57 Nigerians graduate in Trinidad &Tobago

FUNDED at a cost of over $6 million, 57 Nigerians recently graduated from the National Energy Skills Centre (NESC) equipped with various skills which they would use in the country.

The money was funded by the federal government of Nigeria under Qess Services Limited whose CEO Godfrey Paul signed a training agreement with the NESC in December 2010. The programme is an initiative of the Ministry of Tertiary Education and Skills Training under Minister Fazal Karim.

Speaking at the graduation ceremony at the NESC in Point Lisas, Karim said the relationship between Nigeria and Trinidad and Tobago has been strengthened by this initiative. Economically Nigeria has for some time been recognised as a viable export market.

The minister said he was heartened to hear some of the personal stories by some of the Nigerian graduates. Darego Obu-Dennis, Karim said, revealed he worked as a gas station attendant and came to Trinidad to pursue training in Millwright Trade with the hope of making a valuable contribution to his community in Nigeria.

“I am also told of Dodo Mojo, whose interest in automotive technology began at a young age. Having graduated he hopes to move into the realm of entrepreneurship with his own automotive shop in Nigeria,” Karim related.

Karim said he was aware some of the participants did not complete the programme. “This is part of the course of life’s journey. The journey is not for the swift but for those with the ability to persevere.”

In addition the minister said plans have been put in place for a second group to commence training in Shielded Metal Arc Welding in August. Over 70 Nigerian nationals will be among those to receive training at the NESC Drilling School at the NESC’s Ste Madeleine campus.

Present at the graduation ceremony was Nigerian High Commissioner to TT, Musa John Jen. The vote of thanks was delivered by Qess CEO Paul.

Libya arrests 400 'illegal immigrants'

      
TRIPOLI  Libyan authorities on Monday said its forces had prevented more than 400 Africans including Nigerians from illegally emigrating to Italy when it intercepted a boat off the coast of the North African country.
 A young Nigerian, Emmanuel, said the Libyan officials had taken all their documents.
"They took everything... money, passport, phones. They told us 'you don't need all this in Europe'," he said, accusing the former rebels of "organising this set-up."
 Forty-year-old Rania, an Ethiopian, said she had been fooled for the third time in a row.
"Each time one takes the boat, a patrol comes to stop and escorts us to the port," she said.
 "You see the captain (of the boat) is still there," she said pointing to a Libyan the boat at the Tripoli docks.
 She said it was Libyans who offered to take them to Europe.
 "They hid us for two months on a farm in Tajura (an eastern suburb of Tripoli) and each time they told us we must wait as the weather was too bad to go to the sea," she said.
"Last night they asked us to board and we had not spent more than two hours at sea when police boats surrounded us and escorted us to the port. I want to leave to Europe. I do not know where they plan to take us," she said as a Libyan official pressed her to board a bus chartered by the authorities.

They said Monday's incident was a set-up.
 Many of the immigrants said they had become victims of a fraud planned by Libyans to swindle them after they had each paid people smugglers between 1,000 and 1,500 dollars.
 In the port of Tripoli some 420 immigrants were being guarded by former rebels who toppled Gadafi as well as being monitored by interior ministry officials, according to report.
Among them were Ethiopians, Ghanaians, Ivorians and Nigerians.
According to General Joma al-Meshri, a group of former rebels and officers intercepted the boat early on Monday 10 miles off the coast of Tripoli.
A commander of the ex-rebels, Khaled al-Bassir, said they had received information about the vessel's departure, and that three patrol boats had set off to intercept it.

 For several years, Libya has been a transit country for hundreds of thousands of African immigrants trying to reach Europe in search of a better life.

Nigerian migrants hope Libyan crisis will ease path to Europe

A group of African migrants have put their destinies to fate with the hope to cross to Europe hoping the chaos in Libya will ease their flight to the boats awaiting them on the Mediterranean.
Take the case of this Nigerians who are determined against the odds to make it to Europe in the face of torture and execution of blacks on suspicion of fighting as mercenaries alongside Muammar Gaddafi's forces.

But for them, the risks from gunmen are an acceptable alternative to being turned back by a border patrol.
"They say blacks are being killed as suspected Gaddafi fighters, but I say we all have a destiny," said Sule, a 25-year-old Nigerian migrant who did not want to give his last name.
"I see this war as an opportunity that I cannot let pass if I want to make it to Europe."
Lured by the seductive mirage of a better life in the West, tens of thousands of Africans trek every year across deserts or risk perilous sea crossings in try to slip illegally into Europe via Spain or Italy.
But for Sule and his companions -- and the dozens of others arriving in northern Niger each day -- that gamble means passing through what may be the most dangerous place in the world right now for an African.
Refugee camps within Libya and sprouting along its land borders contain thousands of fleeing Africans telling tales of horror at the hands of rebel fighters suspicious they are pro-Gaddafi mercenaries. Identity cards of nationals from Chad, Niger, Mali, Sudan and other African states have been found on the bodies of gunmen who anti-Gaddafi fighters say were paid to confront them. "We are risking our lives but we have been assured by our guide that we'll be alright between here and the Libyan border.
The rest is our affair," Sule said.
"If things become dangerous, we can always head to a refugee camp," said Obasi, one of Sule's companions.
Sule's group travelled 700 km from their homes in Kano, to Agadez, a city in Niger's northern desert just below the Air mountain range.
In this bustling town, once a popular destination for European tourists seeking a taste of the Sahara before a Tuareg uprising in 2007 and a string of Al Qaeda-linked kidnappings made it a no-go zone,
Sule's group waits for the signal to complete the 3,000 km journey north. "The smuggler said he'll bring us to Libya via the mountain trails through Agadez. There are others coming and even if we become impatient, the timing is his responsibility. There are preparations to complete and it is important that we have enough water," said Serin, one of Sule's companions.
Sule's group paid 300,000 CFA francs ($625) each to be smuggled to the Libyan border, about double what they would have paid before the war, they said.
They said they had been encouraged to try the route when Gaddafi threatened Europe with a deluge of illegal immigration early on in the uprising against him.
Italy's government said last month it has proof Gaddafi planned to turn its tiny island of Lampedusa, off the southern coast of Siciliy, into an "inferno" by sending thousands of desperate African migrants there. A deal between Gaddafi and Italy to send migrants back before they entered Italian waters had curbed the flow of migrants until the Libyan uprising brought strict border controls.
Abdul Rachid is a driver in Agadez, paid to run the smuggling routes to Libya's border with a cargo of humans.
He said migrants were given choices between riding in the back of a powerful 4X4 pickup truck -- the "fast and comfortable option" but more expensive -- or being packed into a larger, slower truck.
"If you take a truck you will be 50 people or 60 people, packed in like sardines. It takes at least 10 days if all goes well," he said.

Three Nigerians Jailed Over London Riots

THREE Nigerians were handed a six-month jail term for ransacking an Argos store during last week's riots in London, United Kingdom.

They include two models of the same parents, who wept profusely as they were handed the jail term and the third, a law student, who got a heavier sentence, as he was handed a full year in jail.

Shonola Smith, 22, described as a bright student, who was scheduled to restart a university course next month and her sister, Alicia, had joined about 100 rioters, who stormed a Croydon shop on Monday, tearing apart display cases and looting the stock. She was arrested with her sister and their 22-year-old friend, Donness Bissessar, when police stormed the building on Monday night.

When Alicia was arrested she was carrying 10 packs of chewing gum, which she had stolen from a nearby Kwik Stop convenience store on the same day. She admitted stealing the items.

All three, who had no previous convictions, received the same sentence on Friday after pleading guilty to entering the store with intent to steal, at the Croydon magistrate's court.

They broke down in tears as they were led to the cells.

District Judge Robert Hunter said: 'The tragedy is that you are all of previous good character, each of you well educated. 'However, I can't ignore the context in which these offences were committed. You have played your part in a wider act where devastation was caused to businesses and local residents.

'In my view, although I'm retaining jurisdiction, the matter is so serious that only a custodial sentence will suffice. That, I hope, will serve as a deterrent to others.'

Clad in identical prison issue clothes, all convicts looked downcast in the dock as they exchanged glances with their parents in the public gallery.

Their lawyer told the court: 'I was taken by surprise. Talking to them and recently talking to their families, they come across as perfectly ordinary, reasonable, dare I say it, civilised young women.

'Their parents have found it really very hard to fathom what's going on. They have accepted their guilt, there's no doubt that they are remorseful.

'They all work. If it all kicked off again tonight I don't for one second think you would find these ladies anywhere near.'

The girls' stunned parents clutched hands as Hunter imposed the sentences and the girls were led to the cells at Croydon Magistrate's Court.

He told the defendants: 'The tragedy is that you are all of previous good character, each of you well educated. You have jobs. You have plans for future education. You have shown remorse and pleaded guilty. However, I can't ignore the context in which these offences were committed.' He added that he hoped the harsh sentence would 'serve as a deterrent to others.'

In another case, a teenage Nigerian law student, Akintunde Amosu, was among three university students jailed for a year each for 'scavenging' £4,500 worth of electronic gear and clothes during the riots.

Amosu, 19, a business and marketing student; Xavier Techie-Afful, 19, and his younger brother Javier, 18, were told at Camberwell Green Magistrates Court they had 'blighted their lives by a moment of madness.'

Magistrates worked round the clock to deliver swift justice to hordes of captured hooligans.

Ministry of Justice officials said 2,033 arrests had been made and 1,043 people had already been charged.

A boy of 13 who went into riot-hit Manchester with a hammer strapped to his leg was hauled before the city's magistrate's court. He was given a nine- month referral order after admitting possessing an offensive weapon without lawful excuse.

District Judge Khalid Qureshi said: 'If you had been 15, you would be going straight to the cells.'

Similarly, a girl of 14 was bailed after her mum admitted she had not seen her for two weeks.

The teen was accused of stealing clothes, CDs and perfume in Tottenham, North London. Neither of her parents was in London's City of Westminster Magistrate's Court to take her home and frantic calls were made to track them down.
Dozens were brought before the courts, accused of trying to rally the mobs online. Jamie Counsell, 24, allegedly used Facebook to organise an event in Cardiff called: 'Rioting, looting, robbing and burgling.' He was remanded in custody for a week by magistrates.

Insurance salesman Aidan Curwen, 18, was accused at Northampton Magistrate's Court of using a BlackBerry to urge 140 people to arm themselves with 'bats and weapons.'

A girl of 11 got a police warning for her involvement with a Facebook page inviting 400 to gather at a Poundland store in Plymouth, Devon, just as jobless Amed Pelle, 18, is bound for prison after he admitted using Facebook to encourage the 'killing of a million police officers' in Nottingham.

Nigerians amongst hundreds of refugees just landed in Italy

A large contingent of 251 African refugees fleeing Libya arrived in Sicily on Tuesday- mostly Erireans and Nigerians; two three-year-old girls and 15 women, one of whom has had to be hospitalised with an abdominal injury,
while 116 more arrived in Malta on a boat that also carried the body of a 29-year-old woman who died during the voyage.
The refugees arriving Malta was carrying mostly Chadians and Somalis, the boat was intercepted by Maltese coast guards who received an alert from an Italian fishing boat that spotted the 50-foot (15-metre) wooden boat late Monday.
The refugees that arrived in Sicily which included Nigerians have been transferred to a temporary structure set up at Porto Empedocle in the south of the island.
A spokesman for the Maltese army said coast guards saw the refugees burning their clothes to attract the attention of passing vessels.
The refugees on the boat that arrived in Malta on Tuesday included 94 men, 18 women, a three-year-old boy and three babies. It has not yet been established how the woman on board died, the spokesman said.

Malta said it had asked Italian authorities to help with the rescue but was refused because they said the boat was 45 nautical miles from Malta and 47 nautical miles from the island of Lampedusa -- Italy's southernmost point.
Lampedusa last week refused to grant permission to enter its waters to a Maltese patrol boat which had rescued some migrants close to the island, which has been swamped with thousands of immigrants and refugees in recent weeks.
More than 1,000 people fleeing Libya have arrived in Malta in recent days.

Two Nigerians get 18 years jail term

A district court in Denpasar, Bali in Indonesia sentenced two Nigerians, members of an international drug smuggling syndicate to 18 year jail sentences on Monday.

The Nigerian defendants, Austine Bosah Uchena, 39, and Michael Onyedika Onuorah, 24, must also pay fines of Rp 2 billion ($230,000) or face an additional two years behind bars.

The sentences were twice those demanded by the prosecution.

The pair were caught attempting to smuggle more than two kilograms of crystal methamphetamine into Bali’s Nugroho Rai International Airport from Malaysia on July 13 last year.

Other members of the syndicate are being tried separately.

They are Yakno, a Filipino, Band everly Adtoon Fulache and Enny Maliani who are Indonesian.