Author: Editor

BETWEEN 2018 and 2024, state governments and parents spent over N122 billion on the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), but the candidates’ pass rate has been poor. The absence of facilities/instructional materials, dearth of qualified teachers, and poor foundation (at the primary school level), among others, contribute to the larger problem of education decline, IYABO LAWAL reports. Last April, to the chagrin of millions of Nigerians, the Lagos State government announced that 31,596 out of 56,134 students from public secondary schools failed the 2024 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE). The failure rate made a mockery of…

A MANCHESTER United squad including Alejandro Garnacho were due to arrive in Malaysia on Monday for a friendly, less than 24 hours after finishing the club’s worst season since 1974. United beat 10-man Aston Villa 2-0 on Sunday at Old Trafford but manager Ruben Amorim has a huge rebuilding task over the summer to revive the fortunes of one of the world’s biggest football clubs. Amorim afterwards apologised to fans for the “disaster” of a campaign, which saw them finish 15th in the Premier League and beaten 1-0 by Spurs in last week’s Europa League final. Hours after beating Villa,…

A TOP World Health Organization official deplored Monday that none of the agency’s trucks with medical aid had been allowed to enter the Gaza Strip since Israel ended its blockade. Humanitarian aid has begun trickling back into the Palestinian territory in recent days after more than two months of blocked access. For more than 11 weeks, “there has been no WHO trucks entering into Gaza for medical care support”, the WHO’s Eastern Mediterranean regional director Hanan Balkhy told a press conference in Geneva. “The situation is devastating. We are not only worried about the immediate work that we are supporting,…

US President Donald Trump called his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin “crazy” on Sunday after Moscow launched a deadly barrage of drones against Ukraine, even as the warring countries completed a large-scale prisoner exchange. At least 13 people were killed when Russia launched a record number of drones against Ukraine overnight to Sunday. “I’ve always had a very good relationship with Vladimir Putin of Russia, but something has happened to him. He has gone absolutely CRAZY!” Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform. “I’ve always said that he wants ALL of Ukraine, not just a piece of it,…

SOUTH Africa’s firebrand opposition leader, Julius Malema on Saturday vowed to keep using controversial chants that featured in a contentious White House meeting between the US and South African presidents. During talks in Washington on Wednesday, US President Donald Trump ambushed his South African counterpart Cyril Ramaphosa by showing a four-minute-long video in support of his claims of a “white genocide” in the country that overcame decades of apartheid. Malema, a 44-year-old opposition politician, was the main character in the video, seen in several clips wearing the red beret of his populist, Marxist-inspired Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party and chanting…

GHANA’s Foreign Affairs Minister has announced that the country has temporarily closed its embassy in the US capital amid an investigation into an alleged visa scam. Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa said the embassy will be shut following the “damning findings” of an audit team he put together to investigate alleged corruption at the Washington diplomatic mission. The statement added that the closure would last “a few days” until a “restructuring and systems overhaul” is finalised. According to Ablakwa, a locally recruited staff member and “collaborators” were allegedly involved in a “fraudulent” scheme whereby they extracted money from visa and passport applicants.…

MANCHESTER City, Chelsea and Newcastle secured places in next season’s Champions League as Liverpool lifted the Premier League trophy after a 1-1 draw against Crystal Palace on a dramatic final day of the season on Sunday. A record-equalling 20th league title for Liverpool and relegation for Ipswich, Leicester and Southampton had long since been decided, leaving the focus of attention on the battle for European places. Liverpool and Arsenal had already secured their place in the Champions League by finishing in the top two, while Tottenham will join them after winning the Europa League on Wednesday. City ensured a disappointing…

ISREALI forces have killed nearly a dozen Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip in the last 48 hours, while thousands more face the threat of imminent starvation amid an intensifying humanitarian crisis. On Sunday, four-year-old Mohammed Yassine joined dozens of other children who have starved to death in recent days as the World Food Programme (WFP) warned that more than 70,000 children in Gaza face acute levels of malnutrition. As well as causing starvation deaths, Israel has intensified its bombardment and ground offensive in Gaza, killing some 600 people in nearly a week. Eleven-year-old Yaqeen Hammad, a popular social media…

UKRAINE’s military said Sunday it had shot down 45 Russian missiles and 266 attack drones in eight hours as Moscow launched a second straight night of major air strikes, killing at least 12 people. “Most regions of Ukraine were affected by the hostile attack. Enemy air strikes were recorded in 22 areas, and downed cruise missiles and attack UAVs (drones) fell in 15 locations,” the air force said on Telegram. Meanwhile, Russian strikes have killed at least 12 people in Ukraine overnight into Sunday, officials said, as Kyiv and Moscow traded fire amid an ongoing major prisoner swap. Ukraine’s emergency…

A MAN slept outside in a car park overnight in Kenya with his wife and infant son in January, consumed by confusion and disbelief. The family, refugees from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), had been expecting a flight to the US for resettlement in just hours’ time. But after US President Donald Trump suspended the US refugee programme just two days before the family’s scheduled departure, the man was told their flight to America was abruptly cancelled – less than 24 hours before take-off. “I didn’t have anywhere else to go,” the man, who asked to go by the…

THE last time that foreign ministers from both continents met, Russia had not launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the war in Sudan had not begun, and France had not lost its influence in Africa’s Sahel region, where its military departed from last year. Foreign ministers from the European Union (EU) and African Union (AU) on Wednesday vowed to strengthen cooperation for peace, security, and economic partnership between the two continents, stressing the urgency of moving from commitments to implementation. Their pledge resulted from the third ministerial EU-AU meeting in Brussels, which the European Council said took stock of progress…

KYLIAN Mbappe virtually wrapped up the European Golden Shoe award with a brace as Real Madrid beat Real Sociedad 2-0 on Saturday, on an emotional home farewell to Carlo Ancelotti and Luka Modric. The Italian is leaving to coach the Brazilian national team, drawing a curtain on his second spell at the club where he won 15 trophies during a total of six years in charge. Croatian midfielder Modric will play at the Club World Cup for Madrid but this was his final game at the Santiago Bernabeu. He was given a guard of honour when replaced late on. Real…

AN Israeli strike has killed nearly the entire family of a Khan Younis doctor while she was at work, Gaza health officials said. The attack hit the home of Alaa al-Najjar, a paediatrician at the southern city’s Nasser Hospital, on Friday, setting it ablaze and killing nine of her 10 children, according to the head of the hospital’s paediatrics department, Ahmad al-Farra. Al-Najjar’s husband is severely wounded, and the couple’s only surviving child, 11-year-old Adam, is in critical condition, Gaza’s Government Media Office said in a statement. The dead children, two of whom remain under the rubble, range in age…

AT LEAST 427 Rohingya, Myanmar’s Muslim minority, may have perished at sea in two shipwrecks on May 9 and 10, the United Nations said, in what would be another deadly incident for the persecuted group. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees(UNHCR) said in a statement on Friday that – if confirmed – the two incidents would be the “deadliest tragedy at sea” involving Rohingya refugees so far this year. “The UN refugee agency is gravely concerned about reports of two boat tragedies off the coast of Myanmar earlier this month,” UNHCR said in the statement, adding that it was still…

JOSEPH Kabila, the ex-president of the Democratic Republic of Congo, has lashed out at the government of his successor – calling it a “dictatorship”. The 53-year-old made a 45-minute speech live on YouTube on Friday evening from an unspecified location a day after the Senate lifted his immunity from prosecution. DR Congo’s authorities intend to charge the former president with treason and war crimes, linking him to the Rwandan-backed M23 rebels, who have taken control of several towns in the east. Kabila, in power between 2001 and 2019, said he had broken his silence because he felt the unity of…

SOUTH Africa’s latest crime statistics debunk claims that a genocide is being committed against white people, the country’s police minister has said. The widely discredited allegation was amplified by US President Donald Trump on Wednesday, in an extraordinary meeting with his South African counterpart Cyril Ramaphosa. Trump told Ramaphosa that white farmers in South Africa were being killed and “persecuted”. On Friday, South African Police Minister Senzo Mchunu said that between January and March, five out of the six people killed on farms were black and one was white. The white victim lived on a farm, while the black people…

MANCHESTER United have told some staff working at their Carrington training ground that they will lose their jobs in the second round of redundancies since Sir Jim Ratcliffe bought into the club last year. Club insiders say the actual process, which could lead to 200 staff losing their jobs, has been ongoing for a number of weeks, with most staff already aware if they are to remain at the club or not. However, BBC Sport has been told some staff connected to the first team were not informed of their fate until Friday so that preparations for Wednesday’s Europa League…

UNITED Nations chief Guterres says the aid Israel allowed into Gaza amounts to a “teaspoon”, says Israel continues to delay aid distribution. More than 50 Palestinians were killed or remain missing after an Israeli air strike on a residential building in northern Gaza. Gaza’s Health Ministry says 29 children and elderly people who died in recent days in Gaza have been registered as “starvation-related deaths”, and thousands more are at risk of starving. Meanwhile, Reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum reiterates that the limited humanitarian aid that has been allowed into the enclave so…

A UNITED States judge has issued a temporary restraining order against an effort to prevent Harvard University from enrolling foreign students. Friday’s ruling comes in response to an emergency petition filed earlier in the day in the federal district court of Boston, Massachusetts. President Donald Trump is furious at Harvard — which has produced 162 Nobel prize winners — for rejecting his demand that it submit to oversight on admissions and hiring over his claims that it is a hotbed of anti-Semitism and “woke” liberal ideology. His administration has already threatened to put $9 billion of government funding to Harvard…

THE US will impose new sanctions on Sudan after finding it used chemical weapons last year in the ongoing civil war against the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the state department has said. US exports to the country will be restricted and financial borrowing limits put in place from 6 June, a statement from spokesperson Tammy Bruce read. A Sudanese government spokesperson described the accusations as “baseless claims with no supporting evidence”. Both the Sudanese military and the paramilitary group the RSF have previously been accused of war crimes during the conflict, which they have denied. More than 150,000 people have…