Keshi and Okocha applaud organisers of Nigerian Centenary Awards UK as Eagles face Scotland tonight

SUPER Eagles head coach Stephen Keshi and former skipper Austin "JJ" Okocha have applauded the organisers of the Nigerian Centenary Awards UK saying it is an admirable way of honouring Nigerians who have served the motherland with distinction over the years.

Due to take place at Waltham Forest Town Hall in east London on June 27, the Nigerian Centenary Awards UK in Collaboration with Ben TV, will involve awards given out to 100 outstanding Nigerians in the UK over the last century. It has been put together to honour Nigerians have excelled in numerous fields of endeavour across the UK including sports, medicine, law, business, engineering, the media, commerce etc.

Among the recipients will be several Nigerian footballers who have excelled in the UK, dating back from 1949 when Nigerian football first came to light after a visit by the national team. Dubbed the Nigerian Tourists, the national team played three friendly games in England, barefoot, delighting the crowd with their silky skills and trickery.

This tour opened the way for Nigerian footballers to come to England as six years later, Teslim "Thunder" Balogun signed a professional contract with Peterborough United  in 1955. Ever since then, the English and Scottish leagues have always had Nigerian players featuring for the clubs and the first ever black player to play for England was Benjamin Odeje who featured for England Schoolboys against Northern Ireland in 1971.

Keshi said: "It is nice to know that a group of Nigerians have seen it fit to honour and respect the contribution certain footballers have made to the country and the UK over the years. Just like the Nigerians who succeed in other areas, the become a top footballer, you need to put in dedication, determination, a lot of hard work and sacrifice."

Okocha, who had a distinguished career in the UK himself, captaining Bolton Wanderers in the English Premiership for four years between 2002 and 2006, followed by a brief stint with Hull City, said it is nice to see footballers recognised. In March 2004, Okocha was named among the top 125 living footballers by Brazilian legend Pelé.

Both Keshi and Okocha were in London for the Super Eagles friendly game against Scotland taking place today at Fulham's Craven Cottage ground. Due to kick off at 8pm, the match will be the first in a series of friendlies the Eagles play as they prepare for next month's World Cup in Brazil.

Ayo Akinfe, the chairman of the Nigerian Centenary Awards UK planning committee, said: "Football is so central to our being as a nation as it is one thing that unites all Nigerians, so it is only appropriate that our event involves honouring some footballers. When the Super eagles play, everyone of our 170m citizens rallies round the team, so it would impossible to organise a Nigerian centenary awards ceremony without recognising a few footballers."

Ronke Udofia, the chairman of the awards sub-committee, added: "As a community, we have come a long way over the last 100 years with a lot of Nigerians achieving a lot in the UK in various fields. Sports is one of the sectors in which we will celebrate those hardworking and industrious people who have defied the odds and excelled."

Kate Anolue, the vice chairman of the Nigerian Centenary Awards UK, said that sports is a vital tool in Nigeria's socio-economic development as it provides hitherto unavailable opportunities for disadvantaged youths. She added that many young people who went on to have successful sports careers might not have been so fortunate had they not had access to football.

To emphasise this point, coach Keshi has written a goodwill message in the event programme, offering his full support. In his message, Keshi regretted the fact that as the gala dinner taking place on June 27 will be holding during the World Cup, he, his assistants and players will be unable to attend.

For more information contact:

Tijani Abass                                                    Jumoke Ariyo

DJA Media                                                      Secretary, Nigerian Centenary Awards UK

07946 811 253                                                 07946 126 561 

djabass1@aol.com                                           jumoke@nigeriancentenaryawardsuk.com

Ronke Udofia

Chair, awards sub-committee, Nigerian Centenary Awards UK

07828 119278

ronke@nigeriancentenaryawardsuk.com

Dayo Olomu

Chair, programmes sub-committee, Nigerian Centenary Awards UK

07957 581 703

dayo@nigeriancentenaryawardsuk.com

Emerson Braithwaite

Ben Television

admin@bentelevision.com

+44 208 808 8800

AGBANI DAREGO CHOSEN AS VIP GUEST TO ATTEND THE 2014 FRENCH OPEN

Agbani

Annually, one celebrity is chosen to represent Nigeria as a VIP Guest on
behalf of Moet & Chandon at the yearly Roland Garros Tournament in France.
Over the past few years, celebrities like Kemi Adetiba, Dolapo Oni have
been privileged to be a part of the wonderful opportunity.
This year, Moet & Chandon has chosen beautiful, versatile Nigerian model
and first Black African Miss World, Agbani Darego as the VIP Guest to
represent Moet & Chandon at The 2014 French Open.
Some of the activities scheduled for the trip include; a visit to the Moet
& Chandon headquarters, champagne cellar tour with other VIP guests,
tasting session with Chef Pascal, an evening at The Chateau de Saran –
former residence of Moet family, great seat at The 2014 French Open and
more.

US author, poet Maya Angelou dies at 86

Maya Angelou was gratified, but not surprised by her extraordinary fortune.

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"I'm not modest," she told The Associated Press in 2013. "I have no modesty. Modesty is a learned behavior. But I do pray for humility, because humility comes from the inside out."

Her story awed millions. The young single mother who worked at strip clubs to earn a living later danced and sang on stages around the world. A black woman born poor wrote and recited the most popular presidential inaugural poem in history. A childhood victim of rape, shamed into silence, eventually told her story through one of the most widely read memoirs of the past few decades.

Angelou, a Renaissance woman and cultural pioneer, died Wednesday morning at her home in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, her son, Guy B. Johnson, said in a statement. The 86-year-old had been a professor of American studies at Wake Forest University since 1982.

Source:  Associated Press

Delta State bursary recipients eulogise Uduaghan, Eghagha and Scholarship board management for bursary scheme

Gov. Uduaghan

Senator Richard Ochei

ADA DIKE

 Some students of Delta State origin who are recipients of the annual bursary also known as Delta State Students’ Special Assistant Scheme have eulogised the Delta State Government led by His Excellency, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, the Commissioner for Higher Education, Professor Hope Eghagha and the management team at the state’s Bursary and Scholarship Board.

Speaking to newsmen recently, the National Senate President of the National Association of Delta State Students (NADESSTU), Senator Richard Ochei, said he has been benefiting from the bursary from 200 level.

He shares his perception about the bursary, “It was manual bursary in 2010 when I was in year one, so the board came on with the Commissioner for Higher Education, Professor Hope Eghagha and decided to innovate, saying that the time of analogue had gone. They set up the E-bursary unlike when they used to pay the money in schools. So they asked everyone to open an account in banks and urged every student to register online and put their details there. Then after the necessary verifications and the schools confirm that the students were not fake, they paid the money into our accounts,” Ochei explained.

Commenting on the online registration, the 400 level student of Public Administration in Anambra State University, Uli, Anambra State, further said that in everything there must be a challenge. “Being done electronically, it is normal for one to have network problems emanating from the network providers. In the real sense of it, if one follows the instructions written down, one would find it easy, except those who are not familiar with anything online.”

On the issue of multiple registrations by some students, the NADESSTU president hinted that “At times some students would want to register their girlfriends or sisters and also may try to double register, but the Delta State Government, Commissioner for Higher Education and scholarship board curtailed that due to the new system of online registration. The challenge we (students) have is the delay by the government in releasing the fund. We have written a communiqué appealing to government to make the fund available to us on time.

“We heard a rumour that some people said they were fake names on the list but I didn’t believe that because if it were true, they would complained to the national level of Delta Students’ association to look into. They wouldn’t have gone on air or published such unconfirmed rumour which may be embarrassing to Delta State Government which releases funds for students from the state to expand their horizon in terms of education. Students supposed to report their challenges to the NADESSTU, though some of them can be very funny in the sense that some of them contract their registration to someone and pay him two thousand naira to get endorsement from their local government and sometimes we come across some students trying to buy four scratch cards to register for the bursary. You find out that a particular student tried to register his or her name four times. In a case whereby such a student did not find his or her name in any list, he or she shouldn’t blame anybody or the board.

“These elements went about alleging that the board and the Commissioner for Higher Education have defrauded the board by inserting 23,000 names. There is no truth in that. So we frown at such a lie.”

Mr. Agbanashi Obinne

Also speaking, NADESSTU National President 2010/2011Mr. Agbanashi Obinne eulogised Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, Prof. Hope Eghagha and the management scholarship board for considering Delta State students in human capital project through bursary scheme and different forms of scholarship schemes. He thanked them for their magnanimity in making many students beneficiaries of the scheme. “Through these schemes, the government is encouraging Delta State to be the best in their academic pursuit. So I see bursary as a relief for students from the government and helping the students, economically.” 

He believes that “If there is a little problem students encounter while registering, it is now easier for them and the board in checking fraud and multiple registration. The scholarship board are operating open door policy by requesting for the list of Delta State students from Joint Admission and Matriculation Board in order to ascertain bonafide students from the state. It may look like a problem for students who did pre-degree without sending their names to JAMB office for regularisation. It is now left with schools’ Dean of Students Affairs to prove the bonafide students of their schools before the board pays the students money into their accounts.

“The state is not trying to frustrate anybody but working to remove racketeers from causing confusion. The NADESSTU people who went to Lagos to apprehend Ezenwani have been on the fore front to warn students not to give money to anybody to get bursary but when Ezenwani, who has been extorting some students discovered that his source of illicit business has been closed, he organised a few people to defame the Commissioner for Higher Education and the board.”

Obinne also accused Ezenwani of parading himself as a regular student just to extort money from students. “I could remember when I was collecting bursary of five thousand naira from the state. After the era, students have migrated to electronic registration and are lucky that they are being paid twenty thousand naira each per session.

”There is another aspect I wish to comment on, it is the amount of the money Delta Government gives to first class students from the state. I made 2.1 {Cumulative Grade Point Average), though I supposed to make first class but I did not due to distractions I had. I believe that if I will do better when I go back for my Master’s degree,” Obinne said.

 He advised Delta State students to appreciate the kind gesture they are receiving from the board and urged them to shun defaming people’s reputation.

Senator Richard Ochei

In the same vein, Personal Adviser to Senior Special Assistant (SSA) to Governor Uduaghan on Students Affairs, Comrade Umukoro Stanley, was of the opinion that Delta State scholarship board has put in so much effort to ensure that genuine students apply and receive bursary from the state. “Initially, registration was done through analogue but now it’s done electronically. I remember vividly a particular time when registration was cumbersome. Actually, I have always advised people to desist from committing fraud.”

 He advised desperate students who pay money to agents to register them to learn how to use computer and do it themselves. It is easy! Even market women these days use computer so it baffles me when I heard that some students contracted someone to register for them and later got swindled. Nobody taught me how to use laptop. They are many challenges now in this scheme because some names some students used in registering are different from their account numbers. If not for the state government being thorough in ensuring that students follow the right steps while registering for bursary, a lot of things would have been messed up,”  Stanley enthused.

 Former South East Coordinator of NADESSTU, Comrade Felix Efeni, said he benefitted from the scheme in 2004/2005, a period he lost his mother and added that the bursary was the major source of money he had that time.

“Delta State bursary is the best scheme for student in the country. I benefitted from it, my wife and my younger also benefitted from it. The only challenge we had then was, there were some fraudulent students who had access to the registrar of the school, so when the state’s scholarship board sent the list to the school, since the right students didn’t have access to that list, the fraudulent students removed the names of the original students and add fake names, there by hindering the real students from getting their money. There were some occasions we would open a newspaper and see our names on the list but when we get to our schools, our names would not be there. The staff of the board suffered in my hands because any time I didn’t see my name in the list, I mobilised students and stormed the board office in Asaba and stampede them. We felt bad when we discovered that the fault wasn’t from the board but from the fraudulent student leaders. We then fought with some of the students’ leaders and some of them ran away.

Comrade Felix Efeni

“Some of them even used graduates’ passport photos or names to register many names and collected the money. For example, one of my cousins that graduated in Obafemi Awolowo University was surprised when someone called and told her that she saw her passport photo but different name as one of the bursary recipients in Unilag. Some of the fraudsters go to photo studios and collect passport photos their owners didn’t collect to register for bursary.”

Efeni maintained that someone told him that Mr. Ambrose Ezenwani was the master minder of such fraud. Apart from other security measures, the sim card registration telecommunications companies introduced, according to him, has to some extent become an impediment for the fraudster to do multiple registrations.

CITATION OF MR. PETER OBUKOWHO AMROMANOH

 AMROMANOH (Photo: ADA DIKE)

Peter Obukowho Amromanoh, an academia, Civil Servant and Administrator for excellence born on 18^th May, 1962 at Okitikpipa, Ondo State was born into the family Pa. & Mrs. Michael Amromanoh in Ethiope East Local Government Area of Delta State. Peter 51, a devoted and advert Roman Catholic member possesses the qualities needed at this moment our life to fix the mirage of problem that have be devoted our nation for so long a time.  He is an apostle of corporate and good governance.  No wonder in 1990, he was enlisted into the then Bendel State Civil Service as a young Planner office in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning and later converted to an administrative officer having discovered his administrative Prowers and competency.  Over the years, he hs held various positions and offices in the Civil service.  On creating of Delta State in August, 1991 he was posted to the Ministry of Economic Planning as administrative officer.  He later deployed to set up the Delta State Computer Centre, which is redeplorable for the computerization of salary system in the State. With this uncommon and unparallel achievement in the computer centre, he was posted to the State Civil Service Commission as Director (Administration and Finance) to assist in building a sound Civil Service Commission within the State.  Giving this same prosperity of energy, he was later posted to the Ministry of Housing, as a Director (Planning Research & Statistic) where he again demonstrated a high level of administrative excellence that can be equal to none in the State.  In three short years, Peter Amromanoh has shown the some dexterity her has been exhibiting as a seasoned administrator, the same abilities to find the remedies to the many complexities of administrative challenges of running our young civil service in the State.  He was in March 2009, appointed by our amiable and Indefatigable Governor, His Excellency Dr. Emmanule Eweta Uduaghan CON. The Executive Governor of Delta State as the Executive Secretary, Delta State Bursary and Scholarship Board.  He has spearheaded the fight against bursary racketeering and other associated fraudulence activities of the Board and turned the Board into an example of good governance and the delight of all.  He has also made a significant impact on consolidating on the transparency credibility, probity and accountability in running of the affairs of the Board.  It is not surprise when he bagged a prestigious award from the Institute of Industrialist and Corporate Administration of Nigeria for “Probity and Accountability”. In further recognition of his administrative capacity and tenacity, he has continued t received award and recognition from reputable organization home and abroad these include, outstanding process in public administration by Institute of corporate administration (ICAD) Quality leadership Award by National Association of Delta State Students, Excellence Award as ICON of Hope and Inspiration to Delta  State Female Students by National Association of Urhobo female students “Professional Executive Service Award” by National Association of Delta State Students St. Paul University College, Awka, 50 Distinguished Nigerian of Merit in 2012 by  Vanguard Newspaper Award, 50 Personalities of High Repute in Nigeria in 2012 by The Guardian Newspaper Award, This Day Newspaper Award as 50 Professional of Excellence in 2012, Leadership Ambassador Award by Nigeria Peace Magazine, Best Executive Secretary in Nigeria “by The Lamplight News, Most Outstanding Civil Servant of the year by Delta Advancement Award, 50 Nigerian most Inspiring Role model by the News Magazine are special Report and presently a nominee in the 3^rd edition of WHO IS WHO in Nigeria.

He is a member and fellow of many professional bodies in the country among which are Fellow, Institute of Industrialist and Cooperate Administrators, Administrative member, Chartered Institute of Economist Nigeria, member  Institute of Political Science and Chartered Administrators too numerous to mention.

From 1962 in Okitipapa, Ondo State to this stellar moment in October, the chronicle of your life has enthralled us.  The early years in Okitipipapa that taught you about the uniqueness of cultures, Humility modesty and sparked your independce.  College, first at St. Pius Grammar School, Igbotako and later in Stella Maries College, Okitipupa, and then in Benin City, where you earned your bachelor degree in Economics and Statistics (Second Class Upper Division) in 1987. He returned to University of Benin where he deepens his commitment in ICT as a veritable tool for effective service delivery in the public service.  Here, he bagged PGD in computer Science in 1991. Presently, he is 500 level law student at the National open university of Nigeria, Asaba.

Today, Peter is happily married to Martina Amromanoh with four wonderful children 2 boys and 2 girls.  He is an accomplished husband, father, administrator and a teacher.  He is staunched promoter of the Urhobo culture.  It is our record that he personally organizes the Urhobo summer school for all Urhobo indigenes children in Asaba.

Ladies and Gentlemen, it is with profound honour for us to come together in this benefit and historic day to present to you’re a man popularly and fondly called by all as “PERO”, Mr. Peter Obokuwho Amromanoh.

Thanks.