The Labour Party (LP) Presidential candidate, Peter Obi, on Thursday, assured millions of his teeming supporters that he will not abandon his mandate. Obi, while addressing a wired press conference at the Transcorp Hilton’s Plateau hall, Abuja, reiterated that the party will be heading to court to reclaim his mandate. Obi, who noted that the election will go down as one of the most controversially conducted in Nigeria, added that “Nigerians have been robbed.” Also, Atiku Abubakar, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, rejected Saturday’s presidential election results, saying the exercise was the “worst in the history of the country.” Mr Abubakar, who addressed journalists in Abuja, on Thursday evening, revealed that the outcome of the election, which favoured the All Progressives Congress (APC)’s Bola Tinubu, would be challenged in court.
The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) boosted supplies by 120,000 barrels per day to 29.24 million barrels per day, with Nigeria accounting for two-thirds of the increase as its output reached a one-year high, according to a Bloomberg survey. Nigeria has pumped 1.44 million barrels per day in February, the survey showed. Other OPEC members largely held output steady, as the group adhered to quotas fixed late last year to keep global crude markets in balance amid a fragile recovery in demand. Group leader Saudi Arabia has pledged that the targets will remain in place until the end of 2023.
Former Ghanaian President, John Mahama, on Thursday, launched a campaign to run again as a candidate for the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the 2024 elections, saying his experience could help salvage the economy. Despite being defeated in the 2016 and 2020 elections by incumbent President, Nana Akufo-Addo, the 64-year-old said he had decided to run again after months of consultations. “At this stage, Ghana demands experience and not experiment,” he told supporters clad in the party’s green, red, black, and white colours in the NDC’s Volta Region stronghold. “Ghana needs a leader who will hit the ground running on 7 January 2025,” he said, referring to the inauguration following the 7 December 2024 ballot. The NDC will hold primaries on 13 May to elect its presidential candidate. Mahama is being challenged by three others, including a former finance minister, Kwabena Duffuor.
French President, Emmanuel Macron, reiterated, on Thursday, that Paris has no intention of returning to past policies of interfering in Africa. He arrived in Libreville, on Wednesday, at the start of a four-nation African tour aimed at resetting relations with the continent. “I prefer to be very clear and explicit in meeting you today,” he said in remarks to the French community, “In Gabon, as elsewhere, France is a neutral interlocutor, which speaks to everyone, and whose role is not to interfere in domestic political issues.” “I’ve decided on a new strategy for all our military bases in Africa. And I have asked the defence minister and the chief of the defence staff to work with their counterparts to adapt our military arrangements,” he said. Macron insisted that the reorganisation was “neither a withdrawal nor disengagement, but adapting an arrangement” with allies.