Electron Native

The rescued Dapchi schoolgirls are now in the General Hospital in Dapchi and are awaiting profiling by the military. A parent of one of the girls, Ali Abdullahi, said that all the girls were in their various homes now. ‘’Immediately the insurgents dropped them from the truck that they were brought in around 8 a.m., the girls all ran home. “Now, the Army told us to bring them to the hospital for checking. “As you can see some of the parents are not willing to let their daughters out of their sight. But the Army are insisting,’’ he said. Vehicles have been stationed at the hospital to convey the girls to Damaturu. Most of the girls at the hospital looked malnourished and wore Hijab (Islamic head and body cover).

The Federal Government on Wednesday confirmed the release of 76 of the 110 abducted girls from the Government Girls Science and Technical College (GGSTC), Dapchi, Yobe. A statement by the Minister of Information and Culture,  Lai Mohammed in Abuja, said the 76 girls were released from captivity in the early hours of Wednesday. Mohammed confirmed that the 76 girls were those who had been documented so far, adding that the process for the release of others was ongoing. ‘‘The girls were released around 3 a.m. through back-channel efforts and with the help of some friends of the country, and that it was unconditional. ‘‘For the release to work, the government had a clear understanding that violence and confrontation would not be the way out as it could endanger the lives of the girls, hence a non-violent approach was the preferred option. ‘‘Within the period when the girls were being brought back, operational pause was observed in certain areas to ensure free passa...

An academic from Cambridge University who harvested data on millions of Facebook users said he has been made a scapegoat by the social network and a UK-based political consultancy that have been accused of trying to sway public opinion for Donald Trump. Courtesy, Betanews Facebook has been rocked this week by a whistleblower who said that Cambridge Analytica, a UK-based political firm hired by Trump for the 2016 campaign, had improperly accessed information on 50 million Facebook users. The company has lost 60 billion dollars of its stock market value over the last two days over fears that its dealings with Cambridge Analytica might damage its reputation, deter advertisers and invite tougher regulation. Facebook has said the data was harvested by Aleksandr Kogan, a psychology academic, who created an app on the platform that was downloaded by 270,000 people. It says he then violated its policies by passing the data to Cambridge Analytica. “The events of the past week ...

The Nigerian Government has confirmed the release of the abducted 105 students of Government Girls’ Science and Technical College, Dapchi in Yobe. Senior Special Assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, gave the confirmation in Abuja on Wednesday. Shehu said that the girls were on their way home from the kidnappers’ den. The girls were kidnapped by suspected Boko Haram terrorists after an invasion of the school on Feb. 19. (NAN)

A new research study has shown that fake news spread more quickly and widely than truthful ones on Twitter. These are even distributed more by people than at automated 'bots' according to the  researchers report in Thursday. A study by Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT, researchers examining about 126,000 stories shared by some 3 million people on Twitter from 2006 to 2017 found that false news was about 70 per cent more likely to be retweeted by people than true news. The study, published in the journal Science, was one of the most comprehensive efforts to date to assess the dynamics behind how false news circulates on social media. Twitter and other social media companies such as Facebook have been under scrutiny by U.S. lawmakers and international regulators for doing too little to prevent the spread of false content. U.S. officials have accused Russia of using social media to try to sow discord in the U.S. and interfere in the 2016 U.S. president...

Snapchat owner Snap Inc will cut over 120 engineers and reorganise its engineering team, according to a company memo report on Thursday. The maker of the Smartphone app known for popularising disappearing messages has been under pressure from investors to reduce costs after revenue fell short of analyst expectations during Snap’s first year as a publicly traded company. According to the memo from Jerry Hunter, senior vice president for engineering, the Southern California Company will offer a package of benefits to those being laid off. The layoffs were earlier reported by news website Cheddar. According to the memo, Snap has scheduled a staff meeting for March 14 to explain the reorganisation and answer employees’ questions. “The shakeup will unify the entire engineering organisation as a single team,’’ Hunter wrote. 

An ecologist, Richard Inyamkume, has advised stakeholders in the agriculture sector to address the issue of bush and waste burning, because of it adverse effect on the soil fertility. Inyamkume, the Senior Programme Officer, Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation Initiative, (CCMAI) gave the advice in Abuja on Thursday. According to him, such practice destroys soil fertility and causes harm to agriculture development. “Bush and waste burning have negative impacts on ecosystems, particularly soil, air quality and the environment. “The habit of setting bushes and wastes ablaze have negative implications. “Apart from causing harm to agriculture, bush and waste burning also cause the destruction of physical and chemical properties of the soil,’’ Inyamkume said. According to him, when the fire is set on the bush, the soil moisture is seriously affected. “It also exposes the soil to erosion, thus when the rains start dropping, erosion becomes a threat and a major c...

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Thursday that African countries should weigh Chinese loans carefully, while adding that Washington was not trying to keep Chinese investment away from the continent. Tillerson, a former Exxon chief executive, is seeking to bolster security alliances on a continent increasingly turning to Beijing for aid and trade. He may also seek to smooth relations after U.S. President Trump reportedly dismissed some African nations as “shithole countries” in January. Trump later denied making the comment. “We are not in any way attempting to keep Chinese dollars from Africa,” Tillerson told a news conference in the Ethiopian capital during his first diplomatic trip to the continent. “(But) it is important that African countries carefully consider the terms of those agreements and not forfeit their sovereignty.” He arrived in Ethiopia, Africa’s second most populous nation, on Wednesday and visited the African Union headquarters on T...

The African Development Bank (AfDB) says it will offer 300 million dollars to financial intermediaries to support the Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa (AFAWA). Mr Ebrima Faal, the Senior Director, Nigeria Country Department, AfDB said this at the 2018 International Women’s Day (IWD) commemorative event organised by the bank on Wednesday in Abuja. Faal was represented by Mr Late Lawson-Zankli, the Manager of Operations in the Bank. He said the theme of this year’s event was “Time is now: Rural and Urban Activists Transforming Women`s lives.” According to him, the objective of AFAWA is to unleash women’s economic potential by enabling more businesses operated by women access available and affordable finance. “We want to achieve this by mobilising about 300 million dollars to financial intermediaries through a partnership driven approach, by measuring impact and by supporting financial system in Africa,” Faal said. He said AFAWA had four components whi...

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Wednesday has welcomed Nigeria’s exit from economic recession and praises its strong recovery as its foreign exchange reserves improves. IMF said this in a report released on Wednesday in Washington DC by its Executive Board after the conclusion of Article IV Consultation with Nigeria. According to the report, the Executive Directors of IMF welcomed Nigeria’s exit from recession and the strong recovery in foreign exchange reserves, helped by rising oil prices and new foreign exchange measures. They commended the progress in implementing the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan, including the convergence in foreign exchange windows, tight monetary policy and improvements in tax administration. IMF, however, said that though, the Nigerian economy has exited recession, it still remained fragile and susceptible to shocks. “The directors noted, however, that important challenges remain as growth in the non-oil, non-agricultural sector ha...

Facebook Inc Chief Executive Officer, Mark Zuckerberg, sold nearly 500 million dollars in the company’s shares in February to fund his philanthropic investment vehicle, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI), regulatory filings showed. The move is not a surprise, being part of Zuckerberg’s plan to expedite stock sales to fund the initiative he set up in December 2015 with his wife Priscilla Chan. Two security filings on Thursday showed that Zuckerberg sold 685,000 shares worth 125.4 million dollars in the last three days of February. This had taken his total sales in the month to about 2.7 million shares worth 482.2 million dollars. Zuckerberg said in September he would sell 35 million to 75 million shares of Facebook over the next 18 months. That would amount to up to 13 billion dollars, based on Facebook’s current share price. The Silicon Valley billionaire has said he will donate 99 per cent of his Facebook shares to CZI – worth about 45 billion dollars when the init...

Afolabi Imoukhuede, the Senior Special Assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on Jobs Creation and Youth Employment, says usage of Google, a search engine, will change job narratives in Nigeria. Imoukhuede made the assertion on Thursday at the unveiling of Google’s new Job Search Feature in Lagos. According to him, the job world is really evolving and government is partnering with the private sector to make the needed change. “The economic strategy of Federal Government to tackle unemployment is going to be both private sector/government-driven. “There is need to attack the problem of unemployment headlong and partnering with platforms like this will make things easy. “Government’s focus is how to turn youths into assets and not liability,’’ the president’s aide said. Also, Ayodeji Adewunmi, the Co-founder, Jobberman, said that unemployment rate in the country was a massive social problem that needed urgent attention. Adewunmi said tackling unemployment should no...

The European Commission on Thursday urged companies and EU member states to toughen up their approach to terrorist and illegal content on the internet. The commission Vice President Andrus Ansip said the European Commission has also recommended concrete measures but stopped short of introducing EU-wide legislation to tackle the issue. “With ever more people turning to the internet as their prime source of information, the EU’s executive is trying to curb the proliferation of terrorist propaganda and illegal content, ranging from child pornography to consumer scams. “What is illegal offline is also illegal online,’’ Ansip said, stressing the need to “react faster” to online content threatening citizens’ security, safety and fundamental rights. The recommendations include provisions for companies to remove terrorist content within one hour of it being flagged, faster overall procedures to detect and remove illegal content as well as safeguards for freedom of expression and...