New here? Start with our FREE 3D Software
Build and render professional quality 3D scenes and animations. Over 2.3 Million Downloads!
Read more & Download FREE

Bundled free with studio

This Week’s Freebies
Hannah DavisHannah Davis how we love you, please let us see more of you. I would sincerely love seeing much more of Hannah, though sadly I don't think it will happen, but I can still dream.

Nicole Richie first made her name as Paris Hilton’s BFF in the hugely underrated and much-missed show, The Simple Life.
Ah, nothing says early noughties nostalgia like the thought of two heiresses cleaning out pig styes, does it?
Anyways, what many people didn’t know at the time is that Nicole got her famous name after being adopted by singing legend, Lionel Richie, and the 66 year old has now opened up about the adoption, and how he first took little Nic in as a favour for his friends.
Speaking on Piers Morgan’s Life Stories (yep, he’s back), Lionel admitted: “I went to a Prince concert and there on the stage in the middle of the concert was this four-year-old kid playing the tambourine.
“So I went backstage and I knew the mother and I knew the father and, of course, they were having difficulties with their relationship.
“I said, ‘While you are having the difficulty the kid is sitting out here in limbo so I’ll tell you what I’ll do, just put the kid in my house until the tour is over with and then we will sort this out later’.
“And so it took about maybe a year for me to just fall in love and she was a little button, and of course by that time I was Dad and so I said, 'OK here is what we are going to do, you’re going to make everyone wish that they had adopted you. You are going to make everyone in your family wish they actually had a chance to get you back,’ and that’s when I said, 'Let’s adopt her.'″
IS ANYBODY ELSE CRYING, IS IT JUST US?!
Nicole is now happily married to Good Charlotte frontman Joel Madden, and has two children - Harlow and Sparrow - but she faced a dark patch back in 2003, when she was arrested for possession of heroin.
Upon hearing the news, Lionel cancelled his tour in order to go into rehab alongside his daughter, explaining: “I sound like my father now, but I went to her and I said, 'When I was growing up I lost three friends, they were the hippest friends I ever knew in life … I said, 'It’s going to happen to your generation. I don’t want you to be in that list of three because after that you’ll be just fine’.
“Three months later her friend died of an overdose and I went back to her and very quietly, I was very shocked, and I said, 'I am sorry to hear that, that’s one.’
“And sure enough, one year later the second one died and I said, 'That’s two’ and I got a phone call and she said, 'Dad I need help, I don’t want to be the third one’.
“And I said, 'I am with you’ and I cancelled the tour. I said, 'Me and your mother’, who didn’t get along that well, 'Me and your mother are checking into rehab with you.'”
Well, you can’t deny that Lionel made good of his promise to his friends way back when Nicole was just a little four-year-old tot, and we bet that she wouldn’t swap her dad for the world.

Saraki and Ekweremadu
Saraki and Ekweremadu
Senate President, Bukola Saraki, and his deputy, Ike Ekweremadu, as well as other Senate officials on Monday shunned a scheduled hearing in a suit seeking their removal from office.
The removal of Saraki and the other principal officers is being sought on the grounds of alleged forgery of the Senate Standing Orders 2015 used for the conduct of their elections shortly after the proclamation of the 8th Senate on June 9.
Plaintiffs in the suit, which is before the Federal High Court in Abuja, are Senators Abu Ibrahim, Kabir Marafa, Ajayi Boroffice, Olugbenga Ashafa and Suleiman Hunkuni, all supporters of Senator Ahmed Lawan for the Senate presidency eventually won by Saraki.
The six defendants in the suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/651/2015, are Saraki, Ekweremadu, the National Assembly and the Clerks of both the National Assembly and the Senate.
None of the defendants was represented by their lawyers when the matter came up on Monday before Justice Adeniyi Ademola, to whom the case was re-assigned after he took over from Justice Gabriel Kolawole as the vacation judge of the Abuja Division of the Federal High Court.
While delivering a ruling during Monday’s proceedings, Justice Ademola noted that the choice of Monday for the hearing of the plaintiffs’ motion on notice seeking an order restraining the Senate from going ahead to constitute its standing and ad hoc committees was with the consent of lawyers to the parties to the suit.
ADVERTISEMENT
However, the plaintiffs’ counsel, Chief Mamman Osuman (SAN), withdrew the motion on notice during the proceedings, saying the essence of the application had been overtaken by event with some of the committees already constituted.
Justice Ademola, while striking out the motion on notice in a short ruling, noted that the application contained the same set of prayers that were in the plaintiffs’ ex parte application earlier dismissed by Justice Kolawole.
The plaintiffs had anchored their suit on the use of alleged illegitimate and unconstitutional Senate Standing Orders 2015 to conduct the election of the current leadership of the Senate on June 9.
The plaintiffs alleged that the Senate Standing Orders 2015 was “contrived” from the amendment of the 2011 version of the Orders without following its (the 2011 edition’s) relevant provisions and those of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
They argued that the said amendment was in breach of the “prescriptive procedures” stipulated by the extant provisions of section 60 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) and Rule 110(1), (2), (3), (4) and (5) of the Senate Standing Orders 2011 (as amended).
They therefore contended that the election of the current leadership of the Senate and other proceedings based on the unconstitutional Orders was null and void.
The senators are seeking, among other prayers, the declaration of the Senate Standing Orders 2015 as null and void for being a product of an alleged illegitimate and unconstitutional amendment of the 2011 version of the standing orders.

Miss Hannatu Kupchi
Miss Hannatu Kupchi
About 17 years after she was born through In Vitro Fertilisation, Nigeria’s first test tube baby, Miss Hannatu Kupchi, has secured admission into a Hungarian University to study medicine.
The medical doctor that supervised the first IVF experiment in Nigeria, Dr. Ibrahim Wada, said Hannatu’s birth on February 11, 1998, at Nisa Premier Hospital in Abuja, signalled a revolution in the practice of medicine in Nigeria.
Speaking on Sunday evening in Abuja during a brief reception and presentation of an award to Kupchi, he said, “When I was out of this country, I knew there were people who wanted babies. I made the decision to come back to Nigeria to help people. It happened on February 11, 1998 when this historic event occurred in this hospital.”
Responding, Kupchi promised to break barriers and become a doctor in order to help families and parents who are unable to give birth through the traditional means.
She said by her birth, misconceptions about IVF were broken and that many more children had been brought into this world as well.
“I barely made it beyond the cut off mark. God helped me. I am going to try my best and make everyone proud. I am studying medicine because I want to be a doctor. I want to study it because I want God to use me to help families who suffer what my parents went through,” she said.
In his remarks, father of Hannatu, Mr. Hosea Kupchi, said, “We had 13 years of marriage without a child and we went through the orthodox method without any success. But along the line, my sister-in-law told me that there was one Dr. Wada that had been helping couples. That is how we came

Bayo Olupohunda
Bayo Olupohunda
I will begin this piece by prefacing my thoughts today with the following questions about President Muhammadu Buhari, and the controversy over his recent appointments: Can a man, who was a serial presidential candidate, with supporters across the country now resort to cronyism as the number one citizen of a diverse nation such as Nigeria? Will a man, who in 2015 campaigned throughout the length and breadth of the country with supporters from different ethnic, religious backgrounds streaming to campaign grounds shouting Sai Baba, now turn around to promote a northern agenda as President?
Is Buhari really an ethnicist masquerading as a nationalist? Did he contest four times to be President just to do the perceived bidding of the North? Can a President, who came into power with a broad coalition of political parties representing different group interests, now turn around to promote sectional interest? Can a statesman, who had been a military Head of State and spent his entire life in public service, promote northern interest in this age and time? No, I hate to believe the President can be boxed into any of these stereotypes. Indeed, it will be a great betrayal for someone like me and ordinary Nigerians, if Mr. President still views Nigeria from the primordial North-South divide. I just hope the President is misunderstood in this matter of appointments.
Now do not get me wrong, as a Nigerian I am not insensitive to the long standing agitation and sentiments that have trailed appointments into public offices in our country. I have also followed since I came of age the debate about ethnic balancing in a nation long wracked by ethnic mistrust. I am also aware that our fault lines are so deep seated that they have caused tensions among the disparate ethnic groups that make up our country.
The need to ensure equity and prevent agitations such as the one that greeted Buhari’s appointments had necessitated the introduction of the Federal Character principle as enshrined in the constitution. Section 13 makes it clear that: “The composition of the Government of the Federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner as to reflect the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity, and also to command national loyalty, thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few states or from a few ethnic or other sectional groups in that government or in any of its agencies.”
Unfortunately, even with the introduction of the so-called quota system to promote inclusiveness in every areas of our national life, the cries of marginalisation continue to grow stringent by those who feel shortchanged by the system. The smaller ethnic groups have always felt dominated by the ‘big three’ ethnic groups. For example, there is the perception by the South that the North has a so-called ‘born-to-rule’ mentality.
The North is thought to have dominated governance and political appointments since independence. Due to the predominance of successive northern governments at the federal level, there is always the perception of a northern agenda in the distribution of resources. Even the so-called ‘dominant’ North felt marginalised after the death of former President Umaru Yar’Adua. Before the assumption of Buhari as President, the North had complained that the death of Yar’Adua had denied the region of the Presidency. As one of the world’s most deeply divided countries, every government in power faces a perennial challenge of incorporating diverse ethnic, regional and religious elites into stable power-sharing arrangements.
The imperative of ethnic power sharing has spawned Nigeria’s federal character principle, which constitutionally mandates the equitable political inclusion of indigenes of the country’s 36 federal states. Just as it is playing out under Buhari, a more informal principle involves the pervasive practice of distributing political patronage among six geopolitical zones.
Even with the power sharing arrangement, successive Nigerian administrations have faced bitter suspicions and allegations of ethnic domination and marginalisation. For example, the Goodluck Jonathan Presidency, in particular, provoked intense criticism and widespread opposition in the North for allegedly concentrating key appointments and headships of many strategic public departments and agencies among his Niger Delta kinsmen and the neighbouring South-East.
The concern about marginalisation has again returned under the Buhari government. Of all the decisions the President has taken so far, it is his appointments that have created tension and promoted the conspiracy theory of a northern agenda. His choice of appointees has re-ignited the cries of marginalisation with some Nigerians accusing the President of favouring the North. There is no doubt that this debate will dominate political discourse in the coming months.
Personally, I consider the appointment uproar as a distraction to the more urgent task of nation-building. Now, the fall out will further stoke up tension and worsen our national cohesion. Conspiracy theorists, disgruntled politicians and mischief makers are weaving different tales and creating fears among the populace. Disgruntled politicians are also using the opportunity to score political points.
In the midst of the national confusion that trailed the appointment, Nigerians are, sadly, not asking the pertinent questions that can refocus the narrative into a more productive one: What has appointment got to do with the national question and malaise that confront our nation? How has previous appointments impacted on the lives of the people? Or is it just the feel good factor that an appointee comes from the same geographical zone as one? Why the fixation on appointments? Why are Nigerians not demanding that our government address the real challenges facing the nation?
If you ask me, I do not think Nigerians should bother themselves with who holds which office so far the appointees can deliver. For example, what has been the contribution of our kinsmen who have held political positions in the past? How has the North benefitted from being perpetually in power?
Despite having been in power more than any other geopolitical zone, the North is reputed to have the worst development indices in the country today. It has the highest number of out-of-school children. Do these realities not render the controversy about lopsided appointment pointless? Let’s take a lesson from our immediate political dispensation. Former President Goodluck Jonathan was in power for six years, yet there were no significant development in the Niger Delta. Jonathan was the President and also had appointees from his ethnic group in various positions. Has the Niger Delta fared better? Was East-West Road completed in the years he was in power? Was Bayelsa transformed into Dubai? Even Otuoke, Jonathan’s hometown, reportedly lacks potable water. Now, it has taken Buhari, a President from the North to begin the clean-up of the environmentally degraded Ogoni after six years of a Niger Delta President. Who is fooling who?

President Muhammadu Buhari
President Muhammadu Buhari
It is important that President Muhammadu Buhari should not squander his political goodwill early in his administration. He will need that goodwill to manage and navigate through complex and difficult economic conditions ahead. This is one of the governance lessons from the failure of former President Goodluck Jonathan. The President clearly by the lack of clear fiscal action on the economy, his attempt to revamp the national airline, revamp the refineries rather than privatising them seem to be economically oriented to big and populist government in a period of constrained fiscal resources. Inevitable painful decisions are ahead on petroleum subsidy because they are not sustainable at least at present levels. We consume petroleum products far less as a nation than what we import. It has been estimated that at least 30 per cent of petroleum products get smuggled across into neighbouring countries due wide cross-border price differentials. Yet, the Nigerian government pays for this huge subsidy. We are essentially subsidising significantly fuel consumption in neighbouring countries at huge cost to the national treasury.
We support and commend the new transparency and anti-corruption stance of government. Resources previously unavailable such as the LNG dividends are now being discovered to be made available to the people. These liberated resources are however meagre compared to what is required to fix the infrastructure challenge and the rotten decay in social sectors like education, health and create jobs. The President will need to ask the nation to sacrifice at a point and negotiate the reordering of government fiscal commitments given meagre resources.
It is in this context that the President would need all the political goodwill when he would have to take inevitable difficult economic decisions. The outcry against the President’s perceived or real sectionally lopsided appointments, which could potentially squander his political goodwill should therefore alarm or give the President serious concern. President Buhari needs to ensure that he does not by commission or omission confirm the fear-mongering by the opposition during the presidential election that he would be a provincial President. This is another lesson to learn from the failure of former President Jonathan. He failed to remember consistently his national mandate and largely governed as a provincial President with “it is our turn” mentality screaming boldly out of his action and inaction.
ADVERTISEMENT
Wise kings surround themselves with wise counsellors. They know what wise counsel is and know where and how to find it. President Barack Obama surrounded himself with the very best of political and economic brains in the United States taking a leaf from Abraham Lincoln by appointing even his rivals like Hilary Clinton. His executive team had strong public, private or academic sector pedigree. The only thing you could disagree with was the ideological orientation of his appointments and that is if you are republican. President Obama even appointed his mentor in John Kerry, who gave him his first national speaking platform at the Democratic convention, as his Secretary of State. Obviously, President Buhari is justifiably concerned with widespread integrity and character issues in our national leadership cadre. He is putting integrity and character as key qualifying criteria for his political appointments. The President should however recognise that he needs women and men with a combination of character and competence and not just character alone in his government. Despite the public relations script of the Presidency especially on his latest appointments, the merit or technical competence in those appointments are largely debatable. Character and competence are not mutually exclusive in leadership or public service. They should not be a substitute for each other. President Buhari must find people who combine both and appoint them into his government. Public servants or leaders with competence and no character will steal us dry while those with character and low competence will largely run a confused government with technically competent but corrupt elites and civil servants running rings around them. Good intentions alone do not guarantee good governance. A public servant must know and understand policy issues and know what to do to perform.
The President also must show political savviness to hold together the “coalition of good” that brought him to power. He will need that coalition to govern in a democracy of plural interests where he does not hold absolute powers. This will call for being politically pragmatic without compromising his core values of integrity. Political pragmatism combined with good values is equivalent to political wisdom, that which is necessary to build contingent pro-active coalitions and consensus and also knowing when to exert uncompromising executive authority in order to move the nation forward. While the President must “belong to nobody” so that he is not held captive by vested interests, he must build a broad level of trust with the “coalition of good” that has brought him to power by sheer political pragmatism and savviness. This trust is critical to hold his political coalition together.
President Buhari must develop personal and emotional touch with his various constituencies while keeping them publicly and privately focused on the larger ideals of “greater good of the nation”, selflessness and good governance. The National Assembly crisis of the President’s political party suggests that he must raise his ante significantly in this area.
Finally, we address the subject of defeating corruption on an enduring basis. Values set at the top matters and we commend the President on this. Suddenly, the anti-corruption agencies woke up from a deep slumber and electricity is now more available without an additional dime of investment. Beyond values however, we must strengthen the institutions meant to fight corruption to ensure they continue to live up to their purpose after President Buhari’s tenure. The first task in this regard is to prevent the institutions from being captured by narrow and corrupt elite through the appointment of their lackeys into the leadership of those anti-corruption and law enforcement institutions including the regulators, the judiciary and the police. The President must be vigilant about nominees into his government, their nominators and their motives to ensure that these vested and narrow interests do not capture his government and critical state institutions even at policy level. The second task is to strengthen our electoral process and institutions to ensure free and fair elections and ensure that people’s vote truly count. There is a clear correlation between corruption in a country and its level of free and fair elections.

Tega Peter Odele
Nigerian athletes have called for better preparations and an improved selection for the country’s athletics teams ahead of future competitions.
Team Nigeria returned from the IAAF World Athletics Championships in Beijing, China with no medal from all the events they participated in. They failed once again to make any impact at the events as they could not capitalise on the success built in Moscow 2013.
An athlete, Sayo Daramola, believes the country will do well in future competitions if proper attention is paid to the selection of the right athletes for the team by the Athletic Federation of Nigeria.
ADVERTISEMENT
Daramola, who is a hammer thrower, said, “We have a lot to learn from what happened in China. Training towards the Olympics will now be a big challenge for every athlete but it has to be done.
“But some of the things involved in the training are more than what we could afford as athletes. Many of us are used to achieving much on our own but help from the AFN is really needed to make impact at competitions.
“Team selection for competitions is also a thing that needs to be worked on by the federation because when the right athletes go for events, we can be sure of winning some medals.”
For Tega Odele, who is the national 200m champion, the preparations for Beijing were not enough.
“My performance in the race with the other contestants showed that I can do more if I have better preparations for competitions,” Tega told Making of Champions.

Buhari is a President of the North – Fayose

on   /   in News, Trending 4:36 pm   /   Comments
By Rotimi Olaleye
Ado-Ekiti – Ekiti State Governor, Mr Ayodele Fayose has said a critical look at President Mohammadu Buhari operation since his emergence in May 29, 2015, portrays him as a president of the Northern Nigeria only.
Fayose, who described such development as tainted in ethnic and tribal colouration, posited that if such steps are not immediately addressed for equity and justice, it could threaten the unity of Nigeria.
Fayose explained that appointments made by President Buhari has showed an agenda for a deliberate “Nothernisation of Nigeria,”
In his words, “appointments made by the President so far negate the principle of federal character and it
appears the unity in diversity of Nigeria is being taken for granted by the President.”
According to a statement issued on Monday, by his Special Assistant on Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka, Governor Fayose said it was wrong for President Buhari to have made 31 major appointments and only seven will come from the South while 24 were from the North.
He asked; “Under Buhari, are people from Southern Nigeria only meant to be hounded and harassed by anti-corruption agencies and the Department of State Security (DSS) while those from the North are meant to enjoy federal government juicy appointments?”
The governor said “apart from lopsided appointments being made by the President, I am worried that construction of Lagos-Ibadan expressway has been slowed down while work has stopped on Lokoja-Abuja roads, which are the major roads linking the Southern part of Nigeria with the North.
“Also, we have been told by the Federal Government that the Second Niger Bridge project has been suspended and one is now beginning to remember how Buhari cancelled the Lagos Metroline Project in 1985 at a loss of over $78 million (then) to the Lagos tax payers.”
Governor Fayose, who maintained that Nigeria can only move forward if there was equity and fairness, said those who made the country’s constitution and enshrined the principle of Federal Character were
mindful of the ethnic diversity of the country, adding that President Buhari’s running Nigeria as if he was a Northern Nigeria’s President was not in the interest of the country.
“They said the President made the appointments on merit and I wish to ask whether there are no competent people in the All
Progressives Congress (APC) in the Southern part of Nigeria, especially South-East where no one has been appointed.
“Are they saying Igbo leader like Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu, who graduated with a first class honours degree in Chemical Engineering at the
University of Lagos, is not competent to be appointed as Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF)?
- See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/08/buhari-is-operating-as-a-northern-president-fayose/#sthash.mRgB7qkX.dpuf

Buhari is a President of the North – Fayose

on   /   in News, Trending 4:36 pm   /   Comments
By Rotimi Olaleye
Ado-Ekiti – Ekiti State Governor, Mr Ayodele Fayose has said a critical look at President Mohammadu Buhari operation since his emergence in May 29, 2015, portrays him as a president of the Northern Nigeria only.
Fayose, who described such development as tainted in ethnic and tribal colouration, posited that if such steps are not immediately addressed for equity and justice, it could threaten the unity of Nigeria.
Fayose explained that appointments made by President Buhari has showed an agenda for a deliberate “Nothernisation of Nigeria,”
In his words, “appointments made by the President so far negate the principle of federal character and it
appears the unity in diversity of Nigeria is being taken for granted by the President.”
According to a statement issued on Monday, by his Special Assistant on Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka, Governor Fayose said it was wrong for President Buhari to have made 31 major appointments and only seven will come from the South while 24 were from the North.
He asked; “Under Buhari, are people from Southern Nigeria only meant to be hounded and harassed by anti-corruption agencies and the Department of State Security (DSS) while those from the North are meant to enjoy federal government juicy appointments?”
The governor said “apart from lopsided appointments being made by the President, I am worried that construction of Lagos-Ibadan expressway has been slowed down while work has stopped on Lokoja-Abuja roads, which are the major roads linking the Southern part of Nigeria with the North.
“Also, we have been told by the Federal Government that the Second Niger Bridge project has been suspended and one is now beginning to remember how Buhari cancelled the Lagos Metroline Project in 1985 at a loss of over $78 million (then) to the Lagos tax payers.”
Governor Fayose, who maintained that Nigeria can only move forward if there was equity and fairness, said those who made the country’s constitution and enshrined the principle of Federal Character were
mindful of the ethnic diversity of the country, adding that President Buhari’s running Nigeria as if he was a Northern Nigeria’s President was not in the interest of the country.
“They said the President made the appointments on merit and I wish to ask whether there are no competent people in the All
Progressives Congress (APC) in the Southern part of Nigeria, especially South-East where no one has been appointed.
“Are they saying Igbo leader like Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu, who graduated with a first class honours degree in Chemical Engineering at the
University of Lagos, is not competent to be appointed as Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF)?
- See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/08/buhari-is-operating-as-a-northern-president-fayose/#sthash.mRgB7qkX.dpuf
I’ve always been good at removing stains—that and parallel parking are things I would list as my best random skills. But I found a new challenge in stain removal when I dug out my older son’s baby clothes once I was expecting baby number two. My older son used to spit up terribly. A lot and everywhere. So even though I washed and thought I removed those stains before I put his clothes in storage, once I got them out I found that over time the stains had come back and yellowed, ruining most of the clothes I had put away for future babies.
But I refused to give up on the clothes without a fight. Through trial and error I found a concoction of things I already had in my home that I used to make a great DIY stain remover that really worked on those years-old dried and stored spit-up stains!
Your browser does not support iframes.
Premier League team mascots who follow players on to the pitch before a game are some of the luckiest kids alive. However, this one may not have realized how good he has it up until the very last minute as the players were about to be called into the stadium.
At the Swansea - Manchester United game this Sunday, one young mascot had a complete mind blowing experience as he stood next to his hero, world-renowned Manchester United forward Wayne Rooney.
Swansea’s young mascot didn’t appear to spot former Everton striker Rooney until the last minute but made up for it with a look of utter astonishment. It was obviously hard for the young fan to contain his emotion as he shared space with his hero.

A young mascot's reaction is priceless after he realizes he's standing next to Manchester United's Wayne Rooney.
A young mascot's reaction is priceless after he realizes he's standing next to Manchester United's Wayne Roone …
 Rooney may have ended a 10-game scoring drought by grabbing a hat trick in Man United's 4-0 win at Bruges that eased the English team into the Champions League group stage on Wednesday. But he did little in Swansea's upset on Sunday soon thereafter the tunnel exit.
A pair of goals in six minutes gave Swansea City a stunning comeback as they down United by a 2-1 scoreline for the third straight time in Premier League play.
Juan Mata had given Manchester United the lead shortly after halftime when Bafetimbi Gomis and Andre Ayew grabbed the game by its horns and set the Liberty Stadium alight after an hour.
The loss is Manchester United’s first of the season, but they remain without more than one goal in any game thus far and sit on seven points. Swansea, thanks to Gomis’s fourth goal in four games, move into the Premier League table’s top four.
FC Barcelona v Manchester United - International Champions Cup Pre Season Friendly Tournament
.

Manchester United's David De Gea Action Images via Reuters / Mark Avery
MADRID (Reuters) - Real Madrid said on Tuesday they had done everything needed to complete the signing of goalkeeper David De Gea from Manchester United before Monday's midnight deadline and hinted that the English club were to blame for the deal's failure.
Spain goalkeeper De Gea was all set to join Real but is now facing an uncertain future after the paperwork failed to arrive at the Spanish league in time and was not entered correctly into FIFA's Transfer Matching System (TMS) as required.
Real said in a statement on their website (www.realmadrid.com) the delay was not their fault and detailed exhaustively how and why the necessary documents were not ready until it was too late.
United had not initiated talks on a possible deal, which included the English club buying Real's Costa Rica keeper Keylor Navas, until Monday morning, the statement said.
After initial agreement was reached, Real said they sent the contracts to United at 1:39 p.m. Spanish time (1139 GMT).
Eight hours later they were sent back with "small modifications", which Real said they immediately accepted.
Real then sent the contracts signed by De Gea and Navas back to United for their signature at 21:32 GMT, 28 minutes before the deadline.
United entered the details of De Gea's transfer into TMS at midnight Spanish time but did not put in details of the Navas deal and by then it was too late for Real to access the system, the said.
TMS gave them a last chance to register the deal around half an hour later and Real also sent the documents to the Spanish league even though they knew the deadline had passed.



Fraser-Pryce won the women's 100m final in Beijin
Fraser-Pryce won the women's 100m final in Beijin
Rather than winning medals, Team Nigeria’s participation at the 2015 IAAF World Championships was tainted with controversy, as other nations and athletes proved their mettle at the games, reports ’TANA AIYEJINA
Prior to the 2015 International Association of Athletics Federations World Championships in Beijing, Nigeria had managed eight medals: four silver and four bronze, since the competition began in 1983.
ADVERTISEMENT
It didn’t look like it was going to change in China. The women’s 4x400m relay team will compete on the final day (today) of the competition, the country’s last chance of winning a medal in Beijing.
Despite making the long trip to China with 17 athletes, sprinter and captain of the team, Blessing Okagbare, was the only athlete with a realistic chance of mounting the podium once again.
Okagbare was scheduled to compete in the 100m, 200m and 4x100m relay events in Beijing. After a poor outing in the 100m final, where she emerged last, a hamstring injury reportedly stopped her from competing in the 200m. She also failed to compete in the 4x100m relays for women.
In the high jump event, Doreen Amata (women) and Tosin Oke (men) managed a final place finish while the likes of Weyinmi Lindsay (100m hurdles), Amaka Ogoegbunam (400m hurdles) and Tega Odele (200m) only made up the numbers in their events.
Olympian Christy Opara-Thompson said the poor showing of the Nigerian team didn’t come as a surprise to her.
The Barcelona ’92 Olympic Games 4x100m bronze medallist said poor preparations, as always, was the country’s undoing in Beijing.
“Lack of preparations has always been the bane of our sports and it saddens me when we repeat the same thing. This is not a mistake, it’s an act of negligence.
“Nigeria should be in the class of the US, Jamaica and Bahamas because we are all blacks. We are even better endowed than the Kenyans but we don’t prepare adequately for competitions,” Opara-Thompson, a gold medallist at the 1994 Commonwealth Games, said.
She added, “As a country, we are big enough to produce three teams. We should have been competing with our Team B in Bejing, while Team A and B should be used for the Olympics and the All Africa Games. But we’ve bluntly refused to do the right thing. What goes into their pockets is the right thing,”
She believed the over-reliance on Okagbare also affected the team.
She added, “It does not make sense to celebrate Blessing alone. Where are the others? A tree cannot make a forest. In my time, we had at least eight athletes in each event. If you were out, others will take your place.
“But we now have a situation where we have only Blessing; once she’s injured, it’s over for Nigeria.”
Controversies
As has become the norm in international competitions, Team Nigeria’s participation in Beijing did come with its controversies.
First, the alleged exclusion of up-and-coming triple jumper Olumide Olamigoke, who got a wild card to compete in Beijing, by the Athletic Federation of Nigeria, raised eyebrows back home.
No doubt, Okagbare was seen as Nigeria’s major medal hopeful. However, after a disappointing performance in the 100m final, where she placed 8th in 11.02secs, athletics buffs were hoping she would make up in the 200m event.
But she failed to show up in the 200m heats sparking a major controversy both in China and in Nigeria. While the AFN said a relapse of a hamstring injury prevented the Beijing 2008 bronze medallist from participating, rumours filtered in from Beijing that the athlete was not injured.
“A hamstring injury during warm-up on Wednesday prevented Blessing Okagbare from participating in the heats of the 200m,” a statement from AFN read.
But Okagbare opened a new angle to the controversy, when she slammed her critics and those she claimed wished she tested positive to drugs, on her Facebook page.
She wrote, “… As for the snakes blowing the trumpet and wishing I have tested positive to drugs, keep wishing for your own downfall because I am more than what, a foolish journalist, critics, haters and those who call me Warri instead of Nigeria when I don’t win, are made of.
“I am self-motivated, confident and work hard which I am extremely proud of and, I owe no one an explanation, win or lose. Not everyone who opens their mouth to talk or write with a pen in the name of journalism, have their sanity intact and they know themselves.”
AFN boss, Solomon Ogba, also condemned journalists for lighting the fire of controversy.
“Imagine a reporter who was not anywhere near Beijing claiming that AFN officials were shocked when Blessing Okagbare pulled out from the 200m. That is outright falsehood. Okagbare was injured, we all saw it; we invited our medical people and IAAF medical people, they did a scan and they advised that she should not run,” he said.
Olusoji Fasuba, an ex-Nigerian athlete, also backed Okagbare.
He stated, “People that say Okagbare is a flop should refrain from using such words. Instead they should ask themselves what they have achieved in life or even in Nigeria.
“She is a blessing to Nigeria in a time when athletics is at its weakest and journalists should celebrate her as she did get into the finals and is among the top eight in the world.”
The ‘war’ didn’t end there. In fact, more wonders started unfolding. No football fan would imagine the Super Eagles participate in a World Cup without a coach.
Alas, it happened in Team Nigeria’s camp in Beijing. Women’s long jump finalist, Doreen Amata, didn’t have a coach at the games.
Amata’s American trainer, Nat Page, is on the United States’ entourage to the championships, but the AFN left out the high jumper’s Nigerian coach, Kola Adebayo, from the trip to Beijing.
Adebayo, who has been Amata’s coach since 2013, is in Port Harcourt, in camp with Team Nigeria, for the 2015 All Africa Games in Congo Brazzaville.
On why he was left out of the championships, Adebayo said, “Only the AFN can explain that. I’m just a coach and I adhere to directives given to me.
“It’s a technical event and she (Amata) needs someone who understands the technical aspects of the sport with her. But if the federation says they want it that way, who am I to kick against it?”
Athletes slam officials
After finishing in 8th place in the men’s triple jump final with a 16.81 metres effort on Thursday, Tosin Oke revealed that officials of the AFN, whom he described as “clueless”, owed him $2,500 prior to the event.
He also expressed disgust at the federation’s apparent interest in a particular athlete at the detriment of the others.
Asked if he actually paid for his flights to the trials in Warri, Oke said, “It’s definitely true and I’m still waiting for the refund of my flight (ticket). I’m here (Beijing), I’m being owed $2,500 by my federation, who are a bit clueless, if you ask me. They invest heavily in one person as you all know…”
He added, “It’s very tough (competing) but luckily, I’ve got a fantastic sponsor and a great family…I try to give my best all the time but it’s hard to take when you hear that one person is getting five figures and you are getting zero.”
Sprinter Gloria Asumnu blamed the AFN for the women’s 4x100m relay team’s exit in the semi-final.
The team ran 43.89 seconds — the second worst time ever by a Nigerian 400m relay team in the history of the championships — to place eighth.
Asumnu ran the first leg in the team that had Deborah Odeyemi, Stepahnie Kalu and Cecilia Francis. Okagbare should have been part of the quartet but Asumnu revealed that head coach Gabriel Okon only informed the other members of the team that Okagbare would not run on the morning of the event, which she said disrupted the rhythm of the athletes.
She wrote on her Facebook page, “Let me start by saying how utterly disappointed I am. Not so much in our performance but how team officials continue to fail us over and over. Every time we as athletes run badly or don’t qualify, the media rips us apart but fails to hold officials accountable.
“Going into this 4x100m, the four girls they put out there have not worked with each other (before). People can say,‘oh your best runner didn’t run.’ But who cares? We didn’t have a plan for that, which I expressed from day one. What will we do?
“Even our relay coach up until this meet was Maurice Greene but for whatever reasons upon arriving here he was no longer our coach… To arrive on race day to the track and have a coach tell you what you’ve known all along and then give you new leg assignments goes to show how unprepared we are as a nation. The embarrassment on a world stage is too much and disheartening.”
AAG signal
Asumnu, who was earlier scheduled to compete at the 2015 All Africa Games, has reportedly pulled out of Team Nigeria for the event in Congo.
It will surely reduce Nigeria’s medal chances in athletics in Brazzaville.
But Olympic bronze medallist, Deji Aliu, believes the country’s athletes will assert their dominance in Brazzaville despite the chaos in China.
He said, “After their performances in Beijing, the athletes’ morale would be down for sure but in Africa, we always have our way. In Congo, it’s not going to be obvious that things are wrong. Individually, the athletes will give their best.
“The only time we are exposed is when we test our strength against countries from other parts of the world. That is when we know that we are lacking.”
Perhaps Team Nigeria’s troubles in China would have drawn the attention of John Carpenter, director of the American film Big Trouble in Little China, if the scenario had taken place in 1986.
Bolt confirms supremacy over Gatlin
Bolt (2nd left) beat Gatlin (right) to 200m gold
However, as the Nigerian contingent was mired in controversy, other athletes stole the opportunity to carve a niche for themselves in Beijing.
World champion Usain Bolt again displayed why he is the king of athletics at the Bird Nest Stadium, beating closest rival Justin Gatlin in the 100m and 200m.
Javelin gold for Kenya’s Yego
Kenya’s Julius Yego won world javelin gold with the third longest throw of all time on Wednesday, a pointer that the East Africans may be coming to assert their dominance in field events.
Jessica Simpson and Tracee Ellis Ross posing together. Photo: @traceeellisross/Instagram
Can you see the resemblance? 
On Saturday, Tracee Ellis Ross posted a photo to Instagram of herself posing with Jessica Simpson on a staircase. She captioned the image #sisters. Well it’s true, they are — sort of. Tracee’s younger brother Evan Ross recently married — and had a daughter, named Jagger Snow Ross — with Jessica’s little sister Ashlee. So #sistersinlaw is probably more accurate. 
Despite their lack of blood relation, the pair definitely dress in a similarly glamorous fashion. The billionaire businesswoman paired a sequin little black dress with super-high stilletos. Simpson kept with the ‘70s vibe by crimping her long blonde hair and adding to the effect with an exaggerated dark smokey eye. The Blackish actress, on the other hand, went for a glitzy look as well with a funky twist. She paired disco ball-inspired leggings with a black top and floral short blazer, which she matched to a pair or red peep-toe sandals. As for her hair, she rocked some fun double buns to match her ensemble.
www.virgoworldventures.net. Powered by Blogger.

Contact Form

Name

Email *

Message *

Followers

Followers

Labels

Tweet Us@virgoworldworl1

Labels

Popular Posts