The priority for Nigeria is to use the Cup of Nations as preparatory ground for building our team for the World Cup. Winning in Angola may not be a priority, but if opportunity calls to be champions, we should grab it”. These were the words of coach Franklin Howard in Lagos, in his assessment of the national team for continental battle.

Hosts Angola will have a reality check in their ambition to win their first ever international soccer title as they face Mali in the Group A opening game of the 2010 Nations Cup tonight.

Nigeria can boast of players who can take them to the final of the Nations Cup. If they don’t, it means that they have not worked hard enough. And from the coach to the players, everybody will share in the blame, the football federation inclusive.

Former NFA board member and one-time chairman of Shooting Stars Sports Club of Ibadan, Elder Bode Oyewole has urged Nigerians to be positive in their utterances as the Super Eagles begin their 2010 African Nations Cup campaign in Angola on Tuesday.

Cameroon striker Samuel Eto’o has said he wants to break the individual goal record for a single African Nations Cup at the January finals, a Kenyan newspaper has reported.

Super Eagles goalkeeper trainer, Alloy Agu has promised that their first match against Egypt at the Nations Cup on Tuesday would not be toyed with.

Former Super Eagles midfielder and erstwhile coach of Sharks Football Club, Moses Kpakor has reiterated his believe that the bunch of players in the Super Eagles for the African Cup of Nations would lift the trophy.

The world’s attention shifts to Angola from today as 16 teams get ready to rumble for the right to called the continent’s soccer king at the African Cup of Nations, a tournament which is steeped in rich tradition and rivalry amongst competing teams, even as it has always thrown up exciting talents, most of whom have gone on to captivate the world attention in other top-rated competitions.

IT is generally agreed that Sokoto as a town nay state recorded its finest moments under the administration of Alhaji Attahiru Bafarawa. Prior to the advent of the Bafarawa regime, what did we have in Sokoto State? The military had just returned to the barracks after having been in power for 16 years.

Dr. Felix Obada is Group Managing Director of Global Biofuels Limited, an indigenous company handling ethanol project in Nigeria. He speaks in this interview on global warming and how Nigeria can reduce carbon emission from its environment

FOLLOWING the prevailing scarcity of petroleum prod ucts in the country since December 2009, independent marketers are now awaiting Federal Government’s directives on the deregulation of the downstream sector of the economy to embark on full stream importation of products.

THERE are strong indications that the manufacturing sector of Nigeria’s economy is rapidly going under as over 55 per cent of manufacturers closed shop in 2009 economic year.

Many individuals, families and companies are still struggling to recover from the effects of the economic crisis that hit many parts of the world last year. Although a number of European and Asian economies are showing positive signs of recovery, the situation in Nigeria cannot be said to be on a definite recovery path.

Those who were to help us raise the money said no problem, that even if we needed N1trillion, they would raise it. But there was a condition which they gave and that was that the foundation cannot be a Presidential committee. They said they could not give their money to such foundation except it is purely a private foundation that is run by a committee, by the private sector people that would be accountable to them.

After I spent one month in the cell and paid N500, 000 and the trial, some officers asked me to keep quiet, that if I said anything or tried to fight the system, they would rope me into one criminal charge and send me to prison.