text:
\section{Introduction}

Arbitrary image style transfer \cite{gatys2016image} is a very challenging task which aims to synthesize artistic images conditioned on arbitrary styles, where the content-style feature transformation plays a vital role and a series of content-style transformation algorithms have been proposed in the literature \cite{heeger1995pyramid, 9117149, de1997multiresolution, portilla2000parametric, cheng2017video}. The widely-used normalization-based methods, including instance normalization (IN) \cite{in}, conditional IN (CIN) \cite{cin}, and adaptive IN (AdaIN) \cite{adain,spade,stylegan}, generally normalize the style of content features to style features. However, only limited style information, \textit{i.e.}, the first-order statistics of style features, is injected into the content features. Another widely-adopted feature-level style transformation method is whitening and coloring transformation (WCT) \cite{wct} which completely peels off the style information of content features then recovers with the target style information. Although the whitening operation was designed to remove style information, it generates artifacts that content details are also removed unintentionally, leading to unpleasant synthesized results. Both normalization-based methods and WCT-based methods cannot well balance the content preserving and style transferring.

In this paper, we propose a new feature-level style transformation technique, named~Style Projection, which is inspired by the order statistics \cite{david2004order,pitas1992order}. The order statistics-based image processing filters, such as max/min/median filters and ranked-order filters, can preserve fine content details of images in applications of noise detection \cite{noise_detection1,noise_detection2}, image denoising \cite{image_denoising}, and object detection \cite{object_detection}. In this work, we exploit order statistics for deep neural network-based content-style feature transformation for the first time, by considering content/style information as order statistics/scalar values of features, respectively. In a very simple manner, Style Projection~reorders the style features according to the order of the content features, such that the correlation of feature values (shapes, textures, etc.) is provided by the content features, while the color information is provided by the style features, enabling a reasonable content-style fusion.

We further present a learning-based feed-forward model to leverage Style Projection~for arbitrary image style transfer in real time. The model works in an encoder-decoder fashion that stylizes a content image based on arbitrarily given style images. In experiments, we conduct extensive studies including quantitative evaluation, qualitative analysis, ablation studies, and user study, to comprehensively validate the efficacy of our style transfer framework. The contributions of this paper are summarized as follows: (1) We present a new parameter-free feature-level transformation technique, named~Style Projection, for fast yet effective content-style feature fusion; (2) We present a real-time feed-forward method for arbitrary style transfer, including a KL divergence loss for further matching the semantics between input contents and stylized output; (3) We demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of our proposed methods through extensive empirical studies.

\section{Method}

\subsection{Arbitrary Image Style Transfer}
The goal of arbitrary image style transfer is to stylize a content image conditioned on an arbitrary style image. To address this task, we introduce a learning-based feed-forward style transfer model. Following the image style transfer practice in previous literature \cite{adain,wct}, we embed content and style images into content and style features with an image encoder $E$. As discussed above, the critical component of our style transfer model is Style Projection~algorithm, which is a parameter-free feature transformation approach for proper fusion of content and style features. Based on Style Projection, the content and style features are fused and then reconstructed as a new stylized image with an image decoder $D$. Despite the simplicity of the model, it is effective and there is a leeway to incorporate useful tricks, for instance the semantic matching regularization of KL divergence, to further boost the style transfer performance. In the following sections, we first introduce Style Projection~algorithm and then discuss the learning objectives of our style transfer model.

\subsection{Style Projection~Algorithm}

\begin{algorithm}[t]
\caption{Parameter-Free Style Projection.}
\label{alg}
\begin{algorithmic}[1]
\REQUIRE
content feature map $x \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot H \cdot W}$ \\
style feature map $y \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot H \cdot W}$
\ENSURE stylized feature map $z \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot H \cdot W}$
\STATE $\vec x \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot V} \gets $ reshape $x$; \\
$\vec y \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot V} \gets $ reshape $y$;
\STATE index $d_x$, values $\vec x_r \gets$ sort $\vec x$ along $V$; \\
index $d_y$, values $\vec y_r \gets$ sort $\vec y$ along $V$;
\STATE $\vec z \left[:,i\right] \gets \vec y_r \left[:,d_x\left[i\right]\right]$, ~~$i=1, 2, \dots, V$;
\STATE $z \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot H \cdot W} \gets$ reshape $\vec z$.
\end{algorithmic}
\end{algorithm}

In this work, we introduce Style Projection~which is a simple, fast, yet effective algorithm for content-style fusion. Given a content feature map $x \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot H \cdot W}$ and a style feature map $y \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot H \cdot W}$, where $C$, $H$, $W$ are channel, height, and width respectively, we firstly vectorize $x$ and $y$ across dimension $H$ and $W$ to obtain features $\vec x \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot V}$ and $\vec y \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot V}$, where $V = H \cdot W$. Then we compute rankings for elements in $\vec x$ and $\vec y$. Afterwards, we reorder $\vec y$ by aligning each element to its corresponding same ranked element in $\vec x$. This actually reorganizes the style feature $\vec y$ according to the sorting order of the content feature $\vec x$. Then we reshape the adjusted feature to get $z \in \mathbb{R}^{C \cdot H \cdot W}$, which will be treated as the input of a decoder $D$ to generate the stylized image. The computing process of Style Projection~is shown in Alg. \ref{alg}.

We propose that the Style Projection module will not lose the color details of style images, while the structure of content images are also carried in the transferred features. In the following, we take insight into the style and content preservation achieved by Style Projection algorithm, respectively.

\noindent
\textbf{Style detail preservation.}
To understand the effectiveness of Style Projection on style detail preservation, we investigate the Gram matrix of images. The Gram matrix $G(i,j)$ of feature map $y$ is formulated as
\begin{equation}
G(i,j)=\sum_{p}y(i,p)y(j,p)
\label{eq:gram}
\end{equation}
where $i$ and $j$ denote two channels on feature map $y$, and $p$ denotes the spatial position. Such that $G_y(i,j)$ is the inner product between two feature channels.

The Gram matrix $G(i,j)$ can be used to evaluate texture synthesis algorithms by measuring the texture correlation between images \cite{gatys2016image}. Consider the difference between Gram matrices of feature maps $y$ and $z$,
\begin{align}
\begin{split}
\mathcal{L}_{Gram}(y,z) & = ||G_y-G_z||^2_{\rm{F}} \\
&=\sum_{i,j}||\sum_{p}y(i,p)y(j,p)-\sum_{p}z(i,p)z(j,p)||^2
\end{split}
\label{eq:gramnotchange}
\end{align}
Gu et al. \cite{reshuffle} theoretically reveals that Eq. \ref{eq:gramnotchange} is equal to $0$ when $y$ and $z$ can be transformed to each other using a bijective transformation, for instance any shuffling function. Therefore, the feature shuffling does not alter the Gram matrix of feature. From Eq. \ref{eq:gramnotchange}, we show that the style information can be well preserved after style feature reshuffling in our proposed Style Projection~module.

\begin{figure}[t]
\centering
\stackunder[3pt]{\includegraphics[width=0.24\linewidth]{figs/baseline/origin.jpg}}{\footnotesize Content / Style}
\stackunder[3pt]{\includegraphics[width=0.24\linewidth]{figs/baseline/onlystyle.jpg}}{\footnotesize No Shuffling}
\stackunder[3pt]{\includegraphics[width=0.24\linewidth]{figs/baseline/random_shuffle.jpg}}{\footnotesize Random Shuffling}
\stackunder[3pt]{\includegraphics[width=0.24\linewidth]{figs/baseline/ours.jpg}}{\footnotesize Style Projection} \\
\vspace{-0.5em}
\caption{
An empirical study on feature shuffling mechanisms.
``No Shuffling'' directly feeds style features to the decoder without feeding content features or conducting any shuffling operation.
``Random Shuffling'' feeds randomly shuffled style features (shuffled within each channel of feature maps) to the decoder.
``Style Projection'' reorders style features according to order statistics of content features.
}
\label{fig:baseline}
\vspace{-0.5em}
\end{figure}

\noindent
\textbf{Content structure preservation.}
Style Projection~also preserves the structure of content images. As suggested by \cite{david2004order}, the order of random variables contains effective information where the order statistics are related to the distribution function of random variables. In Style Projection~module, the style features are reshuffled according to the order of content features, thus the structural relationships in content features can be implicitly inherited by the reshuffled style features.

To verify this claim, we conduct an empirical study on feature shuffling mechanisms and the results are shown in Fig. \ref{fig:baseline}. We observe that among the three methods, only Style Projection~is capable of fusing content and style properly. `No shuffling' of style features shows an exact reconstruction of the original style image. `Random shuffling' shows a repetition of random style patterns, demonstrating that the style patterns can be preserved after feature reshuffling. Only Style Projection, which reorders the style features based on content features, shows reasonable image stylization. This study reveals the effectiveness of Style Projection~as it is able to preserve both content and style information during feature transformation. Through Style Projection, the spatial structure (shape, edge, etc.) of content images and the color/texture patterns of style images are well fused.

\subsection{Style Transfer Model}

We illustrate our style transfer model in Fig. \ref{fig:framework}. The learning objective of our style transfer model is composed of three parts, including the style loss, the content perceptual loss, and the content KL divergence loss. The style loss $\mathcal{L}_s$ is used to match the feature statistics between the style image $s$ and the stylized image $\hat{c}$ as $\mathcal{L}_s = \sum_{i=1}^{N} \lVert \mu,\sigma(E_{i}(s))-\mu,\sigma(E_{i}(\hat{c})) \rVert_{2}$,
where $\mu$ and $\sigma$ denotes the mean and standard deviation, and $E_i$ is the intermediate output of the $i$-th layer of encoder $E$, and $N$ is the number of encoder layers. The content perceptual loss $\mathcal{L}_p$ \cite{johnson2016perceptual} is used to minimize the pixel-wise feature distance between the content image $c$ and the stylized image $\hat{c}$ as $\mathcal{L}_p = \left \| E(c)-E(\hat{c})\right \|_{2}$.

\begin{figure}[t]
    \centering
    \includegraphics[width=1\linewidth]{figs/scheme.pdf}
    \vspace{-2em}
    \caption{The scheme of our proposed style transfer framework.

    }
    \label{fig:framework}
    \vspace{-1em}
\end{figure}

Most image style transfer methods suffer from non-natural image clues in stylized results. We conjecture this is partially due to the missing of semantic information such as brightness. Inspired by the insights provided by generative models \cite{goodfellow2014generative}, we introduce a distribution matching objective, Kullback-Leibler (KL) divergence \cite{kl}, into the style transfer framework to leverage more semantic information in content images, as
\begin{equation}
    \mathcal{L}_{KL} = \mathcal{KL}\left[E(c)~||~E(\hat{c})\right]
\end{equation}
where $c$ is an input content image and $\hat{c}$ is the stylized image produced by decoder $D$. With the aid of KL divergence, we regularize $D$ to generate images that contain more semantics of content images.

Overall, the complete learning objective of our model is formulated as $ \mathcal{L} = \mathcal{L}_p + \lambda \mathcal{L}_s + \kappa \mathcal{L}_{KL}$, where $\lambda$ and $\kappa$ are the loss weights of $\mathcal{L}_s$ and $\mathcal{L}_{KL}$, respectively. As Style Projection~is a parameter-free method and the added KL divergence loss only brings negligible extra computing time, our style transfer approach is highly efficient.

\section{Experiments}

\subsection{Experimental Setup}

\noindent
\textbf{Datasets.}
We adopt the training set of MS-COCO dataset \cite{mscoco} as the content images and that of WikiArt dataset \cite{wikiart} as the style images. In training, we resize all input images to the size of 512$\times$512 and randomly crop each image to 256$\times$256. All content and style images used for testing purpose are selected from the test set of the two datasets, and the test images are never observed by the model during training. Our encoder and decoder networks work in a fully-convolutional manner, and they can be applied to images of arbitrary size in testing.

\noindent
\textbf{Implementation.}
We implement our style transfer model\footnote{\href{https://github.com/PaddlePaddle/PaddleHub/tree/dbca09ae78b5387ebe3b49f37ce88de45d41d26a/hub_module/modules/image/style_transfer/stylepro_artistic}{\textcolor{blue}{https://github.com/PaddlePaddle/PaddleHub/Stylepro\_Artistic}}} based on the PaddlePaddle framework \cite{ma2019paddlepaddle} and release a pretrained model as an official PaddleHub tool\footnote{\href{https://www.paddlepaddle.org.cn/hubdetail?name=stylepro\_artistic}{\textcolor{blue}{https://www.paddlepaddle.org.cn/hubdetail?name=stylepro\_artistic}}}.
We train our style transfer model for 160,000 iterations. We use an Adam optimizer \cite{kingma2014adam} with an initial learning rate of 1e-4 and a learning rate decay of 5e-5. Unless otherwise specified, the loss weights $\lambda$ and $\kappa$ are set to 10 and 2.5, respectively. Note that the loss weights are employed to balance the style transfer and content semantics preservation. More empirical studies on the KL divergence weight $\kappa$ are illustrated in the following ablation studies. We use a batch size of 8 for training.

\noindent
\textbf{Networks.}
The encoder network used in the model is the VGG-19 network \cite{vgg} pre-trained on ImageNet \cite{imagenet}, and its weights are not updated during training. The decoder network is composed of nine \textquoteleft Padding-Conv-ReLU\textquoteright~blocks, except the last block that has no ReLU layer. Three up-sampling layers are adopted right after the 1-st, 5-th, and 7-th block to restore the input image dimension successively, where the nearest neighbor interpolation is employed for up-sampling. We do not use normalization layer in our decoder network since it will hurt the diversity of synthesized images \cite{adain}.

\begin{table}[!t]
\centering
\caption{Quantitative evaluation of style loss $\mathcal{L}_s$, content loss $\mathcal{L}_p$, and total loss. The lower the better.
}
\vspace{-1em}
\resizebox{1\hsize}{!}{
\begin{tabular}{l|c|c|c}
\hline
\textbf{Method} & \textbf{Style loss} $\mathcal{L}_s$ & \textbf{Content loss} $\mathcal{L}_p$ & \textbf{Total} \\
\hline
CNN \cite{gatys2016image} & 0.90  & 2.51 & 3.41 \\
StyleSwap \cite{styleswap} & 4.87 & 2.56 & 7.43 \\
WCT \cite{wct} & 1.33 & 4.08 & 5.41 \\
AdaIN \cite{adain} & 0.39 & 2.56 & 2.95 \\
LinearPropagation \cite{li2019learning} & 2.86 & 2.86 & 5.73\\
\hline
Style Projection & \textbf{0.38} & 2.61 & 2.99 \\
Style Projection~+ Skip & 0.48 & 2.56 & 3.04 \\
Style Projection~+ KL & \textbf{0.38} & 2.25 & 2.63\\
Style Projection~+ Skip + KL & 0.49 & \textbf{2.09} & \textbf{2.58} \\
\hline
\end{tabular}}

\label{table:loss}
\end{table}

\input{fig_compare}

\subsection{Comparison with State-of-the-Arts}

\noindent
\textbf{Quantitative evaluation.} In Fig. \ref{fig:comparison}, we quantitatively evaluate the state-of-the-art arbitrary image style transfer methods, including Style-Swap \cite{styleswap}, WCT \cite{wct}, AdaIN \cite{adain}, Linear Propagation \cite{li2019learning}. We investigate the content loss $\mathcal{L}_p$, style loss $\mathcal{L}_s$ and total loss in inference. Our Style Projection~shows competitive results compared with the state-of-the-art style transfer modules with respect to both style and content loss. The SP+Skip+KL method presents more superior results than the other methods and similar style loss as AdaIN, indicating that the modules proposed in this paper, including Style Projection~and KL divergence loss, work well in arbitrary style transfer tasks. We also observe that there is a trade-off between style loss and content loss. Generally, SP+KL and SP+Skip+KL reach a good balance in such a trade-off.

\noindent
\textbf{Qualitative comparison.} In Fig. \ref{fig:comparison} we show stylized images generated by different methods. The images generated by WCT \cite{wct} have a low fidelity probably due to the whitening operation which peels off some critical content clues. AdaIN \cite{adain} better reconstructs the content details, however there are still several \textquoteleft non-natural strokes\textquoteright~caused by only transferring the mean and standard deviation of the style features. The images produced by the StyleSwap \cite{styleswap} are too dark probably due to the way of replacing content features. Our methods (last two columns) provide more pleasant results. Even using Style Projection~independently (\textit{i.e.}, Ours-1), style information is properly transferred while main content is preserved. SP+Skip+KL (\textit{i.e.}, Ours-2) produces more appealing results where content details and semantics are better preserved.

Both DFR \cite{reshuffle} and SP are reshuffling-based feature transformation methods. A comparison between DFR and Style Projection is shown in Fig. \ref{fig:dfs}. DFR includes an expensive optimization process in its framework, thus it is time-consuming in image generation (taken about 114 seconds/image). Our parameter-free Style Projection~is able to give appealing stylized results with a high efficiency (0.068 second/image).

\begin{figure}[t]
\centering
\stackunder[3pt]{\includegraphics[width=0.24\linewidth]{figs/dfs/c1.png}}{\small Content}
\hfill
\stackunder[3pt]{\includegraphics[width=0.24\linewidth]{figs/dfs/s1.png}}{\small Style}  \hfill
\stackunder[3pt]{\includegraphics[width=0.24\linewidth]{figs/dfs/c1_s1_dfs.png}}{\small DFR \cite{reshuffle}}
\hfill
\stackunder[3pt]{\includegraphics[width=0.24\linewidth]{figs/dfs/c1_s1.jpg}}{\small SP} \vspace{-0.5em}
\caption{
A comparison of shuffling-based transfer methods.
}

\label{fig:dfs}
\end{figure}

\begin{table}[t]
\caption{User study on style transfer methods.
``\textbf{Method Score}'' is the percentage of times that users prefer the images in pairwise comparisons.
``SP'' denotes Style Projection and ``Full'' denotes Style Projection+Skip+KL.
``\textbf{User Consistency}'' denotes the consistency among users.
``Scene'' and ``Person'' are two categories of content images.
}
\vspace{-1em}
\footnotesize
\centering
\begin{tabular}{l|c|c|c|c}
\hline
\multirow{2}{*}{}  & \multicolumn{3}{c|}{\textbf{Method Score} (\%)}                   & \multirow{2}{*}{\textbf{User Consistency} (\%)}  \\ \cline{2-4}
 & \multicolumn{1}{c|}{AdaIN} & \multicolumn{1}{c|}{SP} & Full  &   \\ \hline
Scene   & 32.58 & 51.89  & \textbf{65.53} & 68.94 \\ \hline
Person    & 34.47  & 37.50 & \textbf{78.03} & 76.52 \\ \hline
\end{tabular}

\label{userstudy}
\end{table}

\subsection{User Study}
We further conduct a user study to evaluate three different methods, including AdaIN, our SP, and our full model (SP+Skip+KL). We build 24 pairs of synthesized images including 8 pairs of AdaIN and SP, 8 pairs of AdaIN and Full, and 8 pairs of SP and Full. The users are asked to choose one synthesized image from each pair under the criteria: (1) whether the image is sharp and clean while its content is close to that of the content image, and (2) whether the image has a similar style as the style image. We have collected feed-backs from 33 individuals and the results are summarized in Table \ref{userstudy}. The `Method Score' is the preference ratio averaged over all the image pairs and users, and the results indicate that most users favor the synthesized images of our methods. Interestingly, for the person images, more users prefer our full model (78.03\%), which indicates that fidelity is deserved to be well maintained for person images (see Fig. \ref{fig:comparison}).

\section{Conclusion}
In this paper, we have presented a real-time feed-forward model for arbitrary style transfer. The core is a parameter-free, fast, and effective feature-level style transformation algorithm named Style Projection. We have also introduced the KL divergence loss into our style transfer model for a regularization of semantic consistency on content structures. Extensive experiments including quantitative evaluation, qualitative analysis, and user study have validated the efficacy of our method for arbitrary image style transfer.

\small
\bibliographystyle{IEEEbib}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaArXiv


text:
EXCLUSIVE: How Isa Funtua fraudulently acquired KeyStone Bank and 9Mobile using AMCON MD
Olufemi Aduwo
Recently, a shocking story came out to public knowledge about how Keystone Bank and 9Mobile were acquired in controversial circumstances by the business interests of one Alhaji Isa Funtua, a close friend of President Muhammadu Buhari, via the instrumentality of Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON). As the smoke raised by the scandalous story is still swirling in the air, with some public groups challenging the government to come out clean on what could be a serious dent on its anti-corruption stance, there is indeed no smoke without fire. For starters, it is a confirmed fact that the son-in-law of Isa Funtua, Ahmed Kuru, is the current CEO of AMCON. Before him, the previous CEO, Chike Obi, was a first-class gentleman and technocrat who was strangely removed from office before the expiration of his term and was replaced with Kuru, the son-in-law of Isa Funtua.
Now, let us get into the insider details of how Funtua bought Keystone Bank and 9Mobile in the most bizarre of dealings that circumvent the laws of the land. Keystone Bank was sold by the current CEO of AMCON to his father-in-law, Funtua, without any AMCON Board's approval and with the active connivance of CBN and NDIC at a grossly undervalued price of 25 Billion Naira. To put things in context, let us recall that Enterprise Bank was sold for over 60 Billion Naira and Mainstreet Bank was sold for over 100 Billion Naira under the former CEO of AMCON.
Before the sale of Keystone Bank to Isa Funtua, all bad debts in the books of the Bank were taken over by AMCON. So, it was a clean Bank with all the Assets and no Liabilities that was sold to the Buyers. The Executive Management of AMCON was coerced into approving the transaction and those who were willing to submit a much higher bid were disqualified under a most opaque, suspicious process that lacks all transparency. The process was just manipulated in favour of the father-in-law of the AMCON CEO.
The Corrupt Payment for Keystone Bank
The most disgusting part of the entire sale of Keystone Bank is how the 25 Billion Naira sales price was paid to AMCON. The Isa Funtua Team paid 5 Billion Naira to AMCON, and then the balance of 20 Billion Naira was later paid through the most criminal and corrupt approach ever perpetrated by AMCON in favour of the Buyer. What happened was that AMCON moved 20 Billion Naira of their own funds as a fixed deposit at GTBank to Heritage Bank. Heritage Bank then paid the 20 Billion Naira on behalf of the Funtua Group to AMCON. In other words, AMCON used their own funds as a collateral for a loan to the Funtua Group for 20 Billion Naira!
When the Funtua Group took over Keystone Bank, they went borrowing immediately at the Interbank Market for 20 Billion Naira to refund AMCON's funds. This has left a hole in Keystone Bank's Balance Sheet and makes the Bank one of the most undercapitalized Banks in the Country as at today.
The evidence of this highly compromised acquisition process can be obtained from the current and former staff of AMCON, from NDIC, CBN and from the current staff of Keystone Bank itself. The story has been all over the place and it is quite shocking that some political parties and public interest groups are just picking it up now.
The Unholy Sale of 9-Mobile
Another suspicious acquisition scandal surrounding the Funtua Group is about the untidy way 9-Mobile, formerly known as Etisalat, was bought. It is Mr. Adrian Wood of Teleology Holdings, a very sound telecoms professional, who collaborated with the Funtua Group for the acquisition of 9-Mobile. The problem with their bid was the lack of a qualified Operator to support the bid which was one of the minimum conditions of NCC. Adrian Wood alone was not a substitute for an Operator.
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) gave several conditions that must be met by the Ultimate Buyer of 9-Mobile to ensure the protection of shareholders value, prevent loss of jobs, protect the telecoms industry from slipping into a crisis and ensure transparency and professionalism in the post-acquisition entity.
The conditions listed by NCC that must be met by the Buyer are Strong Telecoms Operating Experience, Strong Financial Capabilities, Strong Technical Knowledge and Strong Administrative Skills.
The first thing that happened once Teleology was announced as the preferred winner was that the Funtua Group edged Adrian Woods out of Management and turned him to an Insignificant Shareholder. The second development was that the Funtua Group raided Keystone Bank again and forced the Bank to Pay 50 million Dollars as down payment for the acquisition of 9-Mobile. The third issue was that Teleology Nigeria replaced Teleology Holdings to remove any influence of Adrian Woods from 9-Mobile totally. The fourth step taken the Funtua Group was to borrow 260 Million Dollars from African Exim Bank. The fifth thing was to coerce NCC to approve the sale at all cost without meeting 90% of the conditions set up ab-initio by the NCC. The sixth strange action of the Funtua Group was to force the board of NCC to approve the sale through the influence and pressure from the Presidency. And the seventh Funtua infraction was to use the influence of CBN to force the Banks to the table and waive their own conditions of sale of 9-Mobile to the Teleology Nigeria group.
So far, the problem with the sales of the above mentioned assets is that all the processes and conditions were brazenly circumvented and Keystone Bank was forced into a deeper pit by the greed and recklessness of the Funtua group.
Today, AMCON as presently constituted is just a tool in the hands of the Funtua Group to acquire peoples' businesses without paying for it or using AMCON's money to pay for the Funtua Group. Even indigenous airlines like Arik and Aero Contractors, like many other companies under AMCON, are being considered for nepotistic acquisition in the near future. Of course, the Funtua Group has been penciled down as the preferred bidders. The devious plot is that if the Buhari government secures a second term and starts the tenure, all other companies under AMCON will be sold by hook or crook to the favoured Funtua Group. Meanwhile, the Management and Staff of AMCON along with the Board have all been intimidated into silence. In fact, the Board is dead and ineffective. And the other Supervisory Bodies over AMCON are just rubber stamps because the fear of Katsina power brokers is the beginning of wisdom.
Posted by Voxpopulid at December 31, 2018 No comments:
NIGERIA IN THE THROES OF ANARCHY
NIGERIA IN THE THROES OF ANARCHY: A PRESS STATEMENT BY MIKE OZEKHOME'S CHAMBERS (LEGAL PRACTITIONERS AND NOTARIES PUBLIC) ON THE UNCONSTITUTIONAL SIEGE LAID BY THE NIGERIAN POLICE ON SENATOR DINO MELAYE'S HOUSE, AT NO 11 SANGHA STREET MAITAMA, ABUJA.
On Friday, the 28th of December, 2018, a team of plain-clothed policemen, stormed Senator Dino Melaye's house at No 11 Sangha Street, Maitama, Abuja, and barricaded the entire street before eventually forcefully gaining entry into his compound. The said plain-clothed policemen proceeded to beat up Melaye's security whom they immediately handcuffed. They also arrested the cook and other domestic staff in Senator Dino's residence.
His relatives approached the head of the said security to find out why they were treating Dino, a serving Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in such high-handed and disdainful manner. The head of the rampaging police while declining any specific answer, told Dino's relatives that they came from the Commissioner of Police FCT,on whose instructions, they were acting. Dino Melaye's brothers demanded to see the warrant of arrest if they had any, but the police refused to show any such warrant. The Police also declined to disclose the reason why they are laying siege on the house of a sitting Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
The Nigeria Police led by the Commissioner of Police FCT, proceeded to do the unthinkable; they disconnected electricity supply to the premises of Senator Dino Melaye, thereby putting his life and health in grave danger. They have also disconnected water supply to his home thus denying him access to water, a concomitant to the basic constitutional right guaranteed by section 33 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999, as altered. Senator Dino Melaye has been without water and food, for the past 72 hours and counting as the said policemen, have blocked the gate, denying family members and his friend's access to him. Senator Dino Melaye is a known asthmatic person and has been denied access to his medications and personal physicians for the past 72 hours and counting.
The police are now firing several gunshots within Senator Dino Melaye's compound and have now started shooting canisters of tear gas through the windows of his house.
It would be recalled that Senator Dino Melaye, had on the 24th of December 2018, cried out to the world, that he had received credible information that there was a grand plan by the police, sponsored by Yahaya Bello, the Governor of Kogi State, to arrest him and inject him with lethal substances to terminate his life. It would also be recalled that Senator Dino Melaye, who has since parted ways with his earlier party, the ruling APC, has been quite vociferous in the condemnation of the poor performance of the Federal Government and his state government under Yahaya Belo. Consequent upon this, he has received fusillades of politically motivated attacks on his life and political career by his traducers using the instrumentality of the Nigeria Police and their operatives.
Members of the public would also recall how Senator Dino Melaye had personally narrated his ordeal on Thursday, the 19th day of July, 2018, that whilst he was returning to his hometown, around Iya junction, Ayetoro Gbede, Ijumu LGA, Kogi State, in a convoy of over twenty vehicles, after the commissioning of his constituency projects, in Kogi West Senatorial District, he was attacked by armed Policemen and his vehicle shot at sporadically by the armed policemen who attacked him.
Our Chambers had written a petition to the IGP, intimating him of the premeditated violent attack on Melaye. Till date, we have not received any response to the said petition.
Senator Melaye had also informed our Chambers, that recently, on the 12th of October 2018, the Commissioner of Police, Kogi State, sent armed policemen who invaded his country home in Kogi State, looking for him. He believes the invasion was targeted at assassinating him, over his political views. It was only when the villagers raised the alarm that the said armed policemen, fled. Senator Dino Melaye then petitioned The President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and copied the said petition to several International Organizations. And again, no response was received in respect of this petition till date.
Senator Melaye informed us, that his party, the People's Democratic Party, had scheduled its party campaign in Kogi State, for the 5th of January, 2019.
Senator Dino Melaye who is also contesting for the Senatorial slot of the Kogi West, Senatorial District, is scheduled to be one of the keynote speakers on that day. Senator Dino Melaye verily believes that the Kogi State Governor, Yahaya Bello, who has always seen him as a palpable political threat, is doing everything possible, including the use of the publicly financed Nigerian Police apparatchik, to harass, intimidate, silence, possibly kill him, thereby ultimately frustrating his senatorial ambition.
Senator Dino Melaye recalls how the said Kogi State, Governor, in his desperate attempts to undo him politically, had stage-managed his botched recall from the Senate, which process failed ignominiously even while he was chained to a hospital bed by the same Nigeria Police. The Nigeria Police had since April 2018, withdrawn Senator Dino Melaye's police security attached to him. The Nigerian Police had refused all requests, to restore Dino Melaye's security, despite several letters written to them, including letters from the Senate President and the Clerk of the National Assembly.
The same Nigerian Police, have refused to release Senator Dino Melaye's International Passports, which is in their custody,notwithstanding a clear order of court directing them to release same forthwith. Our Chambers had written several letters to the Inspector General of Police, urging it, to obey the subsisting court order, but the IGP, had consistently flouted the said court order. Till date, Dino's passports are illegally and wrongfully detained by the same police, notwithstanding the subsisting court order, and several letters from our chambers urging them to release same.
Senator Dino Melaye has was charged in different hierarchies of the Nigerian court, within five months, over six times, over trumped-up charges. Some of these frivolous charges have either been withdrawn by the police, or struck out by the court.
It is highly condemnable that the recent attacks on Senator Melaye's life appear obviously state-sponsored by his political enemies using the instrumentality of a willing police, to prevent him from campaigning and thus frustrate his political ambition of returning to the Senate.
The entire conduct of the Nigeria Police Force thus far leaves much to be desired. It is compromised, despicable, selective, arbitrary and amounts to a brazen abuse of office and repression of a Nigerian citizen, Senator Dino Melaye, whose fundamental rights, they have serially trampled upon. The life of Senator Dino Melaye is now in grave danger.
The last time we checked, Nigeria is supposed to be operating a constitutional democracy, and not fascism or under a police state. This is no time for a "golden silence" by Mr President, who is the ultimate supervisor of the Nigerian Police Force under sections 214 and 215 of the 1999 Constitution.
This is a humble sos, sir. Kindly treat sir, with promptitude and the urgency of now.
Chief Mike Ozekhome, SAN,OFR,FCIArb,Ph.D.
Chief Counsel/Head of Chambers
NYSC Scandal: I Never Claimed To Have Gotten A Degree From OAU – Dapo Abiodun
Olufemi Aduwo/Voxnews
The governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress in Ogun State, Mr Dapo Abiodun, has reacted to the certificate scandal hanging over his campaign, insisting the whole matter is down to mudslinging.
During an appearance on Channels Television's Sunday Politics, Mr Abiodun said he was not worried about the scandal.
"There are no issues about my certificate," he said, adding, "I never claimed to have finished from the University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University)."
The APC candidate has faced allegations that he submitted conflicting educational qualifications to the Independent National Electoral Commission in 2015 when he ran for Senate and this year in his quest to become governor of his state.
Of contention is the allegation that he claimed to have obtained a degree from the University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University, an allegation he denies.
"I never claimed to have gotten a degree from the University of Ife," he insisted when asked about the matter.He, however, said he studied at the university, but he didn't graduate from there.
When asked about some profiles of him that indicate he had a B.A in Accounting, replied, "But that is not from Ife" When his attention was subsequently drawn to the argument of those who fault claims that he bagged B.A in accounting on the grounds that the institution did not issue B.A. certificates in accounting, he blamed the controversy on political attacks.
"This has all been an attempt at mudslinging and to confuse the electorate and it is bundled with a lot of half-truths," he said. "I never claimed to have studied accounting at the University of Ife. I never claimed to get it (the degree) from the University of Ife. So, this issue has been presented as the presenter wanted it presented."
Asked to clarify what degrees he had, Mr Abiodon said, "I do have a Bachelor of Business Administration degree in Accounting and I will like to stop at that because this matter will be sub judice if I go any further."
Stressing that the matter was in court, he declined to comment further on it when questioned about where he got his degree and the veracity of the certificate he indicated he had in his form for senatorial election in 2015.
Nigeria's Excess Crude Account depletes 73% in three weeks
Nigeria's Excess Crude Account depletes 73% in three weeks
December 20, 2018 Olufemi Aduwo
Nigeria's ministry of finance building
Controversy trailed Wednesday's revelation by the Federation Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) that the excess crude revenue account savings has been depleted to only $631 million within three weeks.
Barely three weeks ago, Minister of Finance, Zainab Ahmed, disclosed at the end of the committee's meeting in Kaduna on November 25, 2018, that the balance in the account stood at about $2.319 billion.
It was not clear how about $1.688 billion, almost 73 per cent, left the account in a space of three weeks.
Excess Crude Account is a special account established to warehouse excess revenues from the prevailing crude oil price at the international market. Income generated above the approved crude oil benchmark price in the annual budget is saved in the account.
Withdrawal from the account is subject to the approval of the three tiers of government and the Executive Council of the Federation (FEC).
It was not clear when the decision to draw from the account was taken and for what purpose.
But, at the end of the FAAC meeting for December in Abuja on Wednesday, Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Finance, Mahmoud Isah-Dutse, said the money was withdrawn to settle the last tranche of the Paris Club loan refund to states.
Mr Isah-Dutse, who disclosed that a total of N812.762 billion was distributed between the federal, states and local governments for November 2018, announced that the balance in the excess crude account stood at $0.631billion as at December 19, 2018.
Asked how the savings in the account was depleted from $2.319billion in late November and to $0.631billion on December 19, Mr Isah-Dutse said the decision was taken that the final payment for Paris Club loan refund to states be drawn from the account.
When his attention was drawn to the apparent illegality in drawing money from the ECA without approval, the Permanent Secretary said the approvals came from the President and the FEC.
The decision was taken that the refund should be funded from the excess crude account, and the right approvals were obtained," he said.
Pressed further for clarification on who exactly gave the approval, the Accountant General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris, asked PREMIUM TIMES to approach the National Assembly to confirm if they were not aware of the approval to withdraw the money from the account.
Meanwhile, a communiqué by the Technical Sub-Committee of the FAAC showed gross statutory revenue stood at about N649.629 billion, which is lower than about N682.161 billion realised in the previous month by N32.533 billion.
Details of the total distributable revenue of N812.762 billion comprised the Statutory Revenue of N649.629 billion, Gross Value Added Tax of N92.079billion, foreign exchange equalisation of N70 billion and exchange rate gain of N1.055 billion.
From the gross statutory revenue, the federal government received N280.913 billion, representing 52.68 per cent; states N142.483 billion, or 26.72 per cent; and local government councils N109.848 billion, or 20.60 per cent.
About N47.882 billion went to the oil producing states as 13 per cent derivation revenue.
The distribution of the Value Added Tax (VAT) showed the federal government got N13.259 billion, or 15 per cent; states N44.198 billion, or 50 per cent, while the local government councils got N30.938 billion, or 35 per cent.
The communique said revenue from company income tax (CIT) increased significantly during the month, while revenues from Value Added Tax (VAT), Import Duty, Petroleum Profit Tax (PPT) and Foreign Oil and Gas, Domestic Oil and Gas Royalties all decreased.
Nigeria: CBN, PPPRA, Other Nigerian Agencies Fail to Remit N10 Trillion Surplus - Official
By Olufemi Aduwo
The federal government said on Tuesday, its own enterprises, including the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), owe about N10 trillion in unremitted operating surplus as at the end of August 2018.
The Director-General, Budget Office of the Federation, Ben Akabueze, disclosed this during his town hall meeting with Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of government-owned enterprises (GOEs) in Abuja.
Lamenting the poor returns on investment by the GOEs, records from the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation showed the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) as the worst culprit, with unremitted operating surplus of over N1.3 trillion, followed by the CBN with about N801.2 billion and Nigeria Ports Authority (NPA) with N192.1 billion.
Others include the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) - N66.1 billion; Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria (N51.99 billion); Nigeria Postal Service (N37.7 billion); Nigeria Communications Commission (N30.9 billion); National Inland Waterways Authority (N30.8 billion); National Information Technology & Development Agency (N30.7 billion); Nigeria Airspace Management Agency (N22.8 billion) and National Examination Council (N16.3 billion).
Also owing are the Nigeria Television Authority (N15.6 billion); National Agency for Food, Drugs Administration & Control (N12.3 billion); Nigerian Shippers Council (N12 billion); National Health Insurance Scheme (N8.8 billion); National Pension Commission (N8.7 billion); Corporate Affairs Commission (N7.7 billion); Tertiary Education Trust Fund (N6.1 billion) and Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (N6.1 billion.
Badeh Death and Boko Haram.
Former Chief of Defence Staff, Alex Badeh has disclosed that activities of fifth columnists in the military and other security agencies who leaked operational plans and other sensitive military information to Boko Haram sect was a major challenge he faced while in office.
Badeh said this in his Valedictory Speech at his pulling-out ceremony from Nigerian Armed Forces on Thursday July 30, 2015.
He called for equipment for the military, improved welfare as well as unity among security agencies as the country continue to battle Boko Haram.
Full text of his speech
1. It is with deep sense of gratitude to the Almighty God that I make this valedictory speech today, on the occasion of my pulling out from the Nigerian Armed Forces. When I commenced my career in the Nigerian Air Force as a cadet in the Nigerian Defence Academy about 38 years ago, little did I know that destiny will take me not only to the pinnacle of my Service as the 18th Chief of Air Staff, but also to the position of the 15th Chief of Defence Staff of the Armed Forces of Nigeria.
Looking back at how God lifted me from my very humble beginnings, through the various ranks and appointments to the pinnacle of my career, I can only say a very big thank you to the Almighty God who directed my steps, protected and empowered me to serve my beloved country. Like the saying goes, "whatever has a beginning must surely have an end". My journey in the Service of my fatherland as a member of the Armed Forces of Nigeria which began on the 3rd of January 1977 in the Nigerian Defence Academy has finally come to an end. Accordingly as I bow out today, I look forward to a deserved and happy retirement.
2. When I joined the Armed Forces of Nigeria, I resolved to put in my very best in whatever assignment I was given, in the service of my fatherland. Furthermore, I purposed within me to be dedicated, loyal and committed to making a difference in whatever task I was given to undertake. That resolve had remained with me throughout my years in Service such that as I reflect on the past, I rest in the firm conviction that I have given my best in the service of my fatherland. That to me, is the least one could do in appreciation to God and to a nation that has invested heavily in my development as a military officer and as a human being.
3. Occasions such as this, usually affords one the opportunity to reflect on the past, share experiences, as well as project into the future. Looking back at the years I spent in Service, I can only say I've had the most exciting life anyone could wish for. My life in the Service has been full of excitement, opportunities as well as challenges. The opportunities I had to be trained as a pilot and to have flown to all the continents of the world as well as working in various capacities with some of the best and most patriotic members of the Armed Forces of Nigeria, are memories that I will always cherish for the rest of my life.
As an Instructor Pilot, I had the awesome privilege of contributing to the production of numerous pilots for the Nigerian Air Force, some of whom are today occupying very important positions in the Nigerian military. Also, the opportunity I had to serve as a Directing Staff and ultimately as the Director National Military Strategy in the National Defence College, afforded me the opportunity to contribute to the development of strategic leaders for the Nigerian Armed Forces.
Furthermore, the opportunities I had to serve as Chief of the Air Staff and Chief of Defence Staff have exposed me to the challenges of managing a national institution like the military, in a very complex society like Nigeria where divergent interests coupled with political, religious and tribal affiliations often conflict with national interest. Despite the challenges however, we remained focused to the tasks at hand, as a result of which we were able to record some modest achievements.
PDP Expresses Shock Over Badeh's Murder …Demands Immediate Investigation
PDP Expresses Shock Over Badeh's Murder
…Demands Immediate Investigation
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) expresses shock over the gruesome murder of former Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), Air Chief Marshal (ACM) Alex Badeh (rtd), on Tuesday, by yet to be identified gunmen, describing it as a national loss.
The party said the ambush and killing of a military officer of ACM Badeh's status has heightened fears and apprehensions, on the level of insecurity in the country, particularly, the safety of average citizens, under the incompetent and insensitive Buhari administration.
Furthermore, the PDP notes that the murder of the former CDS, came ahead of his opening of defence, in January next year, in the N3.9 billion military fund case preferred against him by the APC-led Federal Government.
The PDP therefore demands a wide-ranging investigation into the killing to unravel those behind the dastardly act as well as the motive behind their action.
The party recalls the killing of former Chief of Army Administration, Major General Idris Alkali, in Plateau state as well as the horrific murder of over 100 of our gallant soldiers in Melete, Borno state, by insurgents and stated that President Buhari has failed woefully as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces.
PDP insists that our nation is drifting and gradually assuming the status of a failed state and urges President Buhari to spend the few months left of his administration to provide a leadership that will secure respect for our territorial integrity and the lives of our people.
Our party notes further that the failure of President Buhari is whittling the confidence of the citizens in our nationhood.
The PDP describes ACM Badeh as a fine and patriotic officer, who made various sacrifices towards the security, unity and stability of the nation, particularly as the Chief of Defence Staff, adding that his killing is a monumental loss to the nation.
The party condoles the Badeh family, the Government and people of Adamawa state and prays God to grant them the fortitude to bear the loss, while urging our security forces to immediately swing into action and leave no stones unturned until the killers are brought to book.
National Publicity Secretary and
Media & Publicity
PDP Presidential Campaign Organization
We were never interested in Nigeria Air' – Qatar Airways faults FG
'We were never interested in Nigeria Air' – Qatar Airways faults FG
by Al-amin Voxipopulid
Qatar Airways has denied interest as a core investor in Federal Government's national carrier project, Nigeria Air.
Akbar Al Baker, the Chief Executive Officer of Qatar Airways said his company was not looking to be a core investor, adding that the government only approached their management on how to go about floating a national carrier.
Al Baker said this while speaking to journalists on the sidelines of the ongoing 18th Doha Forum in Doha, Voxipopulid reports.
While refuting rumours that the national carrier project was suspended for lack of investors, Hadi Sirika, minister of state for aviation had listed Qatar Airways and Ethiopian Airways as some of the potential investors of the national carrier.
"We never applied to serve as core investor in the proposed Nigerian national carrier. The government of Nigeria only approached us on how to go about setting up the carrier. And we advised that Nigeria needs massive investments to float a national carrier," Vanguard quoted Al Baker to have said on Sunday.
"Nigeria, being the largest country in Africa, cannot afford not to have a national carrier that competes, first in Africa, and then the global stage. Again, Nigeria must also have the airport that can accommodate modern aircraft that can drive competition."
He said his company also advised Nigeria on the type of aircraft to acquire for profitability and that Qatar Airways would rather encourage the Nigerian government to designate some airlines to Doha rather than pay royalties; pending the floating of the new national carrier.
Al Baker also said Qatar Airways will not fly into Abuja or other routes in Nigeria so as not to kill the domestic airlines in the country.
Posted by Voxpopulid at December 19, 2018 1 comment:
Alex Badeh (1957-2018): The Man Who Flew Two Former US Presidents
Olufemi Aduwo ,Op
Alex Badeh (1957-2018): The Man Who Flew Two Former US Presidents And Received A Recognition From Koffi Anan
Alex Sabundu Badeh, born January 10, 1957, was a retired four star flag officer of the Nigerian Air force who served as the 18th Chief of Air Staff (October 4, 2012 – January 16, 2014).
He was the 15th Chief of Defence Staff of the armed forces of Nigeria (January 16, 2014 to July 13, 2015).
Badeh was born in Vimtim, Mubi Local Government Area of Adamawa State, North East Nigeria into a family of peasant farmers.
He attended Vimtim Primary School, Vimtim and went on to obtain his school certificate from Villanova Secondary School in 1976 before proceeding to the Nigerian Defence Academy
Alex Badeh was admitted into the Nigerian Defence Academy as a member of the 21 Regular Course on 3 January 1977, and was commissioned Pilot Officer on 3 July 1979. He commenced his flying career at the 301 Flying Training School on the Bulldog Primary Trainer aircraft in 1979.
He holds an M.Sc. degree in Strategic Studies from the University of Ibadan.
Air Marshal Badeh was promoted Air Vice Marshal on 3 January 2008.
Badeh was Commander of the Presidential Fleet, during the Olusegun Obasanjo's presidency. The Presidential Fleet Crew flew around the world frequently and by 2002, Badeh logged over 6000 flying hours shuttling VIPs, dignitaries, top government officials and Heads of State.
He was given the green light to fly former United States Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter on different occasions after extensive check was done by the United States Secret Service.
Badeh's professional dexterity on duty earned him commendation and an autographed pen from Koffi Anan and the then UN Secretary after flying him to an official trip.
Appeal Court Sacks Kashamu As PDP Governorship Candidate In Ogun State
The Ibadan Division of the Appeal Court has sacked Sen. Buruji Kashamu and other 'candidates' in the Adebayo Dayo-led faction of the Ogun State PDP, leaving Hon. Oladipupo Adebutu and others who emerged through the party's primaries as the authentic candidates of the party in the 2019 election.
The judgement was delivered today, Tuesday, December 18, 2018.
The three-man appeal panel set aside the judgment of a Federal High Court in Abeokuta which threw up Kashamu and his factional members as the authentic PDP candidates.
The panel headed by Justice A. B. Bada, resolved the four issues raised for determination in the appeal in favour of the PDP, saying the appellants were not properly served in the case at the lower court which breached their rights to fair hearing.
Both Justices Bada and N. Okoronkwo agreed with Justice H. S. Samani who read the lead judgment.
The judgment is expected to have removed the cloud over governorship candidates of Hon. Oladipupo Adebutu and the National Assembly and Ogun State House of Assembly candidates for the 2019 election.
The PDP had dragged the Adedayo Bayo-led faction to the appellate court to challenge the lower court judgment which threw up its candidates. They prayed the court to set aside the judgment on the grounds that they were not properly served before judgment was delivered and that the lower court judge was wrong in his judgment.
Adebutu won
Appeal Court sitting at Ibadan declares Ladi Adebutu as authentic PDP governorship candidate in Ogun State, sets aside High Court order making Buruji Kashamu candidate.
Ogun PDP Crisis: Court To Decide Kashamu, Adebutu's Fate Today
Ogun PDP Crisis: Court To Decide Kashamu, Adebutu's Fate Today
The court of appeal sitting in Ibadan, Oyo state, has reserved judgement in the case between two factions battling for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governorship candidacy in Ogun state, till Tuesday.
In the suit filed by the Ladi Adebutu faction of the party and heard on Monday, the group asked the appeal court to set aside the orders of the federal high court, Abeokuta, which ruled in favour of the Kashamu faction.
On October 2, the federal high court in Abeokuta had ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to accept and process the list of candidates and delegates submitted to it by the faction of Kashamu.
The commission had written Uche Secondus, national chairman of the PDP, that it was only going to accept list of candidates from Kashamu group.
Secondus had handed over the party's governorship ticket to Adebutu but the Kashamu faction also unveiled the senator as their candidate.
At the court on Monday, Emeka Etiaba, counsel to Adebutu, demanded that the case be assigned to another judge at the federal high court.
But Alex Izinyon, counsel to Buruji, vehemently opposed the granting of the prayers sought by the appellants.
Etiaba said a party in perpetual violation of positive and subsisting orders of court cannot justifiably seek favour from the same court it had treated with contempt.
He contended that the appellants had the opportunity to state their case at the federal high court, Abeokuta, after they were served and chose to stay away from the court on October 2.
After two hours of deliberations, the three-man panel of justices of the court of appeal presided by Olukayode Bada adjourned the case till Tuesday
Breaking: OAU Sex-for-Mark Prof bags 6 years jail
Voxipopulid
By Adeniyi Jaiye Voxnews
Justice Maurine Onyetenu of the Federal High Court sitting in Osogbo, Monday sentenced former lecturer of Obafemi Awolowo University, OAU, Prof. Richard Iyiola Akindele, to six years imprisonment for demanding sex to pass her student, Monica Osagie.
Prof. Richard Akindele .Photo courtesy RMG media
The accused had pleaded not guilty to the charge of sexual harassment preferred against him by the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offenses Commission, ICPC.
He had since then been remanded in prison custody following objection to his bail by the prosecution ICPC.
When the case came up on Monday, Akindele opted to change his earlier plea and admitted guilty of the offences as charged.
He was arraigned before Justice onyetenu on November 19 for alleged sexual harassment.
Meanwhile, efforts by the defence counsel to suspend the sentencing and negotiate for plea bargain failed, as Justice Onyetenu frowned at the rampant cases of students harassment by lecturers.
Justice Onyetenu said "the plea bargain is not absolute. The court still have discretion.
"This kind of issue is too rampant in our tertiary institutions. We send children to school, they come home telling us that lecturers want to sleep with them.
"We can not continue like this. Somebody has to be used as example. Even primary schools pupils are complaining. Telling me to suspend sentence does not arise. Plea bargain does not arise. May be the case continue to occur and reoccur because someone has not been used as example.
"It is time for the court to start upholding the right of the children, especially female students. The case is endemic.
Counsel to the defendant, Mr. Francis Omotosho, informed the court that the defendant has lost his job and has learnt his lesson.
He told the court that the University has discovered the mistake in the marking of the examination paper of the victim and has concluded plans to compensate her.
The Counsel further told the court that plans are ongoing to make offices of the lecturers open by building the front side with glasses at OAU.
But, the Judge, who apparently not convinced with the prayer of the Counsel, said "do you think they do it in the office? They go to hotel.
Counsel to the ICPC, Mr. Shogunle Adenekan, urged the court to confiscate the mobile phone of the defendant and forfeit it to the federal government, saying that sensitive materials were discovered there during forensic.
He also urged the court to grant order, releasing the mobile phone of the victim, Monica.
After considering the plea bargaining entered and signed by the Counsels, the Judge said there is a need to deter other people because of the nature of the case.
In her judgement, Justice Onyetenu sentenced the convict to 24 months on count one, 24 months on count two, 1 year on count three and 1 year on count four.
She said the jail term should run concurrently.
She also ordered that the Samsung X4 of the victim should be returned to her and the Samsung X8 of the confict should be forfeited to the federal government.
Give me more time, Buhari tells Nigerians on 76th birthday
President Muhammadu Buhari [Photo: The News (Nigeria)]
President Muhammadu Buhari has urged Nigerians to understand him and give him more time to translate his intentions for the country.
Mr Buhari made the call Monday in Abuja after a special parade organised in his honour by the Guards Brigade of the Nigerian Army to celebrate his 76th birthday.
Speaking briefly with State House correspondents in both English and Hausa languages, Mr Buhari said, "Nigerians should continue to pray for me and understand my intentions and give me time."
Mr Buhari also said he will keep reminding Nigerians about his performance in office so far.
"We will keep reminding Nigerians about what we have done, how we met the country, what we were able to do from the time we came in to now with the resources available to us."
The president and his party leaders have repeatedly told Nigerians that the challenges being faced were caused by the Peoples Democratic Party which governed the country for 16 years until 2015.
The president said he was impressed by the honour shown to him by the Army.
"I am impressed, they put a lot of time behind it and I thank them very much. I appreciate it indeed."
Apart from the special parade session, various birthday cards were presented to the president.
The Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan-Ali, presented a card on behalf of the Armed Forces, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation presented on behalf of the government and people of Nigeria, while the president's Chief of Staff, Abba Kyari, also presented a card on behalf of the president's aides.
The commandant of the Guards Brigade also presented a card on behalf of the army unit responsible for the protection of the president and his family.
Corruption Is Official' - Atiku Releases 10 Questions Buhari Must Answer
Below is a Press statement from Atiku's Media Team made available to Voxipopulid
The Peoples Democratic Party Presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, was taken aback last week when Mr. Babachir Lawal, Buhari's former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, turned up at the Presidential Villa on Thursday, December 13, 2018, where he was received with pomp and pageantry.
Mr. Babachir Lawal attended the launch of the Together Nigeria organized by the Buhari Support Organization (BSO).
It is a very sad day for Nigeria, when the President honours a man proven beyond all reasonable doubt to have soiled his hands with money meant for starving refugees.
These are the actions which feed the perceptions that has made Nigeria turn in its worst ever Corruption Perception Index rating by Transparency International where we went back 12 steps in 2018's rankings, moving from 136 under President Jonathan to 148 today.
According to Transparency International, Nigeria is more corrupt today and we ask the government to answer a few questions including:
· Who reinstated and double promoted Maina?
· Who owns the Ikoyi Apartment $42 million?
· What has happened to Aisha Buhari's ADC who looted ₦2.5 billion?
· Why was the $25 billion NNPC contracts awarded without due process investigated?
· Why haven't those beyond Buhari's padded budget scandals been sacked or charged to court?
· When will Babachir be charged?
· How come fuel subsidy has doubled even when petrol price has doubled?
· Why did President Buhari lift the suspension of the corrupt NHIS boss, Usman Yusuf, before public pressure forced him to suspend him? Why has he not been charged?
· In May, Transparency International warned that Buhari had increased Security Vote by 600%, yet our soldiers have no weapons and are killed by terrorists. Where is the money going?
· In February Buhari withdrew $1 billion from the Excess Crude Account to ostensibly fund the war on terror, yet the Chief of Army Staff said after Metele that they have no weapons. Where did that money go?
Answers to these and other questions are urgently required from President Buhari by Nigerians and failure to answer them only proves that under Buhari, the All Progressive Congress Government is not just Corrupt, but corruption is its policy.
APC Ogun Guber Candidate, Dapo Abiodun In Certificate Scandal Olufemi Aduwo
APC Ogun Guber Candidate, Dapo Abiodun In Certificate Scandal
Dapo Abiodun, governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Ogun state, is enmeshed in allegations of perjury over his post-secondary school qualifications.
According to documents seen, Abiodun declared only his West African School Certificate (1978) in the Form CF001 that he submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on October 23, 2018, ahead of the 2019 general election.
However, when he ran as the APC senatorial candidate (Ogun east) in 2015, he claimed to have attended the University of Ife, Ile-Ife (1986) and Kennesaw State University, Atlanta Georgia, US (1989) in his INEC form CF001, backed by an affidavit he swore to at the high court, Abeokuta, Ogun state.
Curiously, while he listed B.B.A. (hons) accounting as the degree he got in 1986 as at then 2015, he was silent on what he studied at Kennesaw State University.
However, in his official curriculum vitae, he claimed to possess another degree, B.Eng (hons) in civil engineering, presumably received in 1989 from the American university.
Also, on the website of Heyden Petroleum Limited where Abiodun is MD/CEO, underneath his name were listed B.Sc Civil Engineering and BBA Accounting.
If he proceeded immediately to Kennesaw after graduating from Ife in 1986, he would not have finished before 1990 as civil engineering is a four-year course in the university.
There are strong suspicions that he did not do the compulsory national youth service, even though he finished his first degree in 1986 — going by the INEC form CF001 he filled head of the 2015 election, supported by an affidavit.
Abiodun was born on May 29, 1960 and was 26 in 1986 when he claimed to have finished his first degree. The age limit for national service is 30.
Apart from the possibility of having committed perjury either in 2014 or 2018, there is also the possibility that he skipped the compulsory national service, which is punishable under the law.
SECTION 13 OF THE NYSC ACT STATES:
(1)Any person (b) who refuses to make himself available for service in the service corps continuously for the period specified in subsection (2) of this section, is guilty of an offence and liable on conviction to a fine of N2,000 or to imprisonment for a term of twelve months or to both such fine and imprisonment.
A criminal conviction will also mean the offender is barred from holding public office.
SECTION 182 OF THE 1999 CONSTITUTION STATES:
182. (1) No person shall be qualified for election to the office of Governor of a State if – (e) within a period of less than ten years before the date of election to the office of Governor of a State he has been convicted and sentenced for an offence involving dishonesty or he has been found guilty of the contravention of the code of Conduct.
Earlier this year, he was appointed chairman of the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) by President Muhammadu Buhari.
In 2012, he was appointed chairman of the Depot and Petroleum Product Marketers Association (DAPPMA), a position he still holds.
Abiodun has been having a running battle with Ibikunle Amosun, governor of the state, and the state working committee of the APC over his endorsement by the national body of the party for the 2019 governorship election, instead of Adekunle Akinlade, the governor's choice.
The APC candidate had accused Amosun of plotting to upturn the decision of national working committee (NWC) of the ruling party to recognise him as the guber candidate of the state, while accusing the governor of being "desperate to install" Akinlade at all cost.
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Stop Using My Pictures On Souvenirs' – Adeboye War...
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Advanced Votes buying Mechanism
Photo from Olufemi Samson Aduwo
To Motivate
Court to rule on Fayemi's eligibility case Dec. 10

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


WATCH ABOVE: The campaign #PutYourSticksOut is starting to catch on as people are leaving their hockey sticks out in front of their homes as a tribute to the victims of the Humboldt Broncos bus crash. Wendy Winiewski reports.
Members of the Canadian Armed Forces stationed in Iraq paid tribute to the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey team by placing hockey sticks outside of the soldiers' barracks, joining others from around the world who honoured the victims in the same way.
The Canadian Armed Forces tweeted an image showing a Canadian flag hanging above a door, while hockey sticks sit outside of each door of the building.
"From Iraq, our hearts are with you. #SticksOutForHumboldt #putyoursticksout," the army tweeted.
The horrific crash that took the lives of 15 people on Friday happened as the junior hockey team was travelling to a semifinal game against the Nipawin Hawks. The team bus collided with a semi-truck.
On Sunday, thousands of people poured into the Elgar Peterson Arena in Humboldt for a vigil to honour the victims.
They were honoured outside of the community as well, as many social media users began to share photos of hockey sticks left outside on front porches in tribute to the Broncos team.
Winnipeg Jets broadcaster and Humboldt native, Brian Munz, appeared to be the first to post the hockey stick tribute on Twitter, by sharing a text he said he received from a friend he went to high school with in Humboldt.
Munz shared an image of the text message and a photo accompanying it.
"Leaving it out on the porch tonight. The boys might need it … wherever they are," reads the text message.
The photo shows a lone hockey stick leaning against a wall on the front step of a house.
The broadcaster invited others to do the same.
Using the social media hashtag #putyoursticksout, people from both sides of the border shared pictures of hockey sticks resting on front porches, joining Munz's call to action.
Like the Canadian military's image, the #putyoursticks out hashtag went on to get responses from people around the world.


To all videographers need help!!!
You might want to delete this thread and re-post in the Photography and Video forum - you're more likely to get an answer.
Has it really been a year since you left us? It still seems like it was only yesterday. I love you, baby.
Actually, according to Brian Germain's downsizing recommendations, you should be under a 230 for at least your first 60 jumps - that presumes that your EXIT weight (not your bodyweight) is less than 200 lbs. If it's above, then you should be staying at a 230 for the first 100 jumps. You REALLY need to be talking to your instructors about this whole issue. Don't be in such a hurry to downsize. Learn to wring every bit of performance out of your canopy before changing sizes. Billvon's downsizing checklist is a good start. When you can perform all those maneuvers safely and consistently, THEN start looking at downsizing a step (230 to 210). Absolutely not. See above. No, it's not - 'getting small' is your first concern, as evidenced by your post. Again, see above.
Because it affects the speed over ground, which affects the separation between groups. Higher speed over ground means less time needed between groups for proper separation. Conversely, a lower groundspeed equates to more time needed for proper separation. Spreadsheet info by billvon, here.
I'm not an instructor, so double-check this with them, but: First off - Before your next jump, get with the instructor and an overhead shot of the area. Have him show you the DZ and the LZ (if separate). Find some landmarks that are easily visible from the air. Discuss your landing pattern with him and figure out where you should be for your downwind/crosswind and base legs. In regards to the flare - ask someone to watch your landings. As a *generality*, it's usually considered better to 'hold what you have' and finish the flare at the right height rather than let up on the brakes. Practice your PLF's!!!!
5D mark II released !!
5D was meant to be a landscape / portrait camera - 4fps is plenty for that.
What to write in log book?
I do a bit of both - what the planned dive was (2-way, fall rate, etc), and narrative on what happened during the dive and thought on improrvements. So it might look like this: Solo dive, fall rate work. Climbout/exit ok, went a bit head low (remember to watch the plane fly away). Hard arch felt good/stable, bit of rocking when reverse arched/slow (try to stay relaxed). Good stable pull at 3.5k, control checks good. Practiced rear riser flares in playground. Pattern entry good/as planned, adjusted crosswind/final due to wind changes. Good flare/landing 3m from peas.
I have a model 5 that I forgot to bring home with me last time... the model 8 looks interesting, too.
What's the difference between a PD Storm and a Spectre?


text:
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Call/Text Anytime
If I do not answer right away, please leave a detailed voicemail or text and I will respond as soon as I can. Response to phone calls may be slower on Saturdays and Sundays.
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E-mail is the best way to get in touch with me.
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Tuesdays, Wednesdays,
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My office is located in South Bath Suites at
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Please call (360)306-0191 if you need any assistance finding my office or entering the building.
There are a handful of paid parking spaces directly in front of the building and many more all throughout Fairhaven. Payment is required 11am-6pm, Mon-Sat at $1/hour.
There is free parking in a large gravel lot just across the street from South Bay at the corner of Mill Avenue and 11th Street (map). To access this lot, go north on 11th Street and turn left just before Fairhaven Bicycles, driving down into the gravel parking area.
Careful! The driveway down into the gravel lot can be bumpy.
A set of stairs goes up from this gravel lot to a sidewalk that leads right to South Bay. The gravel lot also connects to the South Bay Trail which leads right up to the South Bay Suites Building (walking south on the path).
1. Take I-5 Exit #250
2. Head west on Fairhaven Parkway for a few miles until you reach the traffic light at 12th Street.
3. Take a right onto 12th Street.
4. Take the fourth left onto Mill Avenue (the Orca Building will be on your right at this turn)
5. South Bay Suites is at the end of of the street past a couple stop signs.
If you're facing the westward towards the bay, the entrance to the suites/offices is to the right of the Village Inn and to the left of Ovn Pizza and big love juice.
There are big blue letters that say "ENTRANCE" over the door.
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Hours, Location, Parking
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Located in South Bay Suites
In Historic Fairhaven
Website © 2023 by Lindsey Frazier
Photos © Parker Peppin, Daniel Ritchie, & Lindsey Frazier


If you have been coming to Wildwood Church for a while and desire to make Wildwood your official church home, we invite you to consider becoming a church member!
Membership does not mean access to a church country club with special perks like travel miles, coffee points, or sanctuary seats with more legroom. There is no VIP lounge for church members!
It means experiencing a deeper sense of living in community, opportunities to serve others, and having a stake in our vision and mission. It also means having a church elder assigned to you who knows and cares for you and your family.
Take a look through the membership steps below. Each step is required because each is an important part of the process of becoming a member of Wildwood Church.
1. Let us know you're interested.
Contact Katie Hallas to learn more about the process and get started!
Share a meal and discover the history, vision and mission of Wildwood Church.
Meet with a church elder in an informal setting to share your story.
Discover more about our beliefs and expectations in a class discussion.
Join us on a Sunday morning as we celebrate our new members, followed by a luncheon!


text:
Le tournoi du New Jersey est un tournoi de tennis professionnel féminin. L'édition 1973 se dispute à Wall Township du 13 au .

Margaret Smith Court remporte le simple dames. En finale, elle bat Lesley Hunt.

L'épreuve de double voit quant à elle s'imposer Françoise Dürr et Betty Stöve.

Résultats en simple

Parcours

Tableau

Résultats en double

Tableau final

Premiers tours

Notes et références

Voir aussi

Articles connexes
 Tournoi de tennis du New Jersey
 Saison 1973 de tennis féminin

Lien externe
  Site de la WTA

Navigation

WTA 1973
New Jersey
Tennis aux États-Unis en 1973
Tennis en août 1973

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
[article] Kim Hyun Joong… WINNING HEARTS
11:04 PM fan Article, KHJL No comments
Written by Lazer Kim
By: LazerKim We still do not have updates for today about Kim Hyun Joong, but we have 2-3 days left to wait until October 4 and we'll get to see him in Japan for the big event for City Conquest. In the meantime, as usual let's find something to divert our thoughts of Kim Hyun Joong, otherwise days would drag slower towards October 4!!. I'll be writing about Hyun Joong winning trophies and winning the hearts of many that he is not aware of. And towards the end of this article I'll leave you with this question, "Did Kim Hyun Joong stole your heart from another artist?" Think about it!!
Winning Trophies
Have you asked yourselves where were you during this period last year at this same month with Kim Hyun Joong? He must be busy around this month last year 2011 preparing for his second album Lucky Guy, since Hyun Joong was able to released the album in October 12 last year. It was towards the year end that Hyun Joong had been busy picking up Awards of Honor from different categories and from different organizations as every fan takes pride every time he steps on that stage and received the awards that he shared with his loving fans. Every success of Kim Hyun Joong is the success of each and every fan he has who loves and supports him all these years.
From 2008 to mid year 2012 Hyun Joong had been receiving trophies from here and there until his bags of awards filled up. From the start of this year Hyun Joong has been doing a lot of traveling with a single goal of reaching out to his fans in many parts of Asia as he perform his Asia Tour fan meeting concert to personally thank his fans and as he was doing so, he keeps winning more hearts of the new fans! This year Hyun Joong released two Japanese albums Kiss Kiss and Heat, which both showed a good record results as both ranked at the Oricon Music Chart in Japan which was quite significant and other music charts from other Asian countries.
After the mid-year feast of his album launching that did a lot of noise in one part of the continent that echoed to the other parts world, Hyun Joong bid his temporary farewell to his image being a singer and focus on his other talent in acting as he is currently preparing for his up coming drama City Conquest. Some fans emailed me and worrying that he might not have an entry for MAMA this year. I never thought about it, that MAMA is just around the corner but then I remember Hyun Joong was saying
"The dream I want to make come true as a singer isn't a grand prize but I want to share and enjoy my music with my fans."
For Hyun Joong winning an award is a great honor, but winning the hearts of his fans is even greater than any award. Last year as Hyun Joong launched his two albums there were high demands for him to do a drama within the year 2011, but then he has to debut on his Japanese music that he would also like to pursue and so he did. This year the demand became louder that made Hyun Joong decided on doing City Conquest while he was still busy with his Asian tour fan meeting concert.
City Conquest had already earned some copyright sales from the foreign TV production prior to filming and this was how much in demand the drama of Hyun Joong is. This week on October 4th we shall know more details about the drama, probably, the schedule of airing and to what TV network it shall be shown. This October 4 event shall be a feast for Hyun Joong fans since it was said the teaser shall be shown for the first time, so let's not miss the fun and stay tuned, City Conquest will be on our screen soon!!
Inspiring the Youth
May I just share an email I got from a Japanese friend of mine, who is currently teaching in one of the schools in Tokyo related an incident. She gave an exams to her students, and one part of the exams answerable in essay form with the question "What makes a person popular?" My friend was quite surprised to have read from 12 of her students out of 20 wrote the name Kim Hyun Joong in their essay as an example of being popular and how people love him for what he is. I was smiling while reading her email that she remembered me being a die-hard fan Kim Hyun Joong and so told me about the essay of her students!!
It made me think since Hyun Joong was in Japan quite recently in July, the impact of his visit had left in the mind of the young ones. I may assume that these students may or may not be Hyun Joong fans, but my point is, he can truly inspire the young ones over his popularity yet remaining humble and being true to himself and to others. I wonder, does Hyun Joong knows this fact from his young fans?
Just like in his concert in Saitama he humbled himself for being honest about his physical condition that he was not in his best and apologizing to his fans for not taking take care of himself that made him sick. And yet that time he has to endure with whatever pain he had and carried on with the concert as a professional artist. The concert ended successfully despite of his condition. That I would consider his most memorable concerts that for me it was on this concert that struck my heart and felt his love to his fans. A truly amazing guy he is, Kim Hyun Joong.
Winning the Hearts of the Sick
I remember in 2009, the first time I have seen Hyun Joong at BOF, I was at the hospital with my brother while he was having his dialysis treatment thrice in a week due to his kidney failure. In the treatment hall there were about 10 patients including my brother and there's wide screen TV, whenever 5:30 pm strikes BOF started airing everyday in my country which is right on time for my brother's treatment. As I have mentioned it was my sick brother who introduced Hyun Joong to me through BOF. While watching the drama during commercial breaks, most of the patients talked about Ji Hoo.
My brother participated with the other patients conversation about Ji Hoo as I started to wonder, why do people in the hospital talk more about Ji Hoo who was just the second lead actor than the main actor Lee Min Ho. My brother said, "Looking at Ji Hoo's face relieves the pain I'm having, his face is so gentle, his character is so kind and he's very good looking." An elder patient next to my brother agreed and added "Ji Hoo's character is so soft that can melt anyone's heart."
It's a regret that I came to know Ji Hoo better this time after my brother passed away that I was not even able to tell Hyun Joong's great Life story to him, that I was not able to let him know that Hyun Joong is the opposite of Ji Hoo and that Hyun Joong has more than just that gentle face of Ji Hoo. But there was one right judgement that my brother had seen in Ji Hoo and a common ground with Hyun Joong and that is indeed he is a gentle healer in his real life behind the screen.
I believe my brother and the other patients were right, dialysis treatment was such a pain to endure not knowing any time it can end my brother's life while in the process. I'll write about it next time when I run out of topics to write!! I got so many silent readers who are sick and one day I'll dedicate one of my articles to them. I myself and so with my brother who passed away can relate to the title given to Hyun Joong as the gentle healer to many sick people. And I'm sure Hyun Joong was not even aware how he helped the sick even he wasn't doing anything for them. He's winning their hearts.
Winning the Future
In 2010 Hyun Joong was at lost having no idea as to why people called him Korean Star which for him was such a burden having the thoughts that he had not done anything as yet to called a star. He was not aware of the impact of Ji Hoo at BOF that gained a lot of attention because of him. And maybe he has no idea simply because he was thinking he was not even good enough as a first time actor as his critics have in mind, and that he's not even the lead actor in that drama as he portrayed the second lead and yet he won the hearts of many. Hyun Joong kept mentioning that he was badly criticized on the drama and yet he won the best actor in the Seoul International Awards!!
Until at present those critics were buried in his mind that made him pushed a bit further in improving himself as an actor. I believe an artist can improve his ability through constant practice, yes, but an artist should be given more chances or opportunity because I believe there's no other better way of improving one self until he has the actual chance. There's a big difference being trained inside the classroom and actual performance on stage both as a singer and as actor. Training inside a classroom are just supplementary aid, experience can bring an artist to the heights of attaining his goal of being a true artist.
Hyun Joong was talking about his future after turning 30 yrs old, meaning after military service, he'll be making more dramas and hopefully movies. Hyun Joong was saying in his interview in Thailand, that the ultimate period that he can open up his ideals of creating what he had missed or his shortcomings is through molding other's talents. He said once he reached a certain age, he would like to create a live band and let them perform what he missed or what he can not do during this current period of his career.
When Hyun Joong turns in his senior stage of career life, he would like to be a director and producer, that's how he foresee himself in the next 10 years. At least he's not the type of artist who would dream of still being as they were 20 years ago, as if curtains never close down, instead of being realistic!! Instead Hyun Joong dreams of sharing what he got to other rookies who was once a dreamer like him too. It's just so remarkable for a young man that after he was able to attained with his dreams, would now be dreaming of sharing to the dreams of future generation.
Stolen Hearts!
Before you have seen Kim Hyun Joong, do you happen to be supporting other artists or having one definite favorite but not necessarily following? I got a long list of favorites as I have mentioned in my other articles, but I do not know anything about them. I only know them by their names, their faces and the dramas they had which I have a collection of DVDs. But I never took interest in looking up their history or who they are! I simply check on the list of their dramas and buy their DVDs. Other than this, I didn't do anything!!
I know a good actor whom I have watched all his dramas. He was able to pursue with his acting career right after he had gone out from the military service as he did the drama 49 Days. It was such a good drama, it has a good TV rating but his next project was followed by two consecutive Chinese dramas and I never heard about him anymore. I went back to his blog site yesterday, and read my own comment last year saying "After watching the drama 49 Days you were my favorite actor, but my heart was stolen by Kim Hyun Joong."
I was laughing with what I have written last year!! I thought about what I have written to this actor which I have not realized before!! Now, Hyun Joong had even stolen my heart from his own boss!! I didn't even research on Bae Yong Joon as my no.1 favorite actor and it was until just last year that I looked him up simply because I was already writing about Kim Hyun Joong!! I wonder now as to how many fans did Hyun Joong stole from other artists??
Gosh, I never thought about this, do you know that Hyun Joong was just fond of stealing the heart of girls from his friends? I think that was sometime in late 2008 in a talk show he was relating that if he likes the girlfriend of his friend, he would just spill it out saying to his friend "I like your girlfriend!!" Although he was still young that time he was saying it. But it made me think as if he's saying the same thing to his seniors "I like your fans, can I steal their hearts from you??" LOL!! It sounds hilarious but it's true. I got a dozens of Korean favorites and Hyun Joong just stole my heart from those actors!!
Hyun Joong just kept winning hearts, just in case you're not aware of!! And the worst part is he will make you stay!! And why wouldn't I stay, long before I get tired staring his latest photos, here he goes with a brand new image! Why wouldn't I stay if today he releases he latest single and listening to it everyday but before I get ever tired here he is, working on a new drama City Conquest, wouldn't I wait for it which is just around the corner?
I don't think I can ever get tired of this guy in fact I couldn't even get enough of him!! I may get physically exhausted writing but it may take sometime before I finally get tired of Hyun Joong. Now unless he stops from showbiz, then it's time to leave and move forward!! Well, I'm a very realistic person, for me nothing is forever.
But there will always be a soft spot in my heart that belongs only to Kim Hyun Joong, that I don't think any other artists can take it from that spot. Not unless another artist with much stronger pull than Hyun Joong comes along.
But then he is ONLY ONE, he's definitely the only unique individual who had ever stolen my heart from others. Kim Hyun Joong indeed is a true winner as he kept Winning Hearts of many people.
LazerKim here writing
[News] SS501 Had a Meeting to Reunite The Group?
10:58 PM News, PJM, SS501 No comments
Credit: www.kpopstarz.com
Repost with full credit, Please.
Will SS501, the idol group that use to have five members, be able to reunite? After their contract terminated with DSP Media in 2010, each member signed with different entertainment agencies and have all been doing their own thing. Recently however, the rumors of the reunification of Kim Hyun Joong, Park Jung Min, Kim Hyung Jun, Heo Young Saeng, and Kim Kyu Jong have been drawing attention in the music industry.
After leaving DSP Media, the members of SS501 all stated clearly that they were not breaking up. Last August, it has been reported that the members discussed hopeful thoughts of a reunification when they all met before Kim Kyu Jong left for the Korean military. Just like the legendary group ShinHwa, SS501 is drawing attention as they are showing hopes of reuniting after years of separation.
Park Jung Min expressed his careful thoughts of a reunification during an interview with eNEWS after his showcase of "Give Me Your Heart" in Tokyo, which followed his official Japanese debut. Park Jung Min stated, "It's true that all the members got together before Kyu Jong left for the military. As we all emphasized before, we never broke up so all of us have continuing hopes of reuniting."
However, Park Jung Min was careful in speaking about the details of possible future plans for SS501. Park Jung Min added, "There is a member who is in the military currently and the rest of the members are still under contract with different agencies so it's very difficult to announce anything specific. However, just like the SS501 fans who have been hoping for a reunification, we the members, are thinking the same thing."
SS501 debuted back in 2005. Within 5 years, SS501 released a total of 18 mini-albums and digital singles. The most popular hit songs include songs like, "Love Like This", "U R Man", "Love Ya", "Promise to Promise" as well as soundtrack songs for the famous drama "Boys Over Flowers".
After the contract with SS501 terminated, leader Kim Hyun Joong signed with Key East Entertainment which is the agency of Bae Yong Joon. Park Jung Min signed with A&R Entertainment, which is the company related with the international musical instrument company, Yamaha. Kim Kyu Jong and Heo Young Saeng joined B2M Entertainment wihle Kim Hyung Jun signed with S-Plus Entertainment.
[Video] Kim Hyun Joong's New CF For Centerpole!
10:57 PM Centerpole, KHJL, Vid No comments
Credit: khjperfect00
KIMHYUNJOONGPERFECT
[News] Park Jung Min said "Received SMS from KyuJong, felt special." As for SS501 activites, mayber after KyuJong enlist [30.09.2012]
10:55 PM News, PJM No comments
Credit: sports.hankooki.com
Korean to Chinese trans: redcat111 @ 金圭钟中文网 www.kimkyujong.com.cn
Chinese to English trans: Bizhen @ DS501fanpage
"When I received KyuJong's letter in the morning, my feelings changed."
Park Jung Min who came back as 'ROMEO' in Japan disclosed the small conversation (thru SMS) that he had with KyuJong, who is currently serving the country, recently.
On the 29th of September, after Park Jung Min finished his "ROMEO CONTACT" in LIVE HOLE IN"Liquid Room in Tokyo, he chatted with the reporter, smiling, and said "Not long ago KyuJong sent a SMS to him at 8am in the morning. And I quickly replied him "What are you doing now?' , then after work, I received 'Still working,' as a reply.", "this situation felt really special'.
SS501′s Kim Kyu Jong was recruited to the army on the 23rd of July, and after four weeks of training at the Jeonju recruit training center, he's now doing public duty. Regarding JungMin's own plan on enlistment, he said "Now I have plans in Korea as well as overseas," , "So maybe I'll go after all these plans."
Regarding on the topic of whether SS501 can reunite, he said "As we are not disbanded yet, so we always have the feeling of want to reunite for a comeback again." He continued, "Before KyuJong enlist, he met all members once, but because he's now in the army, and due to the members' conflicting schedules, its quite difficult for us to make a comeback together for now," and he carefully made his statement.
[News] Park Jung Min of SS501 Successfully Completes Showcase in Japan [30.09.2012]
Source : kpopstar.com
SS501 member Park Jung Min officially began his solo artist career in Japan.
Yesterday (September 29), the showcase for Park Jung Min was held on September 29 at the Liquid Room in Tokyo, Japan. Park Jung Min showcased his first live performance of "Romeo" and spent time with his fans. Appearing on stage as "Romeo", Park Jung Min showed off his charismatic masculinity. Park Jung Min grew out of his idol group image and created a completely different image for his promotional activities in Japan.
The showcase was designed as a fan service for the fans that have already purchased his album. A select number of fans who have been chosen through a random process were invited to watch Park Jung Min's first live showcase. The tickets for the showcase were completely sold out within an hour after they went on sale.
On stage, Park Jung Min performed "Give Me Your Heart", "Taste the Fever", "Devil", "Tonight the Night", "Hide and Seek Love", "Dream Out Loud" and "Romeo."
After his performance, Park Jung Min stated, "'Romeo' will have a personality that is very different from me. I know there are fans who have been expecting the same Park Jung Min from SS501 but I think a lot of people already began to see me as 'Romeo' already. I hope all the time and effort that I put into this album pays off."
Meanwhile, Park Jung Min is scheduled to appear on a Japanese TV program on September 30 even though it is Chuseok, the Korean Thanksgiving Holiday.
[News] Park Jung Min "When I am doing activities as ROMEO, I felt restraint occasionally" [30.09.2012]
Source: news.kstyle.com
Chinese Translation: SOS @ 百度朴政珉吧ALLFORPJM.COM
English Translation: RoyalPJM (royalpjm.wordpress.com)
Please repost with full credits.
SS501 Park Jung Min rebirth as ROMEO in Japan, he frankly said "When I am doing activities as ROMEO, to hide my original image, I felt restraint occasionally."
On 29th September, Park Jung Min held a Live 'ROMEO 2ND CONTACT' for 777 fans in Tokyo's Ebisu Live House Liquid Room. That day, Park Jung Min did not spoke any words, he stayed mysterious and sexily, performing for the fans which captured their hearts.
A unique 'dark' concept was used for the live performance. During the interview with the reporters on the day of performance, Park Jung Min expressed that "In Japan, I do activities under the name of ROMEO. The attitude presented on the stage is indeed ROMEO. The original Park Jung Min does not exist on the stage."
He smiled and continued "When I went up the stage, the so-called Park Jung Min feeling is completely switched off. Instead, when I came down from the stage, I'll turn back to my original self like now, the chattering and cheerful personality."
During the Live, to express the man's heart which was injured by love, you must look as if you want to be compensated in general, and show a painful expression and gesture. This is once again proven his strength after musical 'Grease'.
He added "The fans in Japan saw the differences between Jung Min and ROMEO. When I am performing earnestly on the stage, the fans at the front row did some strange facial expression and fidgeted. When I faced with that situation, it was very hard for me to hold back my laughter."
Labels: fan Article, KHJL
Labels: News, PJM, SS501
Labels: Centerpole, KHJL, Vid
[Video Mess] Kim Hyun Joong – Message for the Lee TaeSung Japan Fan Meeting
Credit: zanes08@YT
[News] Park Jung Min said "Received SMS from KyuJo...
[News] Park Jung Min of SS501 Successfully Complet...
[News] Park Jung Min "When I am doing activities a...


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