Leicester scored one in the second half through their Youngster player, Gray. More photos of the match after the cut.
BIGUPS MANU...
Sunday, September 25, 2016
PHOTO:Paul Pogba scores first goal as Man U demolish EPL champions Leicester city 4-1
Leicester scored one in the second half through their Youngster player, Gray. More photos of the match after the cut.
Photos from the traditional wedding of Orobosa, daughter of Esama of Benin, Chief Gabriel Igbinedion
Edo State, yesterday,the traditional marriage ceremony of Umar Mantu and Orobosa, daughter of Esama of Benin, Chief Gabriel Igbinedion and his Jamaican born wife, Lady Cherry Igbinedion. Next stop is the white wedding which is coming up next weekend. See their pre-wedding photos and and photos from her bridal shower held yesterday, after the cut.
CIBN Conference: Ajibola Highlights Importance of MSMEs in Economy Recovery
The President, Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria, Prof. Segun Ajibola, says the financial services sector must redirect the economy to the path of recovery by channeling a major part of their loan portfolio to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises financing. He spoke in Abuja at the 10th edition of the Annual Banking and Finance Conference, tagged, ‘Innovation in the financial services sector: Driving Nigeria’s new economy.’
Ajibola noted that the economic recession in the country could be traced to years of “skewed economic structure” as manifested in the monolithic nature of the source of Federal Government foreign exchange earnings.
He said, “Our economy has been overstretched with the level of foreign exchange reserves hovering around $25bn, perhaps the lowest in recent decades and barely able to support six months import bills.
I believe this is the time the financial services sector needs to play some catalystic roles to redirect the economy path of recovery, growth and development.”
In a bit to recover the economy, Ajibola stressed the need to give MSMEs necessary support through a lasting initiative modelled after countries like Malaysia and South Korea.
The CIBN President said, “Nigeria has experimented with multitude of policies and programmes aimed at supporting this lower end of the economy with minimal results.
“Perhaps, one way of entrenching a lasting initiative is to benchmark the models already successfully implemented in countries such as India, Malaysia, South Korea and Indonesia where the contribution of micro businesses to the GDP hovers around 75 percent. He added, “South Korea, for example, recovered from the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997 through the SMEs. In 1999, the SMEs accounted for 81.9 percent of industrial employments and 74.3 percent of total manufacturing in the country.
“We should also be prepared to accept the truism that the promotion of this segment of the economy can succeed if only the various institutions and agencies provide their complementary roles of providing the enabling environment, infrastructural base and funding support.”
Earlier, the Governor, Central Bank of Nigeria, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, in his Keynote address, had emphasized the importance of an improved payment system to sustainable economic growth.
He noted that the successes recorded in the e-payment space in the country were made possible through programmes aimed at migrating transactions from cash to electronic payments.
Emefiele said, “In order to sustain this progress, the CBN launched the second the second phase of the National Strategy in September 2013, aimed at ensuring safety, improving efficiency and integrating effectively into the global payments system through compliance with international standards.
The CBN governor stated that Nigeria’s transaction-to-fraud rate had dropped significantly in 2015 to 0.01 percent, representing a 63 percent reduction.
Nelly says he and Shantel Jackson aren't engaged
The 42 year old rapper, who has two children doesn't seem ready to settle down yet. Two days ago there were rumours he had proposed to his girlfriend of over two years, Shantel Jackson after she shared a pic that looked like he'd proposed. Nelly has denied it via his IG page but says they are working on it. He dated Ashanti for nearly 10 years...
Photos: President Buhari arrives Abuja, declares his UNGA71 outing, a success
At the conclusion of his five-day activities during the 71st Session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA71), President Muhammadu Buhari declared that he had a very successful outing.
Addressing the media to round off his visit to New York, the President reviewed all his major and side events during the visit and highlighted the issues on which he sent a clear and direct message to world leaders.
"I highlighted the need for the international community to work together to liberate humanity from poverty, save our planet from the devastation of climate change and rid the world of terrorism for a more peaceful and prosperous future," he said.
President Buhari also stressed that, “I mentioned that the plight of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) arising from Boko Haram terrorism is of particular concern to us. For this reason, we have taken concrete steps to address their humanitarian needs and to ensure that necessary conditions are established to enable the voluntary return of the displaced persons to their homes in safety and dignity.”
While acknowledging that "Nigeria as a developing country has been adversely affected by the global economic downturn,” he however, stressed that “we are undeterred and have embarked on a wide range of reforms in our efforts to diversify our economy and shift emphasis to mining, agriculture, industrialization, infrastructure development and the creation of the enabling environment for Foreign Direct Investment."
He also noted that “fighting corruption remains of prime importance to our administration,” adding that the campaign is already yielding positive gains including significant stolen assets recoveries.
The President stated clearly Nigeria’s position on Climate Change, development in developing countries, youth development, statehood for the Palestinians, and reform of the UN Security Council with Nigeria ready to serve on a reformed Council to “advance international peace and security.”
President Buhari listed his meetings with world leaders and the benefits from some of the side events such as the US-Africa Business Forum during which discussions focused on how top American business executives “can collaborate with us to diversify our economy, which will in turn drive development, job creation and general business development in Nigeria.”
He mentioned his meeting with top Nigerian professionals in the United States and the urgent need to reclaim the shrinking Lake Chad, even as he expressed delight that “some countries notably the United Kingdom and United States pledged additional support in the tune of US $391 million humanitarian aid for the Lake Chad region.”
President Buhari used the occasion of the media event to thank relevant United States authorities for efficient security and administrative arrangements and officials of the Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for demonstrating “that we still have capable officers in our Foreign and Civil Services.”
He commended the Nigerian officers for the “tireless effects in projecting a positive image to our country, even in difficult times.”
President Buhari did not forget members of the Nigerian media, as he thanked them for “going through elaborate security checks and clearance procedures to follow my activities and hectic schedule in order to keep all our people at home well informed of my meetings and engagements.”
Monday, August 8, 2016
11 mindblowing facts about Tesla’s Gigafactory
After months of endless construction, Tesla’s gargantuan Gigafactory in Sparks, Nevada welcomed guests and select members of the press for a celebratory grand opening event last week. To be clear, it will still take a few more years before construction on the factory is 100% complete, but Tesla was comfortable enough with the progress it has already made to give the world a bit of a glimpse inside the massive structure.
While the opening of a factory may seem uneventful if not downright boring in a general sense, Tesla’s Gigafactory is anything but ordinary. Aside from being a physically impressive structure, the Gigafactory’s existence in and of itself is plays a crucial role in Tesla’s quest to manufacture more than 500,000 cars per year by 2020. Now in order to get make that dream a reality, Tesla needs a whole lot of batteries; and because no company on earth can handle the level of battery production Tesla needed, the company up and decided to build its own battery factory, a colossal structure appropriately called the Gigafactory.
If all goes according to plan, the Gigafactory will eventually double the current level of global lithium-ion battery production. With the grand opening of the Gigafactory now behind us, we’ve put together a list highlighting some of the more interesting facts surrounding the building itself along with a summary of the resources and logistical efforts that went into its development and construction.
The Gigafactory will be the biggest building in the world
The Gigafactory measures in at 5.5 million square feet, easily making it the biggest building in the world in terms of its physical footprint. The closest building to the Gigafactory is Boeing’s Everett factory in Washington state with a square footage of 4.3 million.
To put the size of the Gigafactory into perspective, the following chart courtesy of Visual Capitalist lays things out clearly.
tesla gigafactory size
By the time the Gigafactory is 100% finished, it will occupy an approximate area of 13 million square feet.
Now in terms of overall volume, it’s worth noting that the Boeing factory does have the Gigafactory beat as it’s much taller.
The Gigafactory cost $5 billion to construct
When the dust settles, it’s believed that the amount of capital invested into the Gigafactory will come out to a cool $5 billion. Construction began in earnest in mid-May of 2014.
Battery production levels will be “faster than bullets from a machine gun”
Once the Gigafactory is finished and operating at 100% capacity, Tesla boasts that it will churn out more lithium-ion batteries in one year “than were produced worldwide in 2013.”
Speaking to this point, Elon Musk during an earnings conference call last year said: “Cells will be going through [the Gigafactory] like bullets from a machine gun. In fact, the exit rate of cells will be faster than bullets from a machine gun.”
Construction workers are on the clock 24/7
Per a recent report in The Wall Street Journal, Tesla now employs 1,000 workers who are on the job “seven days a week on two shifts in an effort to start churning out lithium-ion cells by late 2016.”
The Gigafactory will run on 100% renewable energy
Hardly a surprise, the Gigafactory will be completely powered by renewable energy. As Tesla notes on its website, “the Gigafactory will also be powered by renewable energy sources, with the goal of achieving net zero energy.”
The Gigafactory roof is white for environmental reasons
Tesla, a green company if there ever was one, is planning to outfit the entire Gigafactory roof with solar panels. In turn, the roof of the structure will be painted white in order to better reflect light, keep things cool, and ensure that the solar panels are as efficient as possible.
The building was designed to be earthquake proof
You ever spend a few billion on building a gigantic battery factory only to have an earthquake come along and mess things up? Yeah, Tesla would like to avoid that at all costs. According to a recent report in Fast Company, the massive structure is actually comprised of “four distinct structures with four different foundations so that an earthquake can’t tear it apart.”The Gigafactory foundation itself costs millions of dollars
The cost of the Gigafactory’s foundation alone set Tesla back $16 million
Tesla spent millions on steel
The steel structure underlying the Gigafactory itself reportedly cost $15 million.
Fireproofing + Electrical wiring
Fireproofing the Gigafactory cost an estimated $5 million while the electrical infrastructure reportedly set Tesla back $300,000
The Gigafactory will employ 6,500 employees by 2020
The Gigafactory won’t run itself, which is why the company anticipates that it will employ upwards of 6,500 at the Gigafactory once construction is fully finished.Thousands of firefighters battle forest blazes in Portugal
More than 4,400 firefighters battled hundreds of forest blazes of varying sizes across Portugal on Monday, authorities said, as the annual summer wildfire season hit a peak. The National Civil Protection Authority said on its website that by late afternoon almost 1,500 vehicles and 32 water-dumping aircraft were deployed at 702 wildfires, some of which have been burning for days.
A forest fire rages in La Palma on the Canary Islands, Spain. Spanish authorities have evacuated 500 more residents in the path of a five-day-old forest fire on the Atlantic island of La Palma. The regional government for the Canary Islands archipelago says the evacuation of two neighborhoods in the town of Villa de Mazo took place Sunday morning shortly after midnight as the fire spread through the hilly terrain.
It classified eight wildfires in the north of the country as major blazes that were out of control. The fires spread quickly through mostly pine and eucalyptus forests that are tinder-dry after weeks without significant rain. Daytime temperatures in recent days have exceeded 30 degrees Celsius (86 Fahrenheit) and in some northern cities exceeded 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) on Monday.
Despite the dramatic scenes no injuries were reported, though some families had to evacuate their homes and some farm buildings burned down. Forest fires commonly occur in Portugal, and elsewhere in southern Europe, in the summer. Portuguese firefighters blame poor forest management for the destruction of large areas of woodland each year.
Three major wildfires blackened swaths of forest near Aveiro, some 200 kilometers (120 miles) north of Lisbon, where one blaze was advancing along a five-kilometer (three-mile) front. Further north in Porto, the country's second-largest city, district authorities activated an emergency plan granting authorities special powers such as the requisitioning of privately owned heavy machinery. More than 100 army soldiers were called out to help.
Meanwhile, in neighboring Spain, authorities said Monday that firefighters had managed to bring a six-day-old forest fire on the Atlantic island of La Palma under control and were allowing evacuated residents to return to their homes.
The regional government for the Canary Islands archipelago said the measure affected 500 residents evacuated a day earlier from the town of Villa de Mazo. The fire claimed the life of one forest worker and has destroyed more than 4,000 hectares (9,900 acres) of forest on the volcanic island off the northwest coast of Africa.
An unnamed 27-year-old German man admitted to police that he had started the fire accidentally by burning soiled toilet paper. Some 350 firefighters, supported by four planes and eight helicopters dumping water, were battling the fire.
Friday, August 5, 2016
Cargo plane overshoots runway at Italy's Bergamo airport
A DHL cargo plane skidded off a runway at Bergamo's Orio al Serio airport early Friday, its nose busting through a perimeter fence and onto a provincial highway. Officials said no one was injured.
Firefighters work on DHL cargo plane that skidded off a runway at Orio al Serio airport overnight, busting through a perimeter fence and onto a provincial highway, near Bergamo in Northern Italy, Friday, Aug. 5, 2016.
Television images showed the plane's nose partially blocking a roadway, flanked by emergency vehicles, while a crane was moved into position to remove it. Italian aviation officials said the Boeing 737-400 overshot the runway on landing from Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport just after 4 a.m. The pilot and first officer were not injured. The cause was under investigation.
A witness, who lives 300 meters (yards) from the airport and was on his balcony at the time, said a few cars were driving along the road that runs next to the airport, but managed to stop in time. "It could have been a tragedy," Ezio Carissoni was quoted by the news agency ANSA as saying.
He also praised the pilot for maintaining a straight line and avoiding a full parking lot. The Bergamo airport is Italy's third-busiest, with over 10 million passengers last year.
I Am Still Boko Haram’s Leader – Shekau
BBC has reported that Abubakar Shekau, the disputed leader of Boko Haram, has said he is still in charge of the militant group.
This comes after the declaration of a new leader by ISIS yesterday.Shekau is said to have denounced the ISIS declaration that Abu Musab al-Barnawi is now the leader of the jihadist group.Shekau in an audio message accused al-Barnawi of trying to stage a coup against him.
Shekau also appeared to distance Boko Haram from ISIS, but still called its leaderAbu Bakr al-Baghdadi “caliph”.
He said that some in Boko Haram had stopped him communicating with al-Baghdadi.
“I was asked to send my ideology in writing to the caliph but it was manipulated by some people in order to achieve their own selfish interests,” he said.
He said he had sent 8 different letters to ISIS leaders but they did not act on them, only to hear the news that he had been replaced.
He then described al-Barnawi and his followers as polytheist.
Why Buhari Must Prosecute Looters – Emir Sanusi
Emir of Kano, Muhammad Sanusi II, has urged the government of President Muhammadu Buhari to recover looted funds from individuals and groups and also prosecute culprits to serve as a deterrent to others. Here are two interesting things to note from the lecture he delivered on the deregulation of the downstream oil sector and Nigeria’s economic development at the National Defence College, Abuja on Wednesday.
Nigeria is bankrupt:
“Nigeria is bankrupt; we are bankrupted by a policy that was foolish, that was unrealistic, and unsustainable, and by all means our refusal over the years to listen.
“We are surprised that we have an economic recession; we are actually surprised that we are in recession? We created the recession.”
Fuel subsidy was a scam
“The whole issue of fuel subsidy was set up to create an opportunity for a few people to make money, and it was presented in a manner that convinced everybody that it was for the poor.
“For every 30,000 metric tonnes of kerosene imported into the country, the Federation Account lost $20m. We were importing six to eight vessels per month for six years until this subsidy unload; the Federation Account was losing from $120m to $160m every month.
“This is just on kerosene; can you imagine a country losing $120m every month to a non-existent subsidy on kerosene, and not on the PMS.”
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