NEWS

The Senator representing Edo South, Neda Imasuen, has voiced concern over the poor condition of facilities at the temporary site of the National Obstetrics Fistula Centre in Ugbor, Benin City. In a statement released on Saturday by his media aide, Moshood Karim, the lawmaker also criticised the slow pace of work at the centre’s permanent site, calling for urgent federal intervention to salvage the institution. Imasuen, a member of the Senate Committee on Health, visited the centre on Friday as part of the committee’s oversight responsibilities to evaluate progress since the hospital was established and following the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the Federal and Edo State governments last year. According to the senator, the state of the facility fell far below the stan...

The University of Ibadan has emerged as the best Nigerian university in both law and medicine, according to the Times Higher Education World University Rankings by Subject 2026. The rankings were obtained by PUNCH Online on the Times Higher Education website on Saturday In the law ranking, UI and the University of Nigeria, Nsukka made the 301–400 band, marking Nigeria’s presence among 425 top global law schools. The assessment covered teaching, research, international outlook, and performance across constitutional, criminal, corporate, and international law. THE said, “The Times Higher Education World University Rankings by Subject 2026 reveal the world’s top universities for law. “The 2026 Law ranking evaluates excellence across: constitutional and adminis...

The Minority Caucus of the House of Representatives has confirmed that discrepancies exist between the tax reform laws passed by the National Assembly and the versions later published in the official government gazette after being signed by President Bola Tinubu. The caucus stated that parts of the recently gazetted tax laws were unlawfully altered, a revelation contained in an interim report submitted by its Ad-hoc Committee on Tax Laws. The committee was established to investigate allegations of inconsistencies between the Acts approved by lawmakers and those eventually gazetted. The seven-member fact-finding committee was inaugurated on January 2, 2026, under the leadership of the House Minority Leader, Rt. Hon. Kingsley Chinda. The panel is chaired by Hon. Afam Victor Ogene, with...

The United Nations, through its Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Nigeria, said that about 35 million Nigerians are at risk of acute hunger this year, including 3 million children facing severe malnutrition, The United Nations disclosed this on Thursday, Jan. 22, following the collapse of global aid budgets. Speaking at the launch of the 2026 humanitarian plan in Abuja, UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator Mohamed Malick Fall said the long-dominant, foreign-led aid model in Nigeria is no longer sustainable and that Nigeria’s needs have grown. Conditions in the conflict-hit northeast are dire, Fall said, with civilians in Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states facing rising violence. A surge in su!cide bombings and widespread attacks k!lled mor...

TikTok has finalised a $14bn deal to establish a US subsidiary, averting a nationwide ban on the popular video-sharing platform. The new ownership structure includes US private equity firm Silver Lake, Abu Dhabi-based artificial intelligence company MGX and Oracle, the technology giant co-founded by Larry Ellison, an ally of US President Donald Trump. Each of the three firms will hold a 15 per cent stake in the US joint venture. TikTok’s Beijing-based parent company, ByteDance, will retain a stake of just under 20 per cent, while the Dell Family Office, the investment arm of Dell Technologies chairman and CEO Michael Dell, is also participating. The agreement follows legislation passed by Congress in April 2024 requiring TikTok to be sold to US owners by January 19, 2025, or face ...

Nigeria experienced a nationwide power outage on Friday following the collapse of the national electricity grid—the first such incident recorded in 2026. According to Naija News, the disruption occurred on January 23, 2026, when power generation dropped to zero megawatts, as indicated by data from the Nigerian Independent System Operator. Records showed that electricity supply to all 11 distribution companies fell to zero at about 1:00 p.m., plunging homes and businesses across the country into darkness. The affected distribution companies included Benin, Eko, Enugu, Ikeja, Jos, Kaduna, Kano, Port Harcourt, Ibadan, Abuja and Yola. This latest grid failure follows a series of similar incidents in 2025, with the most recent before now occurring on December 29. Despite ongoing eff...

A 27-year-old woman, identified as Esther Akwaji, has reportedly died after collapsing under unclear circumstances at her boyfriend’s home in Abuja. According to reports, the incident occurred at the man’s residence in Dei-Dei, within the Bwari Area Council of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), while the couple was having a meal. SaharaReporters disclosed that the boyfriend allegedly disappeared shortly after Esther’s death, and his identity has yet to be confirmed. Sources said Esther, who lived in Nasarawa State, had travelled to Abuja to visit relatives. On January 21, she reportedly left her family home, saying she was going to a bank in Dei-Dei, but failed to return. Several hours later, her family was said to have received a call from a man who introduced himself as her...

A truck overturned on the Otedola Bridge in the early hours of Friday, Jan. 23, causing a gridlock along the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. The gridlock caused motorists heading into Lagos to seek alternative routes. Confirming the incident in a post on Facebook, the Rapid Response Squad of the Lagos State Police Command said that a secondary accident occurred as a result of the overturned truck. The post read, “Two serious accidents have occurred at Otedola Bridge, inward Lagos. “In the first incident, a fully loaded truck overturned, spilling its consignments onto the road and covering about 90 per cent of the carriageway. The second accident occurred directly behind the first crash, compounding traffic disruption in the area. “Emergency responders have been alerted. M...

Russia will take part in trilateral peace talks with the United States and Ukraine for the first time, with the meeting scheduled to hold today in Abu Dhabi, the Kremlin has confirmed.  The development follows talks between US President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Davos, as well as a separate meeting between an American delegation and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow.  The Kremlin confirmed Russia’s participation after Putin held four hours of talks on Thursday night with Trump’s peace envoy, Steve Witkoff, and the US president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. Russian officials described the discussions as “exceptionally substantive, constructive, and extremely frank and trusting,” while cautioning that a breakthrough was not guaranteed...

“We Intend To Get The North Back On Track, We Know We Would Hurt People” – Al-Mustapha Says The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed the murder case filed by the Lagos State Government against Major Hamza Al-Mustapha (retd), the former Chief Security Officer to the late Head of State Sani Abacha, over the assassination of Alhaja Kudirat Abiola. Alhaja Kudirat Abiola, wife of the late businessman and politician MKO Abiola—the presumed winner of the annulled June 12, 1993 presidential election—was killed in Lagos on June 4, 1996, amid political unrest and her campaign to restore her husband’s mandate. In a unanimous decision delivered by a five-member panel led by Justice Uwani Aba-Aji, the Supreme Court held that Lagos State had effectively abandoned its appeal to reopen Al-Mustapha...