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George Clooney implores Biden to quit presidential race

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George Clooney, Hollywood actor and prominent Democratic fundraiser, has implored US President Joe Biden to drop out of the presidential race.

Clooney made the call in a New York Times opinion piece published on Wednesday and titled: ‘I love Joe Biden. But we need a new nominee’.

The request also comes just weeks after the producer headlined a major fundraiser for Biden’s re-election campaign.

Concerns about Biden’s re-election bid heightened after his shaky debate performance against Donald Trump, the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party.

Biden, 81, blamed a cold and jet lag for his feeble performance.

A slew of Democrats have however privately and publicly expressed fears that their party could lose the White House with Biden at the top of the ticket.

“I love Joe Biden. As a senator. As a vice president and as president. I consider him a friend, and I believe in him. Believe in his character. Believe in his morals,” Clooney wrote.

The actor said the Biden he saw during the June 15 fundraiser, which also included former President Barack Obama, “was not the Joe big F-ing deal Biden of 2010. He wasn’t even the Joe Biden of 2020″.

The Hollywood star said Biden has won many battles in the last four years but “the one battle he cannot win is the fight against time”.

“He was the same man we all witnessed at the debate,” Clooney opined.

“Our party leaders need to stop telling us that 51 million people didn’t see what we just saw.

“This is about age. Nothing more. We are not going to win in November with this president.”

Clooney added that his concerns matched those of “every member of congress” he has spoken with.

The actor’s comments also come after Nancy Pelosi, former house speaker, said time was “running short” for Biden to decide whether to stay in the race or not.

But the president has repeatedly said he is confident of beating Trump and would remain in the race.

“I don’t walk as easily as I used to, I don’t speak as smoothly as I used to, and I don’t debate as well as I used to. But what I do know is how to tell the truth,” Biden told a cheering crowd after the debate.

The US president acknowledged that age affected his fluency during the debate but insisted that he “could do the job”.

The White House said the reasons Biden cited were not excuses but provided context for the situation.

The presidency also added that Biden is “clear-eyed” and would stay in the race.

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South Korean president faces second impeachment vote

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South Korea’s opposition leader warned his ruling party colleagues on Friday that “history will remember” if they do not back the impeachment of President Yoon Suk Yeol, with just over 24 hours until a vote to remove him from office.

Yoon’s short-lived imposition of South Korea’s first martial law in over four decades plunged the country’s vibrant and combative democracy into some of its worst political turmoil in years.

An attempt to remove him from office last Saturday failed when lawmakers from the ruling People Power Party boycotted the impeachment motion.

But after a week of back-door politicking and a mounting investigation into Yoon and his inner circle, analysts now say the main opposition Democratic Party may have better luck with its second attempt.

Saturday’s impeachment vote will take place around 5:00 pm (0800 GMT), with Yoon charged with “insurrectionary acts undermining the constitutional order” for his martial law bid.

Two hundred votes are needed for it to pass, meaning opposition lawmakers must convince eight ruling party colleagues to defect.

On Friday, the leader of the Democratic Party, Lee Jae-myung, implored the PPP to support the president’s removal from office.

“What the lawmakers must protect is neither Yoon nor the ruling People Power Party but the lives of the people wailing out in the freezing streets,” Lee said.

“Please join in supporting the impeachment vote tomorrow. History will remember and record your choice.”

Two ruling party lawmakers supported the motion last week.

And as of Friday noon, seven ruling party lawmakers have pledged to support impeachment — leaving the vote on a knife edge.

But members of the opposition are confident they will get the votes.

Lawmaker Kim Min-Seok said Friday he was “99 percent” sure the impeachment would pass.

Should it pass, Yoon will be suspended from office while South Korea’s Constitutional Court deliberates.

Prime Minister Han Duck-soo will step in as the interim president during that time.

The court will then have 180 days to rule on Yoon’s future. If it backs his removal, Yoon will become the second president in South Korean history to be impeached.

There is also precedent for the court to block impeachment: in 2004, then-President Roh Moo-hyun was removed by parliament for alleged election law violations and incompetence.

But the Constitutional Court later reinstated him.

The court also currently only has six judges, meaning their decision would need to be unanimous.

And should the vote fail, Yoon can still face “legal responsibility” for the martial law bid, Kim Hyun-jung, a researcher at the Korea University Institute of Law, told AFP.

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Brazil’s president Lula undergoes brain surgery, stable in ICU

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Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has undergone surgery following a brain haemorrhage caused by a recent fall, the Syrian-Lebanese Hospital in São Paulo announced on Tuesday.

“The operation was completed without complications” on Monday night, and Lula is “doing well and under monitoring” in an intensive care unit, the hospital stated in a release shared on the president’s Instagram account.

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UK granted 300k new visas to Nigerians in the last couple of years, says Envoy

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Richard Montgomery, the British high commissioner to Nigeria, says the United Kingdom’s visa policies are favourable towards Nigerians.

Montgomery said the evidence of the positive relationship is evident in the “large” numbers of approved visas to Nigerians.

According to the high commissioner, around 300,000 new visas were granted to Nigerians in the last few years.

The British envoy who did not specify the time frame spoke on Monday during his appearance on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily.

Responding to a question on the restrictions placed on certain UK visas, a development many have described as harsh, the high commissioner said the trends for Nigeria have been positive.

“I have to contest this picture because the UK in the last couple of years has granted around 300,000 new visas to Nigerians which far exceeds any other visa relationship which Nigeria has with any other country,” Montgomery said.

“The trends have been really positive. Nigeria has been a major beneficiary of the post-Brexit migration visa rules.

“And if you look at, say, the number of people getting work visas in the UK, these people play an incredibly important role in certain sectors, particularly our social care sector, the number of people getting work visas to go to the UK has gone from something like 10(thousand) to 20,000, six, seven years ago, to 80 (thousand), 90,000 a year in the last two years, last year and this year.

“Now, we have 145,000 visit visas already approved this year, similar to last year. Student numbers are down. We had around over 100,000 last academic year. The initial figures suggest they’re around 70,000 this year.

“So student numbers, I admit, are down, but I think everybody agrees that it’s a huge relationship. There’s a lot of positivity in it.

“If you apply with the right documentation and the right evidence, the approval rate is very high. Student visas, it’s 75 percent I think, sorry, 97 percent. Work visas, if you’ve got the right documentation and the job lined up again, very high.

“So I would like to emphasize how huge the relationship is, it outstrips any other visa relationship that Nigeria has with any other single country in my understanding.”

Montgomery who is also the UK permanent representative to the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) added that Nigeria accounts for about 10 percent of visas granted by the UK in the last two years.

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Bodex F. Hungbo, SPMIIM is a multiple award-winning Nigerian Digital Media Practitioner, Digital Strategist, PR consultant, Brand and Event Expert, Tv Presenter, Tier-A Blogger/Influencer, and a top cobbler in Nigeria.

She has widespread experiences across different professions and skills, which includes experiences in; Marketing, Media, Broadcasting, Brand and Event Management, Administration and Management with prior stints at MTN, NAPIMS-NNPC, GLOBAL FLEET OIL AND GAS, LTV, Silverbird and a host of others

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