In its bid to reposition the Nigerian Army for expected operational challenges in the coming year and beyond, the Nigerian Army Council has commenced issuing terminal letters to over 40 generals preparatory to their leaving the force.

The Presidency, yesterday, reviewed its performance in the outgoing year and gave itself a pass mark, saying that it recorded unprecedented feat despite distractions from the opposition.

However, the opposition All Peoples Congress (APC) pooh-poohed the Presidency’s claims, saying the citizenry are worse off on account of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party’s alleged bad rule.

But for mother luck, Governor Adams Oshiomhole would have died after a bus lost control and crashed into his car along Auchi-Benin Road yesterday.

The All Progressives Congress, APC and the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP were, yesterday, engaged in a war of words over the propriety of President Goodluck Jonathan exchanging words with former President Olusegun Obasanjo on the state of the nation.

The Presidency plans to spend at least N2.3 billion on local and international travels and transportation next year.

The proposal is contained in the 2014 appropriation bill submitted by President Goodluck Jonathan through the Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, to the National Assembly last week.

FORMER President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, yesterday, declined to respond to President Goodluck Jonathan’s reply to his December 2 letter, saying that he stands by the contents of his missive.

Obasanjo who spoke to newsmen at his hilltop mansion in Abeokuta through his media aide, Tunde Oladunjoye, said he would not reply the letter because he has chosen to maintain his serenity.

President Goodluck Jonathan has accused former President Olusegun Obasanjo of deceitfully manipulating facts and figures to impugn his credibility, vowing that he would not for any reason mortgage a bright future for the country.

The cloud overhang of mass mobilization that the All Peoples Congress, APC, has engendered appears to be getting heavier with the visit of the party’s leadership to former President Olusegun Obasanjo at his Abeokuta residence.
But the APC hierarchy would not stop at that, Sunday Vanguard can reveal authoritatively.

Mastermind of the Christmas day bomb blast that killed about 44 persons and wounded 75 others at St. Theresa’s Catholic Church, Madalla, Niger State, in 2011, Kabiru Umar, alias Kabiru Sokoto, was yesterday, sentenced to life imprisonment by a Federal High Court sitting in Abuja.

The Federal Government yesterday presented a budget proposal of N4.6 trillion for the 2014 fiscal year to the National Assembly. The proposed budget christened ‘Budget for Job Creation and Growth’ represents N100 billion reduction from the N4.7 trillion that was budgeted for this year.

With echoes of the open letter to former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo from his daughter, Iyabo, reverberating nationwide, the daughter yesterday gave reasons she gave up on her father ever changing.

In what is turning out to be a season of open letters, daughter of former President Olusegun Obasanjo, Iyabo, has ruled out further communication with her father till death, describing him as a liar, manipulator, two-faced hypocrite determined to foist on President Goodluck Jonathan what no one would contemplate with him as president.

The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, is to spend N93 billion to conduct a hitch-free general election in 2015, even as it disclosed, yesterday, that elections may not hold in strife-torn sections of the North-East.

President Goodluck Jonathan, yesterday, warned those opposed to his administration, including former political allies trading allegations of his sponsorship of a terror squad that they were treading the path of treason.

As the Presidency prepares a reply to the 18-page letter written by former President Olusegun Obasanjo to President Goodluck Jonathan on the state of the nation, indications emerged, yesterday, that the former leader was not expecting any reply but action from Jonathan.