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Canadian PM, Justin Trudeau, Wife Sophie Grégoire, Announce Separation
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his wife, Sophie Grégoire Trudeau, have decided to separate, according to statements posted online by both of them.
“Sophie and I would like to share the fact that after many meaningful and difficult conversations, we have made the decision to separate,” Trudeau wrote in a message posted to his Instagram account.
Trudeau, 51, and Grégoire, 48, were married in May 2005 and have three children together: two sons, Xavier, 15, and Hadrien, nine, and one daughter, 14-year-old Ella-Grace.
“As always, we remain a close family with deep love and respect for each other and for everything we have built and will continue to build,” Trudeau and Grégoire Trudeau wrote in identical messages. “For the well-being of our children, we ask that you respect our and their privacy.”
Grégoire Trudeau, a former television presenter, has been a prominent presence at Trudeau’s side throughout his political career and became a public figure in her own right as an advocate for several charitable and social causes, including mental health and gender equality.
According to a statement from the Prime Minister’s Office, Trudeau and Grégoire Trudeau have “signed a legal separation agreement.”
“They have worked to ensure that all legal and ethical steps with regards to their decision to separate have been taken, and will continue to do so moving forward,” Trudeau’s office said.
“They remain a close family and Sophie and the Prime Minister are focused on raising their kids in a safe, loving and collaborative environment. Both parents will be a constant presence in their children’s lives and Canadians can expect to often see the family together. The family will be together on vacation, beginning next week.”
According to a source with knowledge of the arrangements, Grégoire Trudeau has moved to a separate home in Ottawa and the prime minister will remain at Rideau Cottage. Grégoire Trudeau will also spend time at Rideau Cottage, where their children are expected to live most of the time, and the Trudeaus will share parenting responsibilities, according to the source. Trudeau is expected to speak publicly this week before leaving on vacation with his family.
Trudeau’s parents — former prime minister Pierre Trudeau and Margaret Trudeau — famously separated in 1977. The announcement of Trudeau and Grégoire Trudeau’s separation was extensively covered by international media on Wednesday.
Dominic LeBlanc, a cabinet minister and childhood friend of Trudeau’s, was expected to brief Liberal MPs about the situation on Wednesday afternoon.
As first reported by the National Post, a source confirms that Grégoire Trudeau will no longer take on any official duties and she will not be provided with government staff to manage her own personal appearances.
As recounted in his autobiography, Common Ground, Trudeau and Grégoire Trudeau began dating in 2003. Grégoire Trudeau, the daughter of a stockbroker and a nurse, was a former schoolmate of Trudeau’s late brother, Michel.
The couple became engaged in 2004 and married each other a year later during a ceremony at Montreal’s Sainte-Madeleine d’Outremont church — “by Canadian standards, a sweet and appropriately understated fairy-tale wedding,” was how a writer for Maclean’s described it.
‘Our marriage isn’t perfect’
Both Trudeau and Grégoire Trudeau spoke at times candidly about their relationship and the challenges of marriage.
“Our marriage isn’t perfect, and we have had difficult ups and downs, yet Sophie remains my best friend, my partner, my love,” Trudeau wrote in Common Ground, which was published in 2014.
Grégoire Trudeau told an interviewer in 2015 that “no marriage is easy.”
“I’m almost kind of proud of the fact that we’ve had hardship, yes, because we want authenticity. We want truth,” she said. “We want to grow closer as individuals through our lifetime and we’re both dreamers and we want to be together for as long as we can.”
Trudeau launched his political career in 2007, when he decided to seek the Liberal Party nomination in the Montreal riding of Papineau. After winning there in 2008 and 2011, Trudeau began to consider seeking the Liberal leadership. The decision, he wrote, would ultimately come down to “a deeply personal private discussion between Sophie and me.”
“We had many long, honest talks that summer,” Trudeau recalled. “I wanted to be sure she knew, from my own experience, just how rough that life can be. I recalled for Sophie that my father had once told me I should never feel compelled to run for office. ‘Our family has done enough,’ he said.”
His father said that, Trudeau noted, “despite having never experienced the incessant, base vitriol of twenty-first-century politics.”
“I welcome a good tussle, and my skin is thick, but I had grown up in the reality of public life,” Trudeau wrote. “Sophie had not, and our decision would affect our kids, in some ways, more than either of us.”
In an interview in 2008, Grégoire Trudeau said that when she met Trudeau, “politics was not impossible, but it was not in the short-term or the mid-term plan.”
“But an opportunity came up, and we felt that if we weren’t going to embark on this adventure, a part of us would be selfish with the voice that we have and the opportunities that are given to us,” she said.
In Common Ground, Trudeau credits Grégoire Trudeau with “profoundly” influencing his style of politics and for helping keep him grounded.
“Sometimes it’s easy for people who have made politics their livelihood to get caught up in the heat of battle and forget about their personal values. Sophie never does, and no matter how intense things get, she makes sure I don’t either,” Trudeau wrote.
Personal lives generally private matters
The personal lives of prime ministers are generally treated as private matters. But Pierre Trudeau’s relationship with Margaret Sinclair — including their marriage in 1971 and their separation in 1977 was highly publicized. Trudeau was the first prime minister to get married while in office and also the first to publicly separate from his partner. Margaret Trudeau later disclosed her long struggle with mental illness.
Justin Trudeau, who was born nine months after his parents wed, experienced their divorce as a young child and he wrote at length about those years in Common Ground. Trudeau said that much of what was written about his parent’s relationship was “lurid and inaccurate.”
“From my perspective today, the commonly held story of my parents’ marital breakdown is nothing but a caricature, because my father was not just the tradition-bound diehard he appeared and my mother was not entirely the totally free spirit that her actions suggest,” Trudeau wrote.
“Things are never that simple, especially with a couple as complex as my parents, and I remain amused by and exasperated with those who view their relationship — all the passion, triumph, achievements, and tragedy — in black and white, seeing it merely as a flawed union between a cool and aloof man and an exuberant and uninhibited younger woman. It was that, but also much more.”
Source: CBC News
An Abuja High Court has cleared the way for the implementation of Nigeria’s new tax regime scheduled to commence on January 1, 2026, dismissing a suit seeking to halt the programme.
The ruling gives the Federal government, the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) and the National Assembly full legal backing to proceed with the take-off of the new tax laws.
The suit was filed by the Incorporated Trustees of African Initiative for Abuse of Public Trustees, which dragged the Federal Republic of Nigeria, the President, the Attorney-General of the Federation, the President of the Senate, Speaker of the House of Representatives and the National Assembly before the court over alleged discrepancies in the recently enacted tax laws.
In an ex-parte motion, the plaintiff sought an interim injunction restraining the Federal Government, FIRS, the National Assembly and related agencies from implementing or enforcing the provisions of the Nigeria Tax Act, 2025; Nigeria Tax Administration Act, 2025; Nigeria Revenue Service (Establishment) Act, 2025; and the Joint Revenue Board of Nigeria (Establishment) Act, 2025, pending the determination of the substantive suit.
The group also asked the court to restrain the President from implementing the laws in any part of the federation pending the hearing of its motion on notice.
However, in a ruling delivered on Tuesday, Justice Kawu struck out the application, holding that it lacked merit and failed to establish sufficient legal grounds to warrant the grant of the reliefs sought.
The court ruled that the plaintiffs did not demonstrate how the implementation of the new tax laws would occasion irreparable harm or violate any provision of the Constitution, stressing that matters of fiscal policy and economic reforms fall squarely within the powers of government.
Justice Kawu further held that once a law has been duly enacted and gazetted, any alleged errors or controversies can only be addressed through legislative amendment or a substantive court order, noting that disagreements over tax laws cannot stop the implementation of an existing law.
Consequently, the court affirmed that there was no legal impediment to the commencement of the new tax regime and directed that implementation should proceed as scheduled from January 1, 2026.
The new tax regime is anchored on four landmark tax reform bills signed into law in 2025 as part of the Federal Government’s broader fiscal and economic reform agenda aimed at boosting revenue, simplifying the tax system and reducing leakages.
The laws — the Nigeria Tax Act, 2025, Nigeria Tax Administration Act, 2025, Nigeria Revenue Service (Establishment) Act, 2025, and the Joint Revenue Board of Nigeria (Establishment) Act, 2025 — consolidate and replace several existing tax statutes, including laws governing companies income tax, personal income tax, value added tax, capital gains tax and stamp duties.
Key elements of the reforms include the harmonisation of multiple taxes into a more streamlined framework, expansion of the tax base, protection for low-income earners and small businesses, and the introduction of modern, technology-driven tax administration systems such as digital filing and electronic compliance monitoring.
The reforms also provide for the restructuring of federal tax administration, including the creation of the Nigeria Revenue Service, to strengthen efficiency, coordination and revenue collection across government levels.
While the Federal government has described the reforms as critical to stabilising public finances and funding infrastructure and social services, the laws have generated intense public debate, with some civil society groups and political actors alleging discrepancies between the versions passed by the National Assembly and those later gazetted.
These concerns sparked calls for suspension, re-gazetting and legal action, culminating in the suit dismissed by the Abuja High Court.
Reacting to the judgment, stakeholders described the ruling as a major boost for the reforms, saying it has removed all legal obstacles that could have delayed the implementation of the new tax framework.
Former governor of Anambra State, presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 election, Mr. Peter Obi, has officially defected to the coalition-backed African Democratic Congress (ADC).
Obi announced the decision on Tuesday at an event held at the Nike Lake Resort, Enugu.
“We are ending this year with the hope that in 2026 we will begin a rescue journey,” Obi said.
The National Chairman of the ADC, David Mark, was among the attendees.
United States Representative Riley Moors has said further military strikes against Islamic State-linked militants in Nigeria could follow recent operations ordered by President Donald Trump, describing the actions as aimed at improving security and protecting Christian communities facing violence.
Moore made the remarks during a televised interview in which he addressed U.S. military strikes carried out on Christmas Day against militant targets in North-west Nigeria.
The strikes were conducted in coordination with the Nigerian government, according to U.S. and Nigerian officials.
“President Trump is not trying to bring war to Nigeria, he’s bringing peace and security to Nigeria and to the thousands of Christians who face horrific violence and death,” Moore said.
He said the Christmas Day strikes against Islamic State affiliates had provided hope to Christians in Nigeria, particularly in areas affected by repeated attacks during past festive periods.
According to U.S. authorities, the strikes targeted camps used by Islamic State-linked groups operating in parts of north-west Nigeria.
Nigerian officials confirmed that the operation was carried out with intelligence support from Nigerian security agencies as part of ongoing counter-terrorism cooperation between both countries.
The United States Africa Command said the operation was intended to degrade the operational capacity of extremist groups responsible for attacks on civilians and security forces.
Nigerian authorities have described the targeted groups as a threat to national security, noting their involvement in killings, kidnappings and raids on rural communities.
Moore said the strikes marked a shift from previous years in which attacks were carried out against civilians during the Christmas period. He said the U.S. administration was focused on preventing further violence by targeting militant groups before they could launch attacks.
U.S. officials have said the military action was carried out with the consent of the Nigerian government and formed part of broader security cooperation between the two countries. Nigeria has received intelligence, training and logistical support from international partners as it seeks to contain militant activity.
Moore had previously called for stronger international attention to attacks on Christian communities in Nigeria and has urged continued U.S. engagement in addressing extremist violence. He said further action would depend on developments on the ground and continued coordination with Nigerian authorities.
Nigerian officials have maintained that counter-terrorism operations are directed at armed groups threatening civilians, regardless of religion, and have reiterated their commitment to restoring security across affected regions.
