Boko Haram releases 833 children

A militia group fighting against the Islamist militant group Boko Haram in northeast Nigeria has released 833 children from its own ranks, some as young as 11, the U.N. children’s agency UNICEF said on Friday.

UNICEF spokesman Christophe Boulierac said the Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF) was formed in 2013 by vigilante groups in Borno state to fight Boko Haram which itself gained international notoriety for kidnapping schoolgirls in the town of Chibok.

The CJTF signed an action plan in September 2017 to end child recruitment, and the release of the children, 40 percent of whom were 15 or younger, was its first formal release.

“This is a significant milestone in ending the recruitment and use of children, but many more children remain in the ranks of other armed groups in either combat or support roles,” UNICEF Nigeria Deputy Representative Pernille Ironside said in a statement.

The released children were among 1,175 boys and 294 girls who had been identified as being associated with the CJTF in the city of Maiduguri, UNICEF said, although the total has yet to be verified and could include another 2,200 or more children.

It said that it had supported the social and economic reintegration of more than 8,700 children released from armed groups since 2017, helping trace their families, returning them to their communities and offering them psycho-social support, education, vocational training and informal apprenticeships.

Boulierac said that the CJTF included children who were “pursuing military objectives” but also lots in support roles, so their reintegration into society might be easier than those released from an armed group like Boko Haram.

That Islamist group has kidnapped thousands since it began an insurgency in 2009 aimed at creating an Islamic state in the northeast.

Nigeria’s government has said since December 2015 that Boko Haram has been “technically defeated”, 20 months after the kidnap of the 270 Chibok girls.

Yet attacks continue in the northeast, while Islamic State West Africa, which splintered off from Boko Haram in 2016, holds territory around Lake Chad.

Reuters

Video - Floods in Nigeria ruin crops for 100,000 farmers

Nigeria’s agriculture minister is warning there could be a shortage of rice, the country’s staple food.

The warning came after devastating floods hit large parts of the country, destroying crops just as farmers were getting ready for harvest.

Al Jazeera's Ahmed Idris reports from some of the affected areas.

Former VP Abubakar to run against Buhari in presidential election

Nigeria's main opposition has chosen former Vice President Atiku Abubakar as its candidate for the 2019 elections as it seeks to remove President Muhammadu Buhari.

The nomination of Abubakar, 71, by the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), sets the stage for what is expected to be a fiercely contested poll in Africa's largest economy.

Abubakar hopes to replicate Buhari’s 2015 feat, when the latter became the first opposition candidate in Nigerian history to defeat a sitting president.

Abubakar, who had been the country’s vice president between 1999 and 2007, left the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) party in November and re-joined the PDP.

Buhari, 75, has already been selected by the ruling party as its candidate.

Next year's presidential race appears to have tightened in recent months, with the APC hit by a wave of defections over Buhari's leadership style.

Abubakar comes from the Muslim-majority north and his nomination follows an unwritten rule in Nigeria that the presidency should alternate every two terms between a candidate from the north and south.
Fall in popularity

In 2015, Buhari's victory over former President Goodluck Jonathan was marked by a wave of optimism, which seems to be in decline now.

In May, his approval rating plummeted to 41 percent from a peak of 80 percent in October 2015, according to NOIPolls, a Nigerian polling service.

There have also been concerns about his fragile health, his economic policies, the extent of his claims about better security, as well as the targets of his campaign against corruption.

However, Niyi Akinsiju, coordinator of Buhari Media Organisation, told Al Jazeera that Buhari's chances of re-election are "very high".

"He has developed a trusting relationship with the people who have confidence in his fidelity and integrity in the exercise of power," he said.

The PDP is hoping Abubakar will be able to leverage Buhari’s dwindling fortunes.

"Atiku Abubakar is seen by a majority of Nigerians as the candidate with the magic solution to the crisis plaguing our nation," PDP spokesman Kola Ologbodiyan told Al Jazeera.

"He has a respectable pedigree within the political class across party leanings," he said.

The country's electoral commission has cleared 19 candidates to challenge Buhari in the February election.

Oby Ezekwesili, 55, a two-time minister and former vice president for Africa at the World Bank, is among other standout candidates.

She is the cofounder of the #BringBackOurGirls group to raise awareness about more than 200 schoolgirls kidnapped by armed group Boko Haram in 2014.

"Governance keeps worsening. So we the citizens have decided to get into the political arena to make things right," Ezekwesili said.

Kingsley Moghalu, former UN official and deputy governor of Nigeria's central bank, is also in the race.

An optimistic Moghalu even points to recent history for an "upset victory" for a non-mainstream candidate. "It happened with Trump. It happened with Macron," he said.

Hamza al-Mustapha, controversial security chief of the country's former military ruler, Sani Abacha, is also in the race. He has never held any political position.

In July, 39 registered political fronts, including the PDP and a splinter group from within the ruling party, signed an agreement to form the Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP).

The splinter group of disaffected APC members led by Buhari's former ally, Buba Galadima, criticised the president's tenure as "a monumental disaster".

Ahead of his election in 2015, Buhari promised to tackle Boko Haram as well as fight corruption, revive the economy and provide jobs.

"He has stabilised the economy, reduced the Boko Haram insurgency from an invading army to opportunistic terrorists. His fight against corruption has reduced acts of brazen corruption and bureaucratic impunity," Akinsiju said.

Nigeria, Africa's top oil producer and the continent’s biggest economy, entered its first recession in 25 years in 2016, mainly caused by lower oil prices and attacks in the Niger Delta crude production region.

It emerged from recession in early 2017, but economists say growth remains sluggish and inflation has remained high.

Buhari’s supporters claim he has stabilised the economy.

"The economy has witnessed an unprecedented, consistent decline in inflation rate over an 18-month period reducing from a high of 18.7 percent in January 2017 to 11.14 percent in July 2018," Akinsiju said.

But the opposition is confident the economic situation will dent Buhari’s popularity.

"Atiku understands this nation and its economy. He is a personality that can take charge of his environment and comes up with decisions that affect the people positively," Ologbodiyan said.

Al Jazeera

Oldest prisoner in Nigeria on death-row seeking pardon

Death-row inmate Celestine Egbunuche has been dubbed Nigeria's "oldest prisoner" amid a campaign calling for his release.

He is 100 years old and has spent 18 years in jail after being found guilty of organising a murder.

Small and slightly hunched over, he looks wistfully into space as he sits on a tightly packed bench inside a stuffy prison visitor's room.

Dressed in a white T-shirt, shorts and flip-flops, he lifts his head slowly - his way of acknowledging our presence.

But otherwise he remains quiet during our visit - in stark contrast to the rest of the room that is filled with loud chatter at Enugu Maximum Security Prison in south-east Nigeria.

His son Paul Egbunuche, 41, sits protectively close to him - and does the talking. He is in jail on the same murder charge.

They were both accused of hiring people to kidnap and kill a man over an alleged land dispute in Imo state.

Paul maintains their innocence. They were detained in June 2000 and eventually convicted and sentenced to death in 2014.

It has not been possible to contact the family of the man who was killed - even the Nigeria prison service has been unable to find them.

'Confused and childlike'

As prison officials look on, he tells me that his father isn't really able to talk much any more and is no longer aware of his surroundings.

"When you ask him something, he says something else. The doctor told me that it is his age, he has become like a little pikin [child].

"There are some times when he will ask me: 'These people here [inmates], what are they doing here?'"

Paul says he rarely leaves his father's side now; he has been his primary carer since his health began to deteriorate in prison.

These health problems include diabetes and failing eyesight - and Paul uses what he can to manage them.

"The only thing I'm using to manage him is food, unripe plantain, and they [officials] give him some drugs."

Birthday photo

Father and son share a cell with other death-row prisoners, who are separated from the general population.

"When I wake up in the morning, I will boil water and bath him," Paul says. "I'll change his clothes then prepare food for him. If they open up [the cell] I'll take him out so the sun will touch him.

"I'm always close to him, discussing with him and playing with him."

Paul says the other inmates sometimes help him care for his father and that many of them want his father to be released.

It was after his father's 100th birthday on 4 August that events were set in motion that may lead to his release.

A photo of Paul and a frail looking Egbunuche went viral in August after a local paper did a story about him turning 100 in jail. It sparked a debate about the length of time Nigerians spend on death row and the place of capital punishment altogether.

The latest figures from the Nigerian Prisons Service show that more than 2,000 people are on death row in Nigeria, many of whom spend years waiting to be executed.

The death sentence is not commonly carried out in Nigeria. Between 2007 and 2017, there were seven executions - the last one taking place in 2016, Amnesty International reports.

Poverty and punishment

However, the death penalty is still meted out by judges for offences like treason, kidnapping and armed robbery.

"You have people who have spent 30 years on death row, it's common," says Pamela Okoroigwe, a lawyer for the Legal Defence and Assistance Project (LEDAP).

"Governors are reluctant to sign [death warrants] and they're not willing to grant pardons - that's why we have a high number of death-row inmates."

Ms Okoroigwe says death row is a "punishment for the poor" and one that a growing number of Nigerians want abolished.

"Have you ever seen a rich man on death row?" she asks.

"How many people can afford to get a lawyer to represent them in court? A rich man who ended up in court can afford to get the best and he'll be free."

This sentiment is shared by Franklin Ezeona, president of the Global Society for Anti-Corruption (GSAC), the non-governmental organisation that brought Egbunuche's case to the public and has been petitioning for his pardon.

"If the man was the father of a governor or a minister, I don't think he would still be in prison," Mr Ezeona says.

"Poverty in most of African countries hinders justice."

He says it is unreasonable to keep people waiting for years on death row as "the trauma and the torture is too much".

'Everyone deserves a second chance'

Mr Ezeona says that he hopes that Egbunuche's case will prompt the government to review other cases and shine a light on the justice system as a whole.

"It will be good for the correctional system. It will show that with good behaviour, the government can give you a second chance."

"Everyone deserves a second chance."

And Egbunuche may get a second chance as he has been recommended for a pardon by Imo state's attorney general, Miletus Nlemedim.

It is now awaiting approval from Governor Rochas Okorocha.

Mr Nlemedim says numerous factors are taken into consideration when an inmate is recommended for pardon - age, time served and the approval of the prison staff.

The family of the victim has not been consulted about a possible release.

"What we do as a government is to try to remove ourselves from sentiment," he says.

According to Mr Nlemedim, the state's Ministry of Happiness offers the chance for reconciliation after a prisoner is released.

In this case Mr Ezeona says it may be unlikely to happen given the length of time that has passed and poor record-keeping.

Nonetheless, he is still confident Celestine Egbunuche will be pardoned.

"If we can't pardon a centenarian, who can we pardon?" he says.

Paul too is confident that his father will be pardoned - and is hopeful that he too will get a reprieve so he can care for him.

"It's good for him to be released. So he will die peacefully in his house rather than in prison," he says.

BBC

Africa's richest man Aliko Dangote is building the world's largest refinery in Nigeria

On any given weekday, commuters in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital, are snarled in traffic for hours.

Container trucks and tankers take up several lanes of traffic on the major thoroughfares close to the city’s ports. Often these trucks have been parked on the highways overnight.

Cars and minivans snake along the remaining single lane, sharing it with pedestrians fighting off early-morning road rage as they slowly make their way from one end of the city to another. There is a palpable fear of accidents, or a spill. Much of Lagos is an environmental disaster waiting to happen.

It is here in this vibrant metropolis of 21 million people that Africa’s richest person, Aliko Dangote, is undertaking his most audacious gamble yet. Mr. Dangote is building a $12 billion oil refinery on 6,180 acres of swampland that, if successful,— could transform Nigeria’s corrupt and underperforming petroleum industry. It is an entrenched system that some say has contributed to millions languishing in poverty and bled the “giant of Africa’’ for decades.

Planned as the world’s largest refinery, Mr. Dangote’s project is set in a free-trade zone between the Atlantic Ocean and the Lekki Lagoon, an hour outside the city center. The site employs thousands, and upon completion — Mr. Dangote says in 2020; some analysts suggest more likely in 2022 — should process 650,000 barrels of crude oil daily.

That’s enough oil to supply gasoline and kerosene to all 190 million Nigerians and still have plenty to export. By the end of this year, the facility is expected to churn out three million tons of fertilizer. The production of diesel, aviation fuel and plastics will then follow.

“The construction site is already a huge beehive of activities, with workers, local and foreign, hard at work. It is going to be the largest manufacturing plant of any sort in Lagos,” said Kayode Ogunbunmi, the publisher of City Voice, a Lagos daily newspaper and lifelong Lagos resident.

Indeed, some 7,000 employees are working around the clock on the site, many arriving by private ferry from the city center. Another 900 Nigerian engineers and technicians are being trained abroad for jobs at the refinery. Mr. Dangote, whose net worth is estimated at $11.2 billion, has had to build a port, jetty and roads to accommodate this project, along with new energy plants to power it all.

Nigeria’s government, despite being a longtime crude oil exporter, has four underperforming and frequently broken down refineries with a combined capacity of 445,000 barrels daily. Those refineries — two in the oil hub of Port Harcourt, one in Warri in the Niger Delta, and the other in the northern city of Kaduna — are all operating at less than 50 percent of capacity.

Which means that even though Nigeria is Africa’s largest oil producer, petroleum for everyday use must be imported. This has spawned fuel importers and diesel traders who have grown extremely wealthy. Nigeria’s government subsidizes fuel imports to keep pump prices low, and this has contributed to Nigeria’s well-documented culture of petroleum industry corruption.

“The failure to produce refined products over the last 25 years has created a huge architecture of graft and corruption around everything,” said Antony Goldman, the co-founder of the London-based Nigeria specialists ProMedia Consulting.

Mr. Goldman does political risk analysis in West Africa and has been working in and out of Nigeria for two decades. Corruption, he explained, stems from illegal refineries and the local criminal network that helps transport illegal crude out of the country. Both elements, he said, have not been sufficiently challenged by the government or law enforcement agencies, which has further contributed to Nigeria’s entrenched oil industry corruption.

“A refinery that actually works and can meet Nigeria’s refined product requirement? It’s a game changer,” Mr. Goldman added. But change, no matter how positive, is potentially destabilizing. “These are not people who relinquish things without a fight,” Mr. Goldman said of Nigeria’s fuel import merchants.

When Mr. Dangote initially unveiled his refinery plans in 2016, he said its aim was to challenge the status quo, which had seen the government spend about $5.8 billion to import petroleum products over the past year.

“This refinery is attacking the entire system,” he said. “You export jobs and create poverty here, so that’s what we are stopping,” he told reporters at the time.

Despite creating thousands of jobs, Mr. Dangote’s refinery hasn’t been universally applauded in Nigeria. The biggest issue is its Lagos location: The refinery is being built hundreds of miles from the impoverished Niger Delta, where the bulk of Nigeria’s oil is extracted.

Two undersea pipelines are under construction in the Delta and will carry petroleum about 340 miles to the refinery in Lagos.

The pipelines will be costly; but also far harder to sabotage than conventional aboveground systems. And security is key in the Delta region, where local rebel groups like the Delta Avengers have kidnapped foreign oil workers and blown up pipelines to protest regional pollution and poverty.

Amid Nigeria’s complex regional tensions, Mr. Dangote — a northerner by birth and Lagosian by decades of residence — is the one person, industry experts say, who could achieve a measure of détente in the region.

Yet critics — and Mr. Dangote has many — worry that his new refinery will allow him to essentially take over the Nigeria’s oil and gas industry. Why would a nation leave an entire industry in the hands of one company? they ask.

The “monopoly” question has swirled around Mr. Dangote for decades. Twice divorced and currently (and vocally) looking for a third wife, Mr. Dangote made his initial fortune operating near-monopolies in cement, flour and commodities across Nigeria, where regulatory oversight is relatively lax. Mr. Dangote’s companies, including pasta producers and property management, are found across Africa.

A decade ago, Mr. Dangote and other private investors tried and failed to buy the government-owned refineries. He was unavailable for comment, but previously told Reuters he does not apologize for his expansionist desires. “If you don’t have ambition,” he said, “you shouldn’t be alive.”

And for some in a tough business environment like Nigeria, a well-run monopoly is better than the current situation, where getting fuel remains an uncertainty. Indeed, despite oligarchy concerns, Mr. Goldman says he believes that Mr. Dangote’s past success actually bodes well for the refinery and Nigeria. “He has a record of success and delivery, and he doesn’t make mistakes on things like this,” Mr. Goldman said.

And Nigerians are tired of power cuts and overpriced gasoline.

“Most Nigerians see Aliko as a doer,” Mr. Ogunbunmi, the publisher, said. “Many quietly hope the refinery will help reduce uncertainties. Gasoline will be available, and possibly power.”

Beyond solidifying his own legacy, Mr. Dangote hopes his refinery will help diversify Nigeria’s economy while reducing its dependence on imported oil.

“We have other opportunities,” he said at the plant’s unveiling. “Agriculture is there. Petrochemicals are there, Nigeria has more arable land than China. If we finish our gas pipeline, it can generate 12,000 megahertz of power. That’s huge. That’s more than what we are looking for in Nigeria and we can supply the rest of West Africa.”

As his refinery nears completion, Mr. Dangote says he will soon focus on his next dream, owning Britain’s Arsenal football team. “Once I have finished with that headache, I will take on football,” he said. “I love Arsenal, and I will definitely go for it.”

New York Times