US President, Donald Trump, has denied reports he plans to declare victory on Tuesday night November 3, once it looks like he’s ahead, even though it might take days or even weeks before battleground states like Pennsylvania finally count their votes.

According to a report by Axios on Sunday night November 1, Trump told confidants he’ll declare victory on Tuesday night if it looks like he’s “ahead,” according to three sources familiar with his private comments.

The report states that Trump has privately talked through this scenario in some detail in the last few weeks, describing plans to walk up to a podium on election night and declare he has won.

For this to happen, Trump’s team expect he would need to either win or have heavy leads in Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, Texas, Iowa, Arizona and Georgia.

The hugely significant US presidential election between Trump and Democrat, Joe Biden starts on Tuesday and will be decided by who wins the electoral vote.

Trump and Republicans believe allowing the votes to be counted days or even weeks after the election night could leave to massive voter fraud in states like Pennsylvania controlled by Democrats, but Democrats have rubbished those claims.

Trump has now denied Axios report that he would declare victory prematurely.

“I think it’s a terrible thing when ballots can be collected after an election. I think it’s a terrible thing when states are allowed to tabulate ballots for a long period of time after the election is over.” Trump said.

He continued: “I think it’s terrible that we can’t know the results of an election the night of the election. … We’re going to go in the night of, as soon as that election’s over, we’re going in with our lawyers.”

“We don’t want to have Pennsylvania, where you have a political governor, a very partisan guy. … We don’t want to be in a position where he’s allowed, every day, to watch ballots come in. See if we can only find 10,000 more ballots.”

When asked to comment on the report, the Trump campaign’s communications director Tim Murtaugh said, “This is nothing but people trying to create doubt about a Trump victory. When he wins, he’s going to say so.”

Trump campaign senior adviser Jason Miller predicted that Trump “will be re-elected handily and no amount of post-election Democratic thievery will be able to change the results.”

Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Monday, November 2, that there could be 10 times as many mail ballots this year than in 2016, “so, yes, it will take longer” to count.

“I expect that the overwhelming majority of ballots in Pennsylvania, that’s mail-in and absentee ballots, as well as in-person ballots, will be counted within a matter of days,” Boockvar said.

Source: Hajia R.

President Yoweri Museveni was on Monday, November 2, nominated by the Uganda Electoral Commission to contest in 2021 general election as he seeks to extend his rule to the fourth decade.

The 76-year-old president, who assumed power in 1986 following a five-year guerilla warfare, will be contesting for his sixth term. 

Confirming his nomination, EC Chairperson, Justice Simon Byabakama said, “I want to commend the first aspiring candidate for keeping time. If any candidate tests positive, (s) he will be nominated in absentia…. I, Justice Simon Byabakama, declare Yoweri Kaguta Tibuhaburwa, a duly nominated presidential candidate for the 2021 general election.”

Museveni’s nomination was done amid tight security in and around Kampala city. Traffic on major routes around Kyambogo sports grounds was also diverted as Police warned against holding processions.

Security personnel were positioned at different points to ensure motorists and drivers don’t access the roads that were cordoned off.

After his nomination, the President called for peace and said anyone who “tries to cause chaos will be dealt with.”

“I have been duly nominated by the Electoral Commission as a candidate for the 2021 presidential election. I thank my nominators, the two young people, Nassur Gaddafi and Hellen Seku,” he said. 

“I also thank the rest of my entourage led by the NRM vice-chairperson Al-Hajj Moses Kigongo and the Secretary General, Justine Lumumba. Special gratitude to our supporters in the districts who signed my endorsement forms.

“At this nomination, I would want to emphasise two points; measures against the Covid-19 pandemic and security.

Covid-19 is deadly and is killing our people. In recent days, among others, we lost an environment expert, Paul Mafabi, and my good friend, Francis Xavier Kitaka, the veterinary expert and entrepreneur.

Do not take this disease lightly. The talk that the villages are insulated from Covid-19 is false. Please follow all guidelines of health experts. Sanitize, wear masks and observe social distancing.

“Secondly, I encourage everybody to maintain peace. I hear talk that some people want to cause chaos. Those plans will not succeed. Anyone planning mischief will fail. No one should threaten Ugandans with chaos. I thank you and I will delve into details of our manifesto at the launch later”

Museveni will launch his 2021 to 2026 election manifesto of the promises he and his National Resistance Movement (NRM) party commit to do for Ugandans in the five years if he is reelected.

Source: Lucky B.

The United States opposed Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as the consensus candidate to lead the WTO.

It has now been revealed that the US said it is supporting South Korean trade minister, Yoo Myung-hee, to become the Director-General of the World Trade Organisation because she is a “trade expert”.

US Trade Representative, Robert Lighthizer, while giving reasons for opposing Okonjo-Iweala, who gained American citizenship in 2019, said WTO needs “someone with real, hands-on experience in the field”.

This was contained in a statement issued by the office of the US trade representative.

“The United States supports the selection of Korean Trade Minister Yoo Myung-hee as the next WTO Director-General,” the USTR, led by Lighthizer, said.

“Minister Yoo is a bona fide trade expert who has distinguished herself during a 25-year career as a successful trade negotiator and trade policy maker. She has all the skills necessary to be an effective leader of the organization.

“This is a very difficult time for the WTO and international trade. There have been no multilateral tariff negotiations in 25 years, the dispute settlement system has gotten out of control, and too few members fulfill basic transparency obligations.

“The WTO is badly in need of major reform. It must be led by someone with real, hands-on experience in the field.”

However, Okonjo-Iweala, while addressing the WTO in July, had explained that she is a trade expert.

She said: “I am a development economist and you cannot do that without looking at trade. Trade is a central part of development. So, I have been doing it. My whole career at the World Bank, I was working on trade policy reform in middle and low-income countries at the bank.

“As finance minister, the customs service in my country reported to me. And that is all about trade facilitation. I helped my country’s negotiation with my trade minister on the ECOWAS common external tariffs. I don’t know how much more trade you can have than that.

“So those who say I don’t have trade, they are mistaken. I think the qualities I have are even better, because I combine development economics with trade knowledge, along with finance, and you need those combinations of skills to lead the WTO. I think I have the skills that are needed. I am a trade person.”

Okonjo-Iweala, who also serves on Twitter’s board of directors, as chair of the GAVI vaccine alliance and as a special envoy for the World Health Organization’s COVID-19 fight, saw her candidacy get another boost this week when the EU threw its weight behind her.

If she eventually gets a majority backing, she would be the first woman and the first African to lead the global trade body in its 25-year history.

Source: Lucky B.

Malaysia’s former prime minister on Wednesday, October 29, said that Muslims have the right “to kill millions of French people”, shortly after a knife-wielding Islamist killed three people in a Church in Nice. 

Mahathir Mohamad, who lost power in February this year, said freedom of expression does not include “insulting other people” as anger over satirical cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed sweeps the Islamic world.

The 95-year-old politician said he did not approve of the beheading of a French school teacher for sharing caricatures of the Prophet, but added that, “Irrespective of the religion professed, angry people kill”.

“The French in the course of their history [have] killed millions of people. Many were Muslims,” he said in a tweet which has since been removed for violating the website’s rules.

Mahathir continued: “Muslims have a right to be angry and to kill millions of French people for the massacres of the past.”

The Malaysian politician said that “by and large”, Muslims have not applied the principle of “eye for an eye”.

“Muslims don’t. The French shouldn’t. Instead the French should teach their people to respect other people’s feelings,” Mahathir, who has drawn controversy for comments about Jews and LGBT people in the past, added.

Mahathir, who served as Malaysian premier twice for a total of 24 years, said that French President Emmanuel Macron was “very primitive” and “not showing that he is civilised”.

Mahathir’s statement came after three people were stabbed to death – two of them beheaded – at a church in the city of Nice by a knifeman shouting “Allahu Akbar”. The knifeman was later shot 14 times and wounded by armed police.

Following Mahathir’s statement, France’s digital minister, Cédric O demanded that Twitter bans Mahathir from its platform.

Cédric O said he told the managing director of the social media giant in France that his account “must be immediately suspended.”

Mr O tweeted on Thursday. “If not, @twitter would be an accomplice to a formal call for murder.”

Source: Murtala D.

Obong of Calabar, Edidem Ekpo Otu has asked Governor Ben Ayade of Cross River state to step aside. 

Daily Trust reported that the monarch said this when Liyel Imoke, a former governor of the state paid homage to him.

The Obong blamed Ayade for the vandalism, looting and destruction of public and private property in the state last week. He maintained that the Governor needs to step aside to enable an interim administration come up so that he can learn governance.

He said; 

“He (Ayade) has not been holding security meeting regularly. This thing would not have happened if he had called the security people together after hearing what happened in Lagos and other places; If he had called them together and tell them, look my friends; nothing should happen in my state. 

“The Governor should be able to open his door for people to come in, and should work with everybody. We have to face it; we don’t need to play around with it; we cannot continue this way. You tell him that there is a need for total reconciliation; a total rehabilitation of whatever he has been doing.

“Everybody matters in this state. He should be able to talk to people. He wouldn’t call you and even when you call him, he doesn’t answer the call. Nobody talks to him.”

The Monarch also accused Governor Ayade of not picking his calls after several attempts. He added; 

“The Governor should be able to open his door for people to come in, and should work with everybody. 

“We have to face it; we don’t need to play around with it; we cannot continue this way.

“You tell him that there is a need for total reconciliation; a total rehabilitation of whatever he has been doing.

“Everybody matters in this state.

“He should be able to talk to people.

“He wouldn’t call you and even when you call him, he doesn’t answer the call. Nobody talks to him.”

Speaking earlier, Imoke told the Obong that in the wake of the incident, he thought it wise to seek the help and cooperation of the traditional institution in finding a way out of the problem. He also disclosed that he was directly affected by the crisis which trailed the #EndSARS protests between October 23 and October 24, as his wife’s shop was vandalized by hoodlums. 

He said; 

 “We do not understand the extent of the carnage.

“We are all victims of this incident.

“If you were not hit directly, you were hit indirectly.

“For me, I was hit directly, so to very many public officials. They were also hit directly.”

Reacting to the Obong’s comment, the Governor’s media aide Christian Ita averred that it is very doubtful that his principal would ignore a call from the Obong of Calabar, stressing that the governor holds him in high esteem as the traditional father of the state.

Ita said; 

“He couldn’t have ignored the monarch’s phone calls.

“It is unfair for him to call for the governor, who has done all in his power very sincerely to enhance the fortunes of he state, to step aside.”

Source: Lucky B.