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Nigeria’s Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, has said his only regret as a minister is that some Nigerians have failed to appreciate that the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari is doing so much with little resources. Mr Mohammed stated this at a Special Forum of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja. […]

There was confusion at the National Identity Management Commission offices across the country on Monday as Nigerians thronged registration centres to obtain their national identity numbers. Punch correspondents who monitored registration centres in  Lagos, Plateau, Kano and Gombe states as well as the Federal Capital Territory, observed that people struggling to register disregarded COVID-19 preventive […]

The Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) has described the second wave of the covid-19 pandemic as being more deadly than the first, going by the increasing number of new infections and deaths in recent times. It further lamented the non-adherence of Nigerians to the non-pharmaceutical measures of hand washing, sanitizing, proper use of face masks, and […]

European countries banned flights from the UK on Sunday and the WHO called for stronger containment measures as the British government warned that a potent new strain of the virus was “out of control”. As the World Health Organization urged its European members to strengthen measures against a new variant of Covid-19 circulating in Britain, […]

Chilean President Sebastian Pinera has been fined $3,500 for breaching COVID-19 rules by posing for a selfie without wearing a face mask. The picture of Pinera with a woman also with no mask on, had gone viral earlier in the month and caused a backlash. The Chilean president has, however, apologised and admitted that he […]

Nigeria may spend about $1.4bn (N540.4bn, at the official exchange rate of $1: N386) to procure and distribute 218,400,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines, Sunday Punch has learnt. The figure is based on estimates of the World Health Organisation as regards the total amount of funds that Africa would need to pursue a vaccination drive. According to […]

Following the resurgence of coronavirus around the world, the Lagos State government has issued fresh directives for residents to comply with. In a press statement by the governor of Lagos, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, it said the state is recording an increase in COVID-19 cases in all local governments, and there is a need for fresh guidelines. Mr Sanwo-Olu, […]

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has given telecommunications operators in the country two weeks to block all SIM cards that are not registered with the National Identity Numbers (NIN). Failure to do so will lead to your line being blocked or disconnected by the 31st of December 2020. However, to avoid going into a new […]

Nigerian Minister of Labour and Employment, Senator Chris Ngige, Thursday, said the Federal Government had done everything possible to please the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, to end its protracted strike that had paralysed academic activities in universities for about 10 months. The minister, in a statement by his Media Officer, said only ASUU […]

The Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19, says there were indications that the country had entered the second wave of infections. The chairperson of the PTF and Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) Boss Mustapha, who gave the indication, lamented the risk of not just losing the gains from the hard work of the last nine […]

The House of Representatives on Wednesday said it was forced to summon the National Communications Commission when strange persons were calling and messaging public office holders during the recent #EndSARS protests. The House stated that the identities of the owners of the telephone lines could not be ascertained as the Subscriber Identification Module cards used […]

Over 164 million phone lines may be disconnected by December 31, if their owners fail to integrate their National Identity Numbers to Subscriber Identification Modules registration records. One of Punch correspondents gathered from the National Identity Management Commission on Wednesday that the number of Nigerians with NINs was about 43 million. In a response to […]

A team of 10 international scientists will travel to the Chinese city of Wuhan next month to investigate the origins of Covid-19, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said. Beijing has been reluctant to agree to an independent inquiry and it has taken many months of negotiations for the WHO to be allowed access to […]

After December 30, all Subscriber Identification Modules that are not registered with valid National Identification Numbers on the network of telecommunications companies shall be blocked, the Federal Government has said. It was gathered in Abuja on Tuesday that the declaration was part of resolutions reached during an urgent meeting of key stakeholders in the communications […]

A woman in Australia fell off a cliff to her death on Saturday after trying to take a photo at the precarious location. Rosy Loomba, 38, was with her husband and child when the accident occurred at Grampians National Park, in Australia’s Victoria state, according to CNN affiliate Nine News. They were at Boroka Lookout, an overhang […]

President-elect Joe Biden declared Monday, hours after the Electoral College made his victory over President Donald Trump official, that “the rule of law and the will of the people prevailed” over Trump’s efforts to undo the results of the election. “The flame of democracy was lit in this nation a long time ago. And we now […]

US President-elect Joe Biden on Monday won the state-by-state Electoral College vote that formally confirmed his victory in the 3 November election and ended Donald Trump’s floundering campaign to steal it. California, the most populous state, delivered its 55 electoral votes to Biden on Monday afternoon, officially putting the former vice president over the 270 […]