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Biden Issues Executive Orders Nullifying Key Trump Policies on First Day in Office

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U.S. President Joe Biden used his first day in office to issue a raft of executive orders undoing some of former President Donald Trump’s marquee policies on climate change and immigration.

Among the 17 executive orders and presidential actions Biden signed on Wednesday were moves to rejoin the Paris climate accord, end a travel ban from several Muslim-majority countries, and halt Trump’s withdrawal from the World Health Organisation.

“There’s no time to waste,” Biden said before signing executive orders in the White House.

“These are just all starting points,” he added.

Biden made rejoining the climate agreement a key point of his presidential campaign, vowing to undo former Trump’s policy.

United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres welcomed the U.S. president’s move.

“Following last year’s Climate Ambition Summit, countries producing half of global carbon pollution had committed to carbon neutrality,” Guterres said.

“Today’s commitment by President Biden brings that figure to two-thirds,” the UN chief added.

Trump, who long railed against the global agreement signed by almost every country, notified the UN of his intent to exit the deal in 2019 and the U.S. formally left in November 2020.

The move also led to a sharp decrease in U.S. contributions to a fund to help poorer nations cope with climate change.

Biden also ended the entry ban on citizens from over a dozen countries, including Eritrea, Yemen, Nigeria, and Sudan.

The American Civil Liberties Union, a non-profit civil rights organisation, applauded the move calling the travel policy a “cruel Muslim ban that targeted Africans.”

Critics had called the policy – one of the first moves by Donald Trump when he became president in 2017 – a “Muslim ban.”

However, the ban was changed, in part due to legal challenges, and included some non majority-Muslim nations.

Biden has described the policy as discriminatory and an affront to the country’s values.

The president also submitted a letter to UN chief Guterres saying the U.S. intended to stay in the WHO, halting Trump’s withdrawal, which was scheduled for July of this year.

The U.S. will be a “full participant and a global leader” in confronting the Coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) and other public health threats, Biden said in a letter to UN chief Guterres that rescinded U.S’s. withdrawal from WHO.

Biden issued an executive order halting construction of a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, dealing a blow to one of Trump’s signature policy goals meant to keep South American immigrants out of the US.

The president also signed an executive order mandating that people wear masks in all federal buildings and on federal lands in an effort to fight the spread of the coronavirus.

“Wearing masks isn’t a partisan issue — it’s a patriotic act that can save countless lives.

“It’s time to mask up, America,” Biden wrote on the official presidential Twitter account.

Trump had long downplayed the need to wear masks and avoided wearing masks in public even as COVID-19 pandemic killed over 400,000 people during his tenure as president.

As part of his executive order, Biden asked everyone in the U.S. to wear a mask when in public for at least the next 100 days.

Biden’s transition team said earlier that the executive orders were meant to reverse “the gravest damages of the Trump administration.”

The Democrat made the policies cornerstones of his presidential election campaign, seeking to reverse tougher immigration rules, a lax attitude on public health and an aversion to international cooperation on climate change seen under his predecessor.

The president has also sent a bill to Congress to overhaul the country’s immigration system, his team said earlier.

The legislation aims to provide pathways to U.S. citizenship for undocumented people, address the root causes of migration and speed up the reunification of families after children were separated from parents at the U.S. border with Mexico.

Biden has already made it clear he aims to push for another 1.9 trillion dollars in relief and stimulus to help the economy through the coming months of the pandemic.

This will involve working with Congress, where he is likely to meet some resistance to more spending, after the U.S. government has already pumped trillions into the economy since March.

However, job loss data is worrisome and businesses are suffering.

(dpa/NAN)

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Military Releases Pictures, Names of Soldiers Killed in Delta Community

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The Defence Headquarters has released the list of 17 military personnel killed in an attack in Delta State. 

The military personnel were killed last week in Okuama, a community in Ughelli South Local Government Area of Delta State after a peace mission.

Days after the gruesome murder, the Defence Headquarters said 17 personnel including the Commanding Officer of 181 Amphibious Battalion, two majors,  one captain, and 12 personnel of the battalion.

“May The Souls of the Departed Rest In Peace,” the Nigerian Army wrote on its X handle alongside a photo collage of the personnel on Monday evening.

The Defence Headquarters gave the names of those killed as:

– Lt Col AH Ali, the Command Officer, 181 Amphibious Battalion, Nigerian Army.

– Maj SD Shafa (N/13976)

– Maj DE Obi (N/14395)

– Capt U Zakari (N/16348)

– SSgt Yahaya Saidu (#3NA/36/2974)

– Cpl Yahaya Danbaba (1ONA/65/7274)

– Col Kabiru Bashir (11NA/66/9853)

– LCol Bulus Haruna (16NA/TS/5844)

– Lal Sole Opeyemi (17NA/760719)

– LCpl Bello Anas (17NA/76/290)

– LCpl Hamman Peter (NA/T82653)

– LCpl Ibrahim Abdullahi (18NA/77/1191)

– Pte Alhaji Isah (17NA/76/6079)

– Pte Clement Francis (19NA/78/0911)

– Pte Abubakar Ali (19NA/78/2162)

– Pte Ibrahim Adamu (19NA/78/6079)

– Pte Adamu Ibrahim (21NA/80/4795).

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Glo 1 Cable is the King of Telecoms

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By Eric Elezuo

Available data and recent happenings have proved that it is not by coincidence that leading telecommunications company, Globacom, is the market leader, not only in provision of telecom services, but in being proactive to foresee future occurrences. This is exemplified in its ability to remain running even as acclaimed major networks have temporarily packed up as a result of the main one cable malfunction a few days ago in Nigeria, and some African countries.

Globacom’s Glo 1 submarine cable has literally remained the only hope for internet users covering both banking and browsing usages.

The GLO-1 (Globacom-1) submarine communications cable, which came on board in 2009, is a cable system along the west coast of Africa between Nigeria and the UK, owned by Nigerian telecoms operator Globacom, under the dynamic leadership of Africa’s pride, Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr.

The submarine cable system is 9,800 km long, and became operational in 2011 with a minimum capacity of 640 Gbit/s.

A project of Globacom, Nigeria’s 2nd largest telecoms provider, total capacity of the system is now advertised as 2.5 Tbit/s. The cable’s link to Ghana was turned up in April, 2011, meaning that Ghana subscribers are part of the millions still enjoying uninterrupted network experience, the failure of main one, notwithstanding.

It would be recalled that massive internet outages was reported in Nigeria following damage to international undersea cables supplying the country with connectivity.

But Glo was not affected, a testimonial that Nigeria should celebrate the brand as against other networks that buckled under the weight of the underwater cable failure, the humongous money they are making from Nigerians notwithstanding. Those also goes to show that they don’t believe in the country.

Reports show that telecommunications companies and a number of banks which rely on the affected cables for internet services were affected by the outage, and will continue to be partially or completely out of service for the next five weeks if reports emanating from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) is anything to go by.

According to reports, the damage affected major undersea cables near Abidjan in Côte d’Ivoire and has led to internet downtime across West and South African countries.

The undersea cables affected are the West Africa Cable System (WACS), the Africa Coast to Europe (ACE), MainOne, and SAT3.

However, Glo 1, owned by Nigeria’s leading digital services company, Globacom, was not affected by the damage and has continued to operate normally. Data users, internet service providers and financial institutions which run on Glo 1 have continued to operate normally.

Industry analysts believe the sturdy nature and resilience of Glo 1 International Submarine Cable is the reason the damage did not affect the cable.

It would be recalled that the Glo submarine cable system Glo 1, made a historic landing in Alfa Beach, Lagos, Nigeria, in 2009. The landing marked the beginning of cheap bandwidth which in itself translated into many possibilities in the Information and Communications sectors of the Nigerian economy.

The project jointly executed by Globacom and its partners, Alcatel Lucent gave and continues  to give Nigeria lead in telemedicine, eCommerce and egovernance among other practices that transform economies.

Then, the Executive Director, Human Resources, Mr Adewale Shangowawa, noted that with the landing of the Glo1 submarine cable, Globacom has scored another first and as well has taken a bold step to give Nigeria the lead in the magical broadband revolution in Africa.

The 9800km cable from Bude in UK, connects Nigeria to the rest of West Africa and the UK. It has landing points in Nigeria, London and Lisbon in Portugal. It is deploying 16 branching units to connect countries in West Africa.

The ED added that globally, the tradition is for a consortium of telecommunication companies to team up to set up a submarine cable network to enhance their connectivity and bandwidth capacity. Globacom became an exception to the norm.

Glo is the first single telecommunication company in the world to own its submarine cable. The high capacity Glo 1 optic fibre cable brought functional direct connectivity between West Africa, the UK and the rest of the world. The 9,800 km long cable provided huge capacity on its 2-fibre pair system. The Glo 1 cable also made available excess bandwidth to all the cities connected to the cable.

This will translate into much faster and more robust connectivity for voice, data and video. The cable will connect 14 West African countries through the branching units to the rest of the world. It will boost economic activities in the region, create job opportunities and serve companies in Europe and Africa.

Facts of the submarine cable landing included that Glo 1 provides connectivity from Lagos to Bude in United Kingdom through fibre optic cable laid undersea.

The cable which is of the 32 STM 64 type has virtual infinite capacity and therefore offers sufficient capacity for traffic for the Globacom’s mobile, fixed, and internet telecommunication services.

Last September, the $250 million Glo-1 cable system landed initially in Lagos and in Accra in Ghana. With 2.5 Tbps of capacity, the Glo-1 cable has been ready for commissioning since July 2010.

Mike Adenuga Jr., Globacom’s chairman, while describing the $250 million project, said the Glo-1 cable will provide Nigerian user’s two benefits: become part of the competitive telecom landscape and make broadband access and long-distance voice service more affordable.

As a company with unparalleled vision, and proactive initiatives, Glo in 2018, and in a bid to boost its data services and remain preferred data services provider with clarity and reach, commenced upgrading its undersea cable, Glo 1 capacity by 100G.

Bisi Koleoso, a deputy chief operating officer, Technical, then, which explaining the process said that, in addition the company as well is investing in equipment for more path redundancy for the Glo 1 in case of fiber cut. In 2024, fibre cut occurred, and Glo is still up and running.

“As the innovation leader in Nigeria’s telecom space, Globacom is committed to ensuring that Nigerians were not left behind in the march to a digitalised world.

“We have invested massively in new technologies to introduce these products which we believe will redefine business, social and personal pursuits,” the DCO had said.

The visionary company did not stop there however. Consequently, on April 8, 2011, it followed up the launch of the sub-marine optical fibre cable, Glo I Submarine Cable, which gulped a whopping $800 million, thereby making it the first telecommunication company to build such a high-capacity optic fibre from the United Kingdom to Nigeria with the rolling out of the Glo 2 submarine cable. The submarine optic fibre cables was designed to connect Lagos directly to Southern parts of Nigeria.

The submarine cables was programmed to “contain three fiber pairs. Fiber Pair 1 (Express) will connect Lagos directly to Southern part of Nigeria with terrestrial extension to existing terrestrial backbone.

“Fiber Pair, also known as Omnibus 1, has eight branching units to offshore oil stations and communities. Fiber Pair 3, otherwise called Omnibus 2, contains two switchable branching units southward Africa.”

The Glo II Submarine Cable would boost overall socio-economic development of the Niger Delta, and offer greater bandwidth for local ICT business to flourish and provide backup for the terrestrial fibre route from Port Harcourt to Lagos.

The company further explained that Glo 2 will equally be much more reliable as far as fibre cut is concerned, assuring that Globacom “has put in place workable plans to scale up the network for the future and innovation in products.

A statement on the effect, read in part: “We plan to initiate new data analytic tools to capture subscribers’ experience in real time and also take pre-emptive actions to improve the network. Also new sites would be rolled out into rural areas, banishing digital divide between cities and villages….to increase capacity by giving a congestion-free network and superior quality in voice data. We also plan to swap old equipment in other states with better quality ones, so that our subscribers can have better services.”

Glo’s invincibility in the telecommunication world is nothing short of insightful leadership, clear cut vision and the passion to put customers first in all its undertakings. This is not forgetting that it has done everything to project Nigeria’s ingenuity in the field of telecommunication,  and by extention other fields.

Glo is flourishing under the leadership of the spirit of Africa, Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr., and the Executive Vice Chairman, Mrs Bella Adenuga-Disu.

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Glo Unveils Korrect Predict Lottery Service, Rewards Subscribers with Cash, Airtime

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A new product, Glo Korrect Predict Lottery has been unveiled by telecommunications services provider, Globacom. Under the new service, any sports lover on Glo network who successfully predicts the final outcomes of football matches played across the world will be rewarded with fantastic cash prizes and free airtime.

“Sports Prediction Market has witnessed significant growth over the years, with a projected value of over $155 billion globally by 2024 and that, the growth is driven by the proliferation of smartphones, increase in online betting platforms, as well as increased sports viewership and adoption of technology”, Globacom said in a statement In Lagos.

This trend, the company explained underscored the unveiling of the new service Korrect Predict lottery, which it said, will give subscribers the opportunity to win cash gifts from predicting match results accurately.

According to Globacom “Subscribers will receive 2 football matches daily for them to predict the correct scores after which those who accurately predict the outcomes of their preferred matches will win amazing prizes from Glo”.

To subscribe to Korrect Predict, you will either dial the USSD Command *7023# or send the keyword “KPRD” to the shortcode “7023” to subscribe to the daily plan costing just N50 or send the keyword “KPW” to the shortcode “7023” to subscribe to the weekly plan of N150. Upon successful subscription, you will receive an SMS with a link to access the service”.

For the first active subscription when they select any of the daily, or weekly auto-renewal plan, Glo said subscribers will enjoy free trial, adding that “This means that a new subscriber can activate the service at no cost for the first twenty-four hours, after which he or she will then be charged for the next renewal cycle. Subscribers who do not want to be charged after the free trial and buy offer will have to cancel their service renewal before the twenty-four hours elapse by dialing the USSD command for deactivation”.

Glo Korrect Predict provides access to two daily predictions on football matches across Africa, Asian, American and European Leagues including Asian League, English Premiership, Italian Serie A,Spanish La Liga, German Bundesliga, French Ligue 1 and Portugese Primeira Liga and it can be accessed by all Glo subscribers via SMS, USSD, and Web.

To subscribe to the daily plan costing just N50 subscribers will either dial the USSD Command *7023# or send the keyword “KPRD” to the shortcode “7023” or send the keyword “KPW” to the shortcode “7023” to subscribe to the weekly plan of N150. An SMS with a link to access the service will be sent to the subscribers upon successful subscription.

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