Slider1
Slider2
Slider3
Slider4
previous arrow
next arrow

Archive March 3, 2025

Verstappen, Biles & Pidcock among Laureus award nominees

Getty Images

Olympic champions Simone Biles, Mondo Duplantis, Leon Marchand, Faith Kipyegon, Sifan Hassan and Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone are among a star-studded shortlist for the Laureus World Sports Awards.

American Biles, the world’s most decorated gymnast, is a three-time winner of the women’s award and also claimed the comeback award last year.

She won three golds in Paris in the team, all-around and vault plus a silver on floor and now has 11 Olympic medals.

She is joined on the shortlist by a trio of athletes – American McLaughlin-Levrone, the 400m hurdles and 4x400m relay champion, Kenya’s Kipyegon, who won a third 1500m title and Dutch star Hassan, the marathon champion.

Last year’s winner, the Spanish footballer Aitana Bonmati, and tennis world number one Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus complete the list.

On the men’s side, pole vaulter Duplantis, who retained his Olympic title and has broken the world record 11 times, and swimmer Marchand, the winner of four golds at his home Games, both enjoyed Olympic success last year.

Also on the shortlist are the 2023 winner Max Verstappen, who claimed his fourth consecutive Formula 1 title, Slovenian cyclist Tadej Pogacar, who won the Tour de France, Giro d’Italia and world title, and Spanish tennis player Carlos Alcaraz, the winner of Grand Slam titles at the French Open and Wimbledon

However, Alcaraz’s on-court rival Jannik Sinner, the world number one had his nomination withdrawn last week after he was given a three-month doping ban.

British cyclist Tom Pidcock is nominated for the action award after retaining his Olympic mountain biking title in spectacular style.

Pidcock, who trailed French rider Victor Koretzky by as much as 40 seconds at one point, defied a puncture to win his second consecutive gold.

He is joined on the shortlist by two gold-medal winning skateboarders – Yuto Horigome and last year’s winner Arisa Trew, snowboarder Chloe Kim, surfer Caroline Marks and Polish speed climber Aleksandra Miroslaw.

The McLaren Formula 1 team are the only nominee for the team of the year award not to hail from either Spain or the USA.

The sport’s second longest-lived team ended a 26-year wait to win the 2024 constructors’ championship.

Also nominated are three Spanish football teams – Real Madrid men, Spain men and Barcelona women, along with USA men’s basketball team and the Boston Celtics.

Basketball is also represented in the world breakthrough award through San Antonio Spurs and France star Victor Wembanyama, who is up against Olympic gold-medal winning athletes Julien Alfred of St Lucia and Letsile Tebogo of Botswana, Canadian swimmer Summer McIntosh and Spanish footballer Lamine Yamal.

Five-time Paris Paralympic gold medallist and London Marathon winner Catherine Debrunner of Switzerland is among those nominated for the sportsperson with a disability along with wheelchair tennis player Tokito Oda, archer Matt Stutzman, swimmers Teresa Perales and Jian Yuhan, and badminton player Qu Zimo.

Nominees

Sportsman of the year

Carlos Alcaraz (Spain) – tennis

Mondo Duplantis (Sweden) – athletics

Leon Marchand (France) – swimming

Tadej Pogacar (Slovenia) – cycling

World sportswoman of the year

Simone Biles (USA) – gymnastics

Aitana Bonmati (Spain) – football

Sifan Hassan (Netherlands) – athletics

Faith Kipyegon (Kenya) – athletics

Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone (USA) – athletics

Team of the year

FC Barcelona women – football

Boston Celtics – basketball

McLaren – Formula 1

Real Madrid men – football

Spain men – football

Breakthrough of the year

Julien Alfred (St Lucia) – athletics

Bayer 04 Leverkusen (Germany) – football

Summer McIntosh (Canada) – swimming

Letsile Tebogo (Botswana) – athletics

Victor Wembanyama (France) – basketball

Comeback of the year

Rebeca Andrade (Brazil) – gymnastics

Caeleb Dressel (USA) – swimming

Lara Gut-Behrami (Switzerland) – alpine skiing

Marc Marquez (Spain) – motor cycling

Rishabh Pant (India) – cricket

Action sportsperson of the year

Yuto Horigome (Japan) – skateboarding

Chloe Kim (USA) – snowboarding

Caroline Marks (USA) – surfing

Aleksandra Miroslaw (Poland) – speed climbing

Tom Pidcock (GB) – mountain biking

Sportsperson of the year with a disability

Catherine Debrunner (Switzerland) – athletics

Teresa Perales (Spain) – swimming

Tokito Oda (Japan) – wheelchair tennis

Matt Stutzman (USA) – archery

Jiang Yuyan (China) – swimming

Sport for good award

Kick4life (Lesotho) – football & gender equity

Figure Skating in Harlem (USA) – figure skating & racial equity

Kind Surf (Spain) – surfing & inclusion

Liberi Nantes (Italy) – football & social inclusion

Paris Basket 18 (France) – basketball & gender equity

Related topics

  • Motorsport
  • Tennis
  • Formula 1
  • Gymnastics
  • Cycling
  • Women’s Football

Obasa Re-Elected Lagos Speaker After Meranda’s Resignation

A lawmaker from Agege Constituency I, Mudashiru Obasa, has been re-elected as the Speaker of the 40-member Assembly in the wake of the leadership tussle that has plagued the Lagos State House of Assembly for the past seven weeks.

Mojisola Meranda, the house’s speaker, resigned on Monday, and Obasa was elected.

Noheem Adams, a former Majority Leader of the House who represents Eti-Osa Constituency 1, was the nominee for his re-election.

Seven weeks after his removal, Obasa took the oath of office as the new Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly.

&

;

In 2007, he was the first member to win a seat in the House. Since then, he has been in the chamber. Before being fired in January 2025, he first started speaking in June 2015.

Chess or Game of Thrones?

More than two-thirds of the 40-member assembly removed Obasa as speaker of Lagos on January 13, 2025, sparking a leadership crisis in the Assembly. He was fired because of alleged misconduct and other offenses.

Meranda, the then-deputy of Obasa, was immediately elected as the new speaker, making her the first woman to lead the state’s South-West state legislature.

Before resigning as the speaker of Lagos in March 2025, Mojisola Meranda officially resigned.

Obasa vehemently opposed his removal on January 25, 2025, and pleaded with him to continue speaking until the right thing was done. He criticized the assembly complex’ militarisation during the impeachment process. He also claimed that while he was away from Nigeria, he was removed as speaker.

Read more about the Rivers Assembly Crisis at APC’s Oki. Lagos Speakership Tussle-APC.

However, 36 lawmakers who are close to Meranda argued that Meranda’s removal was final and that she would continue to be House speaker.

When security personnel and some legislative workers argued over the former’s presence in the Assembly Complex on February 17, 2025, fighting broke out in the hallowed chambers. After that, 36 of the lawmakers approved a heartfelt motion and adjourned the session indefinitely.

As he entered the hallowed chambers on February 27, 2025, Obasa showed up at the Assembly Complex and was escorted by a retinue of uniformed security personnel with armed, stern-looking uniforms. Since being removed as Lagos speaker on January 13, 2025, Obasa made his first appearance in the Assembly on Thursday.

Netanyahu’s plan to deprive and rule in Gaza will fail again

About 1.9 million Palestinians, almost the entire Gaza population, were displaced by Benjamin Netanyahu between October 2023 and January 2025. He must be pleased. The Israeli prime minister will now be known as the man who displaced the most people within the smallest area on his or her own.

One of these 1.9 million people is me. I was forced to flee twice, first at the start of the genocidal war, and then again a year later.

Numerous Palestinian families were repeatedly displaced, sometimes ten times.

Netanyahu’s clear plan was to divide us. The north and south were separated. The “Northerners” were forced to flee south for good. Then, the “southerners” and the other displaced people were forced to relocate to the center.

He was not up for it, though. The Israeli prime minister authorized a significant campaign to raze the Gaza Strip’s housing stock, particularly in the north and south. He also mandated that humanitarian aid be stopped from starving us.

The Gaza Strip’s 92 percent of homes, or about 436, 000 structures, were destroyed or damaged as a result of Israeli aggression, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Throughout the duration of the ceasefire, the Israeli army has continued to destroy homes in Rafah, according to Al Mezan Center for Human Rights.

More than 2 million people were fully dependent on food assistance as of January, according to the World Food Programme, and hundreds of thousands were living in “catastrophic levels of food insecurity.”

Netanyahu has now ordered that all humanitarian aid be stopped and plans to forcefully reroute Palestinians from the north to the south.

His goal is simple: to split communities, divide and weaken us, and turn us against one another due to extreme poverty. However, his strategy failed in the previous 16 months and will fail once more.

The people of Gaza showed incredible solidarity with one another in the midst of a genocidal conflict. Anyone who had a home standing would make it available to the displaced, including their friends, neighbors, and even strangers. Who shared the food, if they had it.

We used to smuggle water bottles through the windows of our neighbor and his daughter to make sure they had something to drink when we were under siege in our neighborhood, Sheikh Radwan, in December 2023. Throwing it over the wall separating our home from other homes also provided food for those in need.

A friend of my father’s gave us access to his south during our second displacement, which allowed us to stay for four months.

The people of Gaza won over Netanyahu and his “divide and rule” strategy on January 15 when the ceasefire was declared. Some of the people who had fled from Rafah were able to return four days later.

The “big return” was then announced on January 27. Palestinians retreated to the north in droves.

Return was a major factor in the majority of the displaced people’s finding themselves homeless. People frequently went on foot and found their homes ruined or damaged. A home that has been flattened like a biscuit is currently being used to describe the wrecked homes in Gaza.

The homeless returnees had few options, including whether to attempt to convert standing walls into a living space, or to pitch a tent in open spaces or on the rubble of their homes.

Families are suffering from the cold, wind, and heavy rain. Many people discovered loved ones’ bodies and dug them out while cleaning, fixing, or searching in the rubble to find their belongings.

Palestinians still find support even in the harsh realities of homelessness.

In overcrowded tents, people share what little they have, including space and food. The repair of damaged walls and roofs is a collaborative effort between neighbors. Some homes have been partially damaged, and some provide shelter for the homeless. Volunteers start campaigns to give food and clothing to shelters, tent camps, and schools.

Some youth work together every day to ensure that no one is left hungry. Through WhatsApp groups and meetings for mental health, people offer emotional support. Families gather at night to talk to one another and offer each other comfort during the night.

The men in our neighborhood created a schedule to assist one another in constructing shelters in destroyed homes. They assisted us in repairing the walls in our damaged home by installing tarps, securing them with poles, and installing tarps. By using our lagging solar panel to power the equipment, we helped other people.

Most people in Gaza now long for “home.” When the world becomes too much to bear, it is supposed to be a warm place filled with sweet memories that you can escape to. It’s not meant to be a destroyed house, a school, or a tent.

Palestinians have also visited this area. Refugiees or descendants of refugees who lost their homes in the Nakba make up the majority of Gaza’s population. My own ancestors were forced to leave their homes in the town of al-Majdal.

The fact that Gaza is not just a place for us, it is also our home seems to Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders to miss.

We will rebuild, not magic, but by our own strength, resilience, and the support of the world, despite how frequently Israel stops providing aid and attacks, destroying homes, and displacing people.

A community that won’t be erased has been created by the continuity that has been passed down from generation to generation. This will resurrect Gaza, according to the Bible.

NDLEA Nabs Suspected Drug Baron After 17 Years In Hiding

A suspected drug baron, baron Ogbonnaya Kevin Jeff, was detained at his hideout in Lagos, according to the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA).

The 59-year-old was detained after 17 years of hiding in the shadows from the authorities, according to a statement from NDLEA spokesperson Femi Babafemi.

He claimed that Brig Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (Rtd), the NDLEA’s chairman and chief executive officer, made this known at a press conference in Abuja on Monday.

Following an Interpol red notice against him and information from the National Intelligence Service of South Korea, the NDLEA boss explained how members of its Special Operations Unit had been following Ogbonnaya.

READ MORE: &nbsp: Angolan businessman excretes 120 wraps of cocaine at Kano Airport – NDLEA

The arrest of a drug lord who is wanted as the head of an international drug trafficking organization is, according to Marwa, “the major development that warranted this special briefing.” Therefore, I’m pleased to report this significant development in our efforts to eradicate drug-trafficking networks.

Our main targets are drug barons and other significant figures who organize drug trafficking rings, as we have stated four years ago when we first introduced the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) reform.

“On Wednesday, February 12th, 2025, we successfully apprehended the 59-year-old drug baron Ogbonnaya Kevin Jeff.” The suspect was detained at No. 1 in his hideout. Off LASU Road, off Ibukunoluwa Taiwo Close, in Lagos, Prior to his arrest, NDLEA had been looking into him.

We now have complete information about his activities and unmistakable proof that he is a notorious drug lord who arranged for young Nigerians to smuggle illegal substances into the Republic of Korea (South Korea) through his recruitment.

According to our records, he was a key figure among the many Nigerians detained abroad for drug-related offences. Additionally, we have established that he imported electronics and other products to launder the proceeds of drug trade. Numerous international passports from different countries, many of which contained Korean visas, were recovered following his arrest and a search of his residence. Additionally, we found some illegal goods in his house’s back room.

The NDLEA boss acknowledged the suspect’s leadership role in the drug trade by stating that “Ogbonnaya Kevin Jeff is an international trafficker operating both from Nigeria and abroad. His dossier indicates that he was deported to Nigeria in 2008 after serving a one-year prison sentence in the Republic of Korea in 2007. Despite this, he continued to engage in illicit trade and continued to be actively involved in Far Eastern drug trafficking.

He is currently wanted in the Republic of Korea for a number of drug trafficking-related offenses he and his accomplices co-operated. His arrest and extradition to the country was ordered by an INTERPOL Red Notice for crimes committed between 2023 and 2024.

It has been established that Ogbonnaya Kevin Jeff, the ringleader of a drug trafficking group responsible for the People’s Republic of Korea, is the result of a number of interdictions. He has been running operations remotely by giving instructions to domestic suppliers and drug lords operating in Cameroon, Ghana, Burkinabe, Liberia, and other East and Southern African nations.

He added details about what investigations into Ogbonnaya’s illegal trade activities had discovered.

The suspect sent 6, 051.06 grams of skunk, concealed in dried chillies and jujube, to a Korean, Kim Dong Wook at a designated address in Jinju City, Gyeongsangnam-do, South Korea, on October 5, 2023, at a location in Burkinabe. The package arrived via Air France at 07:20 am on October 19 at Incheon Airport.

According to his investigation, he directed his drug couriers, Santa Elizabeth Pieterse and Carl Yohan Stephan Brisman, to smuggle a total of five kilograms of meth into South Korea via overseas flights between December 2023 and April 2024 while residing in Nigeria. He has recently sent illicit drugs to South Korea for street value worth more than N1.4 billion.

Asa, an unknown domestic carrier, is delivering for him drug consignments to a warehouse run by Okori Emmanuel, a Nigerian, who is his supply manager in South Korea. In January and June 2024, the Seoul Central District Court has currently issued two arrest warrants for Ogbonnaya. He is accused of importing narcotics in violation of Article 3-7 of the South Korean Narcotics Control Act, an offence that can result in a maximum sentence of life in prison.

Marwa reaffirmed NDLEA’s commitment to making sure that Nigeria doesn’t act as a hub for international drug trafficking operations.

Meranda Resigns As Lagos Speaker, Re-Elected Deputy Speaker

The state’s first female speaker, Mojisola Meranda, resigned on Monday in the midst of a horde of resignations and reshuffles that swept the floor of the crisis-torn Lagos State House of Assembly.

Meranda, who represents Apapa Constituency I, resigned after the plenary, which was followed by her re-election as the Assembly’s Deputy Speaker.

The lawmakers praised her ability to lead and for bringing peace to the Assembly in Lagos State. They applauded her courage and modesty for adhering to the All Progressives Congress (APC) rules and regulations.


Meranda’s resignation came after a meeting with some senior APC members in the state to figure out how to navigate the state’s leadership crisis, which has reportedly erupted in the last seven weeks.

Mudashiru Obasa, the ousted Speaker of Agege Constituency I, was nominated by a former House Majority Leader Noheem Adams, who now represents Eti-Osa Constituency 1. He was then nominated for re-election after stepping down.

Seven weeks after his removal, Obasa took the oath of office as the Assembly’s new leader. In 2007, he was the first member of the House. Since then, he has been in the chamber. Before being fired in January 2025, he first started speaking in June 2015.

Mudashiru Obasa

Chess or Game of Thrones?

In the same vein, Mojeed Fatai, the house’s deputy speaker, who represents Ibeju-Lekki Constituency I, announced his resignation.

Fatai claimed the House was interested in his resignation. He was re-elected as the Assembly’s chief whipright away.

Setonji David, the Assembly’s chief whip for Badagry constituency II, also resigned from his position and won a second term as the house’s Deputy Chief Whip.

Okanlawon Sanni, a House member from Kosofe Constituency I, also submitted his resignation as the House’s Deputy Chief Whip.

More than two-thirds of the 40-member assembly removed Obasa as speaker of Lagos on January 13, 2025, sparking a leadership crisis in the Assembly. He was fired because of alleged misconduct and other offenses.

Meranda, the then-deputy of Obasa, was immediately elected as the new speaker, making her the first woman to lead the state’s South-West state legislature.

Obasa vehemently opposed his removal on January 25, 2025, and pleaded with him to continue speaking until the right thing was done. He criticized the assembly complex’ militarisation during the impeachment process. He added that while he was away from Nigeria, he was also accused of having been removed as speaker.

Read more about the Rivers Assembly Crisis at APC’s Oki. Lagos Speakership Tussle-APC.

However, 36 lawmakers who are close to Meranda argued that Meranda’s removal was final and that she would continue to be House speaker.

When security personnel and some legislative workers argued over the former’s presence in the Assembly Complex on February 17, 2025, fighting broke out in the hallowed chambers. After that, 36 of the lawmakers approved a heartfelt motion and adjourned the session indefinitely.

As he entered the hallowed chambers on February 27, 2025, Obasa showed up at the Assembly Complex and was escorted by a retinue of uniformed security personnel with armed, stern-looking uniforms. Since being removed as Lagos speaker on January 13, 2025, Obasa made his first appearance in the Assembly on Thursday.