A FRESH showdown looms in the polity as the national leadership of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, yesterday dared the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, saying it cannot stop it from conducting fresh primaries in some states.

The Chairmen of the Nigerian Inter-Religious Council, NIREC, Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar and Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, have called on the Federal Government to find lasting solution to the ethno-religious crises in Plateau and Borno States which have recorded heavy casualties. They made the call at the 2011 general meeting of NIREC in Ibadan yesterday.

ANAMBRA State resident electoral commissioner, Prof Chukwuemeka Onukaogu, said yesterday in Awka that he had been receiving death threats from some people in the state whose communities were yet to receive materials for the ongoing voters’ registration across the country.

Federal Government, yesterday, said it was now ready for the prosecution of Fidelis Anosike and his brother, Noel, their company Folio Communications Ltd, one Nicholas Okoye and Gogo Kurubo for criminal conspiracy over the purchase of Daily Times of Nigeria in the matter before a Federal High Court sitting in Lagos.

The Arewa Consultative Forum, ACF, said yesterday that the emergence of President Goodluck Jonathan as the PDP presidential candidate is legally and morally wrong, adding that the north must produce the next president.

THE Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, yesterday, tightened money supply into the economy, in anticipation of further rise in inflation, saying the economy grew by 7.85 per cent in 2010, up from 6.89 per cent in 2009.

President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday asked the Senate to approve a new law which will enable him increase the numbers of justices of the Court of Appeal from 70 to 90.

SPEAKER of the House of Representatives, Mr. Dimeji Bankole, yesterday firmly informed Dino Malaye and six other members who were suspended last June that he won’t release their salaries and other allowances, saying the case was still in court.

As part of precautionary measures against the spate of bomb explosions in the country, Governor Babtunde Fashola of Lagos State has directed relevant agencies to remove all abandoned, disused and wrongly parked vehicles, including those being worked upon on Lagos roads and inner streets, if owners of such vehicle fails to remove them.

A cloud of uncertainty was yesterday hovering over the continued stay in the federal cabinet of the embattled Minister of State for Health, Alhaji Suleiman Bello, ahead of his expected trial for corruption by the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission, ICPC.

Multinational oil giant, Shell Petroleum Development Company, SPDC, will appear before Dutch Parliament today to defend its environmental and human rights impacts on account of its activities in Nigeria, even as Amnesty International and Friends of the Earth International filed an official complaint against Shell for breaches of basic standards for responsible business set out by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD.

A Kaduna State High Court, has struck out the suit by Yerima Yusuf, against the Nigeria Polo Federation, NPF, seeking to determine the legality of the status of the NPF and whether it can lawfully conduct elections into its executive offices and regulate the game of polo in the country.

Minister of Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, has dismissed insinuations by some persons that the Direct Data Capture, DDC, machines used by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in the on going voter registration did not capture the finger prints of people with some ailments, including diabetes, hypertension and HIV/AIDS.