[dropcap]L[/dropcap]ionel Messi has signed a new contract tying him to Barcelona until 2020-21 with a buyout clause worth 700m euros (£626m). The 30-year-old Argentina international’s ,whose previous deal was due to expire next year, has put paid to speculations of his readiness to commit his future to Nou Camp.

Since joining the club at the age of 13, Messi has helped Barcelona win eight Spanish league titles and won the Champions League four times.This means that Messi, has scored 523 goals in 602 appearances for the club, will spend 21 years with the Catalonian giants.

He was presented with his fourth European Golden Shoe on Friday – the award given to the highest scorer in European club football – after finding the net 37 times in the Spanish league last season. The club announced in July that Messi had agreed a new deal, after he had reportedly rejected an initial offer in May.

In a statement, the club said Messi “still has a lot more to give, which is music to the ears of all Barca fans who will get to continue marvelling at his greatness”. Club president Josep Maria Bartomeu said, “We are in luck with the Barça players. We continue to enjoy the best player in the history of football.”

“For a long time we have been waiting to do the signature and today it was done. I am pleased to still be connected to the club. As I always said, this is my home.

“I always wanted to end my career here. My dream was to end my career with Barcelona and we are on track, “Messi told Barca TV.

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he trial of the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu, has been adjourned till December 5, with the court insisting that the defendant’s sureties either produce him or explain his disappearance to the court.
The Abuja Division of Federal High Court, presided over by judge, Mrs. Binta Nyako, had in October adjourned the matter till yesterday in expectation of the appearance of the sureties. She had further given instructions that the sureties had three options regarding their roles in the disappearance of the IPOB leader.
Reacting to an application by one of the sureties, Eyinnaya Abaribe, through his lawyer, Ogechi Ogbonna, that he should be relieved of his role as Kanu’s surety and that the court withdraw its order for a bond of N100 million, Mrs. Nyako submitted that only the appearance of the defendant would prevent a possible forfeiture of the bond.
“Even if you apply from today till next year, this court will only have one of these three options for you: produce the defendant, pay the bond or demand for time to come and explain to court.
“Once you sign to be somebody’s surety, that person automatically becomes your responsibility,” she said.
Kanu was last seen on September 14, months after he was granted conditional bail specifically on April 25 based on health grounds.

His lawyer, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, accused the Nigerian Army of invading Mr. Kanu’s residence in Abia state and kidnapping him (Kanu). The allegation was, however, denied by military spokesperson, Maj.-Gen. John Enenche.
On the next possible line of action to be taken by the authorities, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Ahmed Raji, said the “simple thing to do would be to declare the defendant wanted.”
“It’s simple what the court can do is to declare him wanted. I don’t think the court can do anything more than what it has mentioned in its conditions to the sureties,” he said.
However, yesterday the court shifted the date for its hearing of the sureties’ explanations till December, following the current engagement of judges at a conference in Abuja.

[dropcap]A[/dropcap] Marine Engineer, Capt. Peter onwordi, has suggested that one way to tackle the problem of getting seatime training for Nigerian cadets is to have the cadets on vessels trading along the West Coast routes, as a start-point.

Onwordi told Marine Network in an interview on Tuesday that it would be better to introduce the cadets to practical sea life by having them go on board the vessels that trade along the coast from Nigeria up to Senegal, rather than remain without sea experience. “We have lamented the issue of lack of seatime training for our cadets for so long, when these cadets can start with as little as going on board trading vessels along the West Coast.

“It is something that the government can do in collaboration with some private partners, to enable the cadets get sea experience. “Let them start with that and get familiar with the practicality of vessels on sea and understand how to even do their charting before talking about vessels that go father to Europe and America,” Onwordi said.

The marine engineer called on critical industry stakeholders to support the cause for standard and complete training for seafarers considering Nigeria’s status as a maritime nation. He said: “The cadets cannot even be called seafarers until they get seatime as part of their training. So, it is a concern for everyone who understands the critical role of manpower capacity, especially for a maritime nation as Nigeria.

“There are so much trading activities along the coasts from Nigeria to Benin Republic, to Togo, even up to Senegal. And government can take that advantage to partner with private businesses for vessels where these cadets can be trained practically,” Onwordi noted.

He added that: “Pilots trained at Zaria start learning how to fly from Zaria to Kaduna, then Jos, Abuja before going on longer ranges. Similarly, our cadets can start in same local trading routes before venturing longer ranges.”

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he Federal Government has announced that it has concluded plans to re-introduce tolls on major highways across the country. The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola (SAN), while appearing before the Senate Commitee on Federal Roads Maintenance Agency on Thursday, said 38 points had been identified in the first phase of the re-introduction. “Clearly, tolling is coming,” the minister told the lawmakers.

While saying that the new toll gates would be situated at the old spots, Fashola stated that tolls would be collected after the roads had been made motorable. He said, “We are not going to ask road users to pay toll on a road that is not good. While the construction (of gates) is going on, we are working on the design. We want to standardise the design so that when we ask people to come and bid for the construction, we can control what they are going to construct. They are going to construct with the materials we have prescribed.

“We can also control the price so that nobody is bidding with disparage prices; there will be the floor and the ceiling. Your price will vary according to how many plazas you build and not because you claim to have used ‘foreign’ materials.

“The last part we are working on is the software that drives the management, audit and payment of toll. We want to use the development that has taken place between when the old toll plazas were dismantled and now. There were no GSM and payment platforms as of that time as we have cell phones and cards now. We want to make it very easy for people to go to kiosks and buy toll cards and pay tolls.

“It will also be easy to audit from any of our offices. We will be able to see what is going on, how many people passed, how many vehicles, and we can settle payments to operators in a very transparent and accountable way.”

Members of the committee decried that only N800m had been released to FERMA out of the N25bn voted to the agency in the 2017 budget.

They disclosed that there was a plan to move a motion next week to ask the government to release more funds for road maintenance as the Yuletide season was approaching.

Fashola however said releases to FERMA were suspended as the agency did not have a board for some time.