Apple Buys Chinedu Echeruo’s Hopstop.com for $1 Billion

Apple has bought Mr. Chinedu Echeruo’s Hopstop.com for one billion dollars, The Wall Street Journal’s publication, AllThingsDigital has reported.

Founded in 2005, Hopstop.com makes mobile applications for both iOS and Android that covers over 300 cities and that helps people get directions or find nearby subway stations and bus stops. Terms of the deal have not been disclosed as at the time of this report.
Echeruo, formerly an analyst at the investment banks and hedge funds, founded Hopstop.com in 2005.

Echeruo is now Chairman of the Board for Hopstop, has been compared to Israel’s Waze, which was recently acquired by Google for $1 billion. The move is seen as Apple’s plan to bolster its map offering, especially given Google’s recent acquisition of Waze.
A serial entrepreneur, Echeruo grew up in the Eastern part of Nigeria and attended Kings College, Lagos.

PDP GOVS TO BOYCOTT NGF MEETING • New leadership may emerge —Okauru

GOVERNORS elected under the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) may not attend today’s meeting of the Nigerian Governors Forum (NGF), convened by the Governor Rotimi Amaechi’s-faction of the group.
The PDP-faction led by Governor Jonah Jang of Plateau State has kicked against the meeting, saying that it was self-serving and an attempt to foist an unacceptable leadership on the body.
The administrator of the Jang-faction Osaze Onaiwu confirmed to Nigerian Tribune in Abuja on Sunday that the PDP governors would not attend the meeting.
He said that those convening the meeting were the same people that caused problems in the NGF leading to its split.
Onaiwu argued that if the PDP governors were to attend the meeting, it would be an indictment on President Goodluck Jonathan, who would then be seen as the person behind it’s crisis.
The factional NGF Administrator alleged that the All Progressive Congress (APC) governors’ motive for calling the meeting was indeed to indict Jonathan.
He added that the next set of governors must be allowed to reorganise the governors’ forum and choose their own leaders.
Onaiwu also rejected the role of the Director-General of the Amaechi-led NGF, Ashihana Okauru, saying that he has no right to write letters inviting the PDP governors to the meeting.
Onaiwu said if such letters were to be written, he would have been the one to do it or write them in conjunction with Okauru.

HOW JONATHAN OUTSMARTED APC – ABATI

The Special Adviser, Media and Publicity to the President, Mr. Reuben Abati, says President Goodluck Jonathan was able to outsmart the All Progressives Congress by quickly conceding defeat and congratulating the President-elect, Muhammadu Buhari.
Abati said prior to the presidential election, the APC had threatened to form a parallel government and had even predicted that Jonathan would be like former Ivorian President, Laurent Gbagbo, who refused to leave office despite losing and was eventually dragged before the International Criminal Court.
However, Abati said in an article titled, ‘Right of Reply: Olusegun Adeniyi’s Trip to Babel,’ which was published on his official website, that Jonathan would forever be remembered as a hero who put his opponents to shame.
He said, “By his very unusual and highly symbolic act of graceful concession, President Jonathan snatched glorious victory from the jaws of seeming defeat. He outsmarted his traducers and became, overnight, a hero of global proponents of true democracy in Africa.

MASSOB DECRIES MEMBERS ARREST OVER NUMBER PLATE

The  Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB), yesterday decried the arrest of its members by the police over Biafran Plate Number.

Addressing newsmen in Onitsha, Anambra State, the MASSOB Regional Administrator for Awka South, Chief Arinze Igbani expressed surprise that MASSOB members should be arrested over plate number when the law allows anybody to own plate number names.

“Why must they arrest our members over Biafra plate number when individuals and groups have their names as plate numbers”
“Our leader, Chief Ralph Uwazuruike, directed us to put Biafra plate number which we did and the police are disturbing us.
This is a slight on us and we will not continue to allow them to disgrace us”, he warned.
The MASSOB administrator recalled that one of their members was arrested by the Fegge Police Station and transferred to Awka, State capital where he has been detained over use of Biafra plate number.

EFCC RE-ARRAIGNS SYLVA FOR N2.45BN FRAUD

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission on Monday re-arraigned a former governor of Bayelsa State, Mr. Timipre Sylva, before a Federal High Court in Abuja for fraud involving about N2.45bn.
The accused allegedly committed the offence between October 2009 and February 2010 as governor of Bayelsa State.
He pleaded not guilty to all the six counts when he was re-arraigned before Justice Evoh Chukwu on Monday.
The former governor also has similar charges pending against him before Justice Ahmed Mohammed of the Federal High Court in Abuja.
Sylva had earlier pleaded not guilty to the Monday’s six counts when he was first arraigned for the offences before Justice Adamu Bello (retd) on June 5, 2012.
The matter had to start de novo (afresh) following the retirement of Justice Bello, a development which prompted Sylva’s re-arraignment before Justice Chukwu on Monday.

The prosecuting counsel, Mr. Festus Keyamo, who signed the charges, accused Sylva of offences, including conversion of various sums of money belonging to the state with the aim of concealing their illicit origins.

OIL PLATFORM FABRICATION: IJAW YOUTHS DRAW BATTLE LINE

The Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) on Sunday reacted to the controversy between the presidency and the owners of the multi-million dollars Egina Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) facility over the decision of the federal government to relocate the fabrication from LADOL yard in Lagos to Agge in Bayelsa State.

They said they would not allow materials fabricated in Lagos to be used in the platform in the Niger Delta region.
The IYC’s reaction is subsequent to an interim order of the federal High Court, Lagos, stopping the federal government from implementing the directive.
According to the IYC in a statement by its spokesman, Comrade Eric Omare, "We want to make it clear that whether court injunction or no court injunction, we would not allow materials to be fabricated in Lagos and used to build oil platform in the Niger Delta region. Niger Deltans have been taken for granted for too long and we would no longer accept it.

COURT ORDERS GTB TO REFUND CUSTOMER’S N5.3BN

A High Court of the Federal Capital Territory in Apo, Abuja, on Monday ordered Guaranty Trust Bank Plc to refund N5.3bn illegally withdrawn from the account of one its customers, Dr. Ted Edwards.
Justice Valentine Ashi, in his judgment, ordered that the N5.3bn should attract 10 per cent interest from Monday, when judgment was delivered, till the time the money was paid back to the owner.
The court also ordered that the money should attract another 21 per cent interest from December 12, 2014 when GTB allowed the illegal withdrawal, until the fund was eventually paid back to Edwards.
The judge, while reviewing the case in his judgment, held that the bank did not have any defence to its action of the withdrawal of the total sum of N5,240,516,186.21 from the customer’s account and thereby ordered the bank to pay the money to the owner through his Zenith Bank Plc account.
Edward, a lawyer of Edwards and Partners Law Firm, had initiated the suit, FCT/HC/CV/939/2015, in January 2015 following the alleged illegal withdrawal of the money on December 12, 2014.
The money was paid into the plaintiff’s law firm’s account with the GTB on January 2, 2014 by the Accountant-General of the Federation, Jonah Otunla.

BUHARI WILL GET 21-GUN SALUTE, ARMY ALERTS PUBLIC

The Guards Brigade of the Nigerian Army on Monday in Abuja alerted the public on firing of artillery guns for Presidential Inauguration and Swearing in Ceremony come May 29.

This was contained in a statement issued by Maj. Charles Ekeocha, the Assistant Director, Army Public Relations in the Guards Brigade.
The statement quoted Ekeocha as saying “rehearsal for the Presidential Inauguration and Swearing in Ceremony has commenced since May 4 at the Eagle Square, Abuja.
He said the rehearsal involved firing of the traditional 21 gun salute.
He stated that “the practice session for the 21 gun salute will take place on May 20 and May 25, and on the inauguration day, May 29.

YOU’RE AN HYPOCRITE, FAYOSE REPLIES FALANA

Ekiti State Governor, Mr. Ayo Fayose, has faulted a claim by a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mr. Femi Falana, that he (Fayose) was providing cover for armed gangs to operate in the state, saying such comment is “ridiculous and nonsensical.”
Falana, while reacting to Fayose’s ‘Save Our Soul’ message to the Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Solomon Arase, in a statement on Sunday, had blamed the governor for the increasing wave of kidnapping in the state, saying armed thugs had been given immunity by the impunity in the state.
He cited the example that the armed thugs had, in connivance with state government, occupied and shut the House of Assembly since November 2014.
But the governor, in a statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Mr. Idowu Adelusi, in Ado Ekiti on Monday, wondered why the Lagos-based lawyer would always keep silent whenever All Progressives Congress-controlled States are involved.
He asked, “Is this not hypocrisy? And Falana did not find it important to ask those All Progressives Congress-controlled states what they have done with their workers’ salaries if truly he is a human rights activist as he claims to be.

PRESIDENT JONATHAN DISSOLVES CABINET TOMORROW

Barring last minute change of plan, President Goodluck Jonathan will tomorrow dissolve his cabinet, Daily Trust has learnt.
A presidency source told our correspondent yesterday that the president would dissolve the cabinet after a valedictory session scheduled to hold inside the Council Chambers of the Aso Rock Presidential Villa, Abuja, Wednesday morning.
The source also confirmed that the Wednesday’s Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting would be the last in the life of the administration of President Jonathan.
He said the president would use the opportunity to thank his cabinet members and request prayers for the country.
The valedictory council session, prayers would also be offered for the incoming government of General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd).