Author: Vardiafrica

The family of a prominent Nigerian business leader, Abimbola Ogunbanjo, who tragically lost his life in a helicopter crash in Southern California alongside five others in February, has taken legal action by filing a lawsuit on Wednesday. The lawsuit contends that the flight should have been grounded due to hazardous weather conditions. Abimbola Ogunbanjo, the former chair of the Nigerian stock exchange, was among those killed in the crash. The lawsuit, filed by Ogunbanjo’s relatives, alleges that the charter company, Orbic Air LLC, negligently flew the helicopter despite adverse weather conditions, including a “wintry mix” of snow and rain in…

The Premier League will introduce semi-automated offside technology next season in the hope of reducing the time it takes to make VAR decisions. At a shareholders’ meeting on Thursday, top-flight clubs unanimously agreed to introduce the system, which is expected to cut the average length of a VAR check for offside by about 30 seconds. “The technology will provide quicker and consistent placement of the virtual offside line, based on optical player tracking, and will produce high-quality broadcast graphics to ensure an enhanced in-stadium and broadcast experience for supporters,” a Premier League statement said. Football’s global governing body FIFA used…

The Federal Government will charge N3,000 on average per toll gate when the Lagos-Calabar coastal road is completed Nigeria’s Minister of Works Dave Umahi confirmed the figure on Thursday when he was featured on Channels Television’s The Morning Brief. “Let me leave out the infrastructure along the corridor. Let me just concentrate on the tolls and I put 50,000 vehicles as an average passage on these toll points per day,” Umahi said on the breakfast show. “I put N3,000 as an average cost. N3,000 because the cars could be like N1,500, and the big trucks could be like N5,000,” he said.…

The Minister of Works Dave Umahi says the Lagos-Calabar coastal road construction will take eight years and cost N4bn per kilometre. Umahi spoke on Thursday while fielding questions about the project on Channels Television’s The Morning Brief. “We are looking at eight years in the life tenure of Mr President [Bola Tinubu],” he said. The minister said each kilometre of the coastal road would cost N4b but said the government’s prudence made that possible. “You know, there are other projects not awarded by me that are also going for about N4 billion per kilometre,” the former lawmaker expla “So, I will…

Actors Guild of Nigeria (AGN) has confirmed the death of actor, Junior Pope Odonwodo and has banned the shooting of movies in riverine areas. Also, the Guild also suspended filmmaker, Adanma Luke, whose film shooting outing led to the incident that drown Junior Pope and others as a result of boat capsized around Cable Point at the waterside of River Niger in Asaba, Delta State. There were initial claims that Junior Pope was revived, the AGN later confirmed that the actor was dead, this led to the suspension of shoots involving riverine areas and boat rides. The AGN President, Emeka…

Meta said Thursday that it was developing new tools to protect teenage users from “sextortion” scams on its Instagram platform, which has been accused of damaging the mental health of youngsters. The US firm said in a statement it was testing an AI-driven “nudity protection” tool that would automatically detect and blur images with nudity sent to minors on the app’s messaging system. “This way, the recipient is not exposed to unwanted intimate content and has the choice to see the image or not,” Capucine Tuffier, in charge of child protection at Meta France, said. The firm said it would…

Africa’s richest man Aliko Dangote says Nigerians should expect a drop in inflation given the reduction of diesel pump prices. He stated this on Wednesday during a chat with journalists after he paid Eid-el-Fitr homage to President Bola Tinubu at his Lagos residence. “I believe that we are on the right track. I believe Nigerians have been patient and I also believe that a lot of goodies will now come through. There’s quite a lot of improvement because if you look at it, one of the major issues that we’ve had was the naira devaluation that has gone very aggressively…

Tahir Mamman, minister of education, says members of the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) and the Non-Academic Staff Union (NASU) may receive half of their withheld salaries if President Bola Tinubu so approves. The nation’s public universities have witnessed recurring disruptions in academic calendars, as members of staff take turns to protest funding deficits, poor conditions of service, and decay in infrastructure. Last year, the president waived the “no work, no pay” policy imposed on the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) by the Muhammadu Buhari administration, after lecturers embarked on an eight-month strike.  The waiver amounted to the federal government paying four months…

World Athletics announced on Wednesday it will become the first international federation to award prize money at an Olympics, beginning at this year’s Games in Paris Gold medal winners in each of the 48 athletics events in Paris will receive $50,000 (46,000 euros). While athletes are often paid by sponsors and the Olympic tradition of amateur competition has long since been consigned to history, the decision by track and field’s international body to pay prize money represents a major shift for the Games. World Athletics President Sebastian Coe told reporters the decision reflected the efforts of track and field athletes…

The Super Falcons have qualified for the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. Nigeria beat South Africa 1-0 on aggregate to reach the Summer Olympics. Rasheedat Ajibade scored from the spot in the first leg of the qualifiers in Abuja on Friday. That goal was enough for the Super Falcons to pick one of Africa’s tickets for the women’s football event of the Paris Olympics as the second leg tie ended goaless in South Africa. The last time Nigeria’s Super Falcons reached the Olympics was 16 years ago.