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Nigerian to open Mosques and Churches From June 19 And 21 – Sanwo-Olu
The Lagos State government has reviewed some of the protocols being used to tackle the escalation of coronavirus (COVID-19) in the state.
At a press conference on Thursday at the Government House in Lagos, Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu announced that the government would be relaxing the measures in the coming days.
He elaborated that this included the approval to open religious centres in the next two weeks, although it would come with some limitations.
“Dear Lagosians, we have completed an extended first phase and now, we are entering the second phase of our easing of the lockdown, in line with the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 and NCDC protocols on ease of lockdown,” Sanwo-Olu said.
He added, “From 14 days’ time, precisely from June 19 for our Muslim worshippers and from June 21 for our Christian worshippers; we will be allowing all of our religious bodies to open at a maximum of 40 per cent of their capacity and we will be working with them as expected.”
For places of worship with large crowds, the governor insisted that worshippers at such centres must not exceed 500 during a session.
He, nevertheless, noted that the government has allowed authorities to conduct more than one service but must maintain proper hygiene of the environment.
Source___Channels TV
Donald Trump call George Floyd protesters as ‘Terrorist’
President Donald Trump on Thursday shared a letter on Twitter that points to the peaceful protesters who were forcibly send away from a park near the White House on Monday evening as “terrorists.”
*The letter from veteran attorney and former Trump lawyer John Dowd appears to be addressed to former Secretary of Defense James Mattis and rebuts Mattis’ Wednesday statement castigating Trump’s response to the nationwide protests after the death of George Floyd at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer.*
“The phony protesters near Lafayette were not peaceful and are not real,” Dowd’s letter claimed, without citing any evidence. “They are terrorists using idle hate filled students to burn and destroy. They were abusing and disrespecting the police when the police were preparing the area for the 1900 curfew.”
CNN has reached out to the White House for further comments on the description of the George Floyd’s protesters as “terrorists.”
The letter drew outrage from the Modern Military Association of America, a nonprofit organization for the LGBTQ military and veteran community.
“Donald Trump just crossed a very serious line that demands swift and forceful condemnation by every Member of Congress,” said the group’s interim executive director, Air Force veteran Jennifer Dane.
“Promoting a letter that labels American citizens peacefully exercising their First Amendment rights as ‘terrorists’ is an egregious breach of his oath to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. Now more than ever, it is absolutely crucial that Trump be held accountable for his reckless actions.”
Source___CNN
China takes a Win Grin over US demonstrations of Black killings
Chinese state broadcast media have given extensive coverage to the protests, not leaving out the chaotic scenes and alleged police brutality in America to claim that China enjoys greater social stability.
Speaking to an international audience, Chinese diplomats are attempting to portray Beijing as a responsible global leader, standing in solidarity with other countries in condemning the racial disparity and injustice in the US.
China’s state news agency Xinhua described the US civil unrest as “Pelosi’s beautiful landscape” – a reference to US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s comment last summer that the Hong Kong protests were “a beautiful sight to behold”.
Chinese and Hong Kong officials have also called out the US for applying “double standards” in its response to civil unrest.
“You know there are riots in the United States and we see how local governments reacted,” said Hong Kong’s leader Carrie Lam.
“And then in Hong Kong, when we had similar riots, we saw what position they adopted then.”
The officials’ view is shared by many Chinese social media users, who dub America “the double standard nation”.
Source___BBC News
AstraZeneca to start producing potential vaccine
Drug company AstraZeneca is to start making a potential vaccine for Covid-19, its boss has disclosed this to BBC.
Testing of the drug are under way but Pascal Soriot said the firm must start making doses now so that it can meet demand if the vaccine proves effective.
“We are starting to manufacture this vaccine right now – and we have to have it ready to be used by the time we have the results,” he said.
AstraZeneca make known of producing and being able to supply two billion doses of the vaccine.
Speaking to the BBC’s Today programme, Mr Soriot said manufacturing was beginning already because, “we want to be as fast as possible”.
“Of course, with this decision comes a risk but it’s a financial risk and that financial risk is the vaccine doesn’t work,” he added.
He said AstraZeneca would not seek to make a profit from producing the drug during the pandemic.
If it works, the company will be able to produce two billion doses after signing two new contracts on Thursday, one of which was with billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates.
Source___BBC News
Organised protest in Gambia to opposed US police killings Adjourned
A protest march, at first slated for Monday against the US police killings of blacks, has been adjourned.
Following the killing of George Floyd and the following shooting of Gambian-born Momodou Lamin Sisay, Gambians had organized to protest in front of the US Embassy in Banjul to express their grievances in the killings and the centuries old racial discrimination against blacks in the US
Nevertheless according to Madi Jobarteh, one of the organisers of the protest, having applied for police permit to hold the procession, the IGP raised the issue of the ongoing restrictions on public gatherings as a measure to curb the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Madi posted on Facebook: “We had a meeting with the IGP this afternoon and he referred to the ongoing state of emergency which imposes restrictions on public gatherings. He noted that he would be unjustified to allow this protest to go ahead when schools, churches and mosques are closed and even some imams and other individuals arrested for leading public gatherings.
“The IGP however assured us that he will grant a permit once these emergency regulations are relaxed. It is expected that by June 8 the state of emergency will end. Even if it is extended the expectation is that the restrictions will be relaxed. As law abiding citizens we accepted his reasons and urged him to ensure that our right to freedom of assembly is respected.”
Madi nonetheless urged Gambians to not stop the online protest and other forms of protests without dozens of them coming together.
Source__Standard Newspaper
President Barrow Selects two Justices of the Supreme Court of The Gambia
His Excellency, President Adama Barrow in as per the power vested on him under Section 138(2) of the 1997 Constitution of the Republic of The Gambia, has appointed Honourable Justice Awa Bah and Honourable Justice Edrissa F. Mbai as Justice of the Supreme Court of The Gambia.
The nomination will be put into existence starting from the1st August 2020, exceeding the recommendations of the Judicial Service Commission.
The appointments of the two Judges would bring the number of full time Gambian judges to seven, with less dependence on part time judges.
It will also provide the Supreme Court with the number required to hear and determine a case of review. These latest appointments are central in increasing the number of Gambian legal luminaries in the Judiciary, an important factor in the judicial reforms under the Barrow administration.
Dou Sanno, Siaka Jatta call Mai useless ‘an ungrateful politician’
The president’s deputy political adviser has distinctly retaliated to comments by Mai Fatty that President Barrow should dismiss all his advisers, saying the GMC leader is “an ungrateful discontented politician who now finds it fashionable to bite the finger that fed him since he is no longer in the system”.
Mr Fatty who himself worked as a special adviser to the president, said the four advisers and two deputies in the president’s office are “mere political operatives” who do not have morals and the good ethics to serve as public office holders.
He therefore offered his hints to the president to move them to his National Peoples Party and to replace them with better people.
Speaking to The Standard yesterday, Sanno hit back: “I want to remind him [Fatty] that the people he is accusing of lacking morals and ethics to run public offices are the same people who rescued him from the clutches of Yahya Jammeh’s brutality and when Jammeh sent him away, it is the same people who fought tooth and nail to enable him return home from exile by putting an end to Jammeh’s misrule.”
As said by Dou Sanno, it was of great significant to remind Mai that the very people he call as lack of morals were the same individuals who supported him in his elevation to ministerial and advisory positions in the government.
He briefed that during his time as adviser to President Barrow, Mai had never raised any better initiative to help his work as presidential advisers and had in fact declared in him that The Gambia’s future was bright with people of his [Dou’s] calibre in the government.
“He never called for our removal when he was in the system. If it comes to morality, love for country and contribution to national development I have made more contribution than Mai. What matters to the majority of Gambians is progress and development and as a government we are doing our utmost to rise to the challenges of bringing development to the doorsteps of Gambians,” Dou Sanno pointed out.
He rebuked Fatty for lacking the “maturity both as a politician and an individual”.
Source___Standard Newspaper
All Four Officers Involved In The Death Of George Floyd Now In Custody
All four fired Minneapolis police officers involved in George Floyd’s death now face criminal charges, and all are in custody.
According to court records, Tou Thao, Thomas Lane and J Alexander Kueng all face aiding and abetting second-degree unintentional murder, as well as aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter.
From left to right: Tou Thao, Derek Chauvin, J Alexander Kueng and Thomas Lane (credit: Henn. Co. Jail)
Additionally, Derek Chauvin’s murder charge has been upgraded to second-degree unintentional murder. He still faces third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.
Obama Praised Young US Protesters, Seeks ‘Use Of Force’ Policy Review
Former US president Barack Obama on Wednesday praised the “profound” protests by Americans demanding racial justice and said demonstrations over last week’s killing of a black man in police custody could hit nationwide reforms.
In his first video comments since George Floyd’s death on May 25 in Minneapolis outrage unrest across the country, Obama also urged state and local authorities to review their policies on the use of force.
He directed his comments at young black men and women who he says have often witnessed or experienced too much violence.
“Too often some of that violence has come from folks who were supposed to be serving and protecting you,” Obama said in a webcast with activists.
“I want you to know that you matter. I want you to know that your lives matter, your dreams matter.”
He also said that in the last few weeks, Americans have witnessed “the kinds of epic changes and events in our country that are as profound as anything that I’ve seen in my lifetime.”
The 58-year-old, who remains remarkable among Democrats, noted the deadly upheaval of the 1960s civil rights movement and said “a far more representative cross-section of America” is protesting now than as compared to half a century ago.
“There is a change in mindset that’s taking place, a greater recognition that we can do better,” Obama said.
Young protesters, in particular, have been forced to silence, he said, and their motivation could serve as inspiration for broader change than it is at the moment
Source___Channels TV
State post-mortem shows George Floyd tested positive for coronavirus
George Floyd tested positive for the novel coronavirus in a test discovered after his death, according to Hennepin County’s new post-mortem report released earlier yesterday.
The post-mortem nasal swab was found to be “positive for 2019-nCoV RNA,” said the report, using another term for the type of coronavirus that causes Covid-19.
Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Andrew Baker said the type of test performed for the autopsy, called PCR, can show a positive result “for weeks after the onset and resolution of clinical disease.”
As an outcome, Baker said, “the autopsy result most likely reflects asymptomatic but persistent PCR positivity from previous infection” — meaning the virus played no significant or little role in Floyd’s death and he was unlikely to have been even contagious.
Source___CNN
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