Michael Ojuroye Initiative (Ngo)

The 2014 Screen Actors Guild Awards were handed out at Los Angeles' Shrine Exposition Center on January 18. Take a look at the full list of winners, marked here in bold. WINNER: American Hustle Motion Picture Nominees Outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture • "12 Years a Slave"  • "American Hustle" -- WINNER  • "August: Osage County"  • "Dallas Buyers Club"  • "Lee Daniels' The Butler" WINNER: Matthew McConaughey Outstanding performance by a male actor in a leading role • Bruce Dern, "Nebraska"  • Chiwetel Ejiofor, "12 Years a Slave"  • Tom Hanks, "Captain Phillips"  • Matthew McConaughey, "Dallas Buyers Club" -- WINNER  • Forest Whitaker, "Lee Daniels' The Butler" WINNER: Cate Blanchett Outstanding performance by a female actor in a leading role • Cate Blanchett, "Blue Jasmine" -- WINNER  • Sandra Bullock, "Gravity"  •...

The prospect of being blown up makes defusing landmines dangerous work, particularly in Afghanistan. But that is just one of many dangers that explosives workers face there. On Tuesday, armed men abducted 68 mine defusers who were on their way to clear explosives in the western province of Herat, on Iran's border, a spokesman for the mine disposal organization that employs them said. Eight of the abducted were able to flee, said Dr. Farid Homayoun of Britain's Halo Trust. Afghan security forces have surrounded the area, and Halo Trust is trying to enlist the help of local tribal elders to secure the release of the remaining 60. The organization has 150 mine defusing teams and employs more than 3,000 Afghans, it says on its website. It also destroys other munitions. Since the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, multiple warring parties have laid landmines, bringing the total number of mines to as many as 640,000 Halo Trust reports. The kidnappers first took the exp...

The Thai government has declared a state of emergency for the tense capital of Bangkok amid anti-government protests, a security official said Tuesday. It will go into effect Wednesday and will last 60 days, Thailand's national security chief, Lt. Gen. Paradon Patthanathubut, told CNN. Since demonstrations against Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra's government began in November, at least nine people have died and more than 450 have been wounded, according to authorities. The emergency decree gives authorities the power to impose curfews, detain suspects without court permission, censor media and declare parts of the capital off-limits. In a bid to resolve the crisis, Yingluck dissolved parliament last month and called for new elections to be held February 2. But the move has done little to appease protesters. They have called on Yingluck to step down from her caretaker position and be replaced by an unelected "people's council," which would see through ele...

President Goodluck Jonathan on Monday expressed the belief that with the measures put in place by his administration, especially the new National Automotive Industry Policy; the country would soon be exporting cars to other countries. Jonathan spoke at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, while granting audience to a delegation of the business community from Anambra State led by Governor Peter Obi. In responding to an address by the delegation, the President said, “I will refer all the issues you raised to the various departments of government. We are totally committed to creating jobs. Nigeria is a country with huge population of youths. If jobs are not created, there will be crisis. The housing, agriculture and power sectors are also receiving attention. “In the next few years, Nigeria will begin to export cars to other countries. We are encouraging the government to support local manufacturers.” Jonathan promised that the industrialists’ basic needs such as roads, power and port fac...

The death of the wife of Indian minister Shashi Tharoor may have been caused by an overdose of drugs, doctors who carried out the autopsy say. Sunanda Pushkar was found in a hotel room in the Indian capital, Delhi, on Friday. The couple became embroiled in a row on Wednesday after Twitter messages suggested he was having an affair. The autopsy also found “injury marks” on Ms Pushkar’s body, but did not say if they were linked to her death. Spokesperson of Delhi’s All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Dr Amit Gupta, told BBC Hindi that the “preliminary report shows there was drug overdose”. The autopsy report has been submitted to a magistrate, media reports say. A public row broke out on Wednesday when seemingly private messages between Mr Tharoor and Pakistani journalist Mehr Tarar were published on his Twitter feed. Ms Pushkar, 52, said she had gone into her husband’s account and published the messages. She accused Ms Tarar of stalking her husband – an allegation denied b...

Your article for the pre-conference issue of ICT Update asks how ICTs can strengthen people’s capacity to improve their position in the agricultural sector. Did your stream on capacity strengthening manage to address this problem?   Yes, my stream hosted a session to see what ICTs can do for grassroots engagement. The session really confirmed that ICTs can empower individuals. It was nice to analyse with some of the presenters the insights that they gained in terms of what makes that difference. I’m thinking, for example, of the presentation by Catherine Molua Mojoko, president of the grassroots organisation Walana Wa Makwasi in Cameroon. She spoke about her work with women, youth groups and mobile phones.   The training Catherine’s organisation gives is relatively simple and helps women to start using mobile phones at least to receive messages. It turns out they learn the technology quite easily. Some of the women are illiterate, in which case it’s important to group them...

Suspected Islamist gunmen shot dead 12 people in two separate attacks on villages near Nigeria’s border with Niger while three others drowned in a river while fleeing, locals said Sunday. The attackers, thought to be from the Boko Haram militant group, on Thursday shot dead seven people in Gashigar village, a fishing community in Borno state, close to the Nigerian border with neighbouring Niger, the locals said. Three others drowned in the river while fleeing from the night raid, they added. The attack came four days after a similar one on two other neighbouring villages — Yawuma-ango and Jabulam — in which gunmen shot dead five people, a former deputy local government council chairman in the district, Talba Gashigar, said. He said most residents of Gashigar village had fled to Niger after the marauders arrived in a convoy of three vehicles and “countless motorcycles” and destroyed dozens of homes and shops. “We all had to flee. Men, women and children had to cross over to neighbou...