt that the report could be a shocker.

A source told Punch that the report, which will be out next week, might not go the way of public opinion.

Our correspondent had reported how Lekan, 51, allegedly beat his wife, Ronke, to death at their home in the Egbeda-Idimu area of the Lagos State last Thursday.

He was alleged to have shut the gate against the corpse and his two children.

The police from the Idimu division were said to have recovered the corpse by Friday morning after the landlady reported the case.

Lekan, a dockworker in Apapa, had fled and was reported to have travelled to Ondo State en route to Benin Republic before he returned to Lagos after much persuasion by friends.

The Abeokuta, Ogun State indigene, who spoke with our correspondent while in hiding, had denied complicity in the death.

He accused Ronke of sleeping with the general manager of a publishing company where she worked as the human resources manager.

After three days in hiding, the suspect gave himself up to officers of the Rapid Response Squad in Alausa, and was taken to the State Department of Criminal Investigation, Yaba.

Punch correspondent, who visited the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Ikeja, on Friday, learnt that the family had already been to the mortuary for some documentations.

A source said the autopsy would be released on Tuesday, adding that the result would be a shocker.

She said, “The police brought the corona form on Wednesday and the autopsy was conducted on Thursday. The report should be ready next week Tuesday. But the outcome will be a shocker to the world.”

It was learnt that Ronke’s family had postponed all plans for her burial till when the result was released.

A family source said she would be given a befitting burial.

He said, “Although this is a tragic incident, she will be given a befitting burial. Her church is expected to hold the service of songs for her next week when the report would have been out and the corpse released.”

Saturday PUNCH made effort to reach Ronke’s alleged lover, Kayode, on the phone, but he cut the call immediately he knew it was a journalist.

“Sorry Mr. Folarin, I cannot talk to you now,” he said and cut the call.

He had since been unreachable and did not respond to a text message sent to him on the matter.

Kayode is expected to report at the SDCI in the coming week to make statements to detectives handling the case.

The Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Fatai Owoseni, said the police were conducting investigations.

He said the police would not react to Ronke’s family reported forgiveness of Lekan.

Osinbajo explains N145 fuel price increase by Augustine Ehikioya, Abuja, May 13, 2016 at 6:26 pm in Featured, News Update

Vice President Yemi Osinbajo on Friday gave more insight into the reasons behind increase of the price of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) also known as petrol.

The government on Wednesday had increased the price from N86.50 per litre to maximum of N145 per litre.

In a statement he signed by himself, Osinbajo noted that there are many misconceptions that followed the announcement of new pump price.

According to him, the increase has nothing to do with subsidy removal but was a result of foreign exchange problem in the face of dwindling earnings.
In the statement titled ‘The Fuel Pricing Debate: Our Story’, Osinbajo said: “I have read the various observations about the fuel pricing regime and the attendant issues generated. All certainly have strong points.

“The most important issue of course is how to shield the poor from the worst effects of the policy.  I will hopefully address that in another note.

“Permit me an explanation of the policy. First, the real issue  is not a removal of subsidy. At $40 a barrel there isn’t much of a subsidy to remove.

“In any event, the President is probably one of the most convinced pro-subsidy advocates.

“What happened is as follows: our local consumption of fuel is almost entirely imported. The NNPC exchanges crude from its joint venture share to provide about 50% of local fuel consumption. The remaining 50% is imported by major and independent marketers.

“These marketers up until three months ago sourced their foreign exchange from the Central Bank of Nigeria at the official rate. However, since late last year, independent marketers have brought in little or no fuel because they have been unable to get foreign exchange from the CBN. The CBN simply did not have enough. (In April, oil earnings dipped to $550 million. The amount required for fuel importation alone is about $225million!) .

“Meanwhile, NNPC tried to cover the 50% shortfall by dedicating more export crude for domestic consumption. Besides the short term depletion of the Federation Account, which is where the FG and States are paid from, and further cash-call debts pilling up, NNPC also lacked the capacity to distribute 100% of local consumption around the country. Previously, they were responsible for only about 50%. (Partly the reason for the lingering scarcity).” He said

He said that the government realised that it was left with only one option, which was to allow independent marketers and any Nigerian entity to source their own foreign exchange and import fuel.

According to him, the government expected the marketers  to source foreign exchange at an average of about N285 to the dollar, (current interbank rate).

He added: “They would then be restricted to selling at a price between N135 and N145 per litre.

“We expect that with competition, more private refineries, and NNPC refineries working at full capacity, prices will drop considerably. Our target is that by Q4 2018 we should be producing 70% of our fuel needs locally. At the moment even if all the refineries are working optimally they will produce just about 40% of our domestic fuel needs.

“You will notice that I have not mentioned other details of the PPPRA cost template. I wanted to focus on the cost component largely responsible for the substantial rise, namely foreign exchange. This is therefore not a subsidy removal issue but a foreign exchange problem, in the face of dwindling earnings.” He stated

  Nicki Minaj has finally opened up on why she dumped her ex-boyfriend of 12 years..She took to twitter to slam Safaree Samuels for stealing for her and not letting go despite gaining so much from her..
 She also said after she bought birthday gifts for Meek Mill, Safaree sued her for emotional distress.

Abandon your marriage if…. Ambode’s wife advises women

Mrs Bolanle Ambode, wife of Lagos State governor
 To thousands of women who are in abusive and violent relationship and who continued to bear the brunt of domestic violence, wife of Lagos State governor, Mrs. Bolanle Ambode, has a sound advice: Abandon the marriage and flee for your life so that you can live to tell your story.
 Mrs Ambode condemned in the strongest possible terms, the vexed issue of domestic violence which has continued to rear its ugly head in the state and across the country.
 She made the denunciation in Alausa, Ikeja, against the backdrop of one Mr. Lekan Shonde, who allegedly beat his wife to death at the couple’s home in Egbeda suburb of the state.
 Mrs. Ambode lamented that domestic violence in the form of assault on wife, child-beating and other forms of uncivilized behavior against women and children, seems to have become an attraction for some men who are still living in primitive times.
 She described as totally unacceptable, a situation where a man would callously turn his wife to a punching bag on the flimsy excuse that the helpless woman had either insulted him or refused to carry out his orders.
 In her words, “How do you explain a situation where the man you married and one who claims to love you, would descend so heavily on you at the slightest provocation; if he is not complaining about delayed dinner, it is another flimsy excuse that is not tenable anywhere. They do it every now and then even to the extent of killing the helpless woman. For how long will this go on?”
The visibly distraught wife of the governor, advised any woman who found herself in an abusive relationship to retrace her steps, so that she could live to tell her own story.
 While rejecting the common and worn out excuse of societal stigmatization of women who abandoned unpleasant marriages, Ambode retorted that when the woman dies in such a cruel marriage, what then does the society say?
 According to her, “Many victims of domestic violence also become victims of their own psychological realities. The world of these women is lonely, isolated and filled with fear, with no emotional outlet whatsoever. Sadly, victims wait until it is too late.”
 “We should cease to treat domestic violence as a case of family affair in order not to involve ourselves. The fact that our society is patriarchal and a value sanctioned by culture is not enough reason for this epidemic called Domestic Violence.”
She maintained that domestic abuse should not only be perceived as a social problem, but also viewed as a criminal act.
 Mrs. Ambode however commiserated with all victims of domestic violence, including families of those that died, urging all women facing similar ordeal to approach the state’s Office of the Public Defender, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Youth & Social Development or the Ministry of Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation for legal assistance at no cost.

Ronke Shonde's war with husband started when she found out he had a child outside wedlock

The family of late Ronke Shonde (nee Bewaji) has reacted to the allegations levelled against her by her husband, Lekan.

The first and only surviving child of the family, Bolatito Bewaji, told PUNCH Metro on Tuesday that Lekan allegedly killed her sister due to jealousy and insecurity.
She said the problem started when Ronke discovered that her husband had a child outside wedlock, which affected their marriage.
Bolatito said her sister had endured a long period of domestic abuse, adding that sometime in December 2015, she almost packed out of his house.

Bolatito, who spoke at the family house on Ogunsiji Close, Allen Avenue, Ikeja, however, said her sister would not have died if she had listened when she (Bolatito) and their mother begged her to leave the house after a series of abuse.

She said, “The first case of abuse which I can remember happened sometime in 2012. The most recent was in December 2015, when we were still mourning the death of my brother. My mother was in the house with them when he started to verbally assault her. It was getting heated and my mum had to immediately leave the house. My mum called me and I went to a police station closest to the house. The policemen there said I could not report the case since I was not the victim.”
She said she went to her sister’s house, but her husband refused to let her go, which created a scene on their street.
“My mother said I must make sure she packed her belongings. I started begging her to follow me, and she stood up and went ahead of me. But as I stepped out, I discovered that she had gone back. When I returned to their house, I found her in bed.

“I called her and said, ‘my sister, do you want to die? We don’t want to lose you. We just lost our second born. I know you are a loving person and you care about your family, but you have to quit this marriage.’ At this point, she (Ronke) started crying,” Bolatito added.
It was learnt that a pastor on the street and the landlady of the house came out to intervene and beg on behalf of Lekan, who was also pleading and saying it was the devil’s handiwork.
Bolatito said her mother insisted she followed them back or she signed an undertaking at a police station that whatever happened to her, the family would not be involved.


She said her sister’s latest problem started after a woman turned up in their home with a child.
She explained that Lekan, who was caught unawares by the visit, started begging his wife for forgiveness.

Bolatito said, “My sister called me and said her husband had a child outside wedlock. She said somebody brought the child to the house and said her husband was the father. She was shattered by that news and from that time, she started keeping to herself.

“Lekan asked her to forgive him, saying it was the devil’s handiwork. He would kneel and beg in the kitchen and bathroom. He promised to do a DNA test to know if the child was truly his own, but he didn’t do it. He started sending people to beg her. But she decided to stop talking to him.”
On the infidelity accusation, Bolatito said her sister never had any relationship out of wedlock, saying the relationship between Ronke and the manager in question was professional.
She also said Lekan did not buy her two cars as he claimed.

“She has been struggling to raise N70,000 to change the gearbox of her car. My sister would sometimes ask me for money for her children’s school fees and other things, but he (Lekan) would check her account and ask who sent the money and they would start fighting over it.

“Since we lost our brother, the two of us became close and we promised to stay together to take care of our mum. But now, see what he has done to our family,” she added.
Another family member, who asked not to be named, said when Ronke refused to take any action on the child born out of wedlock, her husband checked her phones to know if she was dating another person in retaliation.
He said aside from the general manager that the suspect mentioned, he had accused her of dating at least three other people in her office.

He said, “He would pick her phone and would query her on numbers not in her contact, he would ask who it was and why he was calling. Before she got her job, whenever she was going for an interview, he would commission a motorcyclist to trail her and check if she actually went for the interview or not.
“If she told him she was going to see a friend, she would call that friend some minutes later and said he could not reach his wife on her mobile phone and would like to talk to her through the friend’s phone; just to check if she was there.

“At another time, he started waiting for her at the gate at night to see who would drop her at the gate.
“It got to a point that he sent friendship request to all her male friends on Facebook and got their contacts and started calling them and harassing them. The man is insecure and jealous.”
The family member described the late Ronke as a loving woman who cared for her family and died because she refused to leave her family.

He said, “Ronke was a loving person. The only thing that mattered to her was her family and her children. Even when things were bad, she would call her sister to borrow money to pay rent or pay the children’s school fees.”
Meanwhile, it was gathered that the family were already making plans to bury the 36-year-old, as the police await the result of the autopsy.

EFCC arrests Lagos lawyer, Adegboruwa for N61m scam...Buhari Responds To David Cameron’s Corruption Comment...Germany to teach Nigerians cleanliness & other major headlines

1.  Buhari Responds To David Cameron’s Corruption Comment About Nigeria
buhari-and-cameron
The President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria has on Tuesday responded to David Cameron, The UK Prime Minster’a comment where he described Nigeria as a “Fantastically corrupt” country.
The President, Muhammadu Buhari described the comment as embarrassing.
In a statement sent to PREMIUM TIMES by his Senior Special Assistant on Media, Garba Shehu, shortly after the news of the Prime Minister’s comment went viral on the Internet, the a president said:
“This is embarrassing to us, to us say the least, given the good work that the President is doing, Mr. Buhari said. “The eyes of the world are on what is happening here.”
 2.  EFCC arrests Lagos lawyer, Adegboruwa for N61m scam



Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has arrested popular Lagos-based lawyer, Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa, for an alleged N61m scam.
The EFCC said on its official Facebook page that Adegboruwa allegedly conspired with some persons to  lease the property situated at House 105 Nicon Town Estate, Lekki Lagos, to one Shelf Drilling Nigeria Limited, in the sum of N61, 631,944.65. The said money was credited to his Zenith Bank’s account, from where he made disbursements. The matter will soon be charged to court.”
Adegboruwa burst into the limelight through activism as a Student Union President at the Obafemi Awolowo University in 1992.
However, he had in recent times openly defended several persons being investigated or tried by the EFCC.
3. FG set to establish six new varsities of science and technology
 The Minister of Education, Malam Adamu Adamu, says the Federal Government is working toward establishing six new universities of science and technology to expand the access to tertiary education.
 The Education Minister Malam Adamu Adamu, disclosed this at a News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) Forum on Tuesday in Abuja.
 In his words, “This government has already decided to even add more; it is going to establish six new universities of science and technology.
 And at the lower level, there will be a technical school in each state of the federation and then vocational centres at the wards and local government levels.
 You know, we have a problem of access; if you look at it last year, one million people sat for the universities but only 150,000 were taken.
 So, we still need to build more universities to create more space for those who want to get in.
 And then the fact that the six new universities are being created for science and technology underscores the decision by the government to put more emphasis on science”.
4. “We will create 210,000 jobs between now and 2018” – Dangote Group
 

Aliko Dangote - Bloomberg Billionaires Index - January 2014 - BellaNaija
The Chairman of Dangote Group of Companies, Alhaji Aliko Dangote on Tuesday said that his organisation would create 210,000 jobs for unemployed Nigerians between now and 2018. He said that 80 percent of the jobs would be in the agricultural sector.
Dangote said this in Katsina in a goodwill message at the opening of Katsina Economic and Investment Summit themed “Unlocking Investment Potentials for Sustainable Development”.
“We will create 210,000 jobs between now and 2018 with 80 percent coming from the agricultural sector. So, we should pay attention to the agricultural sector for investment opportunities, particularly when the crude oil is now becoming unreliable,” he said.
He also said that agriculture is a lifetime opportunity for Nigerian, adding that Brazil, which had same peculiarities with Nigeria, had $350 billion in its foreign reserves, with 80 percent of the fund attributed agriculture.



5. Shame! Germany to teach Nigerians cleanliness
To the eternal shame of some Nigerians who continued to be indifferent to their dirty environment, Germany is now proposing to teach us how to keep a clean environment.
The German Consul-General in Lagos, Mr Ingo Herbert, who made this known on Tuesday expressed his government’s readiness to include the importance of keeping a clean environment in its cultural exchange with Nigeria.
 Herbert said it was imperative for Nigerians to begin to imbibe the culture of keeping their neighborhoods clean at all times.
“Our new plan of cultural exchange with Nigeria, is to begin to use films to tell Nigerians of the importance of keeping their environment clean. Nigerians need to desist, for instance, from dumping garbage into the creeks, drains along the roadsides, streets and other unauthorized places,’’ he said.








6.  Police save frustrated woman from suicide
  The Police in Imo have rescued a female staff of the Alvan Ikoku Federal College of Education, Owerri, from committing suicide.
A witness narrated that the woman in her early 40s climbed a water tank stanchion, about the height of a three-storey building, from where she threatened to jump down.
 The witness said that the woman was shouting at the top of the stanchion before people in the neighbourhood noticed her.
 He said the neighbours then alerted two policemen who climbed the facility and pleaded with the woman before she came down at about 6.30 a.m.
 The Public Relations Officer of the Imo Police Command, DSP Andrew Enwerem, confirmed the incident.
 Enwerem said that the woman attempted to take her life but was rescued unhurt by policemen who were invited by her neighbours.
 According to the police spokesman, preliminary information obtained from the woman showed that she was a Staff of the Alvan Ikoku Federal College of Education, Owerri.
“The woman climbed a high water tank stanchion as early as 6 a.m. and was shouting on top of her voice that she was frustrated and tired of life,’’ he said.



7.  Gunmen attack Rivers judiciary complex, kill two



The Rivers State Judiciary complex, which houses the Rivers State High Court, has been closed down after gunmen invaded the court premises, killing two private security personnel attached the institution.
At the moment, the cause of the killing has not been ascertained, but security operatives have been deployed in the court premises.
 It was learnt that the gunmen had invaded the judiciary complex late last night and attacked their victims leaving two dead and another hospitalised.
 An employee of the judiciary told The PUNCH they had been asked go home for the moment following the incident.
 8.  Pandemonium as women protest naked in Ebonyi
 naked1
There was pandemonium at Nkwegu community near Abakaliki, capital of Ebonyi state as over 200 women from Afikpo South Council area of Ebonyi state protested naked over the alleged continued detention of the President General of the community, Ndubuisi Ekumankama.  He was detained by  the police for allegedly demolishing a widow’s house in Amangwu Edda community.
The women, who had planned to storm the Government House in protest were intercepted by policemen at the Nkwegu, near military cantonment when they resisted the first team of policemen who could not withstand the sight of the rampaging naked women.
Daily Sun gathered that the women protested without wearing anything at the upper parts of their body which threw many into confusion, including the policemen.
However, it took the intervention of the Police Commissioner, CP Peace Ibekwe Abdallah who immediately mobilised another team of policewomen led by the Officer in charge of Criminal Investigation Department,  who led other policewomen to the scene.



9. Moslem Ban: Trump to make ‘exception’ for new London mayor

 Trump-and-Khan
The United States  presidential hopeful in  November  2016 election, Mr.Donald Trump has said that  the newly elected mayor of London , Sadiq Khan would be an “exception” to his proposed ban on Muslims travelling to the US.
 Khan had , because of his faith,  expressed concern that he would not be able to visit the US if Mr Trump were elected.
 Mr Trump proposed a ban on Muslims entering the US after attacks in Paris killed 130 people last year.
 But in his response to this concern,  the Republican businessman said  “there will always be exceptions.”
The temporary ban has been widely criticised in the US and abroad but Mr Trump has stood by the proposal, saying it is needed to ensure US security.
 Mr Trump said he was “happy” that Mr Khan would be leading London.
“If he does a good job and frankly if he does a great job, that would be a terrific thing,” he added.
 Mr Khan – the son of Pakistani immigrants – is London’s first Muslim mayor, after beating Conservative rival Zac Goldsmith for the Labour Party by 1,310,143 votes to 994,614.
“I want to go to America to meet with and engage with American mayors,” Mr Khan told Time magazine. “If Donald Trump becomes the president I’ll be stopped from going there by virtue of my faith.”
He added that he was “confident that Donald Trump’s approach to politics” would not prevail in America.
10.  A Robot Has been Teaching Grad Students Since January and None of Them Knew Until They Were Told


Artificial Intelligence



Professor Ashok Goel teaches Knowledge Based Artificial Intelligence (KBAI) at Georgia Institute of Technology. It is a core course for the online Master of Science in Computer Science programme. Goel estimates that about 10,000 questions are posted in the online forum for the course anytime he teaches the course.
Goel used to have 8 teaching assistants, but when the work became too much for them, he decided to add a ninth – a robot named Jill Watson, designed using IBM’s Watson Analytics System.
According to Goel “The world is full of online classes, and they’re plagued with low retention rates…. One of the main reasons many students drop out is because they don’t receive enough teaching support. We created Jill as a way to provide faster answers and feedback.”
Goel and his team of researchers tracked down all the questions (about 40,000) that had been asked on the forum and fed Jill the questions and answers.
According to Goel, “One of the secrets of online classes is that the number of questions increases if you have more students, but the number of different questions doesn’t really go up. Students tend to ask the same questions over and over again.”
Jill has been responding to emails posted on the forum since January, and none of the students knew she was a robot until they were told. She responded with words like “yep”, and “we’d loved to” to some of the emails sent in by students.
Describing Jill, one of the students, Gavin said, “It seemed very much like a normal conversation with a human being,”
On finding out that Jill is a robot, another student said, “I was flabbergasted”. Petr Bela, another student even wanted to nominate her as an outstanding teaching assistant.
Goel estimates that within a year, Jill will be able to answer about 40% of student’s questions, freeing the humans to tackle the more technical and philosophical inquiries, such as “How do you define intelligence?”
According to Goel, Jill should not be confused with customer-service chatbots that “operate at the level of a novice”. “Jill operates at the level of an expert,” he said.