Beverly Osu Calls Out Bleaching Cream Manufacturers And Sellers

Big brother Africa star, Beverly Osu yesterday addressed manufacturers and sellers of bleaching cream on Instagram that always tag her while displaying their products.

According to her, she is not their target market. 

Lilian Esoro Stuns In Hot Swimsuit Photos, Tiwa Savage, Toke Makinwa React

Lilian Esoro has always been covered up...

Celebrities took to Lilians comment box, leaving wow wow comments, our dear R&B queen of Africa, Tiwa Savage said she will leave Instagram for Lilian, but wait o! Is Lilian Esoro really sexy?

People Said I Overreacted Cause I Cut Ties With Man Who Sexualized My Daughter

A lady who decided to ends every form of friendship with a man she knew has taken to Twitter to cries out after she was told that she overreacts to a man who is trying to sexualize her 2 year old daughter.

She tweets;
“A guy I know was commenting on my daughter’s body. How she is well built and curvy etc. She is 2 years old. I got scared. I cut him out of my life and people are saying I’m overeacting.”

She continued saying;
“She was wearing a t shirt with no panties and he said why is she running around Unclad? Does she want to impress me with her curves etc. And continued “complementing” her. She had just pottied hence the unclothedness.”

Another lady reacting to the post made by @PortiaAfrika said she decided to be a PERMANENT SINGLE MOTHER because her baby daddy allowed his friends to comment that her daughter does not have curves like her.

She wrote;
“My baby daddy allowed his friends to comment that my daughter does not have curves like me. That was the day I decided to be a single mom permanently!”

Barbra Streisand Says She Has Never Had a #MeToo Moment in Her Career

Barbra Streisand is getting candid...

Kicking off the 35th annual PaleyFest L.A. Television Festival at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood on Friday, producer Ryan Murphy sat down with the legend, who was just honored with the 2018 PaleyFest Icon award, and talked about the current climate in Hollywood.

"We’re in a strange time now, in terms of men and women, and the pendulum swinging this way and that way, and it’s going to have to come to the center,” Streisand also said of the #MeToo movement and post-Harvey Weinstein Hollywood, reports Variety.

When the American Horror Story creator had asked if she'd been sexually mistreated at any point in her career, the Academy, Grammy and Golden Globe-winning said, "No. I mean, never."

The 75-year-old icon then added, "I wasn't like those pretty girls with those nice little noses. Maybe that's why. I have no idea, I don’t know."

Oprah Winfrey and Gwyneth Paltrow Talk Harvey Weinstein and #MeToo in New Podcast

According to Variety, in addition to talking about her lengthy career in Hollywood, the notoriously private star did give audience members one of the reasons why she's avoided the press for years. 

Stresiand said that years ago she did an interview with Mike Wallace (prior to his being on 60 Minutes) and afterward she felt that he had been "mean" to her. Soon after, she called to complain to him and then she claims that after facing backlash over the interview, Wallace went on the air the next week to say that Streisand had told him how much she "loved" the sit down.

Variety reports that she told the PaleyFest audience, "I thought, I don’t know what date rape is, it’s terrible, but it was such a violation...Why lie?"

When they weren't talking about serious matters, some lighter notes were hit...

An audience member asked her about the upcoming Lady Gaga remake of her 1976 hit film, A Star Is Born, Babs said, "I can’t say too much."

But she did reveal a little: "I haven’t seen it totally finished, but it’s very good. It’s very, very good."

Blue Ivy Carter Bids $19K on Art While Attending Auction With Beyoncé and Jay-Z

Show them the money!

Beyoncé and Jay-Z's 6-year-old daughter Blue Ivy Carter threw up bids at an art auction on Saturday...to the tune of $19,000.

The three attended the 2018 Wearable Art Gala in Los Angeles, organized by Bey's mom Tina Knowles and her husband Richard Lawson to raise money for a non-profit art and performance complex.

Blue Ivy initially bid $17,000 for an acrylic painting of a young Sidney Poitier. She then went higher at $19,000. After she raised her hand, Jay-Z jokingly tried to stop her from continuing to bid, drawing laughs. The moment was captured on camera and went viral on social media. 

"Her mother and father have been talking about how you gather art and that is a big deal for African Americans," host Star Jones told the crowd. "Listen, you know Ms. Tina told me all of this. Why you think I'm up here talking about it?"

"19 for Miss Blue, yes, and she's like, 'I like that,'" she said.

Tyler Perry then bid $20,000 and won the art piece.

But Blue Ivy was not going to allow the Carters to go home empty handed. According to Vanity Fair, she bid on the next item, a 36" x 36" art piece made of deconstructed law and medical books California, and won with a final price $10,000.

The magazine said Beyoncé also made a winning bid of $17,000 on a set of Lorraine Schwartz panther earrings that she had previously worn to an event.

The theme of the gala was "Waco to Wakada," inspired by Black Panther.

APC, PDP clash over Edo State $232.2m foreign debt

The ruling All Progressives Congress in Edo State and the Peoples Democratic Party have traded words over the state’s foreign  external debt burden.

The Debt Management Office had in its latest statistics ranked Edo as the third highest debtor to foreign creditors among sub-national governments in Nigeria.

According to the data, Edo State owes $232.2m as of December, 2017, coming behind Lagos and Kaduna, which owed $1.47bn and $238.28m, respectively.

The opposition PDP, while reacting to the DMO report, said it had shown that the APC government had allegedly thrown the state and its citizens into perpetual indebtedness, an allegation the ruling party denied.

The PDP also accused the state government of over-burdening the citizens with debts that “generations yet unborn will continue to settle and pay.”

The PDP state Chairman, Chief Dan Orbih, said, “Our own information shows that we (Edo) are the second (highest debtor). I think I need to reconcile what we have with the DMO so that it would see that, actually, Edo is number two.

“It shows clearly what we have been saying over the past nine years of the APC government. It (the APC) has thrown the state into a bottomless pit of debt that generations yet unborn will continue to settle and pay.”

But the state Chairman of the APC, Anselm Ojezua, told our correspondent on the telephone that the data released by the DMO also included debts incurred by previous administrations under the PDP, adding that the loans taken by the state government had been directed at capital projects and other activities aimed at boosting the state’s economy.

Ojezua said, “The DMO statistics include debts that were incurred even before the APC got into office in this state; they include the ones that were incurred by the PDP government. But one thing I want to let you know is that all the loans we have taken as the APC (government) in Edo State have all been directed to capital projects, infrastructure, and all the debts that we will eventually incur will be those that can be used to boost the economy of our state and human resources, not to pay salaries and claims, as is the tradition of the PDP.

“The PDP is the party I know; it would take loans and not use it for the purpose. Rather, it would privatise the money and transfer the liability to the state. But in the case of the APC, we are very responsible with the type of debt that we incur.”

ICYMI: Ex-wife of Dangote steps out

Not much is known about the marital status of Africa’s richest man and billionaire businessman, Aliko Dangote, because he guards it jealously.

However, he tries to be discreet about his family, rumour has it that he has been married and divorced a few times. Unlike some of his friends, who attend important events in company with their wives, Dangote always steps out at such occasions with his daughters, especially Halima, who he is particularly close to and almost always represents him at functions that he is unavoidably absent.

Even though the word in town is that Dangote has been married more than once and has kids from more than one woman, very little is known about his supposed exes. Nevertheless, the wedding of his daughter, Fatima, that held in Kano a few days ago provided the opportunity for people to meet with the bride’s mum, Zainab, who used to be married to Dangote.

The beautiful woman, who bears a striking resemblance to Fatima, was present at the numerous activities marking her daughter’s wedding to Jamilu Abubakar. She also played a prominent role at the Mother’s Night organised as part of the wedding activities and was supported by another of her daughters, Mariya, who,  unlike Fatima and Halima, is less prominent.

Labour plans nationwide strike over N30bn NSITF fraud

Irked by the alleged looting of funds at the Nigerian Social Insurance Trust Fund, some members of the organised labour want the Federal Government to bring the perpetrators to book to prevent a nationwide strike, OZIOMA UBABUKOH writes

Nigerians should brace for a nationwide strike as workers have bemoaned the Federal Government’s attitude over the N30bn fraud allegedly perpetuated by the last Board of the Nigerian Social Insurance Trust Fund and have threatened to down tools soon.

According to labour unions in the country, the NSITF, set up to bring succour to the working class, has been looted over the years and it has not been able to fulfil the reason for its establishment.

Trouble started for a former Managing Director of the NSITF, Umar Abubakar, and his co-defendants, (some of who are former board members and current staff of the Fund), when a whistle-blower petitioned the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission accusing them of abusing their positions to divert public funds running into billions of naira.

Acting on the petition, EFCC operatives investigated the allegations and it was alleged that between 2012 and 2015, the accused received kickbacks in dollars while discharging their duties “and conspired to divert about N18bn, being contribution from the Federal Government as take-off grants and Employees Compensation Scheme for Ministries, Departments and Agencies.”

The EFCC said the money was diverted into personal accounts by an e-payment mandate. The offence is said to contravene Section 311 of the Penal Code cap 532 LFN (Abuja) 1990 and punishable under Section 312 of the same code.

The United Labour Congress called on the administrative panel of enquiry recently set up by the Ministry of Labour and Employment to conduct a thorough investigation into the alleged looting of the funds, and insisted that the government must bring the culprits to book “or risk a nationwide strike from all the labour unions in the country.”

In a telephone interview with our correspondent on Sunday, the General Secretary, ULC, Didi Adodo, said, “The ULC wishes to state categorically that we support this probe and any other action that the minister will take to sanitise the industry and make the NSITF to fulfil the aims and objectives of its existence.

“Hearing about the rot and the plundering that has taken place in that agency is enough for any right-thinking organisation and comrades to support a major probe that will not only unearth what has taken place, but to also bring the perpetrators to justice.”

The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, in line with a presidential directive, had recently inaugurated all the boards of parastatals under the ministry except that of the NSITF due to the alleged fraud discovered in the agency.

The boards inaugurated by the minister are those of the National Productivity Centre, National Directorate of Employment, and Michael Imoudu National Institute for Labour Studies.

President Muhammadu Buhari had in October 2017 constituted the Board of the NSITF with the former President of the Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers, Chief Frank Kokori, as the chairman.

Giving reasons why the board was not inaugurated alongside others, Ngige said he had the consent of the President to stay action on the NSITF board pending the outcome of the administrative panel of enquiry set up by the ministry “to investigate the mindless looting of the agency.”

He urged members of the other boards inaugurated to be accountable in the discharge of their mandates to avoid a repeat of the rot in the NSITF.

Ngige said, “The operations of the various parastatals must strictly conform to financial regulations, especially Section 32 of the Procurement Act. The audited accounts of the parastatals must always be prepared and submitted to the relevant authorities as and when due.

“The NSITF, for example, is reeling from massive looting with no audited accounts for five years. A whooping sum of N5bn was unearthed by an audit panel of enquiry as having been taken out of the NSITF coffers with First Bank in a single day without vouchers.”

The minister added, “Worse still, the organisation maintained no cash book as required by financial regulations. This resulted in massive looting of funds by board members acting in concert with the management staff.

“When we say N5bn was taken in one day, that’s not the only amount missing. Over N30bn cannot be accounted for and the members of the past board participated actively in the looting.”

Adodo, however, said that members of the ULC hoped that after the probe, “the NSITF will be put in proper shape to deliver on its mandate.”

“We call on the government to do a detailed investigation about the fraud in the NSITF and Trustfund, as no stone should be left unturned. These two bodies have workers’ funds, their life savings and, in this era of the fight against corruption, there should be no sacred cow,” he added.

The ULC Deputy President, Igwe Achese, who shared Adodo’s views, demanded to know the roles that the representatives of labour and private sector on the board of the NSITF played in the alleged fraud.

He said, “The probe should be extended to the board members that served in the last tenure and they should be arrested by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission and relevant security agencies for prosecution. We need to know the roles and actions of all the board members, including representatives of labour when the fraudulent activities took place, as they were supposed to represent workers’ interest.

“If the representatives of labour were involved, Nigerian workers should rise up against the board members for not protecting their hard-earned life savings.”

Members of the Nigeria Labour Congress represented the organised labour on the NSTIF board, but when our correspondent contacted some of them, they declined speaking on the matter.

One of them said, “You know those who represented us on the board. Why not reach out to them.”

Achese said that the board members from the organised labour did not do well in protecting the workers’ savings, “which led to the high magnitude of fraud and embezzlement.”

“Therefore, they should be made to face the wrath of the law,” he added.

Mother of unemployed graduates commits suicide

A mother of two unemployed graduates, whose name was given as Uzoaku, on Saturday hanged herself in Mgbakwu, in the Awka North Local Government Area of Anambra State.

It was gathered that the 66-year-old woman had complained to some people that she was angry that her two children, who graduated some years back, had not got any job.

A villager, Uche Aniuno, said, “I saw her about four days ago. She expressed bitterness over the unemployment situation of her two children who graduated some years back. But I didn’t know that could lead her to this situation.

“She was a hard-working woman and I won’t say she was poor. One of her daughters is married with children. We are all surprised that she ended this way.”

But the younger brother of the deceased, Fredrick Nwenu, told some journalists that his sister had no reason to take her life.

Nwenu, who said he accommodated her late sister for some time, said the news came to him as a shock.

He said, “My sister had no reason to do this, having trained her two children to university level.

“She had two children who are university graduates. Her daughter is happily married with kids. So, she had no reason whatsoever to commit suicide.”

The community was thrown into mourning when the news of the suicide spread, as many described her as an industrious woman.

It was gathered that the deceased hanged herself with a rope which she tied to the burglary-proof bars of the window in her room.

PUNCH Metro learnt that the victim was cooking in her kitchen around 4pm when she suddenly abandoned the food and dashed to the bedroom where she allegedly took her life.

A neigbour, Isaac Umeh, who described the incident as regrettable, wondered why a grandmother would take such a decision.

He said the deceased was alone at home when the incident happened.

He said, “Nobody was around that time. The food she was cooking was still on the fire when she suddenly rushed into the room where she used a rope to hang herself.

“The whole thing is still a mystery to us because nobody believed a woman of her age with grandchildren could take her own life.”

When our correspondent visited the residence of the deceased, sympathisers were still trooping in in large numbers to offer condolences to the family.

Calls made to the Police Public Relations Officer in the state, Nkeiruka Nwode, rang out.  A text message sent to her had also yet to be replied to as of press time.