Group declares vacancy in Aso Rock, says Buhari unfit to continue

•President Buhari.

A pro-democracy group, the Good Governance Advocates, has declared the Presidency vacant, insisting that ailing President Muhammad Buhari is unfit to continue in office and that what Nigeria. The group argued in a statement, a copy of which was made available to News Express, that what the country needs is not an Acting President but a substantive one.

The statement, signed by the group’s Lead Partner, Ifedayo Obi, reads: “This is to inform the people of Federal Republic of Nigeria that vacuum has been created since January 19, 2017 in the Office of the President due to illness of our dear President Muhammad Buhari. The issue of governance has been hanging on balance since President Buhari embarked on the first medical tourism in January till March 10, 2017 when he returned. During his stay in the country till May 7 when he left for second trip, no meaningful official obligation can be traced to him as occupier of the highest seat of power. It is now a matter of necessity to know who is leading us.

“We should be worried of how APC and Buhari-led government are laying bricks of bad precedence for our nascent democracy by their singular act of promoting leadership vacuum. I hope one day another party will not come and put a corpse in Aso Rock as President. Our dear country is in dire need of vibrant leadership for good governance that will bail her out from many problems staring at her.

“For how long are we going to continue being led by proxy? We should not be holding over 180 million people to ransom just because of one man’s illness and political correctness.

Surprisingly, we are all behaving as if Nigeria is Zimbabwe where a President can abandon his job twice in four months based on medical tourism. President Buhari has said that age is no more on his side to lead us and today the reality has been evident to all. Therefore, we should enjoin him to resign and if people around him are holding him back in doing so, he should be declared incapable to continue in power. We don’t need an Acting President but a substantive President. Truly, anybody can fall sick and be prayed for to recover but we should not saddle such person with rigours of leading most populous black nation.

“President Buhari should recover speedily and return to his retirement home not Aso Rock while Yemi Osinbajo should be sworn in as President to complete his boss tenure that ends 2019. This is because old age syndrome will not allow President Buhari to perform as expected.

“However, if Osinbajo surpasses Nigerians’ expectations as he has been doing in the absence of his boss, Nigerians will want him to rule them beyond 2019, so no Anglo or Junaid can stop him. The narrative that power should return to North can’t fly again, the Southern region is not in Nigeria for geographical illustration. This region is here for business of governance, after the North had ruled for 38 years out of 57 years of Nigeria as an independent nation, it is a moral demand to allow other components to take their share of the coexistence at any given opportunity.

“Moreover, if the North wants to put up fight against constitution of our land like they did to immediate past administration, Nigerians are now wiser and they will resist any form of subversion. My advice for the Northern people is to always present a vibrant representative whenever the demand arises for leadership. To Prof. Anglo and Dr. Junaid, please allow constitution to always take its course and stop spiting trash.

“This nation belongs to all, therefore let us demand for Buhari resignation now or declare him unfit to rule us as Yemi Osinbajo takes over till 2019. Aso Rock is not for recuperating, enough of political correctness, by May 29, 2017 it will be two years of this government and 99% of promises made are yet to see light.”

Politics : The White House has a credibility crisis — and it's started to engulf one of its most independent voices

Experts say McMaster is still the most independent voice in the White House, but he could be headed for trouble if he keeps ceding ground to the political wing.

Politics

National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster speaks to reporters at the White House in Washington on May 21, 2017.  (Thomson Reuters)

The White House's credibility crisis continues to deepen, and experts say it may now reach one of the few remaining independent voices in the Trump administration: national security adviser H.R. McMaster.

After former national security adviser Michael Flynn was forced to resign in February when it emerged that he misled Vice President Mike Pence about contacts he'd had with Russian officials during the 2016 campaign, McMaster arrived to right the ship.

His selection was especially notable because many saw him as the antithesis to Flynn.

He was brought in as someone who was beyond reproach.

"He was brought in as someone who was beyond reproach, who wasn't in [President Donald] Trump's inner circle, had a stellar reputation, and was supposed to be distanced from Trump," said Jon Michaels, a professor and expert on national security at UCLA Law.

Like Secretary of Defense James Mattis, McMaster was revered by his troops while serving as a general in the Marine Corps and earned a great deal of respect from soldiers. He is an expert on military strategy, counterinsurgency, and history, and is not known for being a 'yes' man. "Put simply: McMaster isn't a political guy, unlike other officers who are trying to jockey for position and move up their careers," Business Insider's Paul Szoldra wrote after Trump chose him.

McMaster has historically "been willing to risk an awful lot to speak truth to power," said Claire Finkelstein, a professor and Director at the Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

But the former Army Lieutenant General has come under fire in recent days, as the White House was hit with a flurry of news stories that raised more questions about the Trump camp's ties to Russia.

Now, experts are beginning to question if McMaster's role has become dangerously politicized, and whether that could pose a threat to the US' national security.

Typically an apolitical position

Trump shakes hands with McMaster after announcing him as the new national security adviser on February 20, 2017.  (REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque)

When The Washington Post broke an explosive report in which intelligence officials alleged that Trump shared highly-classified information with Russian officials during an Oval Office meeting, McMaster went in front of cameras to call the story false as reported and to defend the president's actions as "wholly appropriate."

His defense came as intelligence officials expressed deep concerns about Trump's handling of sensitive information, as well as the risks it posed to Israel, the source of the intel and a key US ally.

Though the national security adviser is a political appointee — in that he is chosen by the president — the role has historically been relatively apolitical when compared to that of other White House staff. This is because the national security adviser has "enormous influence" over issues of war and peace, and presidents of both parties have tried to keep political concerns away from that area, according to Robert Deitz, a former top lawyer for the National Security Agency and the CIA.

Experts say there is some justification for McMaster speaking out in this case, because he was brought out to address a national security concern.

"The Trump-Russia controversy touches international politics in a way that others do not. ... If you're talking about whether Russia influenced the US elections, if you're talking about the US president meeting with Russian officials and giving them classified information — that is hardcore foreign policy stuff, and McMaster has, or at least had, very high credibility in that area," Deitz said. "So it seems logical that he would be pushed out to lead that parade."

Did it assuage concerns our allies may have had about sharing intelligence? Probably not.

But choosing him as a spokesperson may have done more harm than good.

In this case, McMaster's "going before the press didn't do anything to limit" fallout from revelations that Trump disclosed code-word information to the Russians, Michaels said.

"At the end of the day, are we now all saying, 'Oh, OK, everything's all hunky-dory because McMaster stood up there'? Did it assuage concerns our allies may have had about sharing intelligence? Probably not."

Deitz concluded that Trump doesn't have many alternatives to McMaster.

"If you look at people in this White House and compare them to people in the Obama or Bush White House," he said, "there are not that many people who have terribly high credibility."

Michaels echoed that assessment and highlighted the unique circumstances the Trump administration faces.

"Almost everything right now feels new and different," he said. "The fact that McMaster has to go out and talk about what the president may or may not have said about [former FBI director] Comey ... all of this stuff feels weird and unusual, and I doubt many national security advisers have been called in to do this particular type of rebuttal or contextualization."

Trump speaks with McMaster by his side during a meeting in Brussels, Belgium on May 24, 2017.  (REUTERS/Francois Lenoir)

If anything, experts say McMaster's selection as the White House's point man following the Post's report likely diminished his credibility and the credibility of the US in the process, and it also appeared to politicize a national security issue.

Glenn Carle, a former CIA operative and national security expert, compared McMaster's selection to former President Bill Clinton's decision to have female Cabinet members speak out on his behalf during the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

"A lot of the women involved resented that and thought it was inappropriate, and Clinton was widely criticized for politicizing them because they were females," Carle said. "Here, McMaster was politicized because he's a general."

And while the credibility of White House operatives like Kellyanne Conway and press secretary Sean Spicer has taken a hit since Trump assumed office, the risks of McMaster losing credibility are significantly greater given his position as the chief national security consultant.

'Not McMaster's finest moment'

Experts say that McMaster is likely aware of the delicate situation he's in.

McMaster's loyalties are "naturally divided," Finkelstein said. "He probably feels like he owes the president, as commander-in-chief, the greatest loyalty he can summon up under the circumstances. But I'm also guessing that standing in that room with the Russian foreign minister and ambassador, he felt that he himself was in a fairly compromised position."

James Comey.  (Zach Gibson/Getty Images)

There have been other instances where that internal discrepancy may have been evident. Shortly after news broke that Trump had reportedly called Comey a "real nut job," and said firing him had taken "great pressure" off during the Oval Office meeting with Russian officials, McMaster appeared on ABC's "This Week" on May 21. The White House has not disputed the report.

When host George Stephanopoulos asked McMaster about why Trump made comments about the FBI's Russia probe to Kremlin officials, McMaster said Trump "feels as if he is hamstrung in his ability to work with Russia" because of media coverage around the topic.

"It's very difficult to take a few lines, to take a paragraph out of what appear to be notes of that meeting, and to be able to see the full context of the conversation," he added.

That interview was "not McMaster's finest moment," Finkelstein said, adding that it likely reflected his need "to act within the military chain of command, while also being aware that these actions and remarks by the president are extremely dangerous for the country."

'If the national security adviser is seen as a stooge or lackey ...'

McMaster is still the most independent voice in the White House, experts say, but if he continues ceding ground to the political wing, it may affect the relationship between the administration and the military.

"The go-between on military matters are the joint chiefs and the national security adviser," Michaels said. "If the national security adviser is seen as a stooge or lackey of an administration that the military may be wary of, it's going to diminish [McMaster's] capacity to be seen as a reliable person to call in the White House for critical issues."

And that logic applies to foreign affairs, too.

"It's not surprising when a politician or statesman presents a favorable interpretation of an issue for the administration," Carle said. But when the national security adviser goes in front of cameras and says something that is "just not true, that harms the US' ability to interact successfully and win the support of our foreign interlocutors."

McMaster gives a distinguished lecture at Fort Bragg in 2009.  (DoD)

"Truly, your word is very important" when dealing with national security, Carle said, adding that credibility is among the chief concerns allies consider when deciding which and how much intelligence to share with another country.

The US' national security apparatus relies not just on heads of state calling each other, Michaels said, but on networks of high-ranking bureaucrats like McMaster whose credibility is crucial to keeping things running.

"There's no more critical moment for that than now," he said, "given the lack of credibility and expertise of the commander-in-chief."

And in the event that the US is thrust into a genuine national security crisis and McMaster comes out to talk to the public or to the US' allies about it, Deitz said, "the question people are going to have in the back of their minds is, 'Are we getting this straight or is this just a political job?'"

McMaster is still a very respected figure, Finkelstein said.

"But he will lose all efficacy as a protector of national security if he simultaneously loses that independent voice he was known to have."

An appeals court deals another blow to Donald Trump's travel ban

THE president’s plan to ban travel from six Muslim-majority countries, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals said on May 25th, “drips with religious intolerance, animus and discrimination”. By a 10-3 vote, the appeals court based in Richmond rebuffed Donald Trump’s attempt to have his second try at a travel ban reinstated after it was blocked by a Maryland judge in mid-March. The pause on the entry of refugees, and on travellers from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, “speaks with vague words of national security” and dials back some of the more egregious aspects of the first ban, the court ruled, but abandons “one of our most cherished founding principles—that government shall not establish any religious orthodoxy, or favour or disfavour one religion over another”.
The centrepiece of the 67-page majority opinion, written by the court’s chief judge, Roger Gregory, is a traipse through a 17-month-long string of declarations, tweets and comments from the president and his advisers which reveal the true motive behind the travel restrictions. The story begins with Mr Trump’s campaign-trail call, in December 2015, for a “total and complete shutdown” on Muslims entering America. It wends its way to the following summer, when Mr Trump appeared on NBC’s “Meet the Press” in July 2016. Judge Gregory recounts that when Mr Trump was asked “whether he had ‘pulled back’ on his ‘Muslim ban’,” Mr Trump replied, “I actually don’t think it’s a rollback. In fact, you could say it’s an expansion. I’m looking now at territories. People were so upset when I used the word Muslim. Oh, you can’t use the word Muslim. Remember this. And I’m okay with that, because I’m talking territory instead of Muslim.” In another flourish foreshadowing the trouble his eventual order would face in court, Mr Trump added: “Our constitution is great...Now, we have a religious, you know, everybody wants to be protected. And that’s great. And that’s the wonderful part of our constitution. I view it differently.”
Mr Trump’s rather novel sense of what the constitution permits is, in the eyes of Judge Gregory and nine of his colleagues—all picked by Democratic presidents—persuasive evidence that his executive order is irreparably tainted. That’s true despite Kleindienst v Mandel, a 1972 Supreme Court ruling that permits presidents to stop foreigners from entering the country and instructs courts not to “look behind the exercise of that discretion” by investigating its motive. But according to Justice Anthony Kennedy's controlling opinion in Kerry v Din , a 2015 case clarifying Mandel, in the absence of a “bona fide” reason to bar entry, judges should take a second look.
The Fourth Circuit majority found that Mr Trump’s thin and weakly reasoned national-security justification for restricting travel from the six Muslim countries did not suffice as a good-faith reason. Drawing on an amicus brief Joshua Matz wrote on behalf of several dozen constitutional-law scholars, Judge Gregory concluded “there is simply too much evidence that [the order] was motivated by religious animus for it to survive any measure of constitutional review”. In a key concurring opinion, Judge Stephanie Thacker agreed that hostility against Muslims fuelled the ban but argued that campaign statements should be out of bounds, as they “are inevitably scatted with bold promises”. Post-inauguration musings from “the president, his adviser and the text” of the first executive order, she wrote, are quite enough to make “crystal clear a primary purpose of disfavouring Islam and promoting Christianity”.
Three dissenting judges—all appointed by Republican presidents—saw
International Refugee Assistance Project v Trump quite differently. Judge G. Steven Agee denied that the plaintiffs had standing to sue. Judge Paul Niemeyer wrote the majority had “radically extend[ed] Supreme Court establishment-clause precedents” to reach a “politically desired outcome”. And Judge Dennis Shedd argued that “the real losers in this case” are “the millions of individual Americans whose security is threatened on a daily basis by those who seek to do us harm”.
What happens next? Jeff Sessions, the attorney-general, quickly announced that the administration “will seek review of this case in the United States Supreme Court”. What type of review is still unclear. The government could ask the nine justices for an immediate emergency order to temporarily lift the stay on the travel ban, a request that would require five votes and a sense that waiting to implement the ban may bring irreparable harm. The other tack would be to ask the justices to hear their appeal in the usual course. The latter path is slower but possibly surer, as it takes only four votes to hear a case. But the appeal would not be heard until October at the earliest, and a decision would take months, diluting the urgency of the administration’s claims. The Trump administration could also pursue both strategies simultaneously.
A host of questions arise regarding how the ideologically divided Supreme Court, with a 5-justice conservative majority, will view Mr Trump’s besieged ban—and even whether they will agree to review it. One unknown is how Justice Kennedy, the unpredictable swing justice, will handle the controversy. Another is the chief justice, John Roberts, a conservative who laments his court’s politicisation and cannot relish the prospect of having to adjudicate such tension between the branches of government.

Want to Conceive Twin Babies? These are the Best S*x Positions to Help You Achieve Your Aim Today

If you have always wished to have to have twin babies, then these are certain s*x positions to adopt to achieve your aim.

In terms of natural conception, twins occur in about one out of every 89 births. In other words, it’s not everyone who wishes to have a set of twins that can get them!

While those who have twins in their families are more likely to conceive twins, experts say many of us may just maintain wishes when it comes to these rare species of humans!

However, s*x experts are assuring that there are certain positions you can assume during s*x, which can aid you in conceiving twins.

Try these styles and get back to us in nine months’ time!

• Doggy style:

Here, the woman will assume kneeling position, while the man will enter from behind.

Advantage: During s*xual intercourse, the sperm is able to swim better and reach the cervix of the woman easily.

• Standing position.

This enables the man to have deep penetration.

Advantage: The sperm can easily reach the egg.

• Missionary position.

This will help the sperm to reach the egg easily. And it’s regarded as the best kind of s*xual position.

See The Epic Reply Reekado Banks Gave A Man Trying To Introduce Him Into Illuminati

Mavin records artiste, Reekado Banks shared this message he received from an Instagram follower supposedly trying to lure and initiate him into the Illuminati, and his reply was this.

Lil Wayne’s Daughter Graduates From School (Photos)

Lil Wayne’s Daughter, Reginae Carter graduated from High School on Thursday.

The 34-year-old American rapper and his ex-wife Toya Wright attended the ceremony, It’s always a special day when a sibling or child achieves another level of higher education.

But for someone who has been in the limelight all his life, it had to be especially special for him to see his first born graduate. Congratulations to Reginae Carter. Wayne, and Toya Wright.

Find out what this man stole that got him arrested, this will shock you

There are different  types of thieves, those who steal big and those who decide to steal small but there is no doubt that the current state of the Nigerian economy has been a source of worry for a lot of people. This could be the reason why the young man pictured below resorted to stealing as a way out of his predicament.

The young man was caught stealing plantain from a farm in Sagbama Overside, Bayelsa state, recently. Luckily for him, he didn’t end up as a victim of mob action, as the police whisked him away to ‘safety’.