Video - UNICEF children's trauma project yields positive results

Nigeria has made massive gains against Boko Haram in the country's north-east. But the aftermath of the insurgency has forced millions of children out of school and left hundreds of thousands orphaned. Aid agencies like UNICEF are looking at creative ways of helping young people cope with their trauma. Here's Kelechi Emekalam again with one forum that's producing amazing results.

Victor Moses gets new endorsement deal

The good times are rolling fast and thick for the Nigerian and Chelsea star, Victor Moses, who last Friday won his first Premier League title with the Blues.

While Moses who has had an amazing season is making it count on the pitch, he is also making a fortune for himself off the pitch as he has just sealed an endorsement with Opera Mini, which has named the Chelsea star as an ambassador.

It is understood that Moses will be featured in the new Opera Mini TV commercial as well as a range of collaborative projects extending throughout 2018.

“Football is one of the most popular types of content consumed by Opera Mini users throughout Africa,” says Jørgen Arnesen, Global Head of Marketing and Distribution at Opera. “Victor Moses is a perfect match for Opera, being not only a high performer but also a great role model and natural ambassador of his home country Nigeria.”

Speaking of his choice as a brand ambassador for Opera Mini, Victor Moses states, “I am proud to be in partnership with Opera and am looking forward to working together. The Opera team have taken me through their plans and vision for the brand in the Nigerian market and it’s made me incredibly excited about the future. I’m delighted to be a part of such a groundbreaking campaign.”

Opera recently launched its first nationwide TV and radio commercials to announce a faster and more affordable internet experience with the Opera Mini browser.

Already airing in South Africa and Kenya, there will be a special version for Nigeria. Victor Moses will literally be challenging his on-field speed against Opera Mini’s.

It is not clear how much the deal is worth.

Premium Times

Video - Nigeria to boost budget by 21%

Nigeria’s lawmakers approved to boost spending by 21 percent this year to help the West African economy recover from its worst slump in 25 years.

The Senate, led by its President Bukola Saraki, agreed on Thursday in the capital, Abuja, to increase spending this year to 7.4 trillion naira ($23 billion). That compares to a budget of 7.3 trillion naira that President Muhammadu Buhari proposed on Dec. 14. The House of Representatives, the National Assembly’s lower chamber, approved it earlier Thursday.

Nigeria’s economy, which vies with South Africa’s to be the largest on the continent, shrunk by 1.5 percent last year, the first contraction since 1991, after revenue from oil, its biggest export, fell by almost half. About 30 percent of the budget will be spent on roads, rail, ports and power to help stimulate business activity.

The government should implement the budget quickly “to boost the economy and take it out of recession,” Michael Famoroti, an economist at Lagos-based Vetiva Capital Management, said by phone. Spending on capital projects to promote exports and in the oil-producing Niger delta region, is expected in the second half of the year, he said.

The spending plans assume daily production of 2.2 million barrels of crude oil sold at $42.5 per barrel, and an exchange rate of 305 naira per dollar, according to budget documents. This was unchanged from Buhari’s proposal, the chairman of the Senate’s Committee on Appropriations, Danjuma Goje, told lawmakers.

The government’s oil-production target may be reached in the second half of the year as “oil revenue is expected to be strong,” according to Famoroti. If non-oil revenue doesn’t increase, Nigeria might face “another under-performance of the budget.”

Foreign-currency shortages in the country forced the central bank to introduce multiple exchange rates, with the main rate at 315 naira per dollar, more than 20 percent cheaper than the street price.

The two chambers of Parliament debate and approve spending plans separately before harmonizing their proposals into a single document sent to the president to sign into law. Buhari’s deputy, now acting President Yemi Osinbajo, might sign the bill in the absence of his boss, who flew to London on May 8 for treatment of an undisclosed ailment. The 74 year-old leader’s ill health has fueled concern about his ability to rule Africa’s most-populous nation of 180 million people.

Like last year, Nigeria delayed approving the budget by more than four months.

The budget’s passage paves the way for the government to borrow 2.3 trillion naira, 46 percent of which will be from abroad, to help plug this year’s fiscal deficit at 2.18 percent of gross domestic product. Buhari asked lawmakers on April 27 to approve the borrowing of $7 billion from China and the World Bank to build railroads and help recovery of northeastern Nigeria. The region has been adversely affected by Jihadist group Boko Haram’s insurgency.

Bloomberg

Video - Can Nigeria's Chibok girls ever be truly free?

Eighty-two of Nigeria’s Chibok schoolgirls are free thanks to a prisoner swap between the Nigerian government and Boko Haram. The release is the biggest since the armed group swarmed a school in northern Nigeria in April 2014, kidnapping 276 girls. News of the deal has brought both happiness and anxiety as families wait to hear if their relatives are among those freed.

Aisha Yesufu, of the #BringBackOurGirls campaign, told Al Jazeera that counseling and rehabilitation must now be a priority.

"At the end of the day, we want to have world leaders out of every one of them so that they can be what the terrorists did not want them to be," Yesufu said.

But critics of the campaign say the girls have become too famous to ever truly be free. Writing in the New York Times, Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani said: "The campaign made them famous and, as a result, precious to the jihadists. The military says it can't guarantee their safety if they go home, so they remain essentially prisoners of the state."

Peter Joseph, a family member of one of 21 girls released by Boko Haram in October 2016, agrees. Those girls are in a government rehabilitation camp where they rarely see their families.

"I think it’s another kind of imprisonment," Joseph told The Stream.

So when it comes to rehabilitation, what is the best way forward? And can the Chibok girls ever really be free?

Video - Nigerian entrepreneur finds muse in hand-pressed coconut oil

A Nigerian entrepreneur has found her muse in hand-pressed coconut oil. The former banker and actor is so comfortable in her new skin, she is confident of exploring markets beyond Nigeria.