The Nigerian Air Force (NAF) will begin aerial display rehearsals in Abuja and Lagos as part of preparations for activities marking the 61st anniversary celebration, slated for May 23.

NAF’s spokesman,Air Commodore Ehimen Ejodame, announced this in a statement on Monday.

He said the display are designed to enhance the spectacle of the celebration’s grand finale and to demonstrate NAF’s professionalism and operational capabilities.

“Residents are kindly advised not to panic but to go about their normal activities, as the rehearsals are carefully planned and executed with strict adherence to safety standards,” he said.

The Federal Executive Council has approved a group life insurance scheme for federal government officials, civil servants, and some other workers at the federal level.

The approval was given at the FEC meeting presided over by President Bola Tinubu at the Council Chamber of the State House, Abuja.

The Head of Civil Service of the Federation, Didi Walson-Jack, who briefed State House correspondents after the meeting, said the scheme covers key government officials, comprising the President, the Vice President, the Chief of Staff, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, ministers, the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, permanent secretaries and employees of federal government ministries and treasury funded agencies.

The scheme also covers paramilitary agencies such as the Nigerian Immigration Service, the Nigeria Security and Civil Defense Corps, the Nigeria Correctional Service, the Federal Fire Service, the Federal Road Safety Corps, the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, and the Office of the National Security Adviser.

“The scheme underscores the importance that President Bola Tinubu’s Administration has placed welfare of staff, specifically the welfare of the federal public servant.

“The Group Life Insurance Scheme is a scheme whereby the Federal Government has taken out a life policy on each public servant. And this means that if the unfortunate incident of death occurs, the deceased public servants’ next of kin stands to have a benefit to help the family cushion the family at that time of loss,” Walson-Jack said.

The scheme is an annual one, and today’s approval was for the 2025/2026 policy year, which would commence from the date of payment of premium to underwriters in line with the no-premium, no cover policy.

However, she said the insurance scheme would expire at the end of 2026.

“The approval for today was for the appointment of 17 insurance underwriters for the group life insurance cover and the year 2025/2026. The premium is paid to the insurance companies for a duration of 12 months.

“So, this policy will expire next year. I just like to say that in as much as this policy has existed throughout this administration and even previous administrations, we find that not too many people know about the policy, and so we have, from my office, even planned to carry out a sensitisation, which will be coming up very soon,” she added.

The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has launched an investigation into the alleged technical glitches, following widespread complaints about poor performance in the 2025 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME).

This is contained in a statement made available to newsmen in Abuja on Monday by the Board’s Public Communication Advisor, Dr Fabian Benjamin.

Benjamin said the Board was also collaborating with Vice Chancellors and IT experts to determine the root cause and ensure that affected candidates receive appropriate remedies if any errors were confirmed.

He said the board was also expediting its annual system review, a comprehensive post-mortem of the examination process, typically conducted months after the exercise.

According to him, the review will cover three key stages comprising, registration, examination, and result of the investigation.

He added that the board was particularly concerned about unusual complaints originating from a few states and scrutinising the issues in details to identify and resolve any technical faults.

“To assist in this process, we have engaged several experts, including members of the Computer Professionals Registration Council of Nigeria, Chief External Examiners (who are heads of tertiary institutions), the Educational Assessment and Research Network in Africa, measurement experts, and Vice Chancellors from various institutions.

“If it is determined that there were indeed glitches, we will implement appropriate remedial measures promptly, as we do in the case of the examinations themselves,” he said.

(NAN)