A 27-year-old man, Munkaila Ado, has been arrested for the alleged m*rder of one Safiya Danladi, a 13-year-old girl, in Pali community of Alkaleri local government area of Bauchi State.

Until her death, Safiya was carrying a four-month-old pregnancy for Munkaila, who was her boyfriend, Leadership reported.

Munkaila was hellbent on getting the pregnancy aborted afterwhich Safiya was secretly taken to Gombe State for abortion, it was reported.

Munkaila later opted to k!ll his lover after an unsuccessful arrangement to abort the four-month-old pregnancy in the neighbouring Gombe State.

However, a statement by the Bauchi State Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), SP Ahmed Mohammed Wakil, said: “The suspect (Munkaila) confessed that the missing girl was his girlfriend who was four-month pregnant to the knowledge of her mother but unknown to the father Alhaji Danladi Mohammed.”

The Police spokesperson added that Munkaila conspired with the mother of the 13-year-old girl and another accomplice by name Mu’azu and they “took the victim to Gombe to procure an abortion, thereafter on reaching Gombe the victim was led to one Hajiya Amina Abubakar ‘f’ 50-yr-old house in Jekada Fari behind Specialist Hospital Gombe where the victim was administered with some substances to cause the abortion.”

He said while returning home in Bauchi State, Munkaila and Muazu strangulated Safiya to death. They thereafter burnt the corpse and bury her in a shallow grave.

SP Wakil stated that the duo will be charged to court on two-count charge of criminal conspiracy and culpable homicide as well as violation of human right and dignity of the girl-child.

The Defence Headquarters said it has arrested the terrorists behind the attack on the St. Francis Catholic Church in Owo, Ondo State.

The Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor, who made the disclosure during a parley with media executives at the Defence Headquarters, Abuja, said the criminals were arrested in collaboration with other security agencies.

Terrorists attacked the Catholic Church during a Sunday Mass and opened fire on the worshippers, resulting in the death of over 30 persons.

The incident happened on June 5.

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has explained why it can’t extend the voter registration exercise across the country.

Akwa Ibom State Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) Mike Igini who spoke during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily on Friday August 5, said extending the voter registration exercise will hamper its preparations for the 2023 general elections.

Igini said “Now that we have officially suspended the CVR process, we have to consolidate; aggregate the data and thereafter run the biometric accreditation system to weed out all multiple registrants.

“Thereafter, Section 19 [Electoral Act 2022] says we must do a one-week display of the voter register for the commission to accept claims; objections as it relates to either omitted names or names of individuals that ought not to be on that register as identified by people in the area.

“And how do you do that? You have to produce the preliminary register of voters for this purpose which means they have to be millions of these would-be voters. That will be posted in the entire wards and local governments of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and that is a huge work.”

Also pointing out that the electoral umpire will produce and distribute the Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) to the new registrants, Igini added that Section 17 of the Electoral Act only mandates the Commission to stop voter registration less than and not exactly 90 days to the election.

Aside from this, he said, “it is not only this that INEC will be doing”. Igini stated that Nigerians should rather be concerned about voter turnout in the next election despite the outcry that greeted the suspension of the registration.

“What gives spice to the practice of democracy is mass participation,” the INEC official said. The INEC REC expressed satisfaction with the recent wave of enthusiasm by Nigerians in the electoral process, likening it to what happened in the country in the lead-up to the 1993 poll.