BBA House Winner: Dillish has some deals up her sleeves.

Namibia’s Dillish Mathews emerged winner of the Big Brother: The Chase last Sunday after 91 days in the Big Brother house to scoop the $300,000. She spoke with journalists immediately she was announced winner.

You got nominated five times for eviction; at what point did you think that you were okay for the game?
I think probably the second time I was saved from eviction, I got the feelings that I was okay for the game sort of. You know you just have the instinct that tells you everything is going to be okay.

Did you ever believe Africans would believe in you and were going to vote for you?
Yes, definitely, I did because there is always somebody that you know out there would appreciate you and cares about you because I have been watching the show and there is this feeling that I had towards it and I gave a bit of chance to everybody in the show and so I just knew there is someone out there working.

Are you really a true princess that you purport to be?
Yes’ I am princess because Steven, my boyfriend gave it to me while Africans gave me the biggest votes.

What was your intention for entering the Big Brother Africa show?
My friend, Maria and I had always wanted to do the show, we are big fans of the show and she knows how much I love it. Last year we wanted to enter but we could not make it and so we were not just bothered because when the show is not for you, it is not just for you. So this year, she entered alone and out of her own will, she just grabbed the form and filled in for me too. Surprisingly, I made it through and she didn’t but fortunately Big Brother called her at the last minute and gave her a through pass too. It was just a thing that we both wanted to do badly and we made it happen.

What is your message for the Namibians who supported you till the end of the show?
I am really proud of my country people and I hope they are proud of me.  I am very happy they have been taking good care of me and that they are protecting and praying for me. I love them so much I cannot wait to meet them again.

Is winning the game one of your biggest stories and how are you going to share it with the world on the part of charity?
Definitely, this is one of my biggest stories. I just won it and I don’t have the slightest idea of what to do with the money. I just budgeted to spend three weeks of my life to spend here and then eventually I made it to 91 days and won, so yes, it is the biggest highlight of my life. For African Magic, this is my African story and I have shared the story of life and childhood. People are afraid to come out and talk about these things but I made it open that it is okay to talk about abuse, separation, negligence and so on and for me that is the message that I have, that it is okay to talk about your life history, it is not a taboo so don’t try to hid anything, just feel free and be real.

You have been in the House for 91 days, so how are feeling right now psychologically?
Emotionally, I am happy and psychologically, if you were watching the show, I used to talk to the fish, in the mirrors and anything, so I was a little going kuku in there. So there comes a stage in the house when you are like normal and you change and keep fluctuating and then you become kuku and then real. So psychologically, I am fine and better but it was a bit scary when I walked out of the house and saw so many people because I have been used to just my housemates for a while, so it is going to take a while for me to adapt again and get used to meeting other people. It is crazy in there, you guys will not understand because in the house there is a different world entirely.

Now that you are out of the BBA House what are your next plans?
I just got out and I have no idea what the story is out there. I don’t know who have a deal for me and whose deal I can take and whose deal I can decline. I am just going to take it one step at a time. I don’t want to rush into things and I don’t want to let thing pass me by and so I just want to take it step by step.

What was your best moment in the House?
I think one of my best moments is when I discovered that I have always wanted to be a princess and then just entering the House with my best friend Maria.

When you entered the house, you had a viable relationship like others in the House but normally when they get into the House they start dating fellow housemates due to the situation in the House. How did you manage to survive this and were you ever tempted to try something out with one of the guys in the House?
Yes, there were temptations but I made it clear to the housemates that I am an honest person.  I won’t lie, I won’t come into the house and see handsome men with six pack who usually come in and take off their shirt and I say no don’t see anything, I see only Steven. No I did see and I was like wow, handsome but I didn’t make moves because I believed that when you are in a relationship, if you are going to break up, let it not be me that caused it, so that I can go back saying it is not my fault but yours and that was what I had in mind and I stayed true to myself. And if the relationship breaks up it is due to him and not me.

If you were not engaged to Steven, who in the House would you have dated?
I had said the Bolt is really handsome when you look at him, but the stuff that comes out of his mouth is such a turn off, if not Bolt… How can I say this? I don’t want to make it sound funny in way. Yes, Maria and Melvin had a little thing going on but he is really handsome, he has a six pack, so if Steven wasn’t there, it would probably be Bolt or Melvin.

When you made the top five, at least you knew you were close to the money, what were your plans for the money and now that you have the money what would you do with it?
I made it very clear from the beginning that I just want to get a house for my siblings and myself to be together. It might sound like something stupid but I never had that family atmosphere of being together but now I can go and do that. And I had told my siblings that before they turned 18, we all will be in a house together and look what happened!

What is the most important thing that you missed out there when in the Big Brother House, apart from your boy friend, Steven?
I would say basically that I missed my siblings because they are like children to me and my grand father and the outside world in general like having the freedom to walk to a shop and have whatever I want without being watched by the camera.

When was it that you started losing conscious of the camera?
When I became the Princes and was free to talk to the fish, mirrors; that was when I was like, the cameras are just part of the decoration and so I won’t take it any more as cameras through which people are watching me, so I can say basically that I lost consciousness of the cameras when I was in delusion in a way.

Will you share your money with your best friend Maria?
No! I will not.

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Summer School

As the summer holiday continues with opportunities for children to do something different from the usual class activities, most parents are seeking ways to make it the best time of the year for their wards,

School is out and this period, more than any other season, has the potential to give experiences that could become life-changing moments and long-lasting memories for children. Expectedly, most parents are cashing in.

Joyfully helping her mum to arrange her lunch box, she had a perfect mood for the occasion. 12-year-old Morayo Omogbenigun was excited about her enrollment at a summer camp somewhere in Victoria Island where she would gain skills in arts, music and drama.
In the past, she has heard endless tales from her classmates on what they did during summer breaks and that has made her grin with envy.

“Now I know I can also join in the conversations of happenings during the holiday.  I have always loved to sing and act in a drama but I have never had the opportunity. During the past years my mum had enrolled me in cooking classes but this year her friend advised her to bring me here and am happy she accepted because the whole experience will change everything about me, especially as I become bold to take on any activity,” She explained with a beam.

Though the culture of summer camp that offers rich experience outside the four wall of a classroom may still be low in Nigeria, interestingly parents are taking the advantage of the available few to engage their children. For the two long months until school begins again summer break offers a period where children are relieved of their educational and routine school curriculum activities. Clearly, summer holiday allows the kids to engage in activities that can broaden and illuminate their mental, emotional and physical well-being for them to start up a new class.

In some cases, summer break provide that opportunity for the children to travel to see countryside or outside the country in order to either meet with friends and family members or to relax and explore.


“We don’t live in Nigeria, but we often come around because our dad lives here,” said Sade Shonibare, who arrived in Nigeria recently from Dublin with her younger sister.
Summer holidays for Sade have always been a part of her growing up years. She had visited Nigeria many times in the past with memorable tales of her visit.

She said:  “Last year, we went to Terra culture in Victoria Island and it was just the normal activities we do every time but this year proved to be a bit different because our dad enquired from a friend who directed him to enroll us in a music, drama and dance school called Society for the Performing Arts in Nigeria (SPAN) and I must confess to you that pray for that friend of his every morning because the whole experience has ignited a positive spark in me.”

Like most organizations and societies that organise summer lessons for kids in Lagos, SPAN has nevertheless maintained its tradition of engaging the audience whether children, youth, families or the elderly to inspire them to grow in their artistic experience with a heightened sense of humanity and social responsibility.

So summer lessons for SPAN are like extending its hands of acceptance to kids in area they show genuine and effortless interest.
“The whole idea is to bring back the African culture, and one way that we can achieve that is by imbibing the cultural values in the children,” explained Benedicta Etieene who is the head of drama department at the society’s office.

According to Etieene, “the whole experience is to build capacity, achieve more and open the minds of participants to something different from what they are used to in every day school life; something apart from the usual school home works and assignments.”
She further enthused that apart from teaching and interacting with them, the summer camp which lasts for four weeks also gives them the platform to express themselves.

“I guess maybe that’s why the issue of summer camp and holidays were even instituted anyway because it gives an avenue for them to see new people and see things differently which is a different ball game from what they do in school which is why I often advice parents to occupy their wards with something worthwhile,”  she noted.


Yes, parents are still divided on the role of summer camps and how children should spend the holiday.
“My daughter has learnt and changed so much in this past few weeks that it just leaves me in great awe,” enthused  Mrs. Lovina Unegbu, a writer and cousellor  who sent her daughter to a summer camp class at Ikeja on a friend’s recommendation.

“Now she is so bold and quite creative. The summer class has stirred up her creative gifts such as drawing, which we never even noticed in her before now. So the idea of moving beyond sending her to just a swimming class has paid off. “Parents should learn to give their children the best things of life that they did not enjoy no matter how little it is because it’s just every parent’s dream for their children to be better than them and It’s just adorable how the smallest moment can have the biggest impacts in a child’s life and help them to be the most creative person in all ramifications.” Unegbu said

For Ms. Anita Sizzlers, an elementary school teacher in Port Harcourt, the idea of getting children completely off school work during summer should be avoided.  She said: “I don’t really buy the idea of exclusively leaving my kids to learning skills and leave out their core educational requirements. It is paramount to let the children be actively prepared for their new classes and not be overwhelmed with life skills activities at summer camps.”

She continued: “For my children, I do take them to where they would learn musical instruments, meet new kids and indulge in child-friendly games but that takes place in the afternoon because in the morning, their private teacher comes over to show them things they are expected to see in their new class and that for me is striking a good balance between life skills and their education which is even more important to me.”

According to experts, one of the challenges facing kids in Nigeria is that just a few of them are confident and courageous enough to express their feelings during their early stage and summer camps could help to reverse the trend.

A Creative Director in a summer school, Joshua Oluchukwu, emphasized that children learn more with their five senses  and concurred on the fact that it is what they get acquainted to early in life that helps shapes their future.

“This is the more reason why we are soliciting for these whole activities to be actively brought back to our educational system and academic curriculum, not just for them to exist in highbrow schools but also in average school for average income earners. Because for us, we go round schools to teach them all these things but it’s just not enough for them because it needs to be part of their daily school or weekly activity.

“In the academy I work for, We try to do exercise that will help their memory, timing, consciousness and concentration and I must confess that Its been wonderful to truly transform kids and watch them go home  positively transformed because the joy that this whole activity gives to kids is not something that melts away overtime, it stays there and continually helps their self esteem and communication,” he observed.

But unfortunately, most children whose family income can barely send them to school never attend summer classes, they either spend the whole break helping out with house chores, going to the market with their parents or even hawking on the streets and highways to raise fund for the next school year.  Fingers are not equal..

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Mob Kill Two Customs Officers over Death of Motorist

Comptroller General of Customs, Alhaji Inde Dikko Abdullahi

Angered by the shooting of a motorist by some officials of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS)  attached to the Seme Border, a mob thursday attacked the Customs post, killing two officers.
But the Customs gave the casualty figure as one.

The attack came barely eight weeks after a Customs officer allegedly shot and killed a pregnant female passenger and three weeks after another person, one Friday Poku, was allegedly killed at the Seme Border.
THISDAY gathered that when the news of the shooting of the motorist, simply identified as Saturday, filtered into town, he was said to have been killed in the incident. This prompted some youths to take to the streets to protest the alleged recklessness of the Customs officers.

Although they did not get the officer suspected to have killed the motorist,  the mob intercepted some senior Custom officers who were on their way to work and allegedly killed two of them. They also burnt their car.
It was gathered that the protest by the youths, which spiralled out of control, was fuelled by the lingering feud between the community and the service personnel who are stationed there.

According to some residents, the killings of people of the community by Customs officers have become so rampant that the youths could no longer watch such an incident continuing with little or nothing being done to bring the suspected killers to book.
One of the community members who spoke to THISDAY on condition of anonymity, said the officers usually cover their tracks by branding their victims smugglers.

The angry youths, chanting war songs, were said to have barricaded the major road during the protest. They later marched on the Customs office in the area during which they burned a patrol van.
It took the prompt intervention of the Divisional Police Officer (DPO), Seme Division, Mohammed Mu'Azu, a Chief Superintendent of Chief Police (CSP), and the border patrol unit of the Nigerian Army, headed by a colonel, to restore normalcy to the area.
However, Custom sources claimed that Saturday was shot while trying to escape after attempting to smuggle bags of rice across the border to Benin Republic.

The source told THISDAY that the suspected smuggler was not dead, but he was injured and was at the moment recuperating in an undisclosed hospital in the area.
But eyewitnesses said Saturday had engaged the yet-to-be identified Customs officer who shot him in an argument, which escalated and resulted in the officer opening fire on him.
But the Customs has debunked such claims, stressing that its men were attacked because they have conscientiously tried to stop smuggling in the area.

In a statement made available to THISDAY, the Customs spokesperson, Ernest Olottah, a Deputy Superintendent of Custom (DSC), said only one official was killed.
He said: "It is with heavy and sorrowful heart, the Seme Area Command of the Nigeria Customs Service announces the gruesome killing of one of our senior officers by some smugglers in the Ashipa area of Seme on Thursday, August 29.
"The deceased Customs officer while in his official uniform unarmed and driving to the command's headquarters for a routine meeting, was accosted by a mob which forced him out of his vehicle.

"Buoyed by an identified chief of the community, the officer was murdered in cold blood and his vehicle set ablaze.
“It is worth noting that the intensification of our anti-smuggling operation which has led to over 686 seizures since January 2013 has placed us in the danger of attacks like this from criminals."
He alleged that those being prevented from using the borders for nefarious activities were behind the attack.
"Our operatives due to their uncompromising stance against smuggling and protecting the nation's economy have come under series of attacks by smugglers and some unpatriotic elements who see smuggling as their right.

“In some cases, attempts  made at disarming some of our operatives in the recent past were rebuffed. Comptroller Othman Abdu Saleh, Customs Area Controller of Seme Border has in collaboration with sister government agencies, including the police, commenced moves to bring the perpetrators of the heinous crime to book.
"The comptroller posits that this unfortunate incident will not deter operatives of the command under his watch from carrying out their lawful duties," he added.

culled from THIS DAY Newspaper

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First Bank Predicts 10% Decline in Loan Growth

First Bank

First Bank of Nigeria Holdings Plc, owner of First Bank Nigeria Limited Thursday forecasts slower loan growth of 10 per cent for this year due to the new monetary policy regulation.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had at its last monetary policy committee meeting raised the Cash Reserve Requirement (CRR) for public sector funds to 50 per cent, warning about the risk of excess liquidity in the banking industry. The central bank had also directed lenders to lower fees and commissions starting from April 1 to reduce conflict with clients.

First Bank Holdings’ loans declined by 1.2 per cent in its first-half financial statement this year due to cut in retail credit and exposure to downstream oil and gas industries, Bloomberg quoted the financial institution’s Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Bayo Adelabu, to have said in an investors’ conference call.

“We’ll target power, manufacturing and telecommunications sectors for lending in the second half, and do more investment banking to mitigate the impact of regulatory rules,” Adelabu said.

First Bank’s net income for the first-half was little changed at N46.1 billion from N45.3 billion a year earlier. Its revenue increased by eight per cent to N194.9 billion while interest expenses climbed 32 per cent to N38 billion.  Also, impairment charges for loan losses rose nine per cent to N10 billion.

The Lagos-based lender plans to increase its revenue as much as 15 per cent in 2013, down from 31 per cent in 2012, according to Adelabu.
First Bank’s share price dropped by 2.6 percent to N15.75 on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) Thursday.

Allizzwell...

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CON-NEC-TION

This is a Nigerian term which implies "Networking". It simply means i know you to an extent, and you in turn know someone of a good status quo and high significance who also knows another individual and this goes on to further build a link that can be helpful to you in the following respect:

• The position of Power
• Financial matters
• Social events
• Intellectually and morally
• Global relevance
• Spiritually
• Maritally......e.t.c

You should be aware that the association you make may make you or mar you. So choose wisely today. 

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IG of Police MD Abubakar set to remarry

According to a report by Sahara Reporters, Nigeria's Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Abubakar is getting ready to re-marry a year and a half after loosing his wife, Maryam Abubakar, to cancer. (Mrs Abubakar died in January 2012)

IG Abubakar will be engaging in a three-day wedding ritual to 35 year old Safiya (pictured above with him). Their wedding proper will take place on Saturday September 14th. Pretty lady..

Sahara Reporters obtained a photo from a series of photos taken during a photo shoot in preparation for their grand wedding. Congrats to them.

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ROCHAS ,NGIGE ANGRY WITH JONATHAN FOR MAKING ENUGU INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

Finally President Jonathan has sealed one of  his 2015 come back promises as the President,.Today AKANU IBIAM INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT received the first International Flight ,ETHIOPIAN AIRLINE and every where was agog and happiness extended..but, wait a minute, not even one member of APC was present. Sources in Imo state Government house said that the Governor was gloomy and angry, as he said to have been pacing about cursing at everybody that helped to make it work,maybe he hates Alaigbo so much that he prefers we go back to caves, just because he wants to appease APC. These are the faces of individuals present at the Akanu Ibiam International Airport, Enugu as the first international plane as at the time of departure.
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