The WEB GIST

The Ali Modu-Sheriff faction of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday prayed for good health and return of President Muhammadu Buhari.

At an expanded South-west PDP Committee meeting in Ijebu-Igbo, Ogun state, the faction said Nigeria needs Buhari “in order to continue his anti-corruption crusade”.

This is contained in the nine-point communiqué issued at the end of the meeting, read by the faction’s National Vice-Chairman, South-west, Chief Makanjuola Ogundipe.

It acknowledged efforts of leaders to reposition the party and get PDP back to winning ways.

The communique said PDP remained the only alternative to the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led government.

The communique urged members to prepare for the forthcoming elections in Ekiti and Osun States.

In his remark, Sheriff said he would continue to work for the progress of the party and return it to the grassroots.

Sheriff, who stated that he would not be provoked by the statement of Chairman of the PDP Strategy Review Committee, Prof. Jerry Gana, challenged him to go and contest election in his locality and win before he could talk to him about party administration and management.

In his keynote address, former Deputy Senate President, Alhaji Ibrahim Mantu, also the Deputy Chairman of PDP Reconciliation Committee, attributed the crisis rocking the party to lack of internal democracy, imposition of candidates and impunity.

Mantu said: “The national leadership is doing its very best to rebrand and reposition our party positively before the Nigerian public in readiness for 2019.

“In spite of the crack in the family, the leadership is moving steadily in the right direction; encouraging mass participation of members in the activities of the party, thereby giving them sense of belonging.

“All hands must be on deck to ensure total victory in the entire South-west and Nigeria in 2019. We must therefore not allow seeming differences affect our victory at the polls.

“Our detractors had expected the crack in the family to be the beginning of our end. Tell them that the lion was just sleeping in order to conserve more energy for 2019. No matter how much weight an elephant loses, it can never be compared to a cow”.

The meeting was attended by the Sheriff’s deputy, Dr. Cairo Ojuigbo; National Secretary, Prof. Wale Oladipo; Senator Sam Anyanwu (Imo West), Senator Buruji Kashamu (Ogun East) and former FCT Minister, Mohammed Abba Gana.

Others included Senator Hosea Ehinlanwo, Hon. Adesegun Adekoya, Hon. Segun Odebunmi; Hon. Victor Akande, Hon. Bowale Solaja, former Presidential adviser, Ahmed Gulak and the leadership of the party from Oyo, Osun, Ekiti, Lagos, Ondo and Ogun States.

Theresa May has come under fire for not acting sooner to criticise a US entry ban on refugees and citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries.
She initially said it was a matter for the US, before No 10 said she "does not agree" with it.
Lib Dem Tim Farron said she should have opposed it earlier. The SNP's Alex Salmond accused her of "cowardice".
Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has tweeted: "Divisive and wrong to stigmatise because of nationality".
He did not mention the US ban but added: "We will protect the rights and freedoms of UK nationals home and abroad."

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Mrs May visited the US on Friday, before President Trump issued an executive order halting the entire US refugee programme and instituting a 90-day travel ban for nationals from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.
She was, by then, in Turkey, where she declined to condemn the order.
'Ignorance and prejudice'
Within hours of landing back in the UK, Downing Street released a statement clarifying her position.
"Immigration policy in the United States is a matter for the government of the United States," said a No 10 spokesman.
"But we do not agree with this kind of approach and it is not one we will be taking."
Image PA
Meanwhile Olympic champion Sir Mo Farah, who lives in the US but was born in Somalia, condemned the ban as "deeply troubling".
"I am a British citizen who has lived in America for the past six years - working hard, contributing to society, paying my taxes and bringing up our four children in the place they now call home. Now, me and many others like me are being told that we may not be welcome.
"It's deeply troubling that I will have to tell my children that Daddy might not be able to come home - to explain why the president has introduced a policy that comes from a place of ignorance and prejudice."
Speaking on the Andrew Marr show, Chief Secretary to the Treasury David Gauke described the policy as "divisive" and said he had "enormous sympathy with those affected by it". But he defended Mrs May's response, saying she was not a "shoot-from-the-hip" politician.

Media MP Zahawi says Trump order banning him from US is "demeaning and sad"
"She is someone who wants to see the briefing and understand it and then will respond to that... The important thing is we are saying we disagree with it and we do think it's wrong."
But opposition politicians and some Conservative MPs have criticised Mrs May for not speaking out sooner.
Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn told ITV's Peston on Sunday: "It wasn't until around midnight that she actually got round to re-adjusting to a position she should've adopted from the very beginning."
Is it worth the backlash for May?
By Susana Mendonca, BBC political correspondent
Before all the hand holding and pally smiles, Theresa May promised the world she would not be afraid to tell Donald Trump what she thought when she disagreed with him. It didn't take long for her to stumble at the first hurdle.
Downing Street later said the prime minister didn't agree with Mr Trump's approach. And her Chief Secretary to the Treasury also said she was not the kind of politician to "shoot from the hip".
But this tougher stance only came after wide criticism of her failure to condemn the president in the first place.
Iraqi-born MP Nadhim Zahawi said he would also be banned from the US; fellow Conservative Heidi Allen said she didn't care how "special" the relationship was, some lines shouldn't be crossed.
And that's the trouble for Theresa May. Donald Trump is bound to cross yet more lines, and if she doesn't criticise him she'll look like the weak partner obeying the powerful one.
The real question for her will be whether keeping Mr Trump sweet in the interests of getting a good trade deal for Britain is worth the backlash she'll get for not being candid enough when she and Britain disagrees with him.
He said it would be "totally wrong" for a state visit to the UK by Mr Trump to go ahead while the row continued.
A petition to stop a state visit - for which no date has been set - has now passed the 100,000 mark, meaning it will be considered for debate in parliament.
Lib Dem leader Tim Farron said Mrs May should have argued against President Trump's actions from the outset.
"You would expect the British prime minister to fight Britain's corner", he said.
And Conservative MP Nadhim Zahawi, who was born in Baghdad, told the the BBC the ban meant he would be unable to visit his sons who are studying at Princeton University in the US.
The MP for Stratford on Avon said the ban was cruel and he hoped it would be reversed.
Image HAMASEH TAYARI
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Hamaseh Tayari (r) was one of those affected by the ban
But former UKIP leader Nigel Farage, the first British politician to meet President Trump after his election, told the BBC's Sunday Politics: "He was elected to get tough. He was elected to say he would do everything within his power to protect America from infiltration by Isis terrorists. Now you know, there are seven countries on that list. He's entitled to do this. He was voted on this ticket."
Meanwhile, Glasgow vet Hamaseh Tayari was told she could not fly home to the UK from Costa Rica via New York as she travels on an Iranian passport.
An appeal to raise funds for a new flight home, via a different route, reached its target just a few hours after being launched.
Number 10 said it was studying the executive order and would "make representations" to the US government if any UK nationals were affected.

Donald Trump is guaranteed to make history as the 45th president of the United States.
And whether you love or loathe him, it's a fact that the Republican will set a range of records as soon as he occupies the Oval Office.
From his age to his bank balance, via his notable lack of pets - here are just some of "The Donald's" historic "firsts".
1. Oldest incoming president
Donald Trump celebrated his 70th birthday on 14 June, which makes him the oldest man in US history to assume the presidency. The previous record-holder, Ronald Reagan, was 69 when he took office in 1981.
Perhaps keen to allay fears about his senior status, the business mogul had his doctor prepare a gushing letter pledging that he would be "the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency".
Image AFP
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Right-wing Indian activists celebrate The Donald's 70th birthday in New Delhi
The average age of all 44 previous incoming presidents is a sprightly 55.
The youngest ever incumbent - Theodore Roosevelt - got the job aged 42 years and 322 days, after President William McKinley's assassination in 1901.
2. The first billionaire president
Mr Trump is the first billionaire president. Exact estimates of his personal wealth vary, with Forbes putting it at $3.7bn (£3bn) and the man himself claiming in a statement that it's "in excess of TEN BILLION DOLLARS".
Many of America's past presidents have also been extremely wealthy, of course. Recent estimates say George Washington's estate would be worth half a billion in today's dollars.
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Donald Trump has said he will take only a dollar in salary - like former governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger (L)
Before his 1963 assassination, JFK reportedly lived off a $10m trust fund thanks to the vast wealth of his father - investor and alleged bootlegger Joseph P Kennedy, Sr.
Mr Trump will be following in the footsteps of former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger by taking just a symbolic dollar as a salary.
3. The richest cabinet
When Mr Trump began unveiling his cabinet picks, the number with fat wallets quickly drew the scorn of Democrats.
"Donald Trump's administration: of, by and for the millionaires and billionaires," tweeted Vermont Senator and Democrat presidential contender Bernie Sanders.
For better or worse, this will be the wealthiest administration in modern American history.
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According to the Washington Post, commerce secretary nominee Wilbur Ross is worth around $2.5bn on his own - roughly 10 times what George W Bush's first cabinet were worth in 2001, when the media branded them an assembly of millionaires.
Image TWITTER
Treasury appointee Steven Mnuchin quite literally bought a bank after 17 years at Goldman Sachs, and reports put his wealth at over $40m.
It has been estimated that the cabinet could be good for an eye-watering $35bn, all told. As Quartz pointed out, this is more than the annual gross domestic product of Bolivia.
4. Least experienced politically
Mr Trump's triumph is also significant because, until now, no-one has been elected president in more than 60 years without experience as a state governor or in Congress.
The last president with no political experience, Dwight Eisenhower, was Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in World War Two, before he was elected to office in 1953.
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Some Trump voters saw his lack of political experience as a guarantee of authenticity
Before that, Herbert Hoover, who was president from 1929 to 1933, was previously an engineer and humanitarian.
But as Mr Trump tells it, his lack of links to the Washington establishment is an asset not a flaw - and more than made up for by his experience as a deal-maker.
5. Most powerful children
Mr Trump has named his son-in-law, real estate developer Jared Kushner, as a senior adviser - prompting cries of nepotism from opponents.
Some claim the appointment makes the 36-year-old the most powerful presidential son-in-law in US history.
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He isn't the first to fit that profile, however.
President Woodrow Wilson's Treasury Secretary, William Gibbs McAdoo, was also married to his daughter, Eleanor.
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First Daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner are set to wield considerable clout
That said, their case pre-dates America's 1967 anti-nepotism statute, and Mr McAdoo was already a cabinet secretary when he wed.
Ivanka Trump, Mr Trump's elder daughter and wife of Mr Kushner, is also being spoken of as the most influential "First Daughter" ever.
6. Fewest White House pets
So much fuss has been made of what Donald Trump owns that you might have missed one glaring absence - a pet.
It looks likely that he'll be the first US President in over a century not to have an animal pal in the White House, after plans to have him adopt a goldendoodle dog reportedly fell through.
According to the Presidential Pet Museum, almost every commander-in-chief has had a pet, and some had a virtual menagerie.
John F Kennedy stands out for owning a veritable Noah's Ark - everything from a rabbit named Zsa Zsa to a canary called Robin - but the crown belongs to Calvin and Grace Coolidge (White House occupants from 1923-1929), who the museum says "quite literally had a zoo".
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Barack Obama's Portuguese Water Dog, Bo, is among the more traditional pets to live at the White House
Their animal companions included at least a dozen dogs, a donkey named Ebenezer, and various creatures presented as gifts by foreign dignitaries - among them lion cubs, a wallaby, a pygmy hippo named Billy, and a black bear.
7. Most adamantly anti free-trade
Donald Trump won the presidency on a pro-job platform, and has blamed free-trade policies for the collapse of the US manufacturing industry.
This is a rare stance for a US president, probably last seen in his fellow Republican Herbert Hoover in the 1930s.
In September 2015, Mr Trump told the Economist China is "killing us", and that millions of Americans are "tired of being ripped off".
He said that as president, he would consider a 12% import tax to make the Chinese "stop playing games".
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During his election campaign, Mr Trump also threatened to rip up Nafta, the free trade agreement between Canada, the US and Mexico, which has been in place for 23 years.
Image TWITTER / DONALD TRUMP
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The Republican has long been opposed to the TPP, which he views as a poor deal for the US
He also vowed that the US would quit the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, a 12-nation agreement, on his first day in the White House.
8. The First Lady's firsts
Former model Melania Trump is as trailblazing as her husband.
She will be the first presidential spouse from Slovenia, and the first non-native English speaker.
She is only the second FLOTUS born outside the US, though - the first being Louisa Adams, wife of the sixth US President, John Quincy Adams (1825-1829), who was born in London.
As Mr Trump has been married twice before, Melania will also be the first third wife to reside in the White House. The only other US president to have divorced was Ronald Reagan, who split from his first wife, actress Jane Wyman, long before leading the nation.
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Melania speaks Slovenian, English, French, German, and Serbian, and may be the most competent linguist to hold the role of FLOTUS.
Image SCOTT OLSON
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Melania Trump will be the first non-native English speaker to be FLOTUS
She is the first president's wife to have posed nude, for GQ magazine in 2000 among others.
Mr Trump is no stranger to men's magazines either. He appeared on the cover of Playboy in March 1990 with the tag-line: "Nice magazine, want to sell it?"

Thousands of women are expected to join a march in London later as part of an international campaign on the first full day of Donald Trump's presidency.
The rally is among events in the UK and elsewhere planned in solidarity with the Women's March in Washington, which is expected to draw 200,000 people.
Organisers aim to highlight women's rights, which they perceive to be under threat from the new US administration.
A protest against Mr Trump took place at London's US embassy on Friday night.
Singer Lily Allen joined demonstrators, local politicians and trades unionists outside the building in Grosvenor Square to highlight concerns raised by his election campaign on issues including nuclear weapons, climate change and immigration.
Other protests took place on Friday in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Manchester, as Mr Trump was being sworn in as the 45th US president.
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Protesters have gathered outside the US embassy, in London
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Placards have been prepared ahead of Saturday's march in London
Saturday's marchers say they will be voicing concerns over issues including racial and gender equality, affordable healthcare, abortion rights and voting rights.
Demonstrations in the UK are scheduled for Belfast, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Lancaster, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol and Shipley.
The London march, which begins outside the US embassy and finishes at Trafalgar Square, has attracted celebrity support on social media from Sandi Toksvig, Alexa Chung, Charlotte Church, Pixie Geldof, Bianca Jagger, June Sarpong and Ian McKellen, among others
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Almost 700 so-called sister marches are planned on Saturday across the globe. Protests by women have already taken place in Australia, New Zealand and Japan.
'Frank' talks
The largest demonstration so far has been in Sydney, Australia, where more than 3,000 protesters carrying placards with anti-Trump slogans took to the streets before gathering in the city's Hyde Park.
Meanwhile, UK Prime Minister Theresa May has congratulated President Trump on taking office, saying "we are both committed to advancing the special relationship between our two countries and working together for the prosperity and security of people on both sides of the Atlantic".
But in an interview with the Financial Times, the prime minister said she would have "very frank" talks with the new president on issues where their opinions appear to differ, such as the future of Nato.
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On Friday night, singer Lily Allen joined protesters outside the US embassy in London
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In Sydney, more than 3,000 protesters took to the streets on Saturday
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The first in the series of women's marches on Saturday took place in Auckland, New Zealand
UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said the UK will work "hand in glove" with Mr Trump's administration "for the stability, the prosperity and the security of the world".
But former Labour leader Ed Miliband tweeted: "Feared the reality of today would be worse than the anticipation and it is".
Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron said he missed watching the swearing-in ceremony, tweeting a picture of himself delivering campaign leaflets, and the message: "Apparently there's something on telly, but I found something better to do instead..."

Donald Trump’s transition team has been forced to distance itself from reports that American intelligence agencies have intercepted communications and financial transactions as part of a broad investigation into possible links between Russia and associates of the president-elect.

On the eve of Trump’s inauguration as the 45th president of the United States, the business dealings of his former campaign chairman Paul Manafort were among the matters under investigation, the New York Times reported, citing current and former senior American officials.

Manafort, who stood down as Trump’s campaign chief in August 2016, has made millions from consulting work while working for pro-Russia oligarchs including Rinat Akhmetov, Dmitry Firtash and Oleg Deripaska.

The National Security Agency has conducted surveillance of Manafort’s business contacts, the Times said, for suspected links to Russia’s security service, the FSB.

Other Trump associates whose contacts are said to be under the microscope include Carter Page, an investment banker who worked in Russia and who was a foreign policy adviser to the campaign, and Roger Stone, whose involvement in Republican politics goes back to Richard Nixon.

However, the Trump team denied any knowledge of the investigations – which have reportedly been led by the FBI and supported by the NSA, CIA and the treasury department’s financial crimes unit – or why they might be under way.

“We have absolutely no knowledge of any investigation or even a basis for such an investigation,” said Hope Hicks, a spokeswoman for the Trump transition.

Manafort called the allegations that he had interactions with the Russian government a “Democrat party dirty trick and completely false”.

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“I have never had any relationship with the Russian government or any Russian officials. I was never in contact with anyone, or directed anyone to be in contact with anyone,” he said in an emailed statement.

“On the ‘Russian hacking of the D.N.C.,’” he said, “my only knowledge of it is what I have read in the papers.”

The reports follow weeks of intrigue over the possible involvement of Russia in trying to help Trump win last November’s election.

A secret CIA analysis reportedly concluded that people with connections to the Russian government provided emails, hacked from the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign, to WikiLeaks in the runup to the 8 November election.

In December, outgoing president Barack Obama ordered US intelligence to review evidence of Russian interference in the election, although the Times reported that it was not clear whether the latest revelations were part of that review.

Jill Stein, the Green party’s presidential candidate, is prepared to request recounts of the election result in several key battleground states, her campaign said on Wednesday.

Stein launched an online fundraising page seeking donations toward a multimillion-dollar fund she said was needed to request reviews of the results in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

Before midnight EST on Wednesday, the drive had already raised more than the $2m necessary to file for a recount in Wisconsin, where the deadline to challenge is on Friday. The campaign had reached $2.5m by 5am EST

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Stein said she was acting due to “compelling evidence of voting anomalies” and that data analysis had indicated “significant discrepancies in vote totals” that were released by state authorities.

“These concerns need to be investigated before the 2016 presidential election is certified,” she said in a statement. “We deserve elections we can trust.”

The fundraising page said it expected to need around $6m-7m to challenge the results in all three states.

Stein’s move came amid growing calls for recounts or audits of the election results by groups of academics and activists concerned that foreign hackers may have interfered with election systems. The concerned groups have been urging Hillary Clinton, the defeated Democratic nominee, to join their cause.

Donald Trump won unexpected and narrow victories against Clinton in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin earlier this month and may yet win Michigan, where a final result has not yet been declared.

Stein and her campaign made clear they were acting because they wanted to ensure the election results were authentic, rather than because they thought she had actually won any of the contests. Several states allow any candidate who was on the ballot to request a recount.

She and those seeking recounts will need to move swiftly. This Friday is the deadline for requesting a recount in Wisconsin, where Trump’s winning margin stands at 0.7%. In Pennsylvania, where his margin is 1.2%, the deadline falls on Monday. In Michigan, where the Trump lead is currently just 0.3%, the deadline is Wednesday 30 November.

The Guardian previously disclosed that a loose coalition of academics and activists concerned about the election’s security is preparing to deliver a report detailing its concerns to congressional committee chairs and federal authorities early next week, according to two people involved.

“I’m interested in verifying the vote,” said Dr Barbara Simons, an adviser to the US election assistance commission and expert on electronic voting. “We need to have post-election ballot audits.” Simons is understood to have contributed analysis to the effort but declined to characterise the precise nature of her involvement.

A second group of analysts, led by the National Voting Rights Institute founder John Bonifaz and Professor Alex Halderman, the director of the University of Michigan’s center for computer security and society, is also taking part in the push for a review.

In a blogpost earlier on Wednesday, Halderman said paper ballots and voting equipment should be examined in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. “Unfortunately, nobody is ever going to examine that evidence unless candidates in those states act now, in the next several days, to petition for recounts,” he said.

Clinton’s defeat to Donald Trump followed the release by US intelligence agencies of public assessments that Russian hackers were behind intrusions into regional electoral computer systems and the theft of emails from Democratic officials before the election.

Curiosity about Wisconsin has centred on apparently disproportionate wins that were racked up by Trump in counties using electronic voting compared with those that used only paper ballots.

Use of the voting machines that are in operation in some Wisconsin counties has been banned in other states, including California, after security analysts repeatedly showed how easily they could be hacked into.

However, Nate Silver, the polling expert and founder of FiveThirtyEight, cast doubt over the theory, stating that the difference disappeared after race and education levels, which most closely tracked voting shifts nationwide, were controlled for.

Silver and several other election analysts have dismissed suggestions that the swing-state vote counts give cause for concern about the integrity of the results.

Still, dozens of professors specialising in cybersecurity, defense and elections have in the past two days signed an open letter to congressional leaders stating that they are “deeply troubled” by previous reports of foreign interference, and requesting swift action by lawmakers.

“Our country needs a thorough, public congressional investigation into the role that foreign powers played in the months leading up to November,” the academics said in their letter, while noting they did not mean to “question the outcome” of the election itself.

Senior legislators including Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Congressman Elijah Cummings of Maryland have already called for deeper inquiries into the full extent of Russia’s interference with the election campaign.

Wednesday’s announcement by Stein, who had previously been hesitant to get involved, also shields Democratic operatives and people who worked on Clinton’s bid for the White House from needing to overtly challenge the election.

Some senior Democrats are known to be reluctant to suggest there were irregularities in the result because Clinton and her team criticised Trump so sharply during the campaign for claiming that the election would be “rigged” against him.

But others have spoken publicly, including the sister of Huma Abedin, Clinton’s closest aide. “A shift of just 55,000 Trump votes to Hillary in PA, MI & WI is all that is needed to win,” Heba Abedin said on Facebook, urging people to call the US justice department to request an audit.

Alexandra Chalupa, a former Democratic National Committee consultant who during the campaign investigated links between Moscow and Trump’s then campaign manager Paul Manafort, is also participating in the attempt to secure recounts or audits.

“The person who received the most votes free from interference or tampering needs to be in the White House,” said Chalupa. “It may well be Donald Trump, but further due diligence is required to ensure that American democracy is not threatened.”

In a joint statement issued last month, the office of the director of national intelligence and the Department for Homeland Security said they were “confident” that the theft of emails from the DNC and from Clinton’s campaign chair, John Podesta, which were published by WikiLeaks, was directed by the Russian government.

“Some states have also recently seen scanning and probing of their election-related systems, which in most cases originated from servers operated by a Russian company,” the statement went on. “However, we are not now in a position to attribute this activity to the Russian government.”

NEW YORK – Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg says the idea that fake news spread on Facebook influenced the outcome of the U.S. election is “crazy.”

Still, the majority of Americans (six in 10) say they get at least some news from social media, mostly Facebook, according to the Pew Research Center. While a lot of this news comes from established outlets — whether CNN or BuzzFeed News — misinformation spreads on Facebook just as information does, shared by users, recommended by software and amplified by both.

Sources of spurious information have ranged from news articles produced by “content farms” for the sole purpose of getting clicks, to “hyperpartisan” sites from both sides of the political spectrum, churning out stories that are misleading at best.

Case in point: “FBI AGENT SUSPECTED IN HILLARY EMAIL LEAKS FOUND DEAD IN APPARENT MURDER-SUICIDE” — a fabricated headline from a fake news site called the Denver Guardian, was shared thousands of times in the days leading up to the election.

Is it possible that voters were swayed for or against a candidate, much like those same people might buy a product after seeing an ad on Facebook?

Zuckerberg says voters deserve more credit.

During an interview Thursday with “The Facebook Effect” author David Kirkpatrick, Zuckerberg said the idea that people voted the way they did because of bogus information on Facebook shows a “profound lack of empathy” for supporters of Donald Trump.

“Voters make decisions based on their lived experience,” he said.

Acerbic political contest

Given the acerbic political contest from which the country just emerged, when countless longtime friends, even family, were unfriended, many are left to wonder if there would be an alternative American history being written today if it were not for Facebook, Twitter and the like.

This, after all, was the first truly social media election, playing out on Twitter and Facebook as much or more than it did on major networks, in living rooms and around watercoolers.

But isn’t social media just a reflection of our world as it exists? Has Facebook become an easy scapegoat when the answer is far more complex?

While Pew found that many believe political discussions on social media to be “uniquely angry and disrespectful,” a comparable number have the same impression of face-to-face conversations when it comes to Democrats, the GOP, or another party.

When it comes to Facebook users, Zuckerberg said almost everyone has friends on the “other side.” Even if 90 percent of your friends are Democrats, for example, 10 percent will be Republican. Still, that’s not a very big number, and the idea of a “filter bubble” — that social media allows people to surround themselves only with the people and ideas with whom they agree — has been a hot topic this election cycle.

“By far the biggest filter in the system is not that the content isn’t there, that you don’t have friends who support the other candidate or that are of another religion,” Zuckerberg said. “But it’s that you just don’t click on it. You actually tune it out when you see it. I don’t know what to do about that.”

‘Open and connected’

Facebook has long denied that it’s a publisher or a media company, or that it acts remotely like either. Its cheery slogan — to make the world more “open and connected” — seemingly invites a broad range of viewpoints, diverse, lively discussion and the free flow of information, rather than censorship.

But it could also make clamping down on fake news difficult. At a time when everyone seems entitled, not just to their own opinions but to their own facts, one person’s misleading headline might be another person’s heartfelt truth.

“We take misinformation on Facebook very seriously,” Adam Mosseri, the executive in charge of Facebook’s news feed, said in a statement to the tech blog TechCrunch this week. “We value authentic communication, and hear consistently from those who use Facebook that they prefer not to see misinformation.”

More work to do

Facebook acknowledges that it has more work to do, and it seems to be putting a lot of faith in the power of data, artificial intelligence and algorithms as the solution.

Over the summer, Facebook fired the small group of journalists in charge of its “trending” items and replaced them with an algorithm. The catalyst appeared to be a report in a tech blog, based on an anonymous source, that the editors routinely suppressed conservative viewpoints.

Subsequently, fake stories ahead of the election began to trend

May this new month bring many opportunities your way, to explore every joy of life and may your resolutions for the days ahead stay firm, turning all your dreams into reality and all your efforts into great achievements may all your heart desires be granted, may the guidance, protection, mercies, grace, favour, blessing and upliftment of The LORD never cease in ur life and family and may this be the beginning of ur new things in your life  stay strong be positive and fulfill your dreams
HAPPY NEW MONTH
THE GOLDEN GIST®✔
www.thegoldengist.blogspot.com

A week ago, the US election looked to be over. Hillary Clinton was riding so high in the polls after a disastrous series of gaffes by Donald Trump that few could conceive of a Republican path to victory on 8 November. Friday’s shock intervention by the FBI may not be enough to change that outcome on its own, but it has certainly set political imaginations running wild.

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The worry for Democrats is that fresh inquiries regarding Clinton’s use of a private email server while secretary of state come at a difficult time. Not only is it hard to prove a negative and re-establish her innocence with barely a week to go until the election, but the letter to congressional officials from director James Comey capped a tricky run of news that was already making a sizeable dent in her polling lead.

Momentum for Trump began to recover first thanks to another set of emails, the contents of which perhaps explain why the Clintons risked so much to try to retain control of her electronic communications in the first place. Released by WikiLeaks, a factor that US intelligence agencies have blamed on Russian hackers, these emails to and from campaign chairman John Podesta have been trickling out for weeks, with mostly embarrassing rather than damaging content.

That changed on Wednesday with the release of a report that appeared to confirm just how much the Clinton family has blurred the boundaries between its business, charitable and political interests. Though almost all of the new information related to Bill rather than Hillary, it gave Trump supporters fresh ammunition at a moment when they were desperate to shift attention from their candidate’s own scandals over taxes and alleged inappropriate behaviour towards women.

In an election that many pollsters describe as an unpopularity contest, it does not take much to swing the mood of independent voters. By Friday, the combination of no news from Trump and bad news from Clinton had halved her average lead in the polls since the last presidential debate.

“When the attention was on Trump, Clinton was winning. Now, the attention is on Clinton,” said political consultant Frank Luntz, who has predicted the winner in 2016 will be the campaign that keeps the focus on its opponent.

When the attention was on Trump, Clinton was winning. Now, the attention is on Clinton
Frank Luntz, political consultant
Sunday’s average lead for Clinton in national polls of 3.4% ought still to be a healthy safety margin. Bill Clinton’s lead over George Bush shrank from 11 points to just three in the last two weeks of the 1992 election, yet he won by nearly double that margin.

But among Democrats, a cause for concern – if not yet panic – is that very few polls published so far were carried out after news broke about the FBI and the emails.

One reputable survey that got close, an ABC News-Washington Post tracking poll released on Sunday, showed just a one-point overall lead for Clinton. It asked some voters on Friday evening what they thought and found the news had mostly hardened existing opinions but could also play a role at the margins.

Hillary Clinton reacts to new FBI investigation into her emails
“About a third of likely voters say they are less likely to support Clinton given FBI director James Comey’s disclosure,” said pollster Gary Langer. “Given other considerations, 63% say it makes no difference.”

Only 7% of Clinton supporters felt it would make any difference, but this rises “much higher among groups already predisposed not to vote for her”, the poll found.

“The potential for a pullback in motivation of Clinton supporters, or further resurgence among Trump’s, may cause concern in the Clinton camp – especially because this dynamic already was under way,” Langer added. “Intention to vote has grown in Trump support groups in the past week as the intensity of criticisms about him has ebbed.”

The notion that the FBI may not change any minds but will bolster opinion, and thus perhaps turnout, was also supported in a poll of voters in 13 battleground states. This CBS poll showed just 5% of Democrats said the issue might make them less likely to support Clinton, compared with more than a quarter of registered Republicans.

This risk also helps explain the ferocity of Democratic calls for the FBI to urgently exonerate Clinton.

Many loyalists are convinced the latest trove of emails, discovered on equipment shared by Clinton aide Huma Abedin and her estranged husband Anthony Weiner, are an irrelevance.

Even if some show more classified information passed its way through the private server, it should not change the FBI’s earlier decision that a criminal charge would be unfair without evidence of intent or coverup.

But so long as this is not categorically established, there may be a nagging doubt in some minds that the FBI suspects otherwise. Not everyone will be prepared to give Clinton the benefit of the doubt. Some studies have shown just 11% of voters describe Clinton as “honest and trustworthy”, lower even than Trump’s score of 16%.

While it may not be enough to the tip the balance, running for president while under potential criminal investigation is never a good look.

Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu on sunday alleged plans by the APC-led government and INEC to re-write results no matter what figures come from the polling units.

He, therefore, said that , “party agents should not be allowed to see how voters vote; there should be safe distance. Illiterate voters should be assisted only by relatives, not by party agents.”

He also urged all eligible voters across the state to be calm and law-abiding, even as he assured them that their votes would count and be protected, on the September 28, 2016, new date for the state governorship election.

He said on his part and on the part of the PDP, they have resolved to be law-abiding and to cooperate with necessary authorities to ensure a hitch free, free and fair election which is the prayer of all Edo people.