It might sound like the set-up for some kind of email scam, but it’s not: Nigerian Minister of Science and Technology Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu has announced that his country plans to send its first astronaut into space before the year 2030.
The announcement comes roughly a month after a highly-circulated email con claiming that a Nigerian astronaut was after secretly being sent to space in 1989, according to the Toronto Sun. The email went on to claim that this astronaut had been kept alive thanks to care packages, but now really wants to come home and needs financial assistance to do so.
Of course, none of that is true, but Nigeria does actually have a space program, and as Channels TV and Quartz reported over the weekend, they want to join the US, India, China, Japan, Russia, Canada and the member states of the European Space Agency as governing bodies that have sent humans beyond the Earth’s atmosphere and the Karman Line (62 miles above sea level).
During a meeting with the Nigerian Defense Space Agency in Abuja last week, Dr. Onu said that spaceflight was “very important for a country like Nigeria” and that the government was working to create the infrastructure needed to pull off a manned mission, according to Channels TV.
He added that space was “a major asset which nations like Nigeria must also be involved in for the purposes of protecting national interest,” and that the ministry would need to “work very hard in the years ahead... to ensure that the nation plays a role” in space travel in the near future.
As Quartz pointed out, however, a Nigerian astronaut actually has already traveled into space – sort of. In 2006, the website explained, the country sent a 17-year-old girl named Stella Felix to an altitude of six miles (10 km), during which time she experienced 30 seconds of weightlessness and was called the first Nigerian to experience a “space flight,” according to BBC News.
Semantics aside, the plan seems to be to launch an astronaut using rockets developed by Nigerian engineers and built domestically through their own space program, which was originally founded in 2001 and launched its first satellite in 2003. It may sound like a tall order, but experts with the program have been working with China to help launch their satellites in exchange for training.
Dr. Onu, for one, is confident that he and his colleagues can pull off the feat, telling This Day, “on or before 2030, we can do it before with the program and infrastructure that we have,” and that all the funding needed to implement was a program had been included in a recently-passed budget.
“We have developed the capacity to design” and “assemble” spacecraft, he continued. “The last stage is the capacity to launch and we believe very strongly that with the support from President Muhammadu Buhari, we will utilize whatever limited resources that we have in a very efficient manner to make sure that we make the nation proud.”
Red Orbit
Tuesday, March 29, 2016
Monday, March 28, 2016
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Disaster averted as 40,000 football fans occupy 16,000 capacity stadium in Nigeria
Listed as a 16,000 capacity venue, the stadium in the north west of the country was subject to a heavy military presence after a pitch invasion marred the last international there in June.
But a decision by the Kaduna State government to open the gates to fans to attend the crucial 2017 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier for free created a frenzied atmosphere.
Hours before kick-off supporters started arriving, with some scaling fences to find their way in. Some were even pictured clambering up floodlight scaffolding to gain a vantage point.
“I felt the game was not going to take place because I thought the number of people on the pitch side was going to cause encroachment,” Rotimi Akindele, a reporter for Beat FM, told Goal.com.
In the end the match passed without major incident off the pitch, although Nigeria’s captain, John Obi Mikel, accused Egypt’s players of “cheating” after Mohamed Salah’s late equaliser kept the Pharaohs on top of Group G.
Oghenekaro Etebo had put the Super Eagles in front on the hour and looked like claiming a crucial win as the match entered the dying minutes. But with Godfrey Oboabona having limped off injured, Egypt’s players refused to kick the ball out and Salah was able to score after being played in by Ramadan Sobhy.
“I think we played very well but we lost a lot of chances that we created that could have fetched us total victory in today’s match against Egypt,” Mikel said.
“Everybody is saying we lost the game in the last three minutes but all I can say is that fair play is fair play, it doesn’t matter, fair play is fair play.
“OK, you can say we should have concentrated a little more but Fair Play is Fair Play. This is cheating, that is all I can say. It happens in Egypt, it happens everywhere. It doesn’t matter how many minutes it is, you have to allow it. It is the referee that controls the game.”
The Arsenal youngster Alex Iwobi was brought on as a late substitute by the Nigeria coach, Samson Siasia – an appearance that means he can no longer represent England on the international stage.
Elsewhere there were victories for Tunisia, Mali and Ivory Coast over Togo, Equatorial Guinea and Sudan respectively, while Leicester’s Riyad Mahrez started for Algeria as they thrashed Ethiopia 7-1 in Blida.
Guardian
Related story: Video - Nigeria draw with Egypt 1-1 in Africa Cupf of Nations qualification match
Video - Parents of kidnapped schoolgirls being used to identify suicide bomber
The Nigerian government is sending parents from the Chibok community of northeast Nigeria to neighbouring Cameroon to verify whether a suspected female suicide bomber is one of the schoolgirls abducted by Boko Haram nearly two years ago. Garba Shehu, spokesperson for Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, said the Nigerian High Commissioner in Cameroon, Hadiza Mustapha, has been in contact with Cameroonian authorities who have shown a willingness to assist the Nigerian government.
The abduction of about 270 school girls by Islamic militants from a school in Chibok on 14 April 2014, sparked international outrage and a campaign #bringbackourgirls. While about 50 of the girls managed to escape, 219 of these girls remain missing.
Military and local government sources on Friday reported that one of two girls arrested in northern Cameroon carrying explosives claimed to be one of the missing Chibok schoolgirls.
The girls were arrested after being stopped by local self-defence forces in Limani near the border with Nigeria that has been the target of frequent suicide bombings in recent months.
"We hope that the Chibok parents will be able to identify the girl and determine whether she is indeed one of their missing students," Shehu told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a telephone interview in Abuja on Saturday.
Shehu said the government was keen to ascertain the girl's identity so she can be brought back to Nigeria and possibly assist the government in investigations regarding the fate and whereabouts of the other missing Chibok girls.
He said the two parents from Chibok selected to embark on the trip to Cameroon are Yakubu Nkeki, chairman of the Chibok Abducted Girls Movement, and Yana Galang, the group's women leader, whose 16-year-old daughter Rifkatu is among the missing.
The trip is being arranged by the government in partnership with the Murtala Muhammed Foundation in Nigeria, a non-government organisation which has been supporting the parents association and has offered to partly sponsor the trip to avoid any delays.
"If it is true, we are very happy about it. If we see her with our eyes, we will know where our girls are," Galang told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Shehu said the two girls will be brought by the Cameroonian government to Douala, the country's largest city, on Monday for further checks into their identities.
Former Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan was criticized for his slow reaction to the Chibok abductions, seen by many as indicative of his response to Boko Haram, which at its strongest held large swathes of northeastern Nigeria.
Muhammadu Buhari, who defeated Jonathan in a 2015 election, ordered a new investigation into the kidnappings in January.
Joint operations between Nigeria and neighbouring countries succeeded in driving Boko Haram from many of its strongholds last year but the Islamists have stepped up cross-border attacks and suicide bombings, many of them carried out by young girls.
EWN
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