A detained Nigerian journalist and former presidential candidate charged with treason has been granted bail but remains in custody, one of his lawyers told CNN on Tuesday.
Nigeria's secret police have been holding, Omoyele Sowore, founder of a New York-based news site since his arrest August 3.
He was initially detained by the Department of State Services (DSS) for calling a nationwide demonstration against President Muhammadu Buhari's government, but formal charges against Sowore, including treasonable felony, cyberstalking and money laundering, were made public only last week.
A court in Abuja ordered the journalist to be immediately released pending his arraignment, according to court documents seen by CNN.
His lawyer, Femi Falana, said the journalist is being held illegally and accused the government of bringing up trumped-up charges against him."We are saying the machinery of the state cannot be used to harass political opponents," Falana told CNN.
DSS spokesman Peter Afunnaya told CNN the case was before the court and declined to make further comment. Afunnaya said he would "get back" with more information about the journalist's whereabouts.
Sowore ran against Buhari in Nigeria's February elections and has joined campaigns decrying corruption and poor governance in previous governments in the West African nation.
"Simple elections can no longer save Nigeria or improve Nigeria's democracy," the former presidential hopeful told Arise News in July.
"Nigerians must take their destiny in their hands, and we deserve or must have a revolution in this country, particularly if we don't want war."
Sowore was detained two days before the demonstration August 5. Police fired tear gas to disperse supporters who gathered at various venues in three cities to protest.
His arrest has sparked protests and criticism of Buhari's government, which is accused of intimidating critics. The journalist's wife, Ope Sowore, who is based in the United States, led protesters Tuesday to United Nations Plaza in New York, where Buhari is attending the 74th UN General Assembly, to mount pressure for her husband's freedom.
"It is very sad to see the cause of action this has taken in the past one and a half months, especially for someone that was calling for a change for the better in Nigeria," she said.
Sowore told CNN she has been allowed only two phone conversations with her husband since his arrest last month. The journalist was supposed to be in Nigeria for two weeks in July and their two children miss their father, she said.
"It's been almost two months since he walked out the door. Children are resilient in times like this, but they miss their father and are really hoping for his safe return," Sowore said.
By Bukola Adebayo
CNN
Related stories: Video - Sahara Reporters founder Omoyele Sowore says President Goodluck Jonathan is the worst Nigerian President
Revolution Now organizer to be detained for 45 days
Wednesday, September 25, 2019
Tuesday, September 24, 2019
Video - Nigeria bans foreign milk to support local farmers
In Nigeria, the government has banned the sale of foreign milk to support struggling local farmers. But the move could backfire, with concerns it will lead to dairy shortages and price increases.
Video - New comedy show on American TV 'Bob Hearts Abishola' highlights Nigerian culture
Immigrants and Coloradans with Nigerian heritage are excited for the new CBS comedy ‘Bob Hearts Abishola.’ The show premiers Monday night and will highlight Nigerian culture and community to a national American audience.
“This is going to break away stereotypes, any point of views people may have had about the African family,” Jessica Compaore said. “This is going to show you what the African family is really like.”
A Colorado native, Compaore’s grandfather came to the U.S. from Nigeria. She learned later in life about her heritage to the African nation but has helped to showcase it in the Denver Metro Area since then. The new comedy has caught the attention of this community in Colorado. It tells the story of a businessman in Detroit falling for a nurse he encounters at a hospital, who is an immigrant from Nigeria.
“It’s about promoting where I am from, who I am, I am embrace where I am from,” Samuel Ogah said. “It’s a big deal, it’s showing our culture and greatness.”
Ogah is the CEO of Best Music Entertainment promoting events in Colorado not only for his Nigerian community but other African groups living in the state. He said the thousands of Nigerians who have come to the state are eager to be a part of the economy and build a family here.
“They’re all working toward how we can create a better Colorado,” he said. “We’re proud of where we come from and you can get to know more about us.”
Billy Gardell plays “Bob” and Folake Olowofoyeku stars as “Abishola” on the show. Both actors spoke to CBS4 ahead of the premiere and the significance of having a series on primetime television not only about immigrants but a family from Africa.
“It feels like a full circle moment and I’m glad I had the opportunity,” Olowofoyeku said.
Ogah said it will be a meaningful example of representation not just for those connected to one country but instead a way to unite those from all over one continent.
“That story really relates to all immigrants, not just Nigerians,” he said. “I think it’s going to give more Africans to be able to relate.”
He hopes his events throughout the year, including one for the celebration of Nigeria’s independence, can have a similar impact by inviting others to learn about their community. He works to create opportunities online and in person for various African immigrants to come together and connect. Not only social gatherings and a chance to celebrate their heritage but also to introduce their businesses and network.
“You can only know about me and my culture when you relate and talk to me,” he said.
Colorado has become home to many in the Nigerian community because of the comfortable weather and the opportunity for growth. Families keep moving here because they find a place for them to live a better life. Since 2013, they have come together for Nigerian Day, which will take place this year in Lowry Park on Saturday, Oct. 5 in Aurora.
“They have this energy, they have this richness, they have this this brightness to see what it means to be successful within themselves,” Compaore said. “They are folks just like you and me.”
By Shawn Chitnis
CBS
Monday, September 23, 2019
Video - Too late to replant damaged crops caused by flood in Nigeria
Food supplies are threatened in northwest Nigeria where floods have destroyed crops. Dozens of people have been killed recently and thousands of homes washed away. Al Jazeera's Ahmed Idris reports from Auyo in Jigawa state, where the local government is struggling to help.
Nigeria runs on generators and nine hours of power a day
Kabir Sabo’s sewing machine hums busily as he hems a “babariga,” a popular dress in northern Nigeria, in his small corner shop on the outskirts of Abuja. It can hardly be heard over the sound of Nigeria’s worst problem.
Sabo’s noisy electricity generator costs him an average of 3,000 naira ($8.30) a day in fuel, he says. That’s the bulk of the roughly 4,000 naira he makes daily.
“When you are a small business owner in a country where there is no power, it really is depressing,” he said. “I have on multiple occasions shut down to take up a monthly paying job. It’s difficult to run the business when most of your earnings go on paying bills, buying fuel and all sorts of things.”
In Africa’s most populous country, almost everyone depends on generators, including President Muhammadu Buhari. His office will spend 46 million naira fueling generators this year. In the country’s 2019 budget, there are 1,358 generator-related expenses.
The shortage of power is one of the biggest issues Buhari faces as he tries to reform a $400 billion economy that is too dependent on oil exports, has too many inefficient state-owned enterprises and is still struggling to recover from a slump in 2016.
“Lack of access to electricity and unreliable electricity supply are key constraints to doing business in Nigeria,” the International Monetary Fund said in its latest economic report on the country. It estimated the annual economic loss at about $29 billion. In a 2014 World Bank survey, 27% of Nigerian firms identified electricity as the main obstacle to doing business.
Households with access to on-grid electricity had an average power supply of only 9.2 hours a day in the first half of 2019, according to a survey by the country’s leading polling agency, NOI Polls. Electricity production per capita is less than 15% of the average of emerging-market economies and less than 25% of the sub-Saharan Africa average, according to the IMF.
To keep out the darkness, households own and operate an estimated 22 million small gasoline generators, whose combined generating capacity is eight times higher than on-grid supply, according to a June 2019 presentation by Dalberg, a global policy and advisory firm. Businesses and individuals spend about $12 billion a year, twice the country’s annual infrastructure budget, fueling these generators.
Nigeria, which also has the continent’s largest gas reserves and ranks ninth globally, consumed an average 3,713 megawatts of electricity from the grid in 2018, data published by the country’s central bank shows. That’s about a 10th of what Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. made available in South Africa, a country with less than a third of the population and which itself is subject to rolling blackouts.
Nigeria is only able to send about a quarter of its total power capacity to homes and businesses due to a poor and dilapidated power infrastructure, much of it installed in the 1980s. The country’s transmission lines can “theoretically” carry about 7,500 megawatts, according to the country’s electricity regulatory authority.
The irony is that Nigeria took the right steps in 2013 by disbanding its state-owned power company and breaking it into three different businesses; generation, transmission and distribution. The state sold the generation and distribution arms to 23 different owners and held on to the transmission lines.
This is similar to the solution now being proposed for Eskom. But Nigeria also shows how not to reform the power industry.
The government retained the right to determine tariffs through a regulatory agency, which raised power prices in 2015 -- and quickly reversed it as elections approached. Since then electricity tariffs have remained largely unchanged even as inflation has remained above the central bank’s upper target of 9% since 2015 and the naira is 50% weaker against the dollar.
Tariffs should go up by a minimum of 50%, according to the IMF, but maintaining prices at current levels has become a fiscal burden. Since 2015, the government has provided three bailouts via the central bank for the electricity sector, amounting to 1.5 trillion naira to plug revenue shortfalls.
It doesn’t help that power customers are often unwilling to pay for the electricity they consume. Distribution companies collected payments for only 64.1% of electricity supplied in the first three months of 2019, according to a report by Nigeria’s power regulatory agency. The distribution firms in turn paid for only 28% of power they received from generation companies and the transmission network.
Buhari’s 2017 recovery plan for the industry hasn’t made much progress, and now the government is proposing a staggered tariff increase from January. The proposal will rates by an average 27% for some users.
Increasing tariffs could lead to new investments, said Cheta Nwanze, an analyst at Lagos-based business advisory service SBM Intelligence.
“The problem is, transmission will still be in the hands of the government, which is inefficient and unable to make the required investment,” Nwanze said.
In Sabo’s small shop, he frequently deals with impatient customers whose clothing orders have been delayed because of long blackouts.
“I am willing to pay more if it means I will not have to rely on the generator to run my business,” he said. “Should I have that choice, I’d pay maybe two naira more.”
By Anthony Osae-Brown, Ruth Olurounbi, and Gordon Bell
Bloomberg
Related story: Stable electricity supply foreseeable in Nigeria's future
Sabo’s noisy electricity generator costs him an average of 3,000 naira ($8.30) a day in fuel, he says. That’s the bulk of the roughly 4,000 naira he makes daily.
“When you are a small business owner in a country where there is no power, it really is depressing,” he said. “I have on multiple occasions shut down to take up a monthly paying job. It’s difficult to run the business when most of your earnings go on paying bills, buying fuel and all sorts of things.”
In Africa’s most populous country, almost everyone depends on generators, including President Muhammadu Buhari. His office will spend 46 million naira fueling generators this year. In the country’s 2019 budget, there are 1,358 generator-related expenses.
The shortage of power is one of the biggest issues Buhari faces as he tries to reform a $400 billion economy that is too dependent on oil exports, has too many inefficient state-owned enterprises and is still struggling to recover from a slump in 2016.
“Lack of access to electricity and unreliable electricity supply are key constraints to doing business in Nigeria,” the International Monetary Fund said in its latest economic report on the country. It estimated the annual economic loss at about $29 billion. In a 2014 World Bank survey, 27% of Nigerian firms identified electricity as the main obstacle to doing business.
Households with access to on-grid electricity had an average power supply of only 9.2 hours a day in the first half of 2019, according to a survey by the country’s leading polling agency, NOI Polls. Electricity production per capita is less than 15% of the average of emerging-market economies and less than 25% of the sub-Saharan Africa average, according to the IMF.
To keep out the darkness, households own and operate an estimated 22 million small gasoline generators, whose combined generating capacity is eight times higher than on-grid supply, according to a June 2019 presentation by Dalberg, a global policy and advisory firm. Businesses and individuals spend about $12 billion a year, twice the country’s annual infrastructure budget, fueling these generators.
Nigeria, which also has the continent’s largest gas reserves and ranks ninth globally, consumed an average 3,713 megawatts of electricity from the grid in 2018, data published by the country’s central bank shows. That’s about a 10th of what Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. made available in South Africa, a country with less than a third of the population and which itself is subject to rolling blackouts.
Nigeria is only able to send about a quarter of its total power capacity to homes and businesses due to a poor and dilapidated power infrastructure, much of it installed in the 1980s. The country’s transmission lines can “theoretically” carry about 7,500 megawatts, according to the country’s electricity regulatory authority.
The irony is that Nigeria took the right steps in 2013 by disbanding its state-owned power company and breaking it into three different businesses; generation, transmission and distribution. The state sold the generation and distribution arms to 23 different owners and held on to the transmission lines.
This is similar to the solution now being proposed for Eskom. But Nigeria also shows how not to reform the power industry.
The government retained the right to determine tariffs through a regulatory agency, which raised power prices in 2015 -- and quickly reversed it as elections approached. Since then electricity tariffs have remained largely unchanged even as inflation has remained above the central bank’s upper target of 9% since 2015 and the naira is 50% weaker against the dollar.
Tariffs should go up by a minimum of 50%, according to the IMF, but maintaining prices at current levels has become a fiscal burden. Since 2015, the government has provided three bailouts via the central bank for the electricity sector, amounting to 1.5 trillion naira to plug revenue shortfalls.
It doesn’t help that power customers are often unwilling to pay for the electricity they consume. Distribution companies collected payments for only 64.1% of electricity supplied in the first three months of 2019, according to a report by Nigeria’s power regulatory agency. The distribution firms in turn paid for only 28% of power they received from generation companies and the transmission network.
Buhari’s 2017 recovery plan for the industry hasn’t made much progress, and now the government is proposing a staggered tariff increase from January. The proposal will rates by an average 27% for some users.
Increasing tariffs could lead to new investments, said Cheta Nwanze, an analyst at Lagos-based business advisory service SBM Intelligence.
“The problem is, transmission will still be in the hands of the government, which is inefficient and unable to make the required investment,” Nwanze said.
In Sabo’s small shop, he frequently deals with impatient customers whose clothing orders have been delayed because of long blackouts.
“I am willing to pay more if it means I will not have to rely on the generator to run my business,” he said. “Should I have that choice, I’d pay maybe two naira more.”
By Anthony Osae-Brown, Ruth Olurounbi, and Gordon Bell
Bloomberg
Related story: Stable electricity supply foreseeable in Nigeria's future
Friday, September 20, 2019
Video - Nigerian girl using art of the spoken word to preach peace
A Nigerian girl is using the art of spoken word to preach peace and prosperity. She says she's on a mission to encourage her fellow citizens to join hands in building a better country despite the numerous challenges facing Africa's most populous nation.
Video - Dambe: martial art form from Nigeria
Originally practiced by Hausa butchers in Nigeria, this form of martial arts known as Dambe is growing in popularity across the West African country. Anthony Okeleke and Chidi Anyina have now created Dambe Warriors, to organize fights, produce them and share them online. With over 100,000 subscribers and interest across the world, their work of taking the sport global seems to be well on its way.
Video - Nigerian returns bitcoins worth $80,000
A Nigerian man who found $80,000 worth of bitcoin had been mistakenly transferred to him, returned them to the owner. Keith Mali Chung woke up to find 7.8 bitcoins in his account.
That is the equivalent of $80,000 or €72,302. He immediately began trying to track down the owner of the bitcoins. Bitcoin is the original digital currency that is exchanged between users online. "I trade in bitcoin, but never such a high amount," Mali Chung explains on the phone from the Nigerian capital, Abuja and continues, "I knew it had to be a mistake so I posted an announcement via some WhatsApp groups to track down the owner."
Three days passed and no-one responded, so Mali Chung took to Twitter. That prompted a response from someone who had the correct encryption code for the transaction.
The owner of the bitcoins mistakenly transferred to Mali Chung is a Nigerian politician who has asked to remain anonymous. Nigeria is plagued by political cronyism, and consistently ranks among the lowest 20 percent on Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index. In June, the Paris-based Financial Action Task Force announced that cryptocurrency firms will be subjected to rules to prevent the abuse of digital coins such as bitcoin for money laundering.
The move by FATF, which groups countries from the United States to China and bodies such as the European Commission, reflects growing concern among international law enforcement agencies that cryptocurrencies are being used to launder the proceeds of crime.
Potential of bitcoin
Crypto currencies are becoming increasingly popular in Nigeria where bank charges are high. On Tuesday 17 September, the Central Bank of Nigeria introduced a 2 percent charge on cash deposits over 500,000 Naira (€1250) in several states, and 3 percent on withdrawals of the same amount.
Although these charges are aimed making Nigeria a cashless society, they are also pushing people to find other ways to transfer money digitally. Mali Chung travels around Nigeria giving free workshops about the potential of bitcoin and other crypto currencies.
"People are especially interested in learning about international transfers to avoid bank fees," Mali Chung has observed. "People in the Diaspora use it to send money home, and people here also transfer bitcoin to relatives abroad."
The Central Bank of Nigeria has yet to regulate crypto currency transactions. Mali Chung's benevolent act has sparked a debate about the potentially positive and the negative use of crypto currencies in a country with an ominous reputation for online fraud and political corruption.
By Rosie Collyer
RFI
Nigeria shuts down Action Against Hunger aid group for feeding Boko Haram
Nigeria's army has stopped the work of international NGO Action Against Hunger accusing it of supplying a militant Islamist group with food and drugs.
The army said it had warned the NGO against "aiding and abetting" Boko Haram in north-east Nigeria.
Action Against Hunger, which denies the accusations, says its "life-saving assistance" to vulnerable people has now been put "into jeopardy".
Boko Haram's 10-year campaign of terror has left more than 30,000 people dead.
More than two million people have also been displaced.
A network of NGOs is assisting the government in helping those who have been forced from their homes.
In 2018, the military accused the UN's children's agency, Unicef, of spying for the militants. It banned the organisation, which denied the allegations, but hours later lifted the ban.
In a statement, Action Against Hunger said it "delivers neutral, impartial and independent humanitarian aid to millions of people in Borno state by providing basic services to the most vulnerable people, especially women and children".
It said it had been told by soldiers without any notice to close its office in the capital of Borno state, Maiduguri.
In July, the Paris-based charity said six of its aid workers had been kidnapped in Nigeria.
The six abductees appeared on a video, with one of them calling on the Nigerian government and international community to intervene. Their whereabouts are still unknown.
No group has said it was behind the kidnapping.
In 2015, Boko Haram seized control of much of Borno state, and spread its activities to neighbouring countries.
A counter-insurgency by the army led to much of that territory being recaptured. But the militants have come to rely more on suicide bombings and kidnappings in recent years.
One of its most notorious attacks was on a school in Chibok, north-east Nigeria, when 276 schoolgirls were kidnapped. Many of them have been freed, but the whereabouts of more than 100 are still unknown.
Since 2013, Boko Haram are thought to have kidnapped more than 1,000 people.
BBC
The army said it had warned the NGO against "aiding and abetting" Boko Haram in north-east Nigeria.
Action Against Hunger, which denies the accusations, says its "life-saving assistance" to vulnerable people has now been put "into jeopardy".
Boko Haram's 10-year campaign of terror has left more than 30,000 people dead.
More than two million people have also been displaced.
A network of NGOs is assisting the government in helping those who have been forced from their homes.
In 2018, the military accused the UN's children's agency, Unicef, of spying for the militants. It banned the organisation, which denied the allegations, but hours later lifted the ban.
In a statement, Action Against Hunger said it "delivers neutral, impartial and independent humanitarian aid to millions of people in Borno state by providing basic services to the most vulnerable people, especially women and children".
It said it had been told by soldiers without any notice to close its office in the capital of Borno state, Maiduguri.
In July, the Paris-based charity said six of its aid workers had been kidnapped in Nigeria.
The six abductees appeared on a video, with one of them calling on the Nigerian government and international community to intervene. Their whereabouts are still unknown.
No group has said it was behind the kidnapping.
In 2015, Boko Haram seized control of much of Borno state, and spread its activities to neighbouring countries.
A counter-insurgency by the army led to much of that territory being recaptured. But the militants have come to rely more on suicide bombings and kidnappings in recent years.
One of its most notorious attacks was on a school in Chibok, north-east Nigeria, when 276 schoolgirls were kidnapped. Many of them have been freed, but the whereabouts of more than 100 are still unknown.
Since 2013, Boko Haram are thought to have kidnapped more than 1,000 people.
BBC
Nigeria orders firm that won $9bn to forfeit assets
A company that was awarded more than nine billion dollars in an arbitration case against Nigeria has been ordered by a court in the capital city of Abuja to forfeit its local assets to the government.
The order comes after two men linked to the company, Process & Industrial Developments (P&ID), pleaded guilty to charges of fraud and tax evasion on its behalf, the court said on Thursday.
The impact on the British Virgin Islands-based firm and its international arbitration award, now worth some 20 percent of Nigeria's foreign reserves, was not immediately clear.
Nigeria's Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) brought 11 individual charges against P&ID and its local subsidiary. The two men, Muhammad Kuchazi and Adamu Usman, plead guilty to all the charges on behalf of the company.
The men, both Nigerians, were not personally charged and freely left the court.
In a statement, P&ID said the EFCC investigation had not afforded basic human rights to those involved and called on the government to "accept its responsibilities under the law."
"None of the individuals involved are current employees or representatives of P&ID," the spokesman said. "P&ID itself has received no communication from any Nigerian authority about the investigation or today's hearing. There has been no evidence produced, no defence allowed, no charges laid, no due process followed," it said.
The EFCC described Kuchazi as commercial director and Usman as director of the company's local subsidiary.
The men could not immediately be reached for comment.
P&ID was set up to execute a 2010 deal with the Nigerian government to build and operate a gas-processing plant in the southeastern port city of Calabar. When the deal collapsed, P&ID took the government to arbitration, eventually winning a $6.6bn award that has been accruing interest since 2013.
Last month, a judge in London said he would grant P&ID the right to convert the award to a judgment, which would allow it to seek to seize assets from the Nigerian government to collect the award.
The government has said the deal was designed to fail and called the award "an assault on every Nigerian and unfair."
The ruling in Abuja would not necessarily affect P&ID's efforts to seize assets. A Lagos court ordered in 2016 that the entire arbitration be set aside, but the arbitration tribunal rejected the court's jurisdiction to rule on the matter - a decision affirmed by last month's London ruling.
With interest payments, the arbitration award now tops nine billion dollars.
Al Jazeera
The order comes after two men linked to the company, Process & Industrial Developments (P&ID), pleaded guilty to charges of fraud and tax evasion on its behalf, the court said on Thursday.
The impact on the British Virgin Islands-based firm and its international arbitration award, now worth some 20 percent of Nigeria's foreign reserves, was not immediately clear.
Nigeria's Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) brought 11 individual charges against P&ID and its local subsidiary. The two men, Muhammad Kuchazi and Adamu Usman, plead guilty to all the charges on behalf of the company.
The men, both Nigerians, were not personally charged and freely left the court.
In a statement, P&ID said the EFCC investigation had not afforded basic human rights to those involved and called on the government to "accept its responsibilities under the law."
"None of the individuals involved are current employees or representatives of P&ID," the spokesman said. "P&ID itself has received no communication from any Nigerian authority about the investigation or today's hearing. There has been no evidence produced, no defence allowed, no charges laid, no due process followed," it said.
The EFCC described Kuchazi as commercial director and Usman as director of the company's local subsidiary.
The men could not immediately be reached for comment.
P&ID was set up to execute a 2010 deal with the Nigerian government to build and operate a gas-processing plant in the southeastern port city of Calabar. When the deal collapsed, P&ID took the government to arbitration, eventually winning a $6.6bn award that has been accruing interest since 2013.
Last month, a judge in London said he would grant P&ID the right to convert the award to a judgment, which would allow it to seek to seize assets from the Nigerian government to collect the award.
The government has said the deal was designed to fail and called the award "an assault on every Nigerian and unfair."
The ruling in Abuja would not necessarily affect P&ID's efforts to seize assets. A Lagos court ordered in 2016 that the entire arbitration be set aside, but the arbitration tribunal rejected the court's jurisdiction to rule on the matter - a decision affirmed by last month's London ruling.
With interest payments, the arbitration award now tops nine billion dollars.
Al Jazeera
Thursday, September 19, 2019
Video - The effect of Saudi oil refinery crisis on Nigeria
As unfortunate as the attacks on Saudi Arabia's oil facilities might be, for some oil producing countries, it's an opportunity to ramp up production and take advantage of the current global spike in price of oil. It's especially so for oil producers in Africa, whose national budgets have been threatened by low oil prices.
Video - Nigeria-South Africa ties date way back to the 60's
Nigeria and South Africa's relations date way back to the 1960's during the Apartheid era. Nigeria reportedly contributed Millions of Dollars as relief funds for victims and to help fight against Apartheid in South Africa until its liberation in 1994. Perhaps it is this historical reason that makes the Nigerian anger especially strong.
Video of Nigerian solidiers roasting suspect goes viral
Some Nigerians have expressed anger at a clip showing three soldiers torturing a man suspected to have committed an offence. While the date of the video could not be ascertained as of the time of this report, the military men could be heard speaking a mix of Hausa and pidgin English.
What the suspect did was not stated in the 30-second clip. The video, posted on Twitter, shows the soldiers hitting the suspect, as one of them strike him with the butt of his gun. The men tie the suspect up and hang him on an iron bar, as he dangles under a burning fire.
He has heavy logs of wood on his head, back and leg to steady him on the flame. “You must feel it now now now,” one of the soldiers said. “Leave am like this…” “Don’t hit him o…” another said, as his colleague hit him with the butt of the gun. “Make I kill am?”
The poster of the video said she could not tell the suspect’s offence. However, Nigerians, who watched the video, called the attention of the Nigerian military to it, demanding immediate investigation. One Daniel, @ayoadaniel, said, “Has the Nigerian military seen this video and please, there should be no denial that these aren’t our soldiers.
Even in war times, rules of engagement aren’t just thrown out of the window like that; this is wrong on so many levels.” Another Twitter user, Dat Fulani Boi, said the soldiers were on their own. “For your information, the Nigerian army does not in any way teach this kind of inhuman punishment to the soldiers. They just do it on their own free will.
And I urge the Nigerian army to look into this. He may be a criminal, but he can be punished secretly and privately,” he wrote.
Some of the people who commented said the suspect might be a Boko Haram terrorist, adding that the torture was justified going by the pains they had caused many families.
A Twitter user, @BonnylifeUche, however, described the act as inhumane, saying there could be no justification for it.
“We’re all against terrorists and terrorism, but this inhumane torture of a captured terrorist by Nigerian military is unacceptable and stand condemned,” he wrote.
The acting Director, Army Public Relations, Sagir Musa, said he was not aware of the video.
Punch
Nigeria becomes staging ground for illegal pangolin trade
In a rubble-strewn storage lot in the sprawling Nigerian port city of Lagos, customs agents crack open a shipping container crammed with scales from pangolins, a shy mammal prized in Asia for its use in medicines.
The scales being stored with elephant tusks in the fetid container are part of a growing haul of pangolin cargos seized in Nigeria, a country that is now the main hub for gangs sending African pangolins to Asia, according to law enforcement officials, non-governmental organisations and wildlife experts.
They say porous borders, lax law enforcement, corruption and one of the continent’s biggest ports have helped criminal networks in Nigeria corner most of the African trade in pangolins, considered to be the world’s most trafficked mammal.
Ranging in size from a small rabbit to a large dog depending on the species, pangolins are the only mammals with scales. The nocturnal tree-climbers that feed on ants and termites are more closely related to bears than the anteaters they resemble.
This year alone, Hong Kong and Singapore have intercepted three huge shipments of pangolin scales weighing a combined 33.9 tonnes and worth more than $100 million, based on estimates of their value in Singapore.
Each shipment was bigger than any that had come from Africa before this year - and they all came from Nigeria.
According to wildlife trade watchdog TRAFFIC, less than a quarter of major pangolin seizures from Africa came via Nigeria in 2016. By 2018, that had jumped to almost two-thirds and three-quarters of the total weight seized was linked to Nigeria.
“Traffickers like Nigeria more than anywhere else ... they prefer to go there because it makes it easier for them to export,” said Eric Kaba Tah, deputy director of wildlife law enforcement group The Last Great Ape Organization in Cameroon.
“The situation for pangolins is becoming more and more serious and even more dangerous,” said Tah, who has helped crack down on the trade in Cameroon, one of the other main pangolin trafficking routes to Asia.
Other African countries known for pangolin trafficking such as Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda all say they have clamped down on the illicit trade as well - pushing pangolin traffickers towards Nigeria instead.
‘TOO MANY FRONTS’
Pangolin meat is considered a delicacy in some Asian markets and the pangolin’s hard keratin scales - the stuff of human fingernails and rhino horns - are dried, ground into powder, and used in medicines in China to treat ailments such as poor lactation, sores and rheumatism.
Demand for African pangolins in countries such as China and Vietnam has been growing as the number of Asian pangolins has dwindled over the years, to the point where two of the four Asian species are now on the critically endangered list.
The other two are endangered and all four African species of pangolin were classed as vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature when all commercial trade in pangolins, also known as scaly anteaters, was banned in 2016.
“At the rate at which pangolins are being traded and poached, it could take two decades for the mammal to be extinct,” said Ray Jansen, chairman of the African Pangolin Working Group in Pretoria.
Nigerian customs officials disagree with the idea their country has become a pangolin trading hub. Assistant Comptroller Mutalib Sule argues that pangolin trafficking through the West African country is on the decline.
“There is tight effort at the borders to ensure that such things do not come in again,” he said, adding that no country had been able to stamp out smuggling altogether.
According to customs officials in Nigeria, agents seized 927 kg of pangolin goods in 2016, 402 kg in 2017, and then seizures rocketed to 12.3 tonnes in 2018.
“Sometimes Nigeria is just a point of convergence,” said Sule.
Oliver Stolpe, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) representative for Nigeria, said the problem was that pangolin trafficking was just one in a long list of criminal activities facing the authorities in the West African country.
“Nigeria is fighting crime on so many fronts,” Stolpe said. “It’s simply too many fronts.”
TIP OF THE ICEBERG
Experts say it’s hard to draw definitive conclusions from data about seizures. A surge in interceptions could just mean law enforcement agencies were doing their job better, rather than there being a major increase in trafficking.
But TRAFFIC’s Sone Nnoke said the sheer number of seizures of pangolin products that have come via Nigeria points to the country now being the main hub for the illegal trade.
“Because of porous borders it’s very easy to take those products to Nigeria,” said Nnoke.
Jansen at the African Pangolin Working Group said seizures very likely only represent about 10% of the actual trade in pangolin scales so the surge in intercepted cargos from Africa was a worrying trend.
According to TRAFFIC, which tracks seizures of more than half a tonne, 67.6 tonnes of pangolin scales from Africa have been seized throughout the world this year, already almost double the amount in 2018.
The Tikki Hywood Foundation, which rescues pangolins in Zimbabwe and Cameroon, estimates 1,666 of smaller white-bellied pangolins need to be killed for one tonne of scales. When it comes to the giant pangolin, that drops to 277 animals.
So the 67.6 tonnes of scales from Africa seized this year and tracked by TRAFFIC would have needed anywhere from 18,725 to 112,620 pangolins to be killed, depending on the species.
‘HUGE AMOUNTS’
The economic motivation for smugglers is strong. In Nigeria, a whole pangolin can sell for as little as $7. But once in China or Vietnam, the scales from one animal alone can fetch $250, according to UNODC.
Yet Nigeria is not just a staging ground where pangolin parts from around Africa are amassed before being shipped to Asia. The country has its own population of the furtive creatures, living mainly in the thick forests of the southwest.
Here, generations of families have hunted, traded and made medicine from “akika”, the Yoruba name for pangolins.
Many of the traders, particularly those dealing in animals hunted in the surrounding forests, said foreigners they believed to be Chinese were buying pangolins or their parts in ever greater quantities.
“They pay huge amounts of money,” said Agbetuya Babatope Samuel, a traditional healer and trader in the town of Akure in Ondo state. “When I get their money I laugh to the bank,” he said. “I wish it would continue for a long time.”
The high demand is taking its toll.
When the sun has set, Sule Ayinla stalks the dark, thick forests of Ondo Akoko in southwest Nigeria for pangolins, a torch fixed to his head. Hearing a rustle, he fires his long-barrelled gun at a tree, to no avail.
“We used to hunt pangolin here,” Ayinla said, lowering his weapon. Taught to hunt by his father, he said the trade was getting tougher and it was becoming rare to find pangolins hiding in the trees where they typically find cover.
“There used to be lots of animals in this forest but they are scarce now.”
By Paul Carsten
Reuters
The scales being stored with elephant tusks in the fetid container are part of a growing haul of pangolin cargos seized in Nigeria, a country that is now the main hub for gangs sending African pangolins to Asia, according to law enforcement officials, non-governmental organisations and wildlife experts.
They say porous borders, lax law enforcement, corruption and one of the continent’s biggest ports have helped criminal networks in Nigeria corner most of the African trade in pangolins, considered to be the world’s most trafficked mammal.
Ranging in size from a small rabbit to a large dog depending on the species, pangolins are the only mammals with scales. The nocturnal tree-climbers that feed on ants and termites are more closely related to bears than the anteaters they resemble.
This year alone, Hong Kong and Singapore have intercepted three huge shipments of pangolin scales weighing a combined 33.9 tonnes and worth more than $100 million, based on estimates of their value in Singapore.
Each shipment was bigger than any that had come from Africa before this year - and they all came from Nigeria.
According to wildlife trade watchdog TRAFFIC, less than a quarter of major pangolin seizures from Africa came via Nigeria in 2016. By 2018, that had jumped to almost two-thirds and three-quarters of the total weight seized was linked to Nigeria.
“Traffickers like Nigeria more than anywhere else ... they prefer to go there because it makes it easier for them to export,” said Eric Kaba Tah, deputy director of wildlife law enforcement group The Last Great Ape Organization in Cameroon.
“The situation for pangolins is becoming more and more serious and even more dangerous,” said Tah, who has helped crack down on the trade in Cameroon, one of the other main pangolin trafficking routes to Asia.
Other African countries known for pangolin trafficking such as Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda all say they have clamped down on the illicit trade as well - pushing pangolin traffickers towards Nigeria instead.
‘TOO MANY FRONTS’
Pangolin meat is considered a delicacy in some Asian markets and the pangolin’s hard keratin scales - the stuff of human fingernails and rhino horns - are dried, ground into powder, and used in medicines in China to treat ailments such as poor lactation, sores and rheumatism.
Demand for African pangolins in countries such as China and Vietnam has been growing as the number of Asian pangolins has dwindled over the years, to the point where two of the four Asian species are now on the critically endangered list.
The other two are endangered and all four African species of pangolin were classed as vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature when all commercial trade in pangolins, also known as scaly anteaters, was banned in 2016.
“At the rate at which pangolins are being traded and poached, it could take two decades for the mammal to be extinct,” said Ray Jansen, chairman of the African Pangolin Working Group in Pretoria.
Nigerian customs officials disagree with the idea their country has become a pangolin trading hub. Assistant Comptroller Mutalib Sule argues that pangolin trafficking through the West African country is on the decline.
“There is tight effort at the borders to ensure that such things do not come in again,” he said, adding that no country had been able to stamp out smuggling altogether.
According to customs officials in Nigeria, agents seized 927 kg of pangolin goods in 2016, 402 kg in 2017, and then seizures rocketed to 12.3 tonnes in 2018.
“Sometimes Nigeria is just a point of convergence,” said Sule.
Oliver Stolpe, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) representative for Nigeria, said the problem was that pangolin trafficking was just one in a long list of criminal activities facing the authorities in the West African country.
“Nigeria is fighting crime on so many fronts,” Stolpe said. “It’s simply too many fronts.”
TIP OF THE ICEBERG
Experts say it’s hard to draw definitive conclusions from data about seizures. A surge in interceptions could just mean law enforcement agencies were doing their job better, rather than there being a major increase in trafficking.
But TRAFFIC’s Sone Nnoke said the sheer number of seizures of pangolin products that have come via Nigeria points to the country now being the main hub for the illegal trade.
“Because of porous borders it’s very easy to take those products to Nigeria,” said Nnoke.
Jansen at the African Pangolin Working Group said seizures very likely only represent about 10% of the actual trade in pangolin scales so the surge in intercepted cargos from Africa was a worrying trend.
According to TRAFFIC, which tracks seizures of more than half a tonne, 67.6 tonnes of pangolin scales from Africa have been seized throughout the world this year, already almost double the amount in 2018.
The Tikki Hywood Foundation, which rescues pangolins in Zimbabwe and Cameroon, estimates 1,666 of smaller white-bellied pangolins need to be killed for one tonne of scales. When it comes to the giant pangolin, that drops to 277 animals.
So the 67.6 tonnes of scales from Africa seized this year and tracked by TRAFFIC would have needed anywhere from 18,725 to 112,620 pangolins to be killed, depending on the species.
‘HUGE AMOUNTS’
The economic motivation for smugglers is strong. In Nigeria, a whole pangolin can sell for as little as $7. But once in China or Vietnam, the scales from one animal alone can fetch $250, according to UNODC.
Yet Nigeria is not just a staging ground where pangolin parts from around Africa are amassed before being shipped to Asia. The country has its own population of the furtive creatures, living mainly in the thick forests of the southwest.
Here, generations of families have hunted, traded and made medicine from “akika”, the Yoruba name for pangolins.
Many of the traders, particularly those dealing in animals hunted in the surrounding forests, said foreigners they believed to be Chinese were buying pangolins or their parts in ever greater quantities.
“They pay huge amounts of money,” said Agbetuya Babatope Samuel, a traditional healer and trader in the town of Akure in Ondo state. “When I get their money I laugh to the bank,” he said. “I wish it would continue for a long time.”
The high demand is taking its toll.
When the sun has set, Sule Ayinla stalks the dark, thick forests of Ondo Akoko in southwest Nigeria for pangolins, a torch fixed to his head. Hearing a rustle, he fires his long-barrelled gun at a tree, to no avail.
“We used to hunt pangolin here,” Ayinla said, lowering his weapon. Taught to hunt by his father, he said the trade was getting tougher and it was becoming rare to find pangolins hiding in the trees where they typically find cover.
“There used to be lots of animals in this forest but they are scarce now.”
By Paul Carsten
Reuters
Three suspects arrested in serial killings of women in Nigeria
Three suspects, linked to a spate of killings targeting women in Nigeria's oil-rich Rivers State have been arrested, police said on Wednesday.
A woman was rescued by police who arrested a man in the city on Wednesday after he attempted to strangle her while she slept in a hotel room they shared, police spokesman Nnamdi Omoni told CNN.
"The young woman escaped because she was able to raise the alarm at about 2am. She was sleeping when she suddenly woke up and saw the man who brought her to the hotel charging at her,"Omoni said.
"She was almost dying when the man tried to strangle her," he added.
Hallmarks of cultism
Women in the city have been found murdered in different hotel rooms since August, often strangled with a piece of white clothing tied either around their neck or waist, police commissioner Mustapha Dandaura said at a briefing Tuesday.
The killings in Port Harcourt bore all the hallmarks of "cultism," police said.
"The same modus operandi is used by the killers. They drug the ladies before strangling them to death. They use a white cloth to tie either on their neck or their waist. There is an element of cultism," Dandaura, said. He added that all the women's body parts were found intact.
Hotels shutdown
All the women killed were involved in prostitution in the city, according to the police.
The police commissioner said a man has confessed to one of the murders and is cooperating with detectives investigating the murders.
Another man was arrested Monday night after a woman alerted officers that the suspect tried to lure her to a hotel room against her will, police said.
"He has also confessed and gave useful clues in our investigation," Dandaura said.
CNN
A woman was rescued by police who arrested a man in the city on Wednesday after he attempted to strangle her while she slept in a hotel room they shared, police spokesman Nnamdi Omoni told CNN.
"The young woman escaped because she was able to raise the alarm at about 2am. She was sleeping when she suddenly woke up and saw the man who brought her to the hotel charging at her,"Omoni said.
"She was almost dying when the man tried to strangle her," he added.
Hallmarks of cultism
Women in the city have been found murdered in different hotel rooms since August, often strangled with a piece of white clothing tied either around their neck or waist, police commissioner Mustapha Dandaura said at a briefing Tuesday.
The killings in Port Harcourt bore all the hallmarks of "cultism," police said.
"The same modus operandi is used by the killers. They drug the ladies before strangling them to death. They use a white cloth to tie either on their neck or their waist. There is an element of cultism," Dandaura, said. He added that all the women's body parts were found intact.
Hotels shutdown
All the women killed were involved in prostitution in the city, according to the police.
The police commissioner said a man has confessed to one of the murders and is cooperating with detectives investigating the murders.
Another man was arrested Monday night after a woman alerted officers that the suspect tried to lure her to a hotel room against her will, police said.
"He has also confessed and gave useful clues in our investigation," Dandaura said.
CNN
Wednesday, September 18, 2019
Video - Tijane Bande of Nigeria gives maiden address as General Assembly President of UN
Tensions between the United States and Iran as well as climate change will be at top of the agenda in the world's biggest annual diplomatic gathering. The 74th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) has officially opened in New York, one week before world leaders arrive.
Tuesday, September 17, 2019
Nigeria to play Brazil in football friendly
Brazil have confirmed they will face Senegal on 10 October and Nigeria three days later at the National Stadium in Singapore.
It will be first ever meeting between Brazil and Senegal, who lost the Africa Cup of Nations final to Algeria and are the continent's top-ranked African side.
Nigeria, who won Bronze in Egypt, will be meeting Brazil for the second time at senior level following a 3-0 defeat in a friendly in June 2003 in Abuja.
"We chose two of the best African teams because they are high level opponents," Brazil Football Confederation official Juninho Paulista said on the website.
"It was a wish of the technical commission. So we went after these opponents."
The friendlies are in line with Brazil's wishes to play top 50 ranked teams whenever possible.
Brazil's only other Africa opponent under coach Tite was a 1-0 win over Cameroon in November last year, in a match played in England.
It will be Brazil's second game in Singapore following a Neymar-inspired victory over Japan in October 2014.
BBC
It will be first ever meeting between Brazil and Senegal, who lost the Africa Cup of Nations final to Algeria and are the continent's top-ranked African side.
Nigeria, who won Bronze in Egypt, will be meeting Brazil for the second time at senior level following a 3-0 defeat in a friendly in June 2003 in Abuja.
"We chose two of the best African teams because they are high level opponents," Brazil Football Confederation official Juninho Paulista said on the website.
"It was a wish of the technical commission. So we went after these opponents."
The friendlies are in line with Brazil's wishes to play top 50 ranked teams whenever possible.
Brazil's only other Africa opponent under coach Tite was a 1-0 win over Cameroon in November last year, in a match played in England.
It will be Brazil's second game in Singapore following a Neymar-inspired victory over Japan in October 2014.
BBC
South Africa apologizes to Nigeria for xenophobic attacks
A South African envoy to President Cyril Ramaphosa apologised "profusely" to the Nigerian government after a spate of deadly xenophobic attacks that rocked Johannesburg and Pretoria.
Jeff Radebe was in Nigeria's capital, Abuja, to attend a meeting on Monday to convey "sincerest apologies about the incident that has recently transpired in South Africa".
"The incident does not represent what we stand for," Radebe said, adding South African police would "leave no stone unturned, that those involved must be brought to book".
The Nigerian government said in a statement following the meeting: "President [Muhammadu] Buhari responded to profuse apologies from the South African president, pledging that relationship between the two countries will be solidified."
Foreign workers in South Africa - the continent's second-largest economy after Nigeria - are often victims of anti-immigrant sentiment in a nation where almost one-third of people are unemployed.
At least 12 people were killed in recent weeks after 1,000 foreign-owned business were targeted.
The violence prompted reprisal attacks against South African firms in Nigeria and the temporary closure of South Africa's diplomatic missions in Lagos and Abuja.
The violence sparked an international outcry and calls for a boycott of South Africa.
Following the violence, Nigeria announced it would repatriate more than 600 nationals to protect them from future violence.
Besides the hundreds of Nigerians returning to their home country, more than 700 people from other countries, including Malawi and Zimbabwe, sought refuge in South African community centres.
Many left their homes with little more than a few bags when the attacks began.
In 2008, at least 62 people, including South Africans, were killed in violence and looting targeting foreign-owned stores.
Al Jazeera
Jeff Radebe was in Nigeria's capital, Abuja, to attend a meeting on Monday to convey "sincerest apologies about the incident that has recently transpired in South Africa".
"The incident does not represent what we stand for," Radebe said, adding South African police would "leave no stone unturned, that those involved must be brought to book".
The Nigerian government said in a statement following the meeting: "President [Muhammadu] Buhari responded to profuse apologies from the South African president, pledging that relationship between the two countries will be solidified."
Foreign workers in South Africa - the continent's second-largest economy after Nigeria - are often victims of anti-immigrant sentiment in a nation where almost one-third of people are unemployed.
At least 12 people were killed in recent weeks after 1,000 foreign-owned business were targeted.
The violence prompted reprisal attacks against South African firms in Nigeria and the temporary closure of South Africa's diplomatic missions in Lagos and Abuja.
The violence sparked an international outcry and calls for a boycott of South Africa.
Following the violence, Nigeria announced it would repatriate more than 600 nationals to protect them from future violence.
Besides the hundreds of Nigerians returning to their home country, more than 700 people from other countries, including Malawi and Zimbabwe, sought refuge in South African community centres.
Many left their homes with little more than a few bags when the attacks began.
In 2008, at least 62 people, including South Africans, were killed in violence and looting targeting foreign-owned stores.
Al Jazeera
Monday, September 16, 2019
Nigerian author Chimamanda Adichie wins the Kassel Citizens' " Prism of Reason" Award
At the award ceremony which held in Germany on Sunday, coincides with the 42nd Birth Anniversary of the multiple award winning writer.
$9.6bn fine: Count me out of your dubious scheme to defraud Nigeria - Malami replies P&ID(Opens in a new browser tab)
According to a statement issued by the organisers of the event, the prize is awarded to 'persons or institutions whose work serves the ideals of the Enlightenment by overcoming ideological barriers and promoting reason and tolerance towards dissenters'.
"The Board of Directors and the Board of Trustees of the Society of Friends and Sponsors of the Kassel Citizens' Prize have selected Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie as the 2019 winner of the "Prism of Reason". This makes her the first Nigerian to receive this remarkable prize.
The award ceremony which takes place at the State Theater of Kassel in Germany is also in recognition of Adichie's undeniable literary prowess, but also for her equality and justice advocacy.
The "Prism of Reason" award was founded in 1990 by citizens of the city of Kassel and the region. So far, the prize has been awarded 28 times. The 2019 award is the 29th in the series.
The first prize-winner (in 1991) was the then German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher; he was honoured for his services to the opening of the Iron Curtain.
Other awardees include Chinese dissident and artist Ai Weiwei; Indian scientist and documenta 13 participant, Vandana Shiva; Somali-born Dutch-American activist, Ayaan Hirsi Ali; Israeli diplomat, peace activist and publicist Avi Primor; and Peruvian farmer Saúl Luciano Lliuya.
A statement made by the Kassel Board president Bernd Leifeld said "Combative but not fanatical, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie... points out ways to overcome outdated patterns which are deeply anchored in education and society.
"Kassel citizens honour her with their Prize 'The Prism of Reason 2019' because she believes in the social, political and economic equality of all people," he said.
The prize consists of a certificate, a sculpture designed by the Kassel art professor and documenta artist Karl Oskar Blase with a prism (symbolising the analytical glass of the Enlightenment).
In a related development, its been a good weekend for Adichie as she celebrates her 42nd birthday.
First was the announcement on Friday that HBO Max, a division of WarnerMedia Entertainment, is creating a straight-to-series order for the television adaptation of Adichie's most recent novel 'Americanah'.
The 10-episode series will star Academy Award winner Lupita Nyong'o, with the pilot being written by screenwriter and actor Danai Gurira (who starred in the movie "Black Panther")- and will be co-produced by Lupita Nyong'o and Brad Pitt's production company Plan B.
Adichie has also been trending non-stop on social media since Friday when a Twitter group of fans of the writer @Chimamanda_Army went viral to announce a competition to celebrate her birthday.
The competition tagged #10ThingsAboutChimamanda, encourages participants to list 10 things about Adichie to stand the chance of winning fan-donated prizes.
The prizes include: 10 collections of Chimamanda's books, 10 pairs of movie tickets to watch a film of their choice at any Filmhouse cinema location; and 10 Amazon Kindle Fire HD 8 Tablets.
According to the fans, the competition kicked off fully at 12am midnight Nigerian time/GMT (the start of her birthday, Sunday September 15th) and will run until 5pm Nigerian time/GMT of the same day.
Vanguard
Tammy Abraham say 'never say never' on playing for Nigeria
Abraham, 21, has represented England at two Under-21 European Championships and featured in two friendlies for the senior squad against Germany and Brazil.
The Chelsea man is eligible to play for Nigeria through his paternal lineage and said he is not ruling out a switch at international level.
"I have not really been focused on that yet," he said. "I think when the time comes, the times comes. We never know.
"You can never say never, whatever comes first really. I just have to keep my full focus on Chelsea."
Abraham faces competition from Harry Kane, Marcus Rashford, Raheem Sterling and Jadon Sancho for a regular spot in Gareth Southgate's team.
Nigeria Football Federation president Amaju Pinnick said: "I told Tammy that he had a better chance of playing regularly for Nigeria than with England, which has a galaxy of strikers."
The striker has enjoyed a great start to the new campaign, scoring seven goals in the Premier League including a hat trick against Wolves on Saturday.
ESPN
Nigerian military forces retreat to super camps as Islamic State storm northeast Nigeria
Nigerian soldiers had left the town earlier that month under a new strategy of withdrawing to “super camps” that can be more easily defended against insurgents the army has been struggling to contain for a decade.
Unchallenged, the Islamist militants torched a clinic in Magumeri, ransacked government buildings and looted shops before returning to another town they had raided that night called Gubio, residents said.
The new military strategy announced by President Muhammadu Buhari in July to concentrate soldiers in big bases is designed to give troops a secure platform from which they can respond quickly to threats in the region and raid militant camps.
People familiar with the military’s thinking and security officials, however, say the new tactic for fighting Islamic State’s West Africa branch and Boko Haram is mainly an attempt to stem casualties.
The military did not respond to requests for more details about its strategy or the impact it will have on the region.
“We strongly believe the days of BH (Boko Haram) moving freely and passing in between static defensive locations are over,” Major General Olusegun Adeniyi, who commands the anti-insurgency operation, told reporters last month.
Boko Haram launched an insurgency in 2009 to overthrow the government and establish an Islamic caliphate. The group, whose unofficial name means “Western education is forbidden”, held territory the size of Belgium in 2014 but a multinational offensive recaptured much of it the following year.
The group split in 2016 and the faction that has been the greater threat ever since won the recognition of Islamic State.
The decade of war has killed more than 30,000 civilians and spawned what the United Nations calls one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, which foreign nations are trying to contain with billions of dollars of aid.
But the crisis shows no sign of abating.
‘IT’S A MESS’
The army’s withdrawal into large bases has coincided with a string of insurgent raids on newly unprotected towns and has left the militants free to set up checkpoints on roads as they roam more freely across the countryside, according to three briefing notes from an international aid and development organization, two security officials and residents.
That has left thousands of civilians without access to aid, according to the briefing notes seen by Reuters.
Soldiers are no longer protecting some key roads, cutting off access for humanitarians workers as more of the region falls under the sway of the insurgents, aid and security sources said.
“It’s a mess, militarily, and a disaster for humanitarian actors,” one foreign security official said.
The population of towns being abandoned by the military is a combined 223,000 people, according to one of the aid agency briefing notes.
The military departures so far have cut off more than 100,000 people from aid and if more soldiers go, as many as 121,000 other civilians could flee their towns, one aid agency briefing note said.
“The impact will be one of continued skirmishes - soldiers under constant strain to deal with the insurgency where Islamic State and Boko Haram dictate the momentum,” said Jasmine Opperman, a terrorism expert based in South Africa.
It’s not yet clear how many “super camps” the army plans to set up, where they will be nor how many soldiers each will hold.
‘HERE TO PROTECT YOU’
The new strategy follows a series of setbacks for the army which has failed to keep a tight grip on territory it has clawed back since 2015. Last year, insurgents repeatedly overran smaller bases and sent soldiers and tens of thousands of people fleeing from larger towns.
Security experts put the military death toll since June 2018 at anywhere from hundreds of soldiers to in excess of 1,000.
The military has not released casualty figures but denies that many soldiers have been killed.
One security adviser at an international aid organization said a major goal of the new large bases was damage control, rather than going on the offensive.
“It is to consolidate all of the strength in one place to prevent them being overrun every week,” the adviser said.
He said the areas vacated were being filled by insurgents and that would make it harder for the military to re-enter, leaving civilians vulnerable.
Those concerns were echoed by the governor of Borno - the birthplace of Boko Haram and the state worst hit by the insurgency. Governor Babagana Umara Zulum told reporters last month that recent attacks were the result of a “serious vacuum” following the withdrawal of soldiers.
Islamic State is also using its newfound freedom to woo locals. Drained by the decade-long conflict, some are open to moving into areas controlled by the insurgents where life can be more stable, residents said.
Before hitting Magumeri last month, the militants had passed through the town of Gubio, some 40 km (25 miles) to the north.
There, an Islamic State fighter led evening prayers followed by a sermon, according to six residents.
“We are here to protect you, not to harm any one of you,” the IS fighter told residents. “Those with uniforms are your enemies, and we are here to deal with them and their supporters. You should feel free.”
Rather than flee to a government-controlled city such as Borno state’s capital Maiduguri, many Gubio residents stayed.
Reuters
Unchallenged, the Islamist militants torched a clinic in Magumeri, ransacked government buildings and looted shops before returning to another town they had raided that night called Gubio, residents said.
The new military strategy announced by President Muhammadu Buhari in July to concentrate soldiers in big bases is designed to give troops a secure platform from which they can respond quickly to threats in the region and raid militant camps.
People familiar with the military’s thinking and security officials, however, say the new tactic for fighting Islamic State’s West Africa branch and Boko Haram is mainly an attempt to stem casualties.
The military did not respond to requests for more details about its strategy or the impact it will have on the region.
“We strongly believe the days of BH (Boko Haram) moving freely and passing in between static defensive locations are over,” Major General Olusegun Adeniyi, who commands the anti-insurgency operation, told reporters last month.
Boko Haram launched an insurgency in 2009 to overthrow the government and establish an Islamic caliphate. The group, whose unofficial name means “Western education is forbidden”, held territory the size of Belgium in 2014 but a multinational offensive recaptured much of it the following year.
The group split in 2016 and the faction that has been the greater threat ever since won the recognition of Islamic State.
The decade of war has killed more than 30,000 civilians and spawned what the United Nations calls one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, which foreign nations are trying to contain with billions of dollars of aid.
But the crisis shows no sign of abating.
‘IT’S A MESS’
The army’s withdrawal into large bases has coincided with a string of insurgent raids on newly unprotected towns and has left the militants free to set up checkpoints on roads as they roam more freely across the countryside, according to three briefing notes from an international aid and development organization, two security officials and residents.
That has left thousands of civilians without access to aid, according to the briefing notes seen by Reuters.
Soldiers are no longer protecting some key roads, cutting off access for humanitarians workers as more of the region falls under the sway of the insurgents, aid and security sources said.
“It’s a mess, militarily, and a disaster for humanitarian actors,” one foreign security official said.
The population of towns being abandoned by the military is a combined 223,000 people, according to one of the aid agency briefing notes.
The military departures so far have cut off more than 100,000 people from aid and if more soldiers go, as many as 121,000 other civilians could flee their towns, one aid agency briefing note said.
“The impact will be one of continued skirmishes - soldiers under constant strain to deal with the insurgency where Islamic State and Boko Haram dictate the momentum,” said Jasmine Opperman, a terrorism expert based in South Africa.
It’s not yet clear how many “super camps” the army plans to set up, where they will be nor how many soldiers each will hold.
‘HERE TO PROTECT YOU’
The new strategy follows a series of setbacks for the army which has failed to keep a tight grip on territory it has clawed back since 2015. Last year, insurgents repeatedly overran smaller bases and sent soldiers and tens of thousands of people fleeing from larger towns.
Security experts put the military death toll since June 2018 at anywhere from hundreds of soldiers to in excess of 1,000.
The military has not released casualty figures but denies that many soldiers have been killed.
One security adviser at an international aid organization said a major goal of the new large bases was damage control, rather than going on the offensive.
“It is to consolidate all of the strength in one place to prevent them being overrun every week,” the adviser said.
He said the areas vacated were being filled by insurgents and that would make it harder for the military to re-enter, leaving civilians vulnerable.
Those concerns were echoed by the governor of Borno - the birthplace of Boko Haram and the state worst hit by the insurgency. Governor Babagana Umara Zulum told reporters last month that recent attacks were the result of a “serious vacuum” following the withdrawal of soldiers.
Islamic State is also using its newfound freedom to woo locals. Drained by the decade-long conflict, some are open to moving into areas controlled by the insurgents where life can be more stable, residents said.
Before hitting Magumeri last month, the militants had passed through the town of Gubio, some 40 km (25 miles) to the north.
There, an Islamic State fighter led evening prayers followed by a sermon, according to six residents.
“We are here to protect you, not to harm any one of you,” the IS fighter told residents. “Those with uniforms are your enemies, and we are here to deal with them and their supporters. You should feel free.”
Rather than flee to a government-controlled city such as Borno state’s capital Maiduguri, many Gubio residents stayed.
Reuters
Friday, September 13, 2019
Video - Nigerians repatriated from South Africa after attacks
Nigeria began repatriating more than 600 of its citizens from South Africa following a wave of deadly xenophobic attacks that frayed relations among neighbouring nations. Private Nigerian airline Air Peace volunteered to fly people for free back to the commercial capital Lagos on Wednesday. It was not immediately clear how many people boarded the flight, but Nigeria's government said it estimated 313 people were on their way home. A second flight departs on Thursday or Friday with 640 Nigerians in total fleeing the country. The repatriation came after riots in Pretoria and Johannesburg killed at least 12 people as 1,000 foreign-owned businesses were targeted. The nationalities of those killed have not been announced but Nigerians, Ethiopians, Congolese, and Zimbabweans were attacked, according to local media.
Related stories: Video - Hundreds of Nigerians sign up for voluntary evacuation from South Africa
Nigeria to repatriate 600 Nigerians from South Africa due to xenophobic violence
Video - Thousands of Nigerian businesses attend event in Lagos
About a hundred Chinese Manufacturers and suppliers are in Nigeria's commercial capital, Lagos for the China Trade Week. It's everything construction under one roof. The Big 5 as it's called, is attracting thousands of Nigerian businesses from across the country.
Ex-coach Samson Siasia mother still missing in Nigeria 2 months after kidnap
Beauty Ogere Siasia,80, was abducted in her house on July 15 in Odoni in Sagbama area in oil rich Bayelsa State, southern Nigeria.
Now having spent more than seven weeks in captivity, family members are now worried about her health.
Siasia’s younger brother, Dennis Siasia, said the abduction had brought distress to the family as they are unable to raise the $230,000 ransom demanded by the kidnappers.
Mrs Ogere had initially been kidnapped in November 2015 but was released 12 days after a ransom was paid.
Last month, the world's football governing body slapped Siasia with a life ban and a 50,000 Swiss Francs ($50,000, 46,000 euros) fine after finding him guilty of taking bribes to fix matches.
By Mohammed Momoh
The East African
22,000 Nigerians missing since Boko Haram crisis began
At least 22,000 people are missing in Nigeria due to the decade-long conflict with the Boko Haram group, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has said.
In a statement, ICRC President Peter Maurer said nearly 60 percent of those missing were children and that it was the highest number of missing persons registered with the organisation in any country.
"They were minors when they went missing, meaning thousands of parents don't know where their children are and if they are alive or dead," he said on Thursday at the end of his five-day trip to Nigeria.
"Every parent's worst nightmare is not knowing where their child is. This is the tragic reality for thousands of Nigerian parents."
Nigeria is faced with multiple conflicts, including attacks by the Boko Haram and the frequent clashes between the nomadic herders and the farmers.
Boko Haram - whose name roughly translates to "Western education is forbidden" - wants to establish an Islamic state based on a strict interpretation of the Islamic law.
The United Nations estimates that more than 27,000 people have been killed and an estimated two million others displaced in Nigeria's northeast because of the violence by the Boko Haram.
Meanwhile, in Nigeria's central states, clashes between farmers and nomadic herders over dwindling arable land have also killed thousands and displaced tens of thousands.
'We have no hope'
In 2015, the Nigerian military launched "Operation Lafiya Dole" to force the Boko Haram out of the country's northeast.
But it is the families of those missing, mainly in the urban centres of Borno state in Nigeria's northeast, who are forced to deal with the trauma.
"My father is traumatised. He goes out looking for my brother from time to time, hoping he will be found," 43-year-old Noami Abwaku told Al Jazeera about her brother Yerima Abwaku, a civil servant who disappeared on October 30, 2015.
She said her 53-year-old brother worked in a government school in Maiduguri, the epicentre of Boko Haram attacks.
"At this point, we have no hope because many like Yerima went missing around that time and they've not been found," Noami Abwaku said. "Three of my colleagues in office also went in the same period."
Boko Haram still occupies large expanses of the Nigerian countryside, mainly in the northeast and has a stronghold around the Lake Chad region bordering Cameroon and Niger.
Analyst Cheta Nwanze told Al Jazeera that the number of missing persons is not surprising and blamed it on a "notoriously lax" administration.
"It is a logical consequence of the fact that we consistently report not the names of the people missing, but just the numbers. To solve this, we must improve the accountability system," he said.
By Mercy Abang
Al Jazeera
In a statement, ICRC President Peter Maurer said nearly 60 percent of those missing were children and that it was the highest number of missing persons registered with the organisation in any country.
"They were minors when they went missing, meaning thousands of parents don't know where their children are and if they are alive or dead," he said on Thursday at the end of his five-day trip to Nigeria.
"Every parent's worst nightmare is not knowing where their child is. This is the tragic reality for thousands of Nigerian parents."
Nigeria is faced with multiple conflicts, including attacks by the Boko Haram and the frequent clashes between the nomadic herders and the farmers.
Boko Haram - whose name roughly translates to "Western education is forbidden" - wants to establish an Islamic state based on a strict interpretation of the Islamic law.
The United Nations estimates that more than 27,000 people have been killed and an estimated two million others displaced in Nigeria's northeast because of the violence by the Boko Haram.
Meanwhile, in Nigeria's central states, clashes between farmers and nomadic herders over dwindling arable land have also killed thousands and displaced tens of thousands.
'We have no hope'
In 2015, the Nigerian military launched "Operation Lafiya Dole" to force the Boko Haram out of the country's northeast.
But it is the families of those missing, mainly in the urban centres of Borno state in Nigeria's northeast, who are forced to deal with the trauma.
"My father is traumatised. He goes out looking for my brother from time to time, hoping he will be found," 43-year-old Noami Abwaku told Al Jazeera about her brother Yerima Abwaku, a civil servant who disappeared on October 30, 2015.
She said her 53-year-old brother worked in a government school in Maiduguri, the epicentre of Boko Haram attacks.
"At this point, we have no hope because many like Yerima went missing around that time and they've not been found," Noami Abwaku said. "Three of my colleagues in office also went in the same period."
Boko Haram still occupies large expanses of the Nigerian countryside, mainly in the northeast and has a stronghold around the Lake Chad region bordering Cameroon and Niger.
Analyst Cheta Nwanze told Al Jazeera that the number of missing persons is not surprising and blamed it on a "notoriously lax" administration.
"It is a logical consequence of the fact that we consistently report not the names of the people missing, but just the numbers. To solve this, we must improve the accountability system," he said.
By Mercy Abang
Al Jazeera
Thursday, September 12, 2019
Video - Hundreds of Nigerians sign up for voluntary evacuation from South Africa
Nigeria will begin repatriating its citizens from the country on Wednesday. Two planes belonging to Nigerian carrier Air Peace will take the first group of returnees to Nigeria Officials say 600 Nigerians in South Africa have registered to return home following xenophobic violence.
Tribunal in Nigeria reject bid to overturn Buhari's election
A Nigerian election tribunal rejected a bid by the main opposition candidate to overturn the result of February's presidential election, which saw Muhammadu Buhari returned to office.
Defeated contender Atiku Abubakar, a businessman and former vice president, was the candidate of the main opposition People's Democratic Party (PDP).
"This petition is hereby dismissed in its entirety," Justice Mohammed Lawal Garba said in announcing the ruling on Wednesday. All five judges who presided over the tribunal rejected Atiku's claims.
The defeat for Atiku was widely anticipated. Buhari, a 76-year-old former military ruler, was re-elected after first taking office as an elected leader in 2015.
The tribunal rejected all three of Atiku's claims: that the election was marred by irregularities, that he received more votes than Buhari, and the president did not have a secondary school certificate, a basic requirement to contest the election.
The PDP said it would mount an appeal against the ruling at the country's Supreme Court.
Buhari took 56 percent of the vote against 41 percent for Atiku, the electoral commission said in February, but with a turnout of just 35.6 percent compared with 44 percent in 2015.
Atiku rejected the result hours after Buhari was declared the victor and said he would mount a legal challenge.
"It is time for the country to move forward as one cohesive body, putting behind us all bickering and potential distractions over an election in which Nigerians spoke clearly and resoundingly," said Buhari in a statement on Wednesday following the tribunal's ruling.
The PDP said in a tweet it "completely rejects the judgment", which it described as a "direct assault on the integrity of our nation's justice system".
Every election result has been contested unsuccessfully since Nigeria returned to democracy in 1999, with the exception of the 2015 poll in which Goodluck Jonathan conceded defeat to Buhari.
Al Jazeera
Defeated contender Atiku Abubakar, a businessman and former vice president, was the candidate of the main opposition People's Democratic Party (PDP).
"This petition is hereby dismissed in its entirety," Justice Mohammed Lawal Garba said in announcing the ruling on Wednesday. All five judges who presided over the tribunal rejected Atiku's claims.
The defeat for Atiku was widely anticipated. Buhari, a 76-year-old former military ruler, was re-elected after first taking office as an elected leader in 2015.
The tribunal rejected all three of Atiku's claims: that the election was marred by irregularities, that he received more votes than Buhari, and the president did not have a secondary school certificate, a basic requirement to contest the election.
The PDP said it would mount an appeal against the ruling at the country's Supreme Court.
Buhari took 56 percent of the vote against 41 percent for Atiku, the electoral commission said in February, but with a turnout of just 35.6 percent compared with 44 percent in 2015.
Atiku rejected the result hours after Buhari was declared the victor and said he would mount a legal challenge.
"It is time for the country to move forward as one cohesive body, putting behind us all bickering and potential distractions over an election in which Nigerians spoke clearly and resoundingly," said Buhari in a statement on Wednesday following the tribunal's ruling.
The PDP said in a tweet it "completely rejects the judgment", which it described as a "direct assault on the integrity of our nation's justice system".
Every election result has been contested unsuccessfully since Nigeria returned to democracy in 1999, with the exception of the 2015 poll in which Goodluck Jonathan conceded defeat to Buhari.
Al Jazeera
Wednesday, September 11, 2019
Online-only bank startup in Nigeria raises $1.6m
Nigerian fintech startup Kuda — a digital-only retail bank — has raised $1.6 million in pre-seed funding.
The Lagos and London-based company recently launched the beta version of its online mobile finance platform. Kuda also received its banking license from the Nigerian Central Bank, giving it a distinction compared to other fintech startups.
“Kuda is the first digital-only bank in Nigeria with a standalone license. We’re not a mobile wallet or simply a mobile app piggybacking on an existing bank,” Kuda bank founder Babs Ogundeyi told TechCrunch.
“We have built our own full-stack banking software from scratch. We can also take deposits and connect directly to the switch,” Ogundeyi added, referring to the Nigeria’s Central Switch — a SWIFT-like system that facilitates bank communication and settlements.
A representative for the Central Bank of Nigeria (speaking on background) confirmed Kuda’s banking license and status, telling TechCrunch, “As far as I’m aware there is no other digital bank [in Nigeria] that has a micro-finance license.”
Kuda offers checking accounts with no monthly-fees, a free debit card, and plans to offer consumer savings and P2P payments options on its platform in coming months.
“You can open a bank account within five minutes, do all the KYC in the app, and you get issued a new bank account number,” according to Ogundeyi.
Ogundeyi — a repeat founder who exited classifieds site Motortradertrader.ng and worked in a finance advisory role to the Nigerian government — co-founded Kuda in 2018 with former Stanbic Bank software developer Musty Mustapha.
The two convinced investor Haresh Aswani to lead the $1.6 million pre-seed funding, along with Ragnar Meitern and other angel investors. Aswani confirmed his investment to TechCrunch and that he will take a position on Kuda’s board.
Kuda plans to use its seed funds to go from beta to live launch in Nigeria by fourth-quarter 2019. The startup will also build out the tech of its banking platform, including support for its developer team located in Lagos and Cape Town, according to Ogundeyi.
Kuda also intends to expand in the near future. “It’s Nigeria for right now, but the plan is build a Pan-African digital-only bank,” he said.
As of 2014, Nigeria has held the dual distinction as Africa’s largest economy and most populous country (with 190 million people).
To scale there, and add some physical infrastructure to its online model, Kuda has correspondent relationships with three of Nigeria’s largest financial institutions: GTBank, Access Bank and Zenith Bank.
He clarified the banks are partners and not investors. Kuda customers can use these banks’ branches and ATMs to put money into bank accounts or withdraw funds without a fee.
“Even though we don’t own a single branch, we actually have the largest branch network in the country,” Ogundeyi claimed.
Kuda’s plans to generate revenues focus largely around leveraging its bank balances. “We plan to match different liability classes to the different asset classes that we create. That’s how we make money, that’s how we get efficiency in terms of income,” Ogundeyi said.
In Nigeria, Kuda enters a potentially revenue-rich market, but its one that already hosts a crowded fintech field — as the country becomes ground zero for payments startups and tech investment in Africa.
In both raw and per capita numbers, Nigeria has been slower to convert to digital payments than leading African countries, such as Kenya, according to joint McKinsey Company and Gates Foundation analysis done several years ago. The same study estimated there could be nearly $1.3 billion in revenue up for grabs if Nigeria could reach the same digital-payments penetration as Kenya.
A number of startups — established and new — are going after that prize in the West African country — several with a strategy to scale in Nigeria first before expanding outward on the continent and globally.
San Francisco-based, no-fee payment venture Chipper Cash entered Nigeria this month.
Series B-stage Nigerian payments company Paga raised $10 million in 2018 to further grow its customer base (that now tallies 13 million) and expand to Asia and Latin America.
Kuda CEO Babs Ogundeyi believes the startup can scale and compete in Nigeria on a number of factors, one being financial safety. He names the company’s official bank status and the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation security that brings as something that can attract cash-comfortable bank clients to digital finance.
Ogundeyi also points to offerings and price.”We look to be the next generation bank where you can do everything— savings, payments and transfers — and also the one that’s least expensive,” he said.
By Jake Bright
Tech Crunch
The Lagos and London-based company recently launched the beta version of its online mobile finance platform. Kuda also received its banking license from the Nigerian Central Bank, giving it a distinction compared to other fintech startups.
“Kuda is the first digital-only bank in Nigeria with a standalone license. We’re not a mobile wallet or simply a mobile app piggybacking on an existing bank,” Kuda bank founder Babs Ogundeyi told TechCrunch.
“We have built our own full-stack banking software from scratch. We can also take deposits and connect directly to the switch,” Ogundeyi added, referring to the Nigeria’s Central Switch — a SWIFT-like system that facilitates bank communication and settlements.
A representative for the Central Bank of Nigeria (speaking on background) confirmed Kuda’s banking license and status, telling TechCrunch, “As far as I’m aware there is no other digital bank [in Nigeria] that has a micro-finance license.”
Kuda offers checking accounts with no monthly-fees, a free debit card, and plans to offer consumer savings and P2P payments options on its platform in coming months.
“You can open a bank account within five minutes, do all the KYC in the app, and you get issued a new bank account number,” according to Ogundeyi.
Ogundeyi — a repeat founder who exited classifieds site Motortradertrader.ng and worked in a finance advisory role to the Nigerian government — co-founded Kuda in 2018 with former Stanbic Bank software developer Musty Mustapha.
The two convinced investor Haresh Aswani to lead the $1.6 million pre-seed funding, along with Ragnar Meitern and other angel investors. Aswani confirmed his investment to TechCrunch and that he will take a position on Kuda’s board.
Kuda plans to use its seed funds to go from beta to live launch in Nigeria by fourth-quarter 2019. The startup will also build out the tech of its banking platform, including support for its developer team located in Lagos and Cape Town, according to Ogundeyi.
Kuda also intends to expand in the near future. “It’s Nigeria for right now, but the plan is build a Pan-African digital-only bank,” he said.
As of 2014, Nigeria has held the dual distinction as Africa’s largest economy and most populous country (with 190 million people).
To scale there, and add some physical infrastructure to its online model, Kuda has correspondent relationships with three of Nigeria’s largest financial institutions: GTBank, Access Bank and Zenith Bank.
He clarified the banks are partners and not investors. Kuda customers can use these banks’ branches and ATMs to put money into bank accounts or withdraw funds without a fee.
“Even though we don’t own a single branch, we actually have the largest branch network in the country,” Ogundeyi claimed.
Kuda’s plans to generate revenues focus largely around leveraging its bank balances. “We plan to match different liability classes to the different asset classes that we create. That’s how we make money, that’s how we get efficiency in terms of income,” Ogundeyi said.
In Nigeria, Kuda enters a potentially revenue-rich market, but its one that already hosts a crowded fintech field — as the country becomes ground zero for payments startups and tech investment in Africa.
In both raw and per capita numbers, Nigeria has been slower to convert to digital payments than leading African countries, such as Kenya, according to joint McKinsey Company and Gates Foundation analysis done several years ago. The same study estimated there could be nearly $1.3 billion in revenue up for grabs if Nigeria could reach the same digital-payments penetration as Kenya.
A number of startups — established and new — are going after that prize in the West African country — several with a strategy to scale in Nigeria first before expanding outward on the continent and globally.
San Francisco-based, no-fee payment venture Chipper Cash entered Nigeria this month.
Series B-stage Nigerian payments company Paga raised $10 million in 2018 to further grow its customer base (that now tallies 13 million) and expand to Asia and Latin America.
Kuda CEO Babs Ogundeyi believes the startup can scale and compete in Nigeria on a number of factors, one being financial safety. He names the company’s official bank status and the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation security that brings as something that can attract cash-comfortable bank clients to digital finance.
Ogundeyi also points to offerings and price.”We look to be the next generation bank where you can do everything— savings, payments and transfers — and also the one that’s least expensive,” he said.
By Jake Bright
Tech Crunch
Banned Shia group in Nigeria allege police killed 12 marchers
A Nigerian Shia group banned by the government said police killed 12 of members and wounded 10 others during marches in the north of country to mark the religious commemoration known as Ashoura.
Spokesman Ibrahim Musa said the Shia marchers were killed in the northern states of Kaduna, Bauchi, Gombe, Sokoto, and Katsina on Tuesday.
"The Islamic Movement in Nigeria has confirmed the killing of at least a dozen Ashoura mourners across the nation during the peaceful Ashoura mourning procession today," said Musa.
The group, the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN), was banned in July after a series of deadly clashes with police. IMN said the police were responsible for the deaths of at least 20 people in July but the police gave no death toll.
Police in the northern city of Kaduna, where IMN said three were killed and 10 injured on Tuesday, disputed the account and said it dispersed marchers "professionally".
A national police spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The group was marching to mark Ashoura, the day in Islamic tradition when the Prophet Mohammed's grandson, Imam Hussein, died in battle in 1680.
Police had warned IMN members not to march, saying any gathering or procession by group members is "ultimately illegal and will be treated as a gathering in the advancement of terrorism".
Leader imprisoned
IMN said police attacked its marchers on Tuesday and, in Katsina, opened fire on them. It said members were killed in Bauchi, Gombe and Sokoto states, all in northern Nigeria, but marches in the capital, Abuja, and other northern states ended without incident.
Clashes with police in the last few weeks followed calls by the group for its leader to be released from police detention.
Their leader, Ibrahim el-Zakzaky, has been held since 2015 when government forces killed about 350 people after storming an IMN compound and a nearby mosque.
While roughly half of the nearly 200 million Nigerians are Muslim, mostly concentrated in the north of the country, Shia are a minority.
Last week the United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions said she had not been presented with any evidence to suggest IMN was weaponised and posed a threat to Nigeria.
Al Jazeera
Spokesman Ibrahim Musa said the Shia marchers were killed in the northern states of Kaduna, Bauchi, Gombe, Sokoto, and Katsina on Tuesday.
"The Islamic Movement in Nigeria has confirmed the killing of at least a dozen Ashoura mourners across the nation during the peaceful Ashoura mourning procession today," said Musa.
The group, the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN), was banned in July after a series of deadly clashes with police. IMN said the police were responsible for the deaths of at least 20 people in July but the police gave no death toll.
Police in the northern city of Kaduna, where IMN said three were killed and 10 injured on Tuesday, disputed the account and said it dispersed marchers "professionally".
A national police spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The group was marching to mark Ashoura, the day in Islamic tradition when the Prophet Mohammed's grandson, Imam Hussein, died in battle in 1680.
Police had warned IMN members not to march, saying any gathering or procession by group members is "ultimately illegal and will be treated as a gathering in the advancement of terrorism".
Leader imprisoned
IMN said police attacked its marchers on Tuesday and, in Katsina, opened fire on them. It said members were killed in Bauchi, Gombe and Sokoto states, all in northern Nigeria, but marches in the capital, Abuja, and other northern states ended without incident.
Clashes with police in the last few weeks followed calls by the group for its leader to be released from police detention.
Their leader, Ibrahim el-Zakzaky, has been held since 2015 when government forces killed about 350 people after storming an IMN compound and a nearby mosque.
While roughly half of the nearly 200 million Nigerians are Muslim, mostly concentrated in the north of the country, Shia are a minority.
Last week the United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions said she had not been presented with any evidence to suggest IMN was weaponised and posed a threat to Nigeria.
Al Jazeera
Nigeria commences repatriation of Nigerians from South Africa
Nigeria has started the process of repatriating more than 600 of its citizens from South Africa following a wave of deadly xenophobic attacks that has frayed relations between the two countries.
Private Nigerian airline Air Peace, has volunteered to fly people for free back to Lagos. At least 320 Nigerians are expected to be flown out on Wednesday, while a second flight will depart on Thursday. At least 640 Nigerians have signed up for the flights.
Al Jazeera's Fahmida Miller, reporting from the airport in Johannesburg, said on Wednesday that "of the more [than] 600 people who [were] expected to leave, at least half of them" were already there, while a "small group of people were turned back, due to incorrect documentation."
The repatriation came after deadly riots in Pretoria and Johannesburg killed at least 12 people, including two foreigners, and targeted 1,000 foreign-owned businesses.
The violence sparked international outcry and calls for a boycott.
Reprisal attacks in Nigeria forced South African business to shut down while the South African embassy in Lagos temporarily closed its doors over safety fears.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, Pastor Ugo Ofoegbu, who was at the airport to board the flight, said that "some [people] had an expired passport."
"They will have to go to the Nigerian consulate to get the [right] documentation that will allow them to travel," the added.
Ayanda Dlodlo, South Africa's minister of state security, told reporters in Cape Town on Monday that those leaving will have to go through immigration processes.
Police on high alert
This is not the first time that foreigners have been attacked in South Africa. In 2008, at least 62 people, including South Africans, were killed, while deadly violence and looting targeting foreign-owned stores left seven dead in 2015.
"I am so worried about the safety of my family, because these [xenophobic] attacks keep happening, so if I don't save my family now, I don't know when [this will] start again," Ofoegbu said
"It happened in 2008, and then in 2015, now it is repeating, so nobody knows when will it happen again," he added.
The root causes of the latest wave of violence are still unclear but reports suggest it is related to high unemployment, criminality and poverty in the country.
Around 700 people are believed to be housed at temporary shelters in Johannesburg, while Mozambique and Zimbabwe were also considering some sort of repatriation of their nationals.
However, South African officials were hesitant to describe the wave of violence as xenophobic attacks, and instead said this was an issue of criminality that the government was trying to deal with.
"While there has been a significant decline in the number of incidents, police forces remain on high alert and are closely monitoring hotspots to ensure further violence does not erupt," Minister of Defence Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula said.
Police have arrested at least 653 people, mostly South Africans but some foreigners as well, in connection with the attacks, Minister of Police Bheki Cele said on Tuesday.
Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari is expected to visit South Africa next month to discuss the attacks and seek a solution.
Al Jazeera
Related stories: Nigeria to repatriate 600 Nigerians from South Africa due to xenophobic violence
Nigeria withdraws from summit in South Africa after deadly riots
Private Nigerian airline Air Peace, has volunteered to fly people for free back to Lagos. At least 320 Nigerians are expected to be flown out on Wednesday, while a second flight will depart on Thursday. At least 640 Nigerians have signed up for the flights.
Al Jazeera's Fahmida Miller, reporting from the airport in Johannesburg, said on Wednesday that "of the more [than] 600 people who [were] expected to leave, at least half of them" were already there, while a "small group of people were turned back, due to incorrect documentation."
The repatriation came after deadly riots in Pretoria and Johannesburg killed at least 12 people, including two foreigners, and targeted 1,000 foreign-owned businesses.
The violence sparked international outcry and calls for a boycott.
Reprisal attacks in Nigeria forced South African business to shut down while the South African embassy in Lagos temporarily closed its doors over safety fears.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, Pastor Ugo Ofoegbu, who was at the airport to board the flight, said that "some [people] had an expired passport."
"They will have to go to the Nigerian consulate to get the [right] documentation that will allow them to travel," the added.
Ayanda Dlodlo, South Africa's minister of state security, told reporters in Cape Town on Monday that those leaving will have to go through immigration processes.
Police on high alert
This is not the first time that foreigners have been attacked in South Africa. In 2008, at least 62 people, including South Africans, were killed, while deadly violence and looting targeting foreign-owned stores left seven dead in 2015.
"I am so worried about the safety of my family, because these [xenophobic] attacks keep happening, so if I don't save my family now, I don't know when [this will] start again," Ofoegbu said
"It happened in 2008, and then in 2015, now it is repeating, so nobody knows when will it happen again," he added.
The root causes of the latest wave of violence are still unclear but reports suggest it is related to high unemployment, criminality and poverty in the country.
Around 700 people are believed to be housed at temporary shelters in Johannesburg, while Mozambique and Zimbabwe were also considering some sort of repatriation of their nationals.
However, South African officials were hesitant to describe the wave of violence as xenophobic attacks, and instead said this was an issue of criminality that the government was trying to deal with.
"While there has been a significant decline in the number of incidents, police forces remain on high alert and are closely monitoring hotspots to ensure further violence does not erupt," Minister of Defence Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula said.
Police have arrested at least 653 people, mostly South Africans but some foreigners as well, in connection with the attacks, Minister of Police Bheki Cele said on Tuesday.
Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari is expected to visit South Africa next month to discuss the attacks and seek a solution.
Al Jazeera
Related stories: Nigeria to repatriate 600 Nigerians from South Africa due to xenophobic violence
Nigeria withdraws from summit in South Africa after deadly riots
Tuesday, September 10, 2019
Video - Children held in 'horrific conditions over Boko Haram ties in Nigeria
Thousands of children have been held in recent years by Nigeria's military in "degrading and inhuman conditions" for alleged association with the Boko Haram armed group, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has said, calling for their "immediate" release. The HRW says children have been forced to stay in squalid conditions and not allowed to see family members. The military denies the accusations.
Video - Opioid crisis in Nigeria
West Africa - and particularly its most populous nation, Nigeria - is battling an opioid abuse crisis. Medicines such as tramadol, legally and legitimately prescribed by doctors for pain relief, are also being taken in life-threatening doses by millions in search of a fix or a release from poverty, unemployment and lack of opportunity. People & Power sent filmmakers Naashon Zalk and Antony Loewenstein to Nigeria to investigate how the drug is smuggled, traded and abused, as well as the widespread corruption that follows this illicit trafficking, and the appalling health consequences for those in its grip.
Related story: Growing meth market in Nigeria
Video - Nigerian entrepreneur creates jobs to drive economic empowerment
A multiple award-winning Nigerian professional Chef is turning her passion for food into an enterprise that is creating opportunities for young aspiring chefs. Fatima Haruna has trained over 80,000 people on various culinary skills and her classes are usually packed. She says her dream is to train as many young Nigerians as possible, so that they too- can become economically empowered.
Video - Nigeria leads continent in Air Pollution-related deaths
Pollution in Nigeria is getting worse. According to a 2019 State of Global Air report, the West African nation has the highest air pollution-related deaths in the continent. In addition, burning wood and coal in Nigeria's vast rural areas is increasingly intensifying the suffering of many.
Growing meth market in Nigeria
Nigeria has emerged over the past decade as a significant producer of methamphetamine (meth), a highly addictive and illegal synthetic psychostimulant drug. Since the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency’s (NDLEA) first discovery in Lagos in 2011 of a clandestine meth laboratory, 17 more have been dismantled elsewhere in the country. The quantity of meth seized has skyrocketed, rising from 177kg in 2012 to 1.3 tons in 2017.
In late 2018, following the dismantling of a lab in Obinugwu village in south-east Nigeria, NDLEA Special Enforcement Team commander Sunday Zirangey reportedly said that meth was a serious threat and that Nigeria risked turning into a narco state.
Despite the acute health risks associated with its consumption – such as high blood pressure and cardiovascular-related illness – a growing number of young people in Nigeria reportedly take the drug. A 2018 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) report estimated that 89 000 Nigerians were using meth. Abimbola Adebakin, a leading Lagos-based pharmacist, told Enact that “the youth may be using drugs increasingly to cope with a depressed economic reality for them”.
“Furthermore, due to our weak pharmaceutical drug distribution system, the youth have a porous drug supply situation that lends itself to support such abuse and misuse, she said.
In 2016, the illicit market for meth took a new turn in Nigeria. Drug syndicates brought Latin American drug experts to Nigeria to help them set up large-scale meth labs, with similar characteristics to those found in Mexico. One industrial super lab was said to have the capacity to produce 4,000 kg of meth per week.
When the NDLEA raided the site in March 2016, they arrested four Mexicans and five Nigerians. The Mexicans were reportedly from Sinaloa State. Their arrest provided further evidence of a formal and successful alliance between Nigerian and Latin American cartels.
The growth of the illicit meth market in Nigeria has also been fuelled by the accessibility of precursor chemicals such as ephedrine, which is theoretically a controlled substance but is widely available in Nigeria.
In March 2019, the NDLEA seized 309 kg of ephedrine from members of a criminal network in Trans Ekulu Estate in Enugu and Festac Town in Lagos. According to a 2017 report by the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna, Nigerian criminal networks bring ephedrine in from countries in West Africa that import more than they need.
According to the UNODC’s Cheikh Touré, the “use and diversion of pre-precursors and other non-controlled chemicals signifies complex challenges in addressing clandestine meth manufacturing in Nigeria and West Africa”. Touré is the UNODC programme co-ordinator for the Economic Community of West African States Regional Action Plan to address the growing problem of illicit drug trafficking, organised crime and drug abuse in West Africa.
While a portion of the meth produced in Nigeria is consumed locally, most is reportedly exported to South Africa where 1kg of meth sells for up to €10 000 (R163,000). It is also trafficked to South-East Asia, in particular Japan, where 1kg can reportedly fetch €130,000.
As in Mexico where syndicates use violence to control the drug market, confrontations between drug gangs in Nigeria have increased. In August 2017, gunmen attacked a church in Ozubulu in Anambra State while looking for a rival drug gang leader, killing 13 people. An investigation revealed that the fighting was between two gangs operating from South Africa.
According to Touré: “Nigeria has built up expertise in relation to the detection and dismantling of clandestine methamphetamine laboratories.” He said stricter control by the national authorities on precursor chemicals and other psychotropic substances was being implemented.
However, despite the great efforts the Nigerian authorities are making to contain illicit meth production, the illicit market of the drug is yet to be eradicated. The government should focus on effective regulation of the import of controlled precursors.
By Mouhamadou Kane
Daily Maverick
In late 2018, following the dismantling of a lab in Obinugwu village in south-east Nigeria, NDLEA Special Enforcement Team commander Sunday Zirangey reportedly said that meth was a serious threat and that Nigeria risked turning into a narco state.
Despite the acute health risks associated with its consumption – such as high blood pressure and cardiovascular-related illness – a growing number of young people in Nigeria reportedly take the drug. A 2018 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) report estimated that 89 000 Nigerians were using meth. Abimbola Adebakin, a leading Lagos-based pharmacist, told Enact that “the youth may be using drugs increasingly to cope with a depressed economic reality for them”.
“Furthermore, due to our weak pharmaceutical drug distribution system, the youth have a porous drug supply situation that lends itself to support such abuse and misuse, she said.
In 2016, the illicit market for meth took a new turn in Nigeria. Drug syndicates brought Latin American drug experts to Nigeria to help them set up large-scale meth labs, with similar characteristics to those found in Mexico. One industrial super lab was said to have the capacity to produce 4,000 kg of meth per week.
When the NDLEA raided the site in March 2016, they arrested four Mexicans and five Nigerians. The Mexicans were reportedly from Sinaloa State. Their arrest provided further evidence of a formal and successful alliance between Nigerian and Latin American cartels.
The growth of the illicit meth market in Nigeria has also been fuelled by the accessibility of precursor chemicals such as ephedrine, which is theoretically a controlled substance but is widely available in Nigeria.
In March 2019, the NDLEA seized 309 kg of ephedrine from members of a criminal network in Trans Ekulu Estate in Enugu and Festac Town in Lagos. According to a 2017 report by the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna, Nigerian criminal networks bring ephedrine in from countries in West Africa that import more than they need.
According to the UNODC’s Cheikh Touré, the “use and diversion of pre-precursors and other non-controlled chemicals signifies complex challenges in addressing clandestine meth manufacturing in Nigeria and West Africa”. Touré is the UNODC programme co-ordinator for the Economic Community of West African States Regional Action Plan to address the growing problem of illicit drug trafficking, organised crime and drug abuse in West Africa.
While a portion of the meth produced in Nigeria is consumed locally, most is reportedly exported to South Africa where 1kg of meth sells for up to €10 000 (R163,000). It is also trafficked to South-East Asia, in particular Japan, where 1kg can reportedly fetch €130,000.
As in Mexico where syndicates use violence to control the drug market, confrontations between drug gangs in Nigeria have increased. In August 2017, gunmen attacked a church in Ozubulu in Anambra State while looking for a rival drug gang leader, killing 13 people. An investigation revealed that the fighting was between two gangs operating from South Africa.
According to Touré: “Nigeria has built up expertise in relation to the detection and dismantling of clandestine methamphetamine laboratories.” He said stricter control by the national authorities on precursor chemicals and other psychotropic substances was being implemented.
However, despite the great efforts the Nigerian authorities are making to contain illicit meth production, the illicit market of the drug is yet to be eradicated. The government should focus on effective regulation of the import of controlled precursors.
By Mouhamadou Kane
Daily Maverick
Film industry in Nigeria draws global entertainment brands
“Oya!” shouts the director in Nigerian Pidgin English. Actors take their marks. Lighting blinks on. The film crew snaps into action after the order to hurry up.
It’s another day in Nollywood, the affectionate nickname for Nigeria’s film industry - the world’s second most prolific after India’s Bollywood, producing hundreds of films and TV episodes each month.
For decades it was a factory churning out visual pulp fiction destined for the market stalls of DVD pirates. But Nollywood is increasingly grabbing the attention - and financing - of global entertainment brands.
Some, like French group Vivendi’s Canal+, seek to harness Nigerian hustle and know-how to extend the lifespan of the traditional pay-TV model, which is bleeding customers in developed markets but still has a future in Africa.
Others, including South Africa’s MultiChoice, are using Nigeria as a testing ground for introducing streaming platforms in African markets with poor communications infrastructure and low income levels.
In both cases, it’s local production that’s benefiting.
“Ten years ago Nollywood was very different,” Mary Njoku, whose ROK studios was acquired by Canal+ in July, told Reuters as the film crew worked in an abandoned hotel in Nigeria’s megacity Lagos. “Today we shoot with better cameras... We do things differently.”
A room on the hotel’s top floor was standing in for a college dorm on “What Are Friends For?”, an ROK comedy series that will be among new shows aired by Canal+ in coming months.
The company first dipped its toe into Africa’s most populous country six years ago, buying up local films, dubbing them and airing them on a dedicated channel, Nollywood TV, to viewers in French-speaking Africa.
That success led to the creation of a second channel.
The deal with ROK secures a steady supply of new films and series as the firm eyes a further expansion of African content, said Fabrice Faux, Canal+ International’s chief content officer.
Since it was founded six years ago, ROK has produced more than 540 films and 25 series. Under the Canal+ deal, Njoku says it aims to increase production from next year to around 300 films and 20 series annually.
Canal+’s pivot to Africa - a golden opportunity for ROK - is a business necessity for the French company.
“It is one of the very rare pay-TV markets that is growing and is growing very fast,” Faux told Reuters. “When I joined Canal+ International back in 2014, we had half a million (African subscribers) and now we have 4 million.”
Compare that to mainland France where, as of last year, it had lost some 1.3 million individual subscribers since 2013.
Much of that decline arose from losing broadcasting rights to popular sporting events. But it also reflected stiff competition from streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon. However, Faux believes such rivals pose no threat in Africa due to a widespread lack of 4G coverage or fixed broadband internet on the continent.
To properly develop African markets, however, Canal+ must cater to their diverse audiences, Faux said.
Francophone Africa has no Nollywood equivalent. Producing shows there has been slow and expensive, as Canal+ has been forced to bring in film crews from Europe to shoot on location, Faux said. He now hopes Canal+ can use ROK to clone the Nollywood model.
“The best knowledge and expertise is there in Nigeria. So it is our intention to try to bring some producers, technicians, directors to French-speaking Africa, for us to try to develop new production methods,” Faux said.
TEMPORARY GLITCHES?
If Canal+ sees little threat from streaming services in Africa, MultiChoice - the first major entertainment group to realize Nollywood’s potential - is out to prove it wrong.
In its infancy in the 1990s, Nollywood churned out cheap films ranging from bawdy comedies to morality tales about witchcraft and infidelity.
Low on production quality but high on entertainment value, these movies quickly garnered a fanatical following across Africa and its diaspora. And in 2003, MultiChoice launched Africa Magic - a Nollywood channel that would grow into a subscription package on its DStv satellite network.
In July, Showmax, MultiChoice’s fledgling video-streaming service, launched in Nigeria.
“The Nollywood phenomenon makes it quite interesting from a content development point of view. You have a huge base of very loyal fans,” said Niclas Ekdahl, CEO of MultiChoice’s connected video division.
Showmax - also available in South Africa and Kenya - is not alone in Nigeria’s video-on-demand market.
U.S. streaming giant Netflix released “Lionheart”, its first original film produced in Nigeria, in January. It is also negotiating licence deals for Nigerian films such as “Chief Daddy”, a comedy that debuted on the platform in March.
But bringing streaming to African audiences won’t be easy. Expensive mobile data and low incomes make regular streaming unaffordable for many on the continent.
One gigabyte of data, enough to watch about three films, costs the equivalent of around $2.80 in Nigeria, while most people live on less than $2 a day.
The experience of Malaysian streaming platform iflix is a cautionary tale.
It launched in Nigeria in 2017, then expanded to Kenya, Ghana and Zimbabwe following a tie-up with Kwese TV, a subsidiary of Zimbabwe’s Econet Media Limited.
However, data discounts and a pay-as-you-go option were not enough to sustain the business. In December, iflix sold its Africa business to the Econet group, which shut down the streaming service last month.
Showmax’s Ekdahl remains undaunted, passing the challenges off as “temporary glitches”. The potential payoff - a largely untapped audience of 1 billion - is worth the effort of tailoring a business to African markets, he believes.
Showmax partnered with mobile phone operators Vodacom, MTN and Telkom in South Africa and Safaricom in Kenya to offer reduced data and subscription fees. It aims to do the same in Nigeria.
It is also experimenting with installing wireless internet in public transport, so viewers can download content during their daily commutes without incurring data costs.
The boom in interest in Nigeria’s film industry can only be a good thing, says Joshua Richard, a barrel-chested actor who plays a fanatically religious student on “What Are Friends For?”
Foreign investment will, he hopes, help Nollywood shake off a reputation for shoddy camerawork and muffled sound, while also leading to greater artistic recognition overseas.
“It exposes African actors to a bigger audience,” he said. “We have lots of good content in Nollywood, but it doesn’t get the credit it deserves.”
By Alexis Akwagyiram
Reuters
Related stories: Nollywood: most prolific movie machine
It’s another day in Nollywood, the affectionate nickname for Nigeria’s film industry - the world’s second most prolific after India’s Bollywood, producing hundreds of films and TV episodes each month.
For decades it was a factory churning out visual pulp fiction destined for the market stalls of DVD pirates. But Nollywood is increasingly grabbing the attention - and financing - of global entertainment brands.
Some, like French group Vivendi’s Canal+, seek to harness Nigerian hustle and know-how to extend the lifespan of the traditional pay-TV model, which is bleeding customers in developed markets but still has a future in Africa.
Others, including South Africa’s MultiChoice, are using Nigeria as a testing ground for introducing streaming platforms in African markets with poor communications infrastructure and low income levels.
In both cases, it’s local production that’s benefiting.
“Ten years ago Nollywood was very different,” Mary Njoku, whose ROK studios was acquired by Canal+ in July, told Reuters as the film crew worked in an abandoned hotel in Nigeria’s megacity Lagos. “Today we shoot with better cameras... We do things differently.”
A room on the hotel’s top floor was standing in for a college dorm on “What Are Friends For?”, an ROK comedy series that will be among new shows aired by Canal+ in coming months.
The company first dipped its toe into Africa’s most populous country six years ago, buying up local films, dubbing them and airing them on a dedicated channel, Nollywood TV, to viewers in French-speaking Africa.
That success led to the creation of a second channel.
The deal with ROK secures a steady supply of new films and series as the firm eyes a further expansion of African content, said Fabrice Faux, Canal+ International’s chief content officer.
Since it was founded six years ago, ROK has produced more than 540 films and 25 series. Under the Canal+ deal, Njoku says it aims to increase production from next year to around 300 films and 20 series annually.
Canal+’s pivot to Africa - a golden opportunity for ROK - is a business necessity for the French company.
“It is one of the very rare pay-TV markets that is growing and is growing very fast,” Faux told Reuters. “When I joined Canal+ International back in 2014, we had half a million (African subscribers) and now we have 4 million.”
Compare that to mainland France where, as of last year, it had lost some 1.3 million individual subscribers since 2013.
Much of that decline arose from losing broadcasting rights to popular sporting events. But it also reflected stiff competition from streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon. However, Faux believes such rivals pose no threat in Africa due to a widespread lack of 4G coverage or fixed broadband internet on the continent.
To properly develop African markets, however, Canal+ must cater to their diverse audiences, Faux said.
Francophone Africa has no Nollywood equivalent. Producing shows there has been slow and expensive, as Canal+ has been forced to bring in film crews from Europe to shoot on location, Faux said. He now hopes Canal+ can use ROK to clone the Nollywood model.
“The best knowledge and expertise is there in Nigeria. So it is our intention to try to bring some producers, technicians, directors to French-speaking Africa, for us to try to develop new production methods,” Faux said.
TEMPORARY GLITCHES?
If Canal+ sees little threat from streaming services in Africa, MultiChoice - the first major entertainment group to realize Nollywood’s potential - is out to prove it wrong.
In its infancy in the 1990s, Nollywood churned out cheap films ranging from bawdy comedies to morality tales about witchcraft and infidelity.
Low on production quality but high on entertainment value, these movies quickly garnered a fanatical following across Africa and its diaspora. And in 2003, MultiChoice launched Africa Magic - a Nollywood channel that would grow into a subscription package on its DStv satellite network.
In July, Showmax, MultiChoice’s fledgling video-streaming service, launched in Nigeria.
“The Nollywood phenomenon makes it quite interesting from a content development point of view. You have a huge base of very loyal fans,” said Niclas Ekdahl, CEO of MultiChoice’s connected video division.
Showmax - also available in South Africa and Kenya - is not alone in Nigeria’s video-on-demand market.
U.S. streaming giant Netflix released “Lionheart”, its first original film produced in Nigeria, in January. It is also negotiating licence deals for Nigerian films such as “Chief Daddy”, a comedy that debuted on the platform in March.
But bringing streaming to African audiences won’t be easy. Expensive mobile data and low incomes make regular streaming unaffordable for many on the continent.
One gigabyte of data, enough to watch about three films, costs the equivalent of around $2.80 in Nigeria, while most people live on less than $2 a day.
The experience of Malaysian streaming platform iflix is a cautionary tale.
It launched in Nigeria in 2017, then expanded to Kenya, Ghana and Zimbabwe following a tie-up with Kwese TV, a subsidiary of Zimbabwe’s Econet Media Limited.
However, data discounts and a pay-as-you-go option were not enough to sustain the business. In December, iflix sold its Africa business to the Econet group, which shut down the streaming service last month.
Showmax’s Ekdahl remains undaunted, passing the challenges off as “temporary glitches”. The potential payoff - a largely untapped audience of 1 billion - is worth the effort of tailoring a business to African markets, he believes.
Showmax partnered with mobile phone operators Vodacom, MTN and Telkom in South Africa and Safaricom in Kenya to offer reduced data and subscription fees. It aims to do the same in Nigeria.
It is also experimenting with installing wireless internet in public transport, so viewers can download content during their daily commutes without incurring data costs.
The boom in interest in Nigeria’s film industry can only be a good thing, says Joshua Richard, a barrel-chested actor who plays a fanatically religious student on “What Are Friends For?”
Foreign investment will, he hopes, help Nollywood shake off a reputation for shoddy camerawork and muffled sound, while also leading to greater artistic recognition overseas.
“It exposes African actors to a bigger audience,” he said. “We have lots of good content in Nollywood, but it doesn’t get the credit it deserves.”
By Alexis Akwagyiram
Reuters
Related stories: Nollywood: most prolific movie machine
Monday, September 9, 2019
Video - Nigeria works to end violence in 'Wild West'
After years of military action in north-west Nigeria, the government is choosing dialogue to end killings and kidnapping mainly by nomadic cattle herders. Government officials say they want to tackle the injustices that fueled the crisis in the first place.
Nigeria to repatriate 600 Nigerians from South Africa due to xenophobic violence
Nigeria will repatriate about 600 citizens from South Africa this week following a wave of xenophobic violence that caused tensions between the countries, a Nigerian diplomat said Monday.
South Africa's financial capital Johannesburg and surrounding areas were rocked by a surge of deadly attacks against foreigners this week, many directed against Nigerian-owned businesses and properties.
"They are about 600 now" due to be flown back, Godwin Adamu, Nigerian Consul General in Johannesburg, told AFP.
Nigerian airline "Air Peace is beginning the airlift by Wednesday, the first flight with 320 Nigerians," he said. "We will have another one immediately after that."
At least 12 people were killed in the violence and hundreds of shops destroyed.
Foreign workers are often victims of anti-immigrant sentiment in South Africa -- the continent's second biggest economy after Nigeria -- where they compete against locals for jobs, particularly in low-skilled industries.
AFP
South Africa's financial capital Johannesburg and surrounding areas were rocked by a surge of deadly attacks against foreigners this week, many directed against Nigerian-owned businesses and properties.
"They are about 600 now" due to be flown back, Godwin Adamu, Nigerian Consul General in Johannesburg, told AFP.
Nigerian airline "Air Peace is beginning the airlift by Wednesday, the first flight with 320 Nigerians," he said. "We will have another one immediately after that."
At least 12 people were killed in the violence and hundreds of shops destroyed.
Foreign workers are often victims of anti-immigrant sentiment in South Africa -- the continent's second biggest economy after Nigeria -- where they compete against locals for jobs, particularly in low-skilled industries.
AFP
Friday, September 6, 2019
Video - Joe Rogan and Zuby talk about scammers from Nigeria
Joe Rogan and Zuby talk about scammers from Nigeria.
Related stories: Global reputation of Nigeria dented by FBI fraud bust
Video - Hacker attempts to help victim of Nigerian 419 scam recover $400,000
FBI charges 80 people connected to Nigerian romance scams
Medical doctor turned hacker says hacking into Nigerian banks is very easy
Nigerians beating bitcoin scams
Video - Nigeria struggling to diversify beyond dependence on crude oil
The continent's largest economy, Nigeria is still struggling to diversify beyond a dependence on crude oil earnings. In the textile industry for instance, the country relies heavily on imported fabrics, since the local supply is insufficient.
Video - Nigeria Police battle angry rioters in Abuja demonstrating against violence
Police in Nigeria's capital - Abuja are battling angry youths - protesting against Xenophobic attacks in South Africa. The youths tried to gain access into South African owned mall - Shoprite during the fracas. This comes as South African Ambassador to Nigeria - Bobby Monroe initiated peace talks with the nations' student and youth Groups.
Video - South Africa closes embassy in Nigeria due to recent xenophobic violence
South Africa has temporarily closed its diplomatic missions in Nigeria following reprisal attacks by Nigerians triggered by xenophobic violence in South Africa.
Between Sunday and Wednesday, mobs looted and destroyed shops, many of them foreign-owned, in South Africa's commercial hub, Johannesburg.
Nigeria's government has been outspoken in its condemnation of the violence.
Police say the unrest has subsided and more than 420 arrests have been made.
South Africa's Foreign Minister, Naledi Pandor, called the violence an embarrassment for her country.
"Our government regrets all violence against foreign-owned stores or Africans from other countries who are resident in South Africa," she was quoted as saying by national broadcaster SABC.
She ordered the closure of the country's high commission in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, and its mission in Lagos, following threats made to the diplomatic staff.
Have any Nigerians been killed?
Videos and images that have been shared on social media purporting to show Nigerians being attacked and killed have inflamed tensions.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, South African-owned businesses were targeted by protesters in several Nigerian cities, and the looters said the attacks were reprisals for the killing of Nigerians in South Africa. South African telecoms giant MTN closed its shops as a precaution.
In response to the violence in Johannesburg, two of Nigeria's top musicians, Burna Boy And Tiwa Savage, announced they were boycotting South Africa.
At least 10 people have been killed in the trouble in South Africa, including two foreign nationals, the South African government says, but none of the victims have been identified as Nigerian.
On Wednesday, Nigerian Foreign Minister Geoffrey Onyeama told journalists: "There are a lot of stories going around of Nigerians being killed, jumping off buildings and being burnt. This is not the case."
While the government believes Nigerian businesses have been targeted in South Africa, he added, it has no evidence that Nigerians have died.
Mr Onyeama also urged people to stop attacking South African businesses in Nigeria, saying that President Muhammadu Buhari was "particularly distraught at the acts of vandalism".
Why has the Nigerian government been so outspoken?
Despite disputing the accounts of Nigerians dying in South Africa, the Nigerian government has been forceful in its condemnation of events there.
On Wednesday, it announced it was boycotting the World Economic Forum on Africa that is currently taking place in Cape Town in protest at the violence.
"The government believes that we have to take the moral high ground on this matter," Mr Onyeama said.
The president has also sent an envoy to South Africa to "express Nigeria's displeasure over the treatment of her citizens".
Nigerians often criticise the authorities for being slow to respond to domestic crises and the government is keen to be seen to be taking action over attacks in South Africa, said the BBC's Nigeria correspondent, Mayeni Jones.
What about reaction elsewhere in Africa?
On Thursday, demonstrators in the Democratic Republic of Congo's second city, Lubumbashi, broke the windows of South Africa's consulate, AFP news agency reports.
There was also a small demonstration outside the South African embassy in the capital, Kinshasa.
Air Tanzania, the country's national carrier, has suspended flights to Johannesburg because of the violence, Transport Minister Isack Kamwelwe said.
Madagascar's football federation has announced that it will not be sending a team to play South Africa in a friendly on Saturday because of security concerns.
The fixture against Madagascar was announced after Zambia pulled out of the match earlier this week over the xenophobic violence.
On Wednesday, students in the Zambian capital, Lusaka, forced the closure of several South African-owned shopping malls.
A group also marched on the South African high commission in the city and defaced the sign outside the compound.
"We are tired of being beaten every day. We're all Africa. Why must we be afraid to go to South Africa?... We want the ambassador to address us," one protester told Reuters news agency.
On Tuesday, the African Union (AU) issued a statement condemning the "despicable acts" of violence in South Africa "in the strongest terms".
What sparked the looting in South Africa?
The attacks on foreign-owned shops began after South African lorry drivers started a nationwide strike to protest against the employment of foreign drivers. They blocked roads and torched foreign-driven vehicles mainly in the coastal KwaZulu-Natal province.
It comes at a time of high unemployment and some South Africans blame foreigners for taking their jobs.
The unemployment rate in South Africa is nearly 28%, the highest since the labour force survey was introduced 11 years ago.
The government minister responsible for small business development told BBC Newsday the rioters "feel there are other Africans coming into the country and they feel these Africans are taking our jobs".
Lindiwe Zulu said the problems were caused by the movement of people across Africa.
"We are facing a challenge that is beyond South Africa as a country. This is an African problem," she said.
Some foreigners are also accused of being involved in pushing illegal drugs.
A taxi driver was allegedly shot dead in Pretoria last week when he confronted foreign nationals thought to be selling drugs to young people, reports South Africa's News 24.
BBC
Thursday, September 5, 2019
Video - Real Estate event in Lagos focuses on bridging investment gaps in the market
An estimated 2000 delegates from across Africa gathered in Nigeria's commercial capital Lagos for the 2nd edition of The African Real Estate Conference. The forum aims to bridge investment gaps and uphold standards in Africa's Real Estate market.
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