£21m Barcelona target wants showdown talks at Chelsea

Reports reaching us, has it that Luiz is concerned over his future at Stamford Bridge, with speculation claiming ‘the special one’ doesn’t rate the versatile Brazilian centre back.

And, with Barca boss Tito Vilanova willing to offer £21million for the former Benfica star, his future could lie away from west London.
Mourinho is yet to take the helm at Chelsea following Rafa Benitez’s departure, but is red-hot favourite to replace the Spaniard and return to the club following his agreed early exit from Real Madrid.
His return is likely to mean a re-shuffle of the playing staff at the club, but the paper reports that Luiz is eager to remain with the Blues. His current contract runs until 2017.
Were Barcelona to get their man however, he’d join another new Brazilian at the Nou Camp after Neymar agreed to join the La Liga champions from Santos.
Luiz would also challenge Gerard Pique and the aging Carles Puyol for first team opportunities, but his priority remains Chelsea at this time.

Bayern win Champions League 2013

Bayern Munich's Arjen Robben slotted in an 89th minute winner as they defeated Borussia Dortmund 2-1 at Wembley stadium on Saturday to be crowned European champions for the fifth time.
Dutchman Robben raced into the area and beat goalkeeper Roman Weidenfeller in a stunning finale to the first all-German Champions League final.
Bayern, on the backfoot for much of the first half, struck on the hour with Robben cutting the ball back for Mario Mandzukic to poke home from close range.
The German champions' joy was short-lived though as Dortmund levelled eight minutes later with Ilkay Guendogan's well-struck penalty awarded for a clumsy Dante challenge on Marco Reus.
Dortmund looked to be holding on for extra time before Robben broke free to score the winner and send the Bayern fans into raptures.

JAMB Release Remaining 68,000 UTME Results.

The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has released the results of over 68,000 candidates who wrote the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) on April 27.

JAMB’s Lagos Zonal Coordinator, Kamaldeen Oladeji said the results, initially seized because of biometric verification-related issues, had been released.

The JAMB co-ordinator advised the affected candidates, who had protested in Lagos, Kano and other places, to check their results on the board’s website.

In all, 1,629,102 candidates applied to sit for the Paper Pencil Test (PPT); 15,008 candidates applied for the Dual Based Test (DBT), bringing the number of candidates to 1,644,110. The results of over 1.5 million candidates were released on May 3.

Oladeji also said there is no going back on the newly introduced Computer Based Test (CBT).

The zonal coordinator, who supervised the CBT of the UTME at the University of Lagos (UNILAG), spoke on Saturday in Lagos in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN).

A total of 100,000 candidates will take the examination at 56 centres across the country.

The examination, which is the first of its kind to be conducted by the board, is expected to end on June 1.

The zonal coordinator noted that if the country is to compete favourably with others, especially in technological advancement, all must support the initiative.

According to him, the adoption of the CBT will eventually assist in enhancing ICT skills amongst the citizenry.

Oladeji said: “This CBT examination has come to stay. Once we get it right, others will follow, because as you can see, our education system is gradually transiting to e-education. This means, we should be talking e-learning, e-teaching, e-research across all the various levels of education in our system.

“With ICT, we can achieve a lot in no time. But the only challenge currently is that the computer penetration and infrastructural backing are still very low in our society.”

He implored stakeholders in the private sector to improve infrastructure and internet penetration across the country.

9 reasons your man can’t trust you

If you complain that your husband or partner does not trust you, he may have good reason not to. Of course there are men who are just insecure, suspicious and jealous and do not have the ability to trust anyone. In the case of the man who is unable to trust, you may be able to change your behaviour to make him more comfortable, but he also has to take the steps that are needed to overcome his trust “issues”.The following are the reasons that may be standing in the way of a loving and trusting relationship with your “honey”:

You try to control everything
If you take over everything, you never give your man the opportunity to “do his thing”. This sends him a silent message that you have no faith in him and you don’t trust him. Why should he trust you if you don’t trust him? Trust is learned and earned and it is a two-way street. To build trust with your man, start with small things like letting him pick the restaurant when you go out to eat or letting him pick the movie on date night.

 You’re not vulnerable
No one can be a “superstar” at everything and when you allow your man to see where you fall short, you are opening the door to a more intimate and trusting relationship. Let him see you without all the hair and make-up work, so he can see and accept the real you. You may feel a little insecure but once you see that it’s safe to be yourself, he will feel safe too.

 You don’t cry on his shoulder
You don’t have to be a weepy mess all the time and literally cry on your man’s shoulder but you can confide in him when you have something troubling on your mind. When you confide in him, he feels more comfortable confiding in you as well.

You’re judgmental
Being judgemental and critical of your partner is one of the quickest ways to kill the trust in a relationship because it makes your partner feel unsafe. People make mistakes and if they don’t feel like they can still be loved and accepted, they are less likely to trust. If your man makes a mistake and tells you about it, judging and criticising him means that next time he won’t trust you enough to tell you what happened. The same goes for feelings; if he tells you how he feels about something and you dismiss his feelings, he will not tell you how he feels next time.

You don’t keep your word
If you say you’re going to do something, do it. Once you start saying you’re going to do something and then don’t follow through, you’re showing your partner that you can not be trusted. Even with seemingly small things like time; when you agree to be somewhere at a specific time, don’t be late.

 You’re two faced
If you act one way in front of him and then another way in front of your parents, he may start wondering about you. If you can hide who you are from other people, who’s to say you’re not hiding things from him as well? The same goes for telling lies. If he hears you being dishonest with others, he can wonder if you are dishonest with him as well.

You’re not honest all the time
Tell your man the truth. Even small lies add up over time. It is better to just tell the truth rather than risk eroding the trust in your relationship.

You’re secretive
If you’re a secretive person, it can be hard for your man to trust you, especially if he’s been betrayed by you or someone else before. Be as open as you can about who you’re talking to, emailing, texting and spending time with.

 You don’t “have his back”
Your man needs to feel like you’re on his side. If you disagree with him, it’s better not to do it in mixed company, for instance. Support him in the moment and if it’s important, you can tell him about which points you disagree with, in private. Your man can’t trust you if you throw him under the bus in front of other people but he will appreciate it if you reserve your disagreements until the appropriate time.

GOODNEWS......Now you can ‘ping’ without a BlackBerry

Yes, it sounds too good to be true, but pinging is no longer exclusive to BlackBerry smartphones alone. This is not because of some technological breakthrough, nor is it due to any government regulation; the makers, formerly called Research in Motion, now BlackBerry, have decided to make the BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) a multi-platform application.

BBM app is to be offered as a download to run on rival platforms.
BlackBerry said it would initially offer texts, photo messages and group sharing functions on devices running Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS operating systems from “the summer”, adding that it planned to roll out screen sharing, voice and video calls - all without charge - later in the year.
The move could prove disruptive to Skype, Whatsapp and other rivals.
The company added that for the app to work iPhone users would need at least iOS 6 and Android users the Ice Cream Sandwich version of Google’s software. There was no mention of Windows Phone, the software which runs the Nokia Lumia series and some HTC phones.

According to a BBC report, the BlackBerry chief executive, Thorsten Heins, revealed the surprise news at the end of his presentation at the firm’s annual developers conference in Orlando, Florida, early last week.

BBM then and now
BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) began as a simple instant messaging tool offering Blackberry owners a free alternative to text messaging.
Over time, the company has added functions including sending pictures, audio messages and other files, as well as making voice and video calls, all over the internet.
The latest addition is Channels - a feature allowing brands and celebrities to send news and status updates to users who want to follow them through the app.
BlackBerry has a chance to leapfrog existing cross-platform rivals by bringing all these facilities to Android and iOS users.
However, with reports that Whatsapp could shortly add voice calls and that Google has been working on its own unified messaging service, Blackberry may find competition in the market is about to intensify.
Implications on BlackBerry fortunes
But Mr Heins played down the idea that offering the feature to rival devices would harm sales of the Canadian company’s own handsets.
“You might ask the question why is BlackBerry doing this now,” said Mr Heins.
“It’s a statement of confidence. The BlackBerry 10 platform is so strong and the response has been so good that we are confident the time is right for BlackBerry Messenger to become an independent multiplatform messaging solution.”
One analyst said it was too soon to know if the move would force competitors to change their own strategies.
“BBM has been a significant traffic driver for BlackBerry - particularly the consumer audience,” said Chris Green, principal technology analyst at Davies Murphy Group Europe.
“Expanding it to be multiplatforms not only widens the consumer appeal but also may help woo back corporate customers it lost due to earlier technical problems.”
A sales manager, who would not want his name in print and works with one the largest phone dealer companies in Nigeria, said only time would tell whether this move was the best for BlackBerry. He said, “What has made BlackBerry unique from other phones is BBM. They may have shot themselves in the foot by this move. Only time will tell.”
Ben Wood from telecoms consultancy CCS Insight added that BlackBerry might have felt forced into the move because of the growing popularity of cross-platform alternatives which also includes Facebook messenger.
“It will increase feature competition among mobile messaging platforms,” he said.
“It dramatically increases BBM’s long-term relevance - but it is unclear how BlackBerry will ensure the move benefits its own hardware sales.”
Certainly, time will tell what holds for the company. For now, it’s the consumers’ time to have the best of it all.

Leave me out of assassination plot, Jonathan tells court

PRESIDENT Goodluck  Jonathan has told the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja,  to strike his name out of the suit linking him to assassination plot against a legal practitioner, Andem Adem, who is the legal adviser of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Akwa Ibom State chapter.
The lawyer, had, in a suit, told the court that there was an assassination attempt on his life by some government officials in the state and members of the Peoples Democratic Party in the state.
In his motion for the enforcement of his fundamental rights, the plaintiff linked the president to the assassination plot.
The president, through his counsel, Cosmas Terenge Akighir, in a counter affidavit, pleaded with the court to refuse the motion and all the reliefs sought as it related to him.Akagir said in his response to the suit against his client was not in any way injurious against the applicant (Adem) and was not privy to any mastermind to injure the applicant.
He said: “ That the applicant ‘s entire affidavit in support of his motion on notice from paragraph 1 to the last has not linked the first respondent to the commission of of the alleged act either directly or indirectly.“That the applicant’s affidavit in support of his motion on notice has not linked the first, second, third and fourth respondent to the alleged acts.
“That the first respondent did not partake in any injurious act against the applicant and was not privy to any mastermind to injure the applicant.
That the deponent did not deposed to the applicant’s affidavit in good faith and conscientiously believing same to be true.
“That it will be in the interest of justice that the first respondent’s name is struck out in this suit.”Other respondents in the suit are the Attorney-General of the Federation, the Chief of Defence Staff, the Chief of Army Staff, Colonel Ibim Lawson, Captain Gambo, Corporal Hassan, Retired Captain Ini Ekong and Mr Aniete Ekong.

The case will come up before Justice Abdul Kafarati today.

I never met APGA Chairman in any bedroom – Patience Jonathan

Nigerian First Lady Dame Patience Jonathan has disassociated her self from ongoing crisis currently rocking the All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA, saying that she never had any meeting with its chairman, Victor Umeh in her bedroom.
Dame Patience also debunked the rumour that she was supporting the factional chairman of the party, Umeh, saying that any report connecting her to the crisis is far from the truth.
The First Lady who reacted to the reports through her spokesman, Ayo Osinlu denied meeting with Umeh, and disassociating herself from the party’s ongoing crisis.
“We wish to state categorically that nothing is farther from the truth, as the first lady did not at any time meet with Chief Umeh on any account, least of all the crisis in APGA.
“She therefore takes strong exception to her being dragged into the mud-slinging between the war-lords of APGA.” Osinlu affirmed.
Continuing, he said that, the first lady “remains a strong advocate of the rule of law which serves as a guarantee to everyone, either weak or strong, and legitimately expect to benefit from justice and equity.”
“I would not be found in any activity or in the company of anyone seeking to pervert the course of justice, he added.
Victor Umeh had reportedly told some close associates on May 12 that he met with the first lady in her bedroom in the company of businessman, Ifeanyi Ubah, and Dan Ulasi.
Umeh was said to have spoken of how the First Lady reportedly informed them that the Acting President of the Appeal Court, Justice Zainab A. Bulkachuwa, is dependent on her and had agreed to help out as a condition for her being confirmed as the Substantive President of the Court.