An Italian drug gang needed money, so it
devised a bizarre plot, Italian police said — it would dig up the body
of legendary automaker Enzo Ferrari and hold it for ransom.
In a massive raid involving hundreds of
officers, 34 people were arrested Tuesday in Sardinia and northern Italy
just as the gang was about to launch its scheme, 1½ years in the
making, at the tomb shared by Ferrari and his father in Modena, in
central Italy, police said at a news conference.
Ferrari died at age 90 in in 1988 and was
buried alongside his father inside the ornate tomb at San Cataldo
cemetery, complete with a model Ferrari perched on top. Modena is where
Ferrari founded the luxury car company in 1939 as Auto Avio Costruzioni.
At least 11 other people are under further
investigation after officers also seized an unspecified but large amount
of cocaine and arms, police said.
Col. Saverio Ceglie, head of the carabinieri, or military police, in the province of Nuoro, said the gang is part of Anonima Sequestri, known as the kidnapping specialists of organized crime operations on the Italian island of Sardinia.
It is associated with the post-World War II
bandit operation run by Graziano Mesina, a legendary figure known as the
"Scarlet Pimpernel of Italy," who has been the subject of many
scholarly books and at least two popular biopics. Mesina, who turns 76
next week, has been in prison for kidnapping plots since December.
Police said they got wind of the gang during
their latest investigation of Mesina, which began almost a decade ago,
and were staking out Ferrari's tomb when the bandits arrived.
"The gang had prepared everything in detail,"
Ceglie said. They made several visits to the tomb over more than a year
of planning, and individual members were identified as being in charge
of drawing up the plans, stealing the body itself and delivering the
ransom demand to the Ferrari family, he said.
Ceglie said the Ferraris were kept in the loop
about the plot, which he said had been "in the works for years but
never succeeded because of our extensive efforts."
A cross section of Nigerians spoken to by The News Office
Desk of Paedia express Multimedia Group in Lagos,Nigeria ,have expressedgreat shock over the recent certificate
voodoo around Senator Dino Melaiye of kogi West Senatorial constituency.
A classmate of the politician in the 1990s in Zaria’s
Ahamadu Bello University ,Samaru Village, Zaria, Kaduna State said that he was
not so surprised as the kogi state born politician was one of the unserious
students in their class at the time.
He told this reporter that Melaiye was one of the inner
caucus member of the student union regime of a pocket sizedbattle ship of a student activist known all
over academic circles as Maradona but who did not eventually graduate in the
school but Kwara Polytechinc in Ilorin,Kwara State of Nigeria.
He disagreed in very strong terms the vote of confidence
passed on the Senator by the Vice Chancellor of the citadel of learning saying
this was partial.
His words:”what it means is that the Vice Chancellor was
ready to lieand possibly help to falsify
documentations for Dino Melaiye or how can you explain his coming physically to
defend him,they must have settled him very handsomely in the process”
“what I think happened even though very wrong academically
is that he did not have the requisite entry requirements for a University
Matriculation Examination candidate,so what he did was to bribe his way through
and then later go on to seat for a West African Examination Council certificate
somewhere to remedy it and this was why he said he served with the National
Youth Service Corps[NY.S.C]before graduating which is a misnomer at any level
of this discourse”
In a related issue ,Yet another source in Lagos,Nigeria
,said that he was surprised that pursuing a good name no longer matters to
anybody in Nigeria.
He wondered why the Vice Chancellor of the school will
follow Senator Melaiye to the floors of the Senate only for his submissions to
be punctured by Nigerians as lacking in merit less than an hour later on
several platforms on the web and the social media.
He went down memory lane to recall that in 1980,some five
friends of hishad asked him to join them
in drugs pushing but he refused it because he believed in integrity and today
he is alive to see his children and grand children grow up into great people while
all his friends are long dead due to corruption.
The source urged Senator Dino Daniel Jonah Melaiye to
pursuegood name in all of his
undertakingsin life and eschew all
forms of corruption at all times.
Other opinions who
spoke on the matter asked that the Federal government should ask the Vice
Chancellor to step aside while the Senate of the school choose a newhead as they were shocked that the Vice
Chancellor came all the way from Zaria to Abuja to defend a scam instead of
rebuking him.
In yet a related ,another public affairs commentator whose
names won’t be in the prints due to the sensitivity of the issue said that if
truth be told virtually all Nigeria’s university were like that.
He wondered why anyone would have expected the Vice
Chancellor ,Professor Ibrahim Garba to have rejected Senator Dino Melaiye
publicly when there was a lot of compromise and politics involved in being
given the job of a Vice Chancellor rather than just mere academic achievements
like many think.
His words:”Mr reporter you are a funny man and thank God the
man is your brother and you guys are from the same state,is Kogi state not one
of the educationally disadvantaged states “
‘so why is everybody surprised Dino Melaiye entered
A.B.U.with three credits “
He added that President Muhammadu Buhari will have moved
against the leadership of the Nigerian Senate a long time ago but sadly he did
not have the numbers of Senators on his side to get the majority of people he
needed to fight out the rot in the National Assembly,Abuja,Nigeria.
In a related issue,yet another source called for a serious
caution on the Senator Dino Melaiye affair.
The Source explained that based on the facts on the ground
,Melaiye may have struck a compromise with the Ahmadu Bello University authorities
to remedy his entry requirements to the school and this was what made it
possible for him to have served at the National Youth Service Corps [N.Y.S.C.]in
1999 before finally graduating.
In yet another version on the growing debate, a source who
was a colleague of this same reporter at the Ahmadu Bello
University,Samaru,Zaria frowned at Senator Dino Melaiye’s claim of serving at the
National Youth Service Corps [N.Y.S.C]in 1999 before graduating in 2000saying something out of the ordinary hah
surely taken place.
She lamented the fact that a highly placed person like the Vice
Chancellorwent all the way to Abuja to
rubbish his reputation and that of the entire school as he stood up for what was
clearly not a tidy arrangement.
Several sources contacted over Senator Ali Ndume’s
suspension in the National Assembly over the Dino Melaiye saga amongst other sundry
issues were however indifferent as they wondered what the suspended politician
was doing in the Senate in the first place with terrorallegations hanging around his neck like a
leech.
BUNKERING:NIGERIA
LOSES CLOSE TO N100BILLION IN 4 YEARS
BY
ABDULMUMINI ADEKU.HELP THIS MAN IS A THIEVE!!!
Due
to the direct connivance of members of the Nigerian Police Commands outpost in
Ibafon area along Lagos-Ibadan Expressway in Ogun state,the nation is losing a
sum of around N50million on a daily basis to the activities of oil thieves also
called bunkering.
Investigations
by the News Office Desk of Paedia Express Multimedia Group in Lagos,Nigeria as
at press time shows that the stealing from bursted pipes of the Nigerian
National Petroleum Corporation [N.N.P.C.]usually takes place in the dead of the
night between one in the morning and five in the morning .
An
impeccable source who lives at Kajola area just directly opposite Magboro along
Lagos-Ibadan Expressway in Ogun state said that it was time President Muhammadu
Buhari takes a drastic action on thearea due to the perennial activities of oil thieves.
He
blamed the problems on the Ijaws who settled in the area just around the swamps
separating them from another village called Arepo,also in Ogun state of
Nigeria.
He
revealed that about a week ago,two truck load of Nigerian Army officials were
in the area for a video recording and wondered why some group of unscrupulous
Nigerians who do not the requisite skills and training are allowed to wear
Nigerian Army uniforms just because they have made money from stealing oil.
He
accused members of The Nigerian Police Post in Ibafon of deliberately turninga blind eye to another direction as oil
thieves make a way with Nigeria’s oil in 50 liters keg,30 litre kegs ,mini
buses,bikes to a yet unidentified black market as at press time.
His
words:’The bunkering hour is usually between one in the morning till fiveand some even go as far as using bikes to
steal our fuel,the bunkering started a long time ago and that was because I got
there only four years ago but the rot had being on even before we got to the
place “
He
explained that the Ijaws in the settlement have so integrated with The Yoruba’s
in the area that they were allowed to worship their local gods during cultural
festivities yearly at the Water –logged settlement .
He
added that about 10 months ago,jet fightersand helicopters had bombarded the area as they combed the place in
search for the oil thievesleading then
to a panic amongst the residents with some even relocating for over two weeks
out of fear of the thieves.
HELP THIS MAN IS A THIEVE!!!
