Gunmen stormed a prayer session at a remote mountain site in the Egbola area, along Agbaja Road in Lokoja Local Government Area of Kogi State, abducting an unspecified number of worshippers.

The incident reported to have happened on Friday during a night vigil on the mountain.

A woman identified as Mary Adams Gure was said to have been rescued by men of the state vigilante services who got the wind of the incident and mobilized to the scene and confronted the gunmen in a gun duel.

According to the report, the attackers attacked the prayer ground, shooting randomly to instill panic before forcing the attendees into the bush.

The rescued woman was said to have escaped amidst chaos.

“The vigilantes were mobilized quickly in response to the attack; and in the process, Gure was rescued . A search-and-rescue operation is ongoing to locate the remaining abducted faithful.

“Gure managed to escape and later found safety, thanks to the swift intervention of local vigilante members who were alerted and got to the scene of the incident on time,” the vigilante source said.

For the second consecutive year, Nigerian Tech Entrepreneur -Solape Akinpelu, Founder of Hervest, Wins $30,000 2025 Aurora Tech Award
Lagos, Nigeria. Monday, April 14, 2025.

For the second consecutive year, a Nigerian female tech entrepreneur has clinched the prestigious Aurora Tech Award. Solape Akinpelu, founder of Hervest, was announced as the 2025 winner of the $30,000 prize at the grand finale held in Cairo from April 11–13.

She follows in the footsteps of fellow Nigerian, Folake Owodunni, who won the award in 2024—marking a powerful moment for Nigerian women driving innovation in the global tech space.
Hervest is a fintech platform providing financially underserved African women access to savings, impact investing, and credit, particularly for smallholder female farmers.

Other top four outstanding female tech founders recognised at the event include the first runner-up, founder of Nido Contech Loretxu Garcia Arraztoa from Chile; the second runner-up and founder of FlexiBees Shreya Prakash from India; the Chief Executive Officer, Arkangel AI Laura Velásquez Herrera from Colombia; and the founder of UpLeap Leonie Korn from Switzerland.

The 2025 Aurora Tech Award winner will receive a cash prize of $30,000, while the second and third places get $20,000 and $15,000, respectively. The fourth and fifth places are entitled to $10,000, respectively. Each finalist will gain exclusive access to the right investors, industry leaders, and strategic partners who can move the needle on their business.

The winners will also tap into inDrive’s expertise, team, and global network, giving them the support and resources to accelerate their growth, secure funding, and scale globally. The flagship event brought together the top 10 finalists from around the world — women building market-defining ventures — to compete for the main award prizes.

This year’s shortlist featured groundbreaking innovators from MENA, LATAM, Central Asia, and APAC, whose startups span diverse industries, including artificial intelligence, fintech, and health tech. The 2025 edition of the award saw an unprecedented 2,018 applications from 116 countries, doubling the number of submissions from the previous year.

The final stage of the competition occurred during the regional SHE CAN conference hosted by Entreprenelle, a leading Egyptian organisation dedicated to empowering women through education, training, and entrepreneurial support. Since its inception in 2015, SHE CAN has become one of the MENA region’s most influential industry events, attracting over 7,000 attendees annually.

Speaking on the award, Head of the Aurora Tech Awards, Isabella Ghassemi-Smith said the platform was created to help support innovators to take their ideas further. “The Aurora Tech Award isn’t about representation for the sake of it — it’s about backing the highest-potential founders building real companies. These women aren’t here because of their gender. They’re here because they’re building businesses investors should care about. If the table wasn’t built for them, they didn’t wait for an invitation — they built their own. Aurora exists to ensure they get the capital, platform, and network to take it further,” Ghassemi-Smith said.

Also speaking on the award, Evgenia Matrosova, Chief Growth Officer and Head of Ride-Hailing at inDrive, said the decision to support these innovators was to help break the gender barrier in investment.

“Supporting female entrepreneurs in overcoming barriers and building strong networks is essential. Through the Aurora platform, we aim to attract future investment, boost visibility, and foster strategic partnerships. Our mission is to drive systemic change in emerging markets like MENA, closing the gender investment gap. The Aurora Tech Award is not just an accolade, it’s a launchpad for the next generation of unicorn founders,” he said.

For more information on the Aurora Tech Award 2025 winners, visit Auroratechaward.com or our Linkedin.

About the project
The Aurora Tech Award, an initiative of inDrive, is a global award for the boldest tech founders building scalable, high-potential businesses, who just happen to be women. But this isn’t just about recognition—it’s a launchpad. Aurora provides winners with direct access to the right investors, industry experts, and a global network—everything they need to scale faster, grow smarter, and dominate their industries. It’s not just a competition, it’s a partnership that accelerates success and opens doors to the resources that truly matter.
inDrive operates in over 888 cities in 48 countries. Driven by its mission of challenging social injustice, the company is committed to having a positive impact on the lives of one billion people by 2030. It pursues this goal both through its core business, which supports local communities via a fair pricing model; and through the work of inVision, its non-profit arm. inVision’s community empowerment programs help to advance education, sports, arts and sciences, gender equality and other vital initiatives.

inDrive is a global mobility and urban services platform. The inDrive app has been downloaded over 300 million times, and was the second most downloaded mobility app in 2024. In addition to ride-hailing, inDrive provides an expanding list of urban services, including intercity transportation, freight delivery, task assistance and courier delivery. For more information visit www.inDrive.com
Please find the photo for publication here.

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has condemned the renewed attacks in Plateau State that claimed many innocent lives on Sunday.

Atiku lashed out at President Bola Tinubu, saying his security policy and infrastructure have failed woefully.

On Sunday, about 47 people were killed in Zike community in the Kimakpa area of the Kwali district of Bassa Local Government Area of Plateau State.

The deadly attack took place just over a week after a similar attack in Bokkos Local Government Area in which scores of people were also killed and properties destroyed.

Atiku Abubakar also criticised the upsurge in terrorist attacks in Borno State, which has led to the loss of lives and territories to Boko Haram insurgents.

In a statement by his media aide, Paul Ibe, Atiku said that these manifestations are indicative of the woeful failure of both the security policy and infrastructure of the Tinubu-led administration.

He, therefore, called on the Federal Government to take tougher proactive measures to deal with what he called “these disgraceful incidents that challenge our national security.”

Atiku explained that “every sincere Nigerian should be worried about the frequency and impunity with which terrorists and bandits attack innocent people in the country, especially in Northern Nigeria, which has become the epicentre of terrorist violence in the country.”

According to Atiku, the delay in the prosecution of captured terrorists and bandits in custody since 2016 has emboldened the mass murderers to kill with impunity.

“If the government had applied the same energy in the prosecution of terrorists and bandits as it did in the trial of political critics, it would have gone a long way to send a powerful message to the outlaws that there are consequences for mass murder,” Atiku said.

According to Atiku, the prosecution of terrorists and bandits should be accorded the highest priority by the Attorney General of the Federation.

He explained that there should be special courts to fast-track the trial and conviction of terrorists in the country.

“Hundreds of terrorists and bandits have been in custody since 2016 without trial, and the delay in bringing them to justice is demoralising to our security forces. If terrorists and bandits are captured and then are left in custody longer than necessary without trial, it will undermine the efforts and sacrifices of our security forces,” he explained.

According to the Waziri of Adamawa, “Our criminal justice system is notoriously slow and as a result, terrorists and bandits are thus encouraged to feel that crime pays.”

The former Vice President also expressed “embarrassment at how armed criminal groups cross through our borders to carry out terrorist activities in Nigeria.”

Atiku added that condemnation of terrorist attacks by the government is not enough, saying that what is needed are prompt and proactive measures to forestall further attacks and loss of innocent lives.

He noted that as long as the terrorists and bandits are operating successfully without consequences, they will continue to attack innocent people again and again.