NAIJAFEED

Friday, February 3, 2023

800 ballot boxes destroyed by Gunmen in Nigeria

More than 800 ballot boxes were destroyed by armed gunmen, who attacked an office of the electoral commission in southeast Nigeria on Wednesday.

It's the latest in the series of attacks on the electoral commission's offices across the region, blamed on armed pro-Biafra separatists groups. Biafra was the country separatists hoped to create but was quashed during Nigeria's bloody civil war.

In recent years, pro-Biafra militants have caused widespread terror, attacking government and security posts, and more recently, electoral offices. It's raising fears for whether the election can hold as planned.

Insecurity is a huge issue in Nigeria, with a militant Islamist insurgency in the north east, banditry in the north west and a rise in kidnapping for cash countrywide. Voters in Africa's most populous country are due to head to the polls at the end of this month.

By Emmanuel Akinwotu, NPR

Video - Elections to go on despite security concerns in Nigeria

Thursday, February 2, 2023

Female bouncers in Nigeria challenging stereotypes

This Nigerian all-female security crew, known as the Dragon Squad, is breaking stereotypes in a male-dominated industry.

Al Jazeera

Police chief killed, including 7 others killed in Nigeria

Gunmen in central Nigeria have killed eight people, including a divisional police chief, in the latest violence before the February 25 presidential and parliamentary elections, police and a security source said on Wednesday.

Insecurity is a big issue for voters in a country where armed gangs terrorise people in villages and on highways, and carry out kidnappings for ransom, especially in the north.

Police in Benue state responded to a distress call after gunmen blocked the Markurdi-Naka road, forcing travellers to flee, state police spokesperson Catherine Sewuese Anene said.

The divisional police officer for Naka town, Mamud Abubakar, led a team of officers that engaged the armed gang in a gunfight, Anene said in a statement.

“However, the DPO (divisional police officer) who led the team sustained gunshot injuries and was rushed to General Hospital Naka where he was eventually confirmed dead,” she said.

A police source said two other police officers were shot and killed during the fight with the armed gang.

When the gunmen retreated, they killed two children and three women in a nearby village, said the source, who declined to be named because he is not authorised to speak to the media.

Al Jazeera

Nigeria disagrees with credit downgrade

Nigeria's finance minister said on Thursday she disagreed with what she called a "surprise" downgrade of the country's credit rating by Moody's, insisting the government was already addressing the agency's concerns.

Moody's downgraded the West African oil producer last week to Caa1 from B3, saying the government's fiscal and debt position was expected to keep deteriorating, an announcement that sent Nigeria's dollar-bond and currency forwards tumbling.

"Moody's downgrade came as a surprise to us because we had presented all the work that we have been doing to stablise the economy," the minister, Zainab Ahmed, told reporters in Abuja.

"But these are external rating agencies that don't have the full understanding of what is happening in our domestic environment."

She said she expected S&P's rating, due on Friday, would be more positive.

"S&P's assessment is not the same as Moody's. They have come out with a much better assessment," she said.

Nigeria has faced oil production shortages due to crude theft in recent years, though production has started to recover.

It has also suffered chronic dollar shortages coupled with high debt service which has eaten into government revenues.

Moody's cited these factors as reasons for its downgrade.

By Felix Onuah, Reuters

Wednesday, February 1, 2023

Video - Nigerian banks face a shortage of new naira notes

Frustration is growing among millions of Nigerians who have queued at automated teller machines to collect new naira notes. The Central Bank of Nigeria extended the deadline to swap the old naira notes by an extra ten days, to February 10. But no one is confident that banks will have enough of the new notes by then.

CGTN

Cash Withdrawals from Government Accounts to be banned in Nigeria