Big Gist Africa

Kaduna State has once again reinforced its status as Nigeria's leading hockey powerhouse following another historic outing by its male and female hockey teams, Kada Stars and Kada Queens, who continue to dominate the sport both at home and beyond the country's borders. At the 2026 National Hockey Super League finals held at the Moshood Abiola National Stadium, Abuja, Kada Stars retained the men's title after edging Plateau Tigers 3–2 to secure a record fifth consecutive championship.  Kada Queens also successfully defended the women's title with a 2–0 victory over Plateau Queens, claiming their fourth successive league crown. Earlier in the year, both teams extended their dominance to the international stage by emerging champions of the male and female categories at the 2026 Median HFS West Africa Invitational Challenge Cup in Accra, Ghana.  The double triumph further established Kaduna State as a major force in hockey across West Africa. Since the 2023 Nati...

Prominent political leaders, business executives, academics, traditional rulers, religious stakeholders, and development professionals converged in Kaduna for the maiden edition of the Omoniyi Salami Colloquium, a one-day national dialogue dedicated to addressing Nigeria's leadership challenges. Held at The Neat Place Luxury Hotel, Kaduna, the event, themed "Nigeria's Leadership Crisis: Who Do We Look To for Solutions – Political Leaders, Business Leaders, Religious Leaders?", was organised to commemorate the birthday of the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of NEAT Microcredit and The Neat Place Luxury Hotel, Alhaji Omoniyi Salami. The colloquium attracted an impressive gathering of business leaders, captains of industry, policymakers, academics, traditional rulers, friends, associates, and stakeholders from across the country, who engaged in robust conversations on the future of leadership in Nigeria. Delivering the keynote address, Dr. Olusegun ...

A socio-cultural organisation, the Association of Ebonyi Indigenes Socio-Cultural in the Diaspora (AEISCID), has cautioned against what it described as attempts to politicise the annual Okeaku (New Yam) Festival of the Ezza Ezekuna people, urging individuals and groups to respect established cultural traditions. In a statement signed on Saturday by its President, Ambassador Paschal Oluchukwu, the group expressed concerns over it called a departure from the customary process of fixing and celebrating the festival, which it said traditionally marks the beginning of a new calendar year for the Ezza nation. AEISCID alleged that a gathering organised on June 30, 2026, at the ancestral Okpoku Ezekuna (Nchionu) ground by a group identified as “Ezza Elites” was held without the guidance or approval of recognised traditional custodians of Ezza cultural heritage. According to the association, while every group has the constitutional right to peaceful assembly and freedom of associati...

*Urges US, EU, other international community to uncover truth in the appointment, bribery scandal  Former Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Comrade Timi Frank has called for a thorough forensic probe of how the principal intermediary in the appointment and bribery scandal Dolapo Babatunde Tanimola died mysteriously.  Frank said for accountability sake, the parents, family members, relatives and the nation at large, the public deserve to know what led to Tanimola's death at a time when his presence would have helped to uncover the truths in the current scandal rocking President Bola Ahmed Tinubu's government.  The presidency had in a statement by Bayo Onanuga dismissed allegations against the Chief of Staff to the president, Femi Gbajabiamila, over the scandalous activities of the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC) and its Director General, Adeniyi Adeyemi.  In the said statement, the presi...

*Commends Apapa Command  The Comptroller-General of Customs, CGC  Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, has warned criminals planning to bring in illicit items into the country to have a second thought, as the officers and men are well equipped with intelligence and technology to beat them to their game. CGC Adeniyi gave the warning, while speaking at the handover of seized narcotic drugs to the NDLEA and expired/unregistered pharmaceutical products to NAFDAC on Wednesday July 1, 2026.  "However, these interceptions equally demonstrate that the Nigeria Customs Service possesses the intelligence capability,  technological capacity and operational readiness to detect, intercept and  dismantle these criminal enterprises," he said. He said that the importation of expired pharmaceuticals  and controlled substances poses a direct threat to public health, while the  sophisticated concealment methods adopted by the criminal networks  demonstrate their deter...

*Accuses presidency, INEC, judiciary of conspiracy to keep Atiku off  ballot  Former Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Comrade Timi Frank, on Monday, alleged a fresh plot by the Presidency, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and elements within the judiciary to remove the African Democratic Congress (ADC) from the ballot ahead of the 2027 general election. Frank warned that any attempt to exclude the ADC and its presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, from the election would amount to an assault on democracy capable of plunging the country into chaos and anarchy. In a strongly worded statement, Frank claimed that credible information available to him indicated that the ADC had become the principal target of a coordinated plan aimed at crippling the opposition and entrenching a one-party state. According to him, the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) is merely being used as a decoy while the real obje...