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Court dismisses suit against Tinubu over Rivers state emergency proclamation

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President Bola Ahmed Tinubu

Justice James Omotosho of the Federal High Court in Abuja has dismissed a suit instituted against President Bola Ahmed Tinubu challenging the March 18, 2025 Proclamation of State of Emergency in Rivers State.

The declaration of the state of emergency by Tinubu led to the suspension of the Rivers State Governor, Siminalayi Fubara and members of the Rivers state House of Assembly for six months.

It also led to the appointment of an Administrator who took charge of running the affairs of the state for six months.

Not happy with the emergency rule, a group which claimed to be Concerned Rivers Indigenes led by Belema Briggs had dragged Tinubu and three others before the court challenging the legality of the Presidential action.

Among others, they claimed that as voters, their fundamental rights to enjoy democratic government were taken away from them by Tinubu and that his action amounted to a coup against their people.

They insisted that conditions precedent to warrant declaration of state of emergency were not in Rivers as at March 18 when the proclamation was made.

In the suit marked FHC/ ABJ/ CS/51/2025 filed on their behalf by Dolapo Tella Attoni, the group prayed the court to void the emergency rule, restore the suspended elected officials and also bar the Administrator from acting in place of elected men.

But delivering judgment in the suit by Belema Briggs and the four others, Justice Omotosho held that the five plaintiffs lacked the legal power to Institute the case for so many reasons.

The Judge said that such a case being a dispute between the State and the federal government and as constituted by the plaintiffs, can only be determined by the Supreme Court only.

In the judgment on Thursday, the Court held that none of the five plaintiffs claimed to be members of the State Executive Committee, members of the House of Assembly or suffered any injury greater than the rest people of Rivers State.

Worse still, the court held that none of the plaintiffs claimed to have the fiat of the Attorney General of the State to initiate the case on behalf of the Rivers State.

Besides, Justice Omotosho said that the claim of President Tinubu that he imposed a state of emergency to avoid and prevent the looming break down of law and order was not challenged or disputed by the plaintiffs.

Credit: dailypost.ng

Cocoa sector gets 12.27% price boost, amid push for industry stability

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RICHARD OWUSU-AKYAW
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Cocoa farmer

The Ministry of Finance has announced a significant increase in the Producer Price of cocoa for the 2024/2025 cocoa season, effective Friday, October 3, 2025.

The decision was made following a meeting of the Producer Price Review Committee (PPRC), chaired by the Minister of Finance.
According to a statement issued by the Ministry and sighted by The Chronicle, the new producer price has been raised to GHS3,625 per bag or GHS58,000 per tonne, marking a 12.27% increase from the previously announced price in August 2025.

On August 4, 2025 the government had initially set the producer price for the 2025/2026 cocoa season at GHS3,228.75 per bag and GHS51,660 (US$5,040)per tonne, representing 70% of the average Gross FoB price of US$7,200 per tonne.

The revised price now adds approximately GHS400 per bag, offering a much-needed boost to cocoa farmers.
While the new pricing takes effect immediately, the Ministry emphasised that margins, fees and rates for all other stakeholders, including COCOBOD, remain unchanged.
The Ministry further stated that COCOBOD will continue its interventions to support cocoa production and enhance farmer welfare.

These measures include the distribution of free cocoa fertilizers (liquid and granular), insecticides, fungicides, spraying machines and flower inducers to farmers across the country.
In addition, COCOBOD is on course to implement a Tertiary Education Scholarship Scheme for children of cocoa farmers, set to commence in the 2026/27 academic year.
The Ministry reaffirmed the government’s commitment to building a robust and resilient cocoa industry that ensures sustainable and optimal benefits for all stakeholders, particularly the hardworking cocoa farmers who form the backbone of the industry.

GIZ partners Communications Ministry to launch Digital Economy Outlook 2025

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GTZ team

The Deutsche Gesellschaftfür Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ)-Ghana, through its Digital Transformation for Inclusive Entrepreneurship in Ghana (DTEG) Project, has partnered with the Ministry of Communication, Digital Technology and Innovation to conduct the Ghana Digital Economy Outlook 2025.

Commissioned on October 18, 2024 the national research study seeks to position digital transformation as a driver of inclusive economic growth, job creation, and innovation.

The initiative aligns with government’s recognition of information and communication technology (ICT) as a strategic enabler of national development.

The Outlook will assess Ghana’s digital transformation journey, identify sectors where digitalisation has significantly impacted economic activities and highlight emerging opportunities within the digital economy.

It will also benchmark Ghana’s performance against leading African economies such as Kenya, Rwanda, and South Africa, while drawing lessons from international best practices.

According to GIZ Ghana, the study is expected to culminate in a comprehensive report offering evidence-based recommendations for shaping future digital strategies.

The report will serve as a key knowledge resource for policymakers, government agencies, industry players, civil society organisations, and development partners to make data-driven decisions that ensure digitalisation delivers real benefits to all Ghanaians.

By aligning national priorities with global opportunities, the Ghana Digital Economy Outlook 2025 aims to build an inclusive and future-ready digital economy, enhance productivity, improve service delivery and strengthen Ghana’s competitiveness on the global stage.

How Taylor Swift made herself too big to fail    

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Taylor Swift

 At midnight on 19 April last year, Taylor Swift released her 11th studio album, The Tortured Poets Department.

It was an emotional garage sale. Over 31 tracks of heartbreak and emotional longing, Swift picked at the scabs of her romances with the rock star Matty Healy and actor Joe Alwyn, while pushing back at social media critics and documenting the pressures of fame.
The reviews were middling at best. Music magazine NME suggested it was a “rare misstep” for Swift, with some “cringe-inducing” lyrics. The New York Times described it as “insular” and “self-indulgent”.

My own review bemoaned the lack of editing, calling Swift “prolific to a fault”.
Others were more complimentary – Rolling Stone called the album “gloriously chaotic” – though the response clearly didn’t match the near-universal acclaim of Swift’s earlier work.
But guess what? Those tepid reviews didn’t matter.

Spotify declared it their most-streamed album in a single day. In the UK, it enjoyed the biggest first-week sales in seven years. Right now, it seems nothing can damage Swift. Her newest album, The Life of a Showgirl, is released tomorrow and it’s difficult to see any way that it doesn’t perform phenomenally well.

More than five million fans have pre-saved it on Spotify (the largest number in the company’s history) and pre-orders for a special vinyl edition sold out from Swift’s online shop in less than an hour. And that’s all before they’ve heard it.
Swift, at 35, appears to have become too big to fail. Her place as one of the all-time greats is assured. But can her hot streak continue, as public taste shifts towards “messier” singers who are more upfront about their vulnerabilities?

Credit: bbc.com

Adekunle Gold returns to roots with 6th album, ‘Fuji’

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NANA KWESI COOMSON
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Afrobeats singer and songwriter, Adekunle Gold

Nigerian singer Adekunle Gold returns to his roots on Friday with the release of his sixth album, “Fuji”, which he described as a tribute to the ancestral sounds of his home country.

“That sound is the soundtrack of Lagos. It’s everywhere. That sound gave birth to Afrobeats and all the things that we hear right now,” Gold told AFP in Paris.

A descendant of the Kosoko royal family, the Afropop icon draws inspiration from the Indigenous Yoruba community, one of the largest ethnic groups in west Africa.

It is “one of the oldest sounds of Nigeria”, the 38-year-old singer said.

“I named this album after an entire genre because Fuji is bigger than music. It is Lagos, it’s street royalty, it’s our story, our hustle, our heritage turned global. What we see as everyday in Nigeria deserves to sit on the world’s biggest stages.

This is not nostalgia. This is reinvention. This is me carrying my roots into the future.

My album Fuji, is a celebration of the music, the culture, and every Lagos boy who dreams beyond the city. This cover is more than an image, it’s a statement,” the Afrobeats star said in an Instagram post.

Fuji music, a popular genre that evolved from Yoruba Muslim culture, is known for its fast beats, large ensemble of percussion instruments, and lyrics based on key sociopolitical themes.

Credit: channelstv.com

Why I married Mr Eazi –Temi Otedola

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NANA KWESI COOMSON
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Mr Eazi and Temi Otedola

Actress Temi Otedola, daughter of billionaire businessman, Femi Otedola, has revealed why she married singer Mr Eazi.

In a recent interview with BBC, Temi explained that she wedded the singer because he is her best friend among other things.

She stated that she couldn’t imagine spending the rest of her life with anyone else other than Mr Eazi.

The interviewer asked: “What made you said ‘Yes’ to Mr Eazi?”

Temi replied: “There’s too many. How will I chose one? I mean, first and foremost, he is my best friend. That’s my person. And I think when you meet your person, you know. I can’t imagine spending the rest of my life with anyone else.

“He is the person I’m excited and can just spend everyday with; build our lives together and walk through our ups and downs together and celebrate together and solve problems together. He’s simply my person. So, we are just excited for what is to come.”

On why she chose to adopt her husband’s surname after marriage, Temi said, “I’m now a married woman, the obvious thing for me is to take my husband’s name. But it’s my personal choice. I also respect a woman’s ability to choose.”

The movie star added that keeping her relationship private helps her control her narrative.

DAILY POST recalls that Temi and Mr Eazi got married a few weeks ago in Iceland. Famous American musician, John Legend performed at their wedding.

Credit: dailypost.ng

I’m fighting for the next generation of actors –Gloria Sarfo

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NANA KWESI COOMSON
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Actress Gloria Sarfo

Award-winning Ghanaian actress Gloria Sarfo has vowed to continue advocating for change in the country’s struggling film industry.

Speaking on Daybreak Hitz with Doreen Avio and Kwame Dadzie, the outspoken actress said although some of her colleagues criticise her for being vocal about the state of the industry, she will not relent.

She stressed that her commitment is for the benefit of younger actors entering the field.

“I used to say the Ghanaian film industry is not worth dying for but I have changed my mind. Because I think that I am fighting for the next generation of film makers. Not the people who think they are okay, who think they are satisfied, they are content with where they are; with where they are movie industry is. I am fighting for the next generation,” she said.

According to her, many young actors frequently reach out to her, expressing their frustrations and urging her not to give up her advocacy. In an Instagram post published on 15th July 2025, Sarfo lamented that the talents of many Ghanaian actors who could thrive elsewhere, particularly in Nigeria, are being wasted at home.

“Honestly, if you’re in Nigeria as an actor, you’d realize that you’ve REALLY WASTED YOUR TALENT back in Ghana,” she wrote. “As in, people are shooting on a daily basis, back to back, non-stop. Meanwhile, in my country Ghana, producers STRUGGLE to even shoot one film in a year.”

She described the situation as “CRAZY” and “totally disheartening,” questioning what had gone wrong in an industry that once flourished. “What has happened to our industry??? Talents are BEING WASTED. Mercy Lord,” she added.

Her comments drew mixed reactions, with some lambasting her for portraying Ghana in a bad light.

Gloria Sarfo has featured in a number of productions including Efiewura, The Perfect Picture, Aloe Vera and Adam The Eve.

Credit: myjoyonline.com

5 students pulled alive from collapsed Indonesia school but hopes fade for remaining classmates

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Collapsed Indonesia school

A rescue team crouched under huge slabs of concrete and corrugated iron as they carefully slid 13-year-old Syailendra Haikal to safety from the twisted wreckage of a collapsed Indonesian boarding school; a brief glimmer of hope in the middle of a disaster.

Haikal was taken to hospital with moderate injuries, authorities said. But as the search at the Al Khoziny Islamic Boarding School in Sidoarjo, about 420 miles east of Jakarta, entered its fourth day on Thursday, Indonesian authorities made the agonizing decision to move from rescue to recovery.

The excavation process has been purposefully slow to avoid further collapse, and rescue forces have worked in shifts to carefully remove the debris.

Terrified mothers, fathers and loved ones have waited with bated breath, fearing the worst while praying for a miracle.

Teams have for days meticulously tunneled under the rubble, crawling on their hands and knees searching for signs of life, knowing the unstable structure could again buckle upon them.

Relief and despair have punctuated their daring rescue mission as they slowly extracted a small number of children, while desperate family members clung to the hope their missing loved ones might too be found.

“I kept saying, ‘Bismillah (in God’s name), my child is strong, my child is strong, my child is strong,’” Haikal’s mother Dwi Ajeng Tyasusanti told CNN affiliate CNN Indonesia on Thursday from the hospital. “Haikal made it out…. His (injuries) were only on the face, just some bruises on his legs.”

Hopes are now fading for dozens of their classmates who remain buried.

At least five people have died and 59 were still missing as of Thursday morning, authorities said.

Credit: cnn.com

Denmark loses £1.4bn tax fraud claim in UK court case

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Sanjay Shah was imprisoned in Denmark in a separate criminal trial last year

Denmark’s tax authority has lost a £1.4bn fraud case at the High Court in London in one of the highest value civil cases ever heard in the UK.

Skatterforvaltningen, known as Skat, argued huge sums of cash had been falsely claimed in tax rebates – as part of so-called “cum-ex schemes”.

The main named defendant in the case was defunct hedge fund Solo Capital Partners, run by trader Sanjay Shah, who was jailed in a criminal trial in Denmark last year.

Ruling on the case, Mr Justice Andrew Baker said the Danish tax authority had not been misled into making the payments.

The case was deciding on whether Skat was deceived into paying the tax refunds, as it had claimed.

“Greed can be a powerful motive, and I consider there was substantial greed here,” said Mr Justice Baker.

“However, the evidence at trial did not persuade me to accept Skat’s claim, and I do not make the findings it sought.”

The judgement noted that of the 4,170 dividend refund claims between mid-2012 and mid-2015 examined as part of the trial, none were valid claims under Danish tax law – and all of them could have been rejected.

However, Mr Justice Baker said the tax authority’s “controls for assessing and paying dividend tax refund claims were so flimsy as to be almost non-existent”.

He said Skat had “failed to established any of the claims pursued at trial where liability was disputed”.

In a statement, the Danish government said its tax authority “strongly disagrees with the premises of the judgment and is now seeking to appeal it”.

Credit: bbc.com

South Korea president apologises for abusive foreign adoption scheme

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South Korean President Lee Jae-myung

South Korea’s president has apologised for a notorious foreign adoption scheme set up after the 1950-53 Korean War that caused “anxiety, pain, and confusion” to more than 14,000 children sent abroad.

President Lee Jae-myung said in a Facebook post on Thursday that he was offering “heartfelt apology and words of comfort” to South Koreans adopted abroad and their adoptive and birth families, seven months after a Truth and Reconciliation Commission said the programme violated the human rights of adoptees.

The commission, which investigated complaints from 367 adoptees in Europe, the United States and Australia, held the government accountable for facilitating adoptions through fraudulent practices, including falsifying records to portray children as abandoned orphans and switching identities.

Lee said he felt “heavy-hearted” when he thought about the “anxiety, pain and confusion” that South Korean adoptees would have suffered when they were sent abroad as children, and asked officials to formulate systems to safeguard the human rights of adoptees and support their efforts to find their birth parents.

Mass international adoptions began after the Korean War as a way to remove mixed-race children born to local mothers and American GI fathers from a society that emphasised ethnic homogeneity, with more than 140,000 children sent overseas between 1955 and 1999.

Foreign adoptions have continued in more recent times, with more than 100 children on average, often babies born to unmarried women who face ostracism in a conservative society, still being sent abroad for adoption each year in the 2020s.

Credit: aljazeera.com

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