ONE WORD

File: Abia State Governor, Okezie Ikpeazu The Abia State Governor, Okezie Ikpeazu, has tested positive to COVID-19, and has gone into isolation. This was revealed in a statement signed by the Commissioner for Information, Abia State, John Kalu on Monday. The statement noted that Governor Ikpeazu had sent his sample for a COVID-19 test on May 30th and had directed members of the State Executive Council (EXCO) and the inter-ministerial committee on COVID-19 to do the same. According to the statement, the Governor’s first test result returned negative on Tuesday, 2nd June 2020. The Commissioner, however, said that the Abia leader did another COVID-19 test on Thursday, 4th, June 2020 with the sample returning positive. “As a result,” the statement added, “Governor Okezie Ikpeazu has gone into isolation, as required by relevant NCDC protocols, and he is being managed by a competent team of medical practitioners with a view to nursing him back to good health. “Consequent on the above, the Go...

Photograph: Matt Rourke/AP Since George Floyd’s death at the hands of police in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on 25 May,  around 140 cities  in  all 50 states  throughout the US have seen protests and demonstrations in response to the killing. More than 10,000 people  have been arrested around the US during the protests, as police forces regularly use pepper spray, rubber bullets, teargas and batons on protesters, media and bystanders. Several major US cities have  enacted  curfews in an  attempt  to stop demonstrations and curb unrest. Jarah Gibson was arrested while non-violently protesting in Atlanta, Georgia, on 1 June. “The police were there from the jump and literally escorted us the whole march,” said Gibson. She said around 7.30pm, ahead of Atlanta’s 9pm city-wide curfew, police began boxing in protesters. While protesters were attempting to leave, Gibson tried to video record a person on a bicycle who appeared to be hit by a police car and...

What’s happening Throughout America’s long history of racial violence, certain names have stood out as markers of the struggles of a particular period in time.  Emmett Till’s  lynching in 1955 drew attention to the brutality of the pre-civil rights era in the South. The beating of  Rodney King  and acquittal of the officers involved sparked the Los Angeles riots in 1992. The police killings of  Eric Garner  and  Michael Brown  in 2014 brought the Black Lives Matter movement into the national consciousness. They were, of course, not the only black people to be lynched, beaten or killed in those eras. But a combination of circumstances, timing and the context of the moment turned them into enduring figures. George Floyd’s name will almost certainly join that list given the extraordinary nationwide reaction to the way he was killed by a Minneapolis police officer. Floyd’s death was part of a string of recent controversial killings.  Ahmaud Arber...