Fire from a lantern has burned the face and legs of a day-old-baby boy in Calabar, the Cross River State capital. The fire also burnt other parts of the baby’s body immediately after the mother put to bed. The ugly incident happened after the mother had spent two days at the Traditional Birth Attendant’s parlour. Eye witnesses, Mrs Stella Aluka, told journalists in Calabar that the mother of the baby could not afford to pay hospital bill. Aluka said the kerosene powered lantern exploded, burning the newborn baby that sustained high degree of injuries. The baby has been admitted at Victoria Medical Centre, beside Hi-Quality Bakery, Ndidem Usang Iso Road, Marian, Calabar, where he is currently receiving treatments.

A man , Sunday Odinaka, has reportedly abandoned his wife , Evelyn, after she was delivered of a set of triplets in a private hospital in Okpoko , in the Ogbaru Local Government Area of Anambra State . Sunday, a native of Ubaraekwem , in the Ihiala LGA of the state, was said to have fled his residence on Obodoukwu Road following his inability to meet up with the hospital bill of over N 450, 000. A source said , “ Before the birth of the triplets — two boys and a girl — the couple had four kids . They were compelled to withdraw their children from school due to financial problems. ” Narrating her ordeal to journalists on Thursday in the hospital, Evelyn, a petty trader , said her husband , who had expected only a baby from the pregnancy, disappeared after telling the hospital management he was going to bring the money. She said , “ Before I gave birth to the triplets, there was nothing in the house to eat. I sell sachet water and my husband has no job. Sometimes , he will do some menial jobs from which we eat . “ We have been living from hand to mouth until the arrival of the triplets and the trouble became worse . My husband has been complaining about how to afford the hospital bill even before I gave birth , believing I will deliver just one baby . “ But on sighting three of them , coupled with the four kids that are not adequately fed , he abandoned us for two weeks now . Worse still , he has no phone for us to call. “ I am sure the N 450, 000 bill he was asked to pay due to the complication I had was the major reason he abandoned us . “ My daughter that I usually send home to get hot water for bathing the triplets said she has not set her eyes on her father . “ My daughter said somebody told her that her father swore never to return until he was sure the hospital bill had been settled. ” Evelyn said she had raised N 50, 000 from friends and well -wishers and appealed to the wife of the state Governor , Chief Ebelechukwu Obiano, to come to her rescue. “ Before my husband fled, he submitted a petition to the office of the first lady and the commissioner for women and children welfare that I gave birth to triplets and needed help, but no response, ” she added . The Anambra State Chairman of the Civil Liberties Organisation, Vincent Ezekwueme, said the family was in dire need of financial assistance not only for settling the hospital bill, but feeding the babies . He appealed for a job for Sunday to enable him to fend for his family.

Kubwa Upper Area Court in Abuja has ordered the arrest of Alhaji Atiku Abubakar Jr. for disobeying its judgment directing him to release his three sons to their mother, Maryam Sherif. Sherif had filed a suit for the custody of the children after her divorce from Abubakar, son of former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar. The judge, Bashir Danmaisule, delivered judgment in favour of Sherif on October 27, 2020. But her lawyer, Nasir Saidu, returned to the court complaining that Abubakar had failed to comply with the judgment. Saidu urged the court to issue a judgment-debtor summons for the defendant to appear in court to explain why he did not obey the order and why he should not be jailed for disobeying the judgment. Both Abubakar and his lawyer, Abdullahi Hassan, were absent in court on Thursday. However, the court bailiff said the defendant was served with the summons on November 3 through the Nigeria Customs Service, where he works.

The Ministry of Youth and Sports Development says the link: https://nyif–edi.mystrikingly.com currently being circulated in the media is fake and is not from the ministry. A statement signed by the Director Press in the Ministry, Mrs. Lere-Adams Adjobome, on Thursday in Abuja, said the application and entrepreneurship development training for the Nigerian Youth Investment Fund (NYIF) is free, and prospective applicants are advised to log on to https://nmfb.com.ng/nigeria-youth-investment-fund.” Adjobome said that after the application on the NFMB Portal, eligible applicants would be invited by the ministry for training by an approved Enterprise Development Institute (EDI). She advised that people should not disclose their Bank Verification Number (BVN) and other personal information to fraudsters, saying that BVN was not required for one to access the entrepreneurship training with and approved EDI. “Do not access unsecure and fraudulent application portals: Apply on https://nmfb.com.ng/nigeria-youth-investment-fund “Do not disclose your BVN and other personal information to fraudsters, Your BVN is not required for you to access Entrepreneurship training with approved EDI’s. “Disregard messages and advertisement inviting youth to pay any sum of money for entrepreneurship training, writing/business plan development or other services related to an application for the Nigerian Youth Investment Fund,’: Adjobome counsels applicants. According to her, for further information and inquiries, the following phone numbers could be contacted: 07047024251- South –South ZONE 07047598382- North-East ZONE 08181127180 – North West ZONE 08152947812 – South West ZONE 07087792103- North Central ZONE 07053820081 – South East ZONE.

A decision by the Communist Party of China to raise the retirement age under a long-term economic and development plan has sparked anger on social media in fast-greying China. In 2018, nearly 250 million of China’s 1.4 billion people were aged 60 or over. That is 17.8% of the population and it may exceed 33% by 2053, a prominent think-tank has said. Authorities will “implement postponing the retirement age in a gradual manner”, the official Xinhua news agency said in a report this month, citing government targets by 2035. No specifics were given but the report has caused a stir. “Delaying retirement means we have to postpone our pension,” one user on the Weibo platform wrote on Friday. For more than four decades, China’s retirement age has remained unchanged at 60 for men and 55 for women civil servants and white-collar workers. Authorities have yet to raise the retirement age although a suggestion to do so in 2013 provoked strong public opposition. “Delaying retirement, which has no rationality or necessity, is out of ideological considerations that only when the interests and health of the people are sacrificed can there be economic development,” another social media user said. China faces what experts call a “demographic time-bomb” as its elderly population increases while its workforce gets smaller, partly due to a one-child policy in place for about four decades until it was finally scrapped in 2016. “Postponing retirement is an inevitable trend,” the state-run Securities Times wrote in a commentary on Friday. “If you travel abroad, you’ll find that people over 60 are still working, and that’s normal.” China’s retirement age is lower than in many other countries. In Japan, it’s 65. Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government said last year it was considering raising it to 70 or even 75. In South Korea, where 25% of the population may be 65 or older by 2030, workers retire at around 68 for men and 67 for women. China’s ageing population will also put huge pressure on its pension system. An official research report showed China’s total pension pot could be “insolvent” as early as 2035.