Nigeria beat Australia in Women's Basket Ball at 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris

 Nigeria’s coaches and players soaked in the moment, taking in the cheers from the crowd as they stood at center court.

The team had just pulled off a surprising victory against Australia in the Olympic opener for both teams. It was the first win in the Olympics in 20 years for the African nation.

It happened a few days after the team made the 2 1/2-hour trek from Lille to Paris for the opening ceremony only to be denied access to the country’s boat by its own federation because there wasn’t enough room, according to a person with knowledge of the situation.

The person spoke to The Associated Press on Friday on condition of anonymity because the Nigeria delegation has not publicly commented.

“It feels so good. It’s been a tough couple of days,” said Amy Okonkwo, who scored 13 points in the win. “We’ve stuck together and this is what it’s about. Like, you overcome adversity and you fight until the finish and you come out with the win.”

The players didn’t want to get into the specifics of what happened Friday night.

“I just want to leave the past in the past. I can’t do anything about it,” Okonkwo said. “But what we can do is focus on what we can do on the court and execute our game plan and continue to just take everything in stride and take it one day at a time.”

It has been a difficult few years for Nigeria since the team reached the quarterfinals of the 2018 World Cup. The country was winless at the Tokyo Games in 2021 and then internal strife between the basketball federation and the government caused the team to miss playing in the World Cup in 2022.

“Sometimes you fight with your brother, your sister, and the next day you make up and you’re friends again,” said Ezinne Kalu, who had 19 points against Australia. “So that’s all we’ve been doing these past few years. Just fighting and just trying to stay together as a team. And today, prove that we can continue to be great.”

Kalu added that the team has gone through so much off the court, but people haven’t been paying attention.

“Nobody cares what we go through off the court,” the guard said. “They just see what we do on the court.”

It was the country’s first win in the Olympics since 2004, when Nigeria beat South Korea 68-64 in the 11th-place game. That’s the only other win by an African team in women’s basketball at the Olympics. The continent is now 2-36.

“We can do anything we put our minds to,” Nigeria coach Rena Wakama said. “I think nobody believed that we could do it, except for the 20 people in my locker room.”

Assistant coach Aisha Mohammed has been a part of both wins now; she was a player on the 2004 team. She saw a lot of similarities between the two victories.

“That game is kind of like this one,” she said. “You know the fight from the beginning, you know, at the end, we didn’t give up. We kept fighting and fighting.”

The difference was that win over South Korea was at the end of the Olympics, and this one is just the beginning. The Nigerians have a lofty goal of trying to reach the quarterfinals — something no African country has ever done.

It’s been a great start to the Olympics for Africa. The South Sudan men’s basketball team won its opener in the country’s first-ever Olympic game.

By Doug Feinberg, AP

Demonstrators in Nigeria gather days early for anti-government protests

Hundreds of protesters have gathered in central Nigeria days before planned national demonstrations over economic hardship and record inflation.

The protesters, many of them young people, converged in the town of Suleja, 3o miles outside the federal capital, Abuja, with placards criticising the government’s policies. Week-long nationwide protests had been due to begin on Wednesday.

A cost-of-living crisis that was already hitting Africa’s most populous country at the time the president, Bola Tinubu, took office in May last year has intensified after he removed a controversial fuel subsidy and announced other reforms.

The prices of everyday commodities have astronomically increased, uninterrupted electricity is a distant dream and fuel queues remain a common feature of life in the country, despite Nigeria’s status as one of the world’s top oil and gas producers.

Nigeria has also become the world’s malnutrition capital with more than 31.8 million children affected, according to NGO data.

As the protest in Suleja commenced, there were counter-protests in parts of Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital and Tinubu’s stronghold, with big banners reading “Say no to protest”, only a couple of miles away from fuel queues in the city.

In recent weeks, the Nigerian government had been warning and pleading in equal measure for citizens not to take to the street, apparently aware of its deepening unpopularity.

“You can’t judge leadership within one year,” Nyesom Wike, the minister in charge of Abuja, said on Sunday, at a forum convened to speak with young people in the city.

Analysts said the government was attempting to prevent a repeat of the protests in Kenya, where young people in the east African nation held the state to a standstill for weeks, forcing the government to repeal new taxes.

Tinubu, who approved a hike in the national minimum wage from N30,000 (£14.40) to N70,000 a month, urged young people not to demonstrate, claiming organisers were mobilising for mass action with “sinister motives”. He has also met traditional rulers across the country to urge them to prevail on their subjects to be patient with his administration.

Authorities have claimed the aim of the protests is to destabilise the country. On Friday, the secret service said it had identified “the funding lines, sponsors and collaborators of” a plot to topple the government via the demonstrations. 

A day after, the police chief, Kayode Egbetokun, said the security agencies were in possession of “credible intelligence” on the involvement of foreign mercenaries. Neither statement gave any details. 

Local reports say soldiers blocked the highway leading to Abuja on Monday while police reinforcements were seen in the northern hub of Kano on Sunday.

The US, UK and Canada have issued travel advisories in advance of the protests.

The last big protests in Nigeria were the Occupy Nigeria demonstrations against fuel subsidy in 2012 – in which Tinubu played a key role – and 2020’s campaign against a rogue police unit known for its extrajudicial killings.

By Eromo Egbejule, The Guardian

Related story: US, UK, Canada issue travel warnings over protests

US, UK, Canada issue travel warnings over protests

The United States, United Kingdom and Canada issued travel warnings for Nigeria ahead of planned protests over economic hardship and rising costs.

The UK Foreign Office said there was a risk of unrest from July 29 through August 10, and noted that "past protests have turned violent with little warning."

The Canadian government also warned that the protests "could turn violent at any time."

Meanwhile, the US embassy in Abuja advised American citizens to avoid crowds and demonstrations.
Why are Nigerians protesting?

Nigeria is experiencing its worst cost-of-living crisis in a generation.

In June, inflation hit a record high at 34.19% while food inflation rose to more than 40.87%, according to Nigeria's National Bureau of Statistics.

Activists have called for 10 days of protests nationwide to begin on Thursday under the banner #EndBadGovernance.

The protests have been organized by a broad coalition of civil society groups, the Sunday Punch newspaper reported.

Both supporters and opponents of the protest have drawn comparisons with recent protests in Kenya against a plan to raise taxes on essential goods.

The Premium Times newspaper reported that some protesters already began blocking major roads in the capital, Abuja, on Monday.
Police on alert

Authorities have urged young people to stay away from the protests. Police cracked down heavily on the last major protests, the #EndSARS demonstrations, in 2020.

"While citizens have the right to peaceful protest, they do not have the right to mobilize for anarchy and unleash terror," defense spokesperson Major General Edward Buba told reporters.

But some opposition leaders like Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party said the government must provide security so that "peaceful protests" can go ahead.

"Any attempt to suppress these rights is not only unconstitutional but a direct affront to our democracy," Abubakar said on social media last week.

DW

Related story: Power grid in Nigeria shut down, airlines disrupted as unions strike

Poultry farming sector hit by inflation in Nigeria

Nigeria's poultry farming sector is experiencing widespread problems. Rising costs of feed, drugs, and production have led to the closure of 30 percent of farms within just six months.

CGTN

Nigeria violated human rights during police brutality protests

A regional African court has ruled that Nigerian authorities violated the rights of protesters during mass demonstrations against police brutality in 2020.

The protests, dubbed End SARS, called for disbanding the Special Anti-Robbery Squad after allegations of torture, extortion and extrajudicial killings.

A coalition of human rights activists and organizations sued in late 2021. Applicants Obianuju Udeh, Perpetual Kamsi and Dabiraoluwa Adeyinka alleged severe human rights violations by state agents as they put down the street protests.

In its verdict issued Wednesday, a three-member panel of the Court of Justice - linked with the Economic Community of West African States, or ECOWAS - determined that Nigerian authorities had used disproportionate force in their response to the protests.

The panel said security agents had violated the African Charter on Human and People's Rights as well as several international human rights laws.

Bolaji Gabari, lead counsel representing the applicants, welcomed the verdict.

"Justice is finally achieved and obtained. ... What we were really looking for was to get an affirmation that this really happened," Gabari said. "This judgment just affirms what we have been saying. The other applicants that came forward initially considered their safety and withdrew."

The ECOWAS court ordered the Nigerian government to compensate each applicant with $6,400, or about 10 million naira; to investigate the rights abuses; and to show progress on holding offenders responsible within six months.

The court also stated that the use of live rounds against protesters at the Lekki toll gate on October 20, 2020, caused fear, and that the Nigerian government did not present evidence refuting those allegations.

Authorities have not responded to the court ruling, and a national police spokesperson did not take VOA's calls for comment.

But human rights groups like Amnesty International and some activists welcomed the court’s decision as a significant victory for human rights in Nigeria.

Nelson Olanipekun, a human rights lawyer and founder of Citizens' Gavel, a civic organization that seeks to improve the pace of justice delivery through the use of technology, said, "The ECOWAS court judgment came at a right time, especially now that Nigerians are going through tough times. And there's also a regional move where Africans largely are recognizing their power as citizens. For example, what happened in Kenya — people demanding accountability from their government — was also similar to what happened during End SARS."

Olanipekun said, however, that more work needs to be done.

"What is the next move? Since End SARS, even though the police have tried, there has been reoccurrence of incidents of police brutality in the country," he said. "It has not abated. There's no sufficient accountability and oversight over government organizations. Also, the Nigerian court has been weak, inefficient and corrupt. They're not independent enough."

Thousands of young Nigerians poured into the streets in October 2020 to demand the dissolution of the SARS unit, but the protest soon expanded to call for better governance before it was forcefully quelled on October 20.

Last October, Amnesty International said at least 15 End SARS protesters languished in a Lagos jail while activists marked the third anniversary of the protests. 

By Timothy Obiezu, VOA