TheNewsGuru

Tag: President

  • We are sorry for enthroning Trump President, Twitter co-founder apologises

    We are sorry for enthroning Trump President, Twitter co-founder apologises

    The co-founder of Twitter, Evan Williams, on Saturday apologised for the social media platform’s role in Donald Trump’s victory in the last United State’s presidential election.

    Williams made this known in an interview with the New York Times on Saturday, saying he recently learned that President Trump said he believed Twitter put him in the White house.

    Williams said, “It’s a very bad thing, Twitter’s role in that,” he said. “If it’s true that he wouldn’t be president if it weren’t for Twitter, then yeah, I’m sorry.”

    The White House did not respond to a request for a comment on Williams’ statement, reports said.

    The 45-year-old entrepreneur criticised the internet for rewarding extremes calling it, “broken”.

    Trump has often used Twitter to dispute reports seen in the news.

    Recently, Trump took to the social media platform to deny that he or his campaign had any involvement with Russia in influencing the results of the presidential election.

    “Again, the story that there was collusion between the Russians and Trump campaign was fabricated by Dems as an excuse for losing the election,” he tweeted on May 12.

    In another tweet this week, the U.S president described the media’s reporting of the matter the “single greatest witch hunt of a politician in American history.”

    But Williams said he was wrong for thinking that the world would be a better place if there was a platform for everyone to freely speak and exchange ideas.

    “Some would say that’s what we deserve for giving the power of tweets to Donald Trump,” he said in a speech at the University of Nebraska this month.

     

  • Hassan Rouhani re-elected President of Iran

    Hassan Rouhani re-elected President of Iran

    Iranians have re-elected President Hassan Rouhani.

    He led with 58.6 percent of the vote, compared with 39.8 percent for his main challenger, hardline judge Ebrahim Raisi, according to near-complete results broadcast on Saturday.

    Although the powers of the elected president are limited by those of unelected Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who outranks him, the scale of Rouhani’s victory gives the pro-reform camp a strong mandate.

    Rouhani’s opponent Raisi was a protege of Khamenei, tipped in Iranian media as a potential successor for the 77-year-old supreme leader who has been in power since 1989.

    “I am very happy for Rouhani’s win. We won. We did not yield to pressure. We showed them that we still exist,” Mahnaz, a 37-year-old Mahnaz reformist voter told Reuters on Saturday.

    “I want Rouhani to carry out his promises.”

    Rouhani, known for decades as a mild-mannered member of the establishment, campaigned as an ardent reformist to stir up the passions of young, urban voters yearning for change.

    During one rally he referred to hardliners as “those who cut out tongues and sewed mouths shut”.

    In a debate last week he accused Raisi of seeking to “abuse religion for power.”

    The rhetoric at the debate earned a rare public rebuke from Khamenei, who called it “unworthy”.

    The big turnout appeared to have favoured Rouhani, whose backers’ main concern had been apathy among reformist-leaning voters disappointed with the slow pace of change.

     

  • Imo Customary Court of Appeal president, Justice Okpara dies

    Imo Customary Court of Appeal president, Justice Okpara dies

    The Imo State government on Thursday confirmed the death of the President of the customary court of Appeal in the state, Justice P. I Okpara.

    A statement in Owerri, the state capital which was signed by the chief press secretary to the governor, Sam Onwuemeodo, stated that the jurist died after a brief illness.

    The statement read, “The governor, His Excellency, Owelle Rochas Okorocha, has received with rude shock the unfortunate death of the President of the State’s Customary Court of Appeal, Owerri, Justice P.I. Okpara, who died after a brief illness.

    The governor and the Rescue Mission Government in the State highly regret the death of Justice Okpara at this time when his services both to the people of the State, the bench, and the bar were mostly needed.

    The governor said the State Government would liaise with the family to give the Judicial Icon the kind of burial he deserved.

    The governor has also extended his Condolences to the heads and staff of all the departments of the Judicial arm in the State, over the demise of this great jurist.

    He urged all Imo people to pray for the family members of the late President of the Customary Court of Appeal and ask God to give them all they need to bear this great loss.

    The governor prays the good Lord to grant the soul of Justice Okpara eternal rest”.

  • Crowd pelt Venezuela’s President’s convoy with eggs, stones at parade

    Crowd pelt Venezuela’s President’s convoy with eggs, stones at parade

    Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s convoy was pelted with objects by members of a crowd at a military parade upon his (the president) return from a trip to Cuba.

    The incident occurred at San Felix, a town in the southern Bolivar region, during a military parade held to welcome him from the trip.

    A live television broadcast of the event showed the president in an open vehicle, surrounded by a security detail, as the crowd began throwing objects at him.

    However, the broadcast cut away shortly thereafter.

    Press reports identified the objects thrown by members of the crowd as eggs and stones, adding that five people were arrested as a result.

    Opposition deputies calling for Maduro’s ouster seized the opportunity to ridicule the socialist leader on social media.

    “Nicolas, the people of San Felix love you and want to feed you: that’s why they threw eggs, tomatoes, vegetables, banana peels and other things,’’ opposition leader Henry Ramos Allup said on Twitter.

    National Assembly president and opposition deputy Julio Borges called for elections, saying that the people of San Felix and all Venezuelans “reject Maduro and repudiate his dictatorship.”

    The official newspaper Correo del Orinoco, however, published a photograph of Maduro greeting the public during the parade with the caption: “President Maduro thanks the people of Bolivar for receiving him with such passion and love.”

    The incident occurred amid escalating protests against the government, following an attempt by the Supreme Court to strip the opposition-controlled National Assembly of its powers. (dpa/NAN)

     

  • Somalia swears in new president, vows to restore dignity

    Somalia on Wednesday sworn in its new leader, President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed in Mogadishu, the country’s capital amidst tight security.

    The new leader promised to restore dignity to the troubled Horn of Africa nation but warned that it will take another two decades to “fix” the country.

    President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed, who also holds U.S. citizenship, was elected earlier this month in a step toward Somalia’s first fully functioning central government in a quarter-century.

    “Multiple challenges are ahead of our government. Therefore, I am telling people that because of the limited resources we have, our achievements will be limited,” said Mohamed, also known as Farmajo. “For the past 26 years, there have conflicts and droughts, so it will take other 20 years to fix this country.”

    He said Somalia’s main obstacles are insecurity and humanitarian crises, including a drought that the U.N. has said affects millions of people. The immediate priority is to “avert famine,” the U.N.’s special representative for Somalia, Michael Keating, told the audience that included several regional heads of state.

    The new president said his government will focus on “reconciliation, justice and law and the restoration of the confidence of people in the government.” He already has promised to tackle graft in a country recently ranked by Transparency International as the world’s most corrupt.

    Mohamed also promised payments, equipment and training for the military, which over the next few years will take on more of the responsibility of countering homegrown extremist group al-Shabab as an African Union peacekeeping mission of more than 20,000 plans to withdraw by the end of 2020.

    Somalia’s new leader has already vowed to make security a priority in a country where al-Shabab still carries out deadly attacks in the capital, Mogadishu, and elsewhere. On Sunday, a car bomb in the capital killed at least 34.

    The Islamic extremist group earlier this week denounced Mohamed’s election and vowed to keep fighting. Fighters affiliated with the Islamic State organization also have emerged.

    The new president said his government would welcome people who choose to leave al-Shabab, adding that “you few thousands cannot stand in the way of 12 million people.”

    The peaceful transfer of power to Mohamed has been widely praised, and an International Crisis Group commentary on Wednesday said the new president’s wide appeal “the strongest platform for any Somali president, is a rare demonstration of unity in the ethnically homogenous but clan-fractured country.”

    But if the new leader can’t manage the “inordinately high expectations … dissatisfaction could trigger a serious public backlash,” the commentary said.

  • I will be Vice, President of Nigeria soon – Fayose declares

    Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP Governors Forum and Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose has said he will soon emerge as Vice President and subsequently as President of Nigeria.

    Fayose revealed this on Monday during a live interview on African Independent Television, AIT.

    In his words: “It is not by power. It is destiny. I did not believe it when I became Ekiti governor after eight years of leaving office.

    “I will be the vice president of Nigeria, even the President very soon.”

    The governor also took time out to criticize the recently installed chairman of the party, Senator Ali Modu-Sheriff.

    Speaking further, the Governor criticized the embattled national chairman of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, PDP, Ali Modu Sheriff.

    “He is a general without an army. If democracy is about people and party politics is about people, tell Senator Ali Modu Sheriff to bring out the people behind him.

    “You will see all the senators at our own meetings, who are those behind Sheriff?

    “When holding a press conference, they will use camera to control them like this, just about three of them,” Fayose said.

  • Turkmen President wins election, secures third term in office

    Turkmen President wins election, secures third term in office

    Turkmen President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov has secured a third term in office by winning a widely-expected landslide in Sunday’s election, preliminary results showed on Monday.
    Berdymukhamedov won 97.69 per cent of the vote with a turnout of 97.27 per cent, the Central Election Commission said.
    Berdymukhamedov, 59, has run the former Soviet republic of five million people with an iron fist for a decade after succeeding equally autocratic president-for-life Saparmurat Niyazov, who died in 2006.
    Eight other candidates ran in the Sunday vote, all of them public servants, managers of state-owned companies or nominees of political parties completely loyal to the government.
    In 2016, Turkmenistan amended its constitution in a way that could allow Berdymukhamedov to stay in power indefinitely, removing the 70-year age limit for presidential candidates and extending the presidential term to seven years from five.
    TheNewsGuru.com reports that Ashgabat, the capital of energy-rich Turkmenistan, has been recognized by Guinness World Records as having the world’s highest density of buildings made from white marble.
    The city boasts 543 new buildings clad with white marble, covering a total area of 4.5 million square meters. The Guinness website says that if the “marble was laid out flat, there would be one square meter of marble for every 4.87 square meters of land.”
    Berdymukhammedov was also honored by the Turkmen parliament on May 25 with the honorary title of “Distinguished Architect of Turkmenistan” for his “titanic efforts put into the political, economic, and cultural development of our beloved Motherland.”
    Meanwhile, according to a new report by Amnesty International, Turkmen citizens are deprived of basic human rights such as freedom of movement and freedom of the press, while the political opposition is routinely harassed, political freedom is limited, and elections are anything but free and fair.

     

    NAN

  • Germany elects Frank-Walter Steinmeier as President

    Germany elects Frank-Walter Steinmeier as President

     

    Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany’s former foreign minister, has been elected as the country’s new president, the 12th person to hold the largely ceremonial post in the post-war era.

    TheNewsGuru.com reports that Steinmeier on Sunday won 931 out of 1,239 valid votes cast by the members of the Federal Assembly, which is made up of 630 federal members of parliament and an equal number of delegates from 16 states.

    “Let’s be brave, because then we don’t have to be afraid of the future,” Steinmeier said in his acceptance speech.

    He said the world faces “rough times,” but that Germany, as a functioning democracy, had the responsibility to fight for stability.

    German Chancellor Angela Merkel congratulated Steinmeier and said she was convinced he would be an excellent president who would have the support of the vast majority of the people.

    “This is a good day for Germany,” Merkel said.

    A seasoned Social Democrat politician who had served as foreign minister until last month, Steinmeier had the support of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s “grand coalition” of centre-right and centre-left parties.

    “I would like, as federal president, to be something of a counterweight to the current tendency towards boundless simplification,” Steinmeier, 61, said before the election.

    While on a tour of Germany to promote his candidacy, Steinmeier emphasised mutual respect, strengthening democracy, taking a broader view, tolerance and solidarity as the ideas that will inform his presidency.

    His predecessor, Joachim Gauck, steps down on March 18.

    TheNewsGuru.com reports that the German president has little executive power, but is considered an important moral authority and symbol of the country as its host for visiting dignitaries.

     

  • FG congratulates new Somalian President

    The Federal Government has congratulated newly elected President of the Republic of Somalia, Mohammed Abdullahi Farmajo.

    The Acting President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo sent the congratulatory message on Sunday.

    In a statement by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Mr. Laolu Akande, the Acting President also congratulated the people of Somalia on the successful conclusion of their electoral process.

    Osinbajo described the process as an important step in consolidating democracy and fully restoring law and order in the country.

    He said Nigeria remained committed to supporting the peace, security, stability and development in Somalia and looks forward to working with Farmajo on other key areas of shared interests and mutual concerns such as the fight against terrorism and security-sector reforms.

    The Acting President also noted that the successful efforts of the Somali security forces and the African Union Mission in Somali and their invaluable role in ensuring a safe and secure environment during the electoral process.

    “This successful election is a landmark achievement for the people of Somalia in particular and Africans in general. It is remarkable that our continent is marching forward with democracy across all of its frontiers. This is a goal that we share with the people of Somalia,” Osinbajo said.

  • Buhari on vacation, nobody can force him to speak if he doesn’t want to – Presidency

    In a swift response to calls in some quarters for the president to address the nation to ascertain his health status, the presidency has said the president is on vacation in London and nobody can force the president to speak if he doesn’t want to.

    TheNewsGuru.com recalls that there was tension in the country during the weekend as some sections of the media reported that the president has passed on in an undisclosed London hospital.

    The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, in an interview with CNBC Africa, insisted that Buhari’s trip to London was not on medical ground.

    He said, “The President is in London on vacation. He is not in any hospital and he is not ill.

    “When he was travelling last week, the statement we put out was that he was going on vacation and during the vacation, he would do routine medical check-up and nothing has changed from what we pushed out last week.

    “If anybody has fed something else into the rumour mill, that is just what it is — rumour.”

    Asked if Buhari would be willing to talk to Nigerians from the UK, Adesina said such a decision could only be taken by the President himself.

    “The fact that he is a President, he still has his rights. Compelling him to come out and talk will be infringing on his rights.

    “The President will talk if he wishes to. If he doesn’t wish to, nobody will compel him to talk.

    “The truth is that the President is on vacation and he has given a date on which he will return to work,’’

    TheNewsGuru.com reports that the president has handed to over to Vice President Yemi Osibajo and he is expected back in the country on February 6.