At least 59 people have been killed in a suspected jihadist attack in north-eastern Nigeria.
Gunmen entered a remote village in the Gubio district of Borno state on Tuesday afternoon, killing dozens.
The village was also razed, in what is believed to have been a reprisal attack, according to local reports.
No group has yet claimed the attack. The AFP news agency said that 59 bodies had been recovered, while Reuters reported that 69 people were killed.
Reuters reported that the militants suspected villagers of sharing information about their movements to security forces, while AFP said jihadist fighters had been killed by locals trying to protect livestock.
While it is unclear who carried out the attack, both the jihadist group Boko Haram and an offshoot which fights under the banner of the Islamic State group have carried out deadly attacks in the north-east of Nigeria.
Boko Haram, which sparked global outrage in 2014 when they abducted more than 270 schoolgirls in Chibok in Borno state, is also active in neighbouring Chad, Niger and Cameroon.
In March, its militants ambushed and killed at least 47 Nigerian soldiers in the country's north east, before killing almost 100 soldiers in Chad the following day.
The group's decade-long insurgency has left thousands dead and displaced many more.
BBC
Wednesday, June 10, 2020
Nigeria to cut healthcare spending by 40% despite coronavirus cases climbing
Plans by Nigeria’s government to cut healthcare spending risk undermining the country’s coronavirus response and severely impacting already strained services, health and transparency groups have warned.
Funding for local, primary healthcare services will be cut by more than 40% this year in a revised budget expected to be passed into law in the coming weeks.
The proposed cuts could affect immunisations, childcare, maternal healthcare and family planning services.
Nigeria currently spends less than 5% of its federal budget on health. Dwindling oil sales, the crash in global oil prices and the impact of the coronavirus pandemic are understood to be the reason for the cuts.
According to Prof Innocent Ujah, the head of the Nigerian medical association, the proposed cuts have come just as more investment in health is needed.
“Our budget for health is unacceptably low, under 5%. With the Covid-19 pandemic, it becomes even more serious,” he said. “It will have an impact on our response to the virus.”
Ujah said he was shocked at the announcement of the cuts, as it had been assumed health budgets would be ringfenced during the pandemic.
Fuelling criticisms of the healthcare cuts has been the 37bn naira (£75m) set aside for renovations to Nigeria’s National Assembly buildings.
“Whatever renovations they want to do in the National Assembly should be suspended,” Ujah said. “This is a global emergency.”
The legislative body is heavily criticised in Nigeria for the lack of transparency in government spending and for the high salaries of lawmakers.
Oluseun Onigbinde, the director of BudgIT, an organisation which tracks government spending, said that the budget cuts were not distributed fairly.
“The National Assembly budget was cut 10%, but the severe cuts were made to education and healthcare,” he said.
“It’s a bit shameful that Nigeria’s allocation for health and education has not gone above 5% of the total budget provision in the last five years. The government has really underinvested in healthcare.”
Nigerian authorities took early steps to try to contain the outbreak of Covid-19. But cases are steadily rising, doubling in the past three weeks to 12,000 infections.
A number of challenges have undermined its test and trace strategy, including too few test kits. Just 80,000 tests have been administered, far lower than the country’s health officials want.
The Nigerian Centre for Disease Control has said 75% of infections are occurring in communities without an identifiable trace.
Adding to the challenges are issues with morale among some health staff.
Fifty doctors and nurses at a key Covid-19 response centre in Lagos University teaching hospital say they have not been paid the allowances promised to workers caring for coronavirus cases since April. The allowances are paid on top of their usual salaries.
According to staff who spoke on condition of anonymity, the delay in receiving allowances was making it difficult to recruit health professionals to fight the virus.
“We were assured payments for the Covid response. We started in April, but we’re in the third month and we haven’t been compensated,” said one member of staff.
Many had not seen their families in three months to prevent spreading the virus, and were furious that their payments are not being prioritised.
“We’ve put our lives on the line here, now for us not to be paid is inhumane,” the health worker said.
Government officials said they are working to address the payment delays.
“They have assured us they are working on this but such issues are causing much disillusionment,” said Ujah. “No matter what, in a healthcare emergency, motivation is a very important component.”
The Guardian
Funding for local, primary healthcare services will be cut by more than 40% this year in a revised budget expected to be passed into law in the coming weeks.
The proposed cuts could affect immunisations, childcare, maternal healthcare and family planning services.
Nigeria currently spends less than 5% of its federal budget on health. Dwindling oil sales, the crash in global oil prices and the impact of the coronavirus pandemic are understood to be the reason for the cuts.
According to Prof Innocent Ujah, the head of the Nigerian medical association, the proposed cuts have come just as more investment in health is needed.
“Our budget for health is unacceptably low, under 5%. With the Covid-19 pandemic, it becomes even more serious,” he said. “It will have an impact on our response to the virus.”
Ujah said he was shocked at the announcement of the cuts, as it had been assumed health budgets would be ringfenced during the pandemic.
Fuelling criticisms of the healthcare cuts has been the 37bn naira (£75m) set aside for renovations to Nigeria’s National Assembly buildings.
“Whatever renovations they want to do in the National Assembly should be suspended,” Ujah said. “This is a global emergency.”
The legislative body is heavily criticised in Nigeria for the lack of transparency in government spending and for the high salaries of lawmakers.
Oluseun Onigbinde, the director of BudgIT, an organisation which tracks government spending, said that the budget cuts were not distributed fairly.
“The National Assembly budget was cut 10%, but the severe cuts were made to education and healthcare,” he said.
“It’s a bit shameful that Nigeria’s allocation for health and education has not gone above 5% of the total budget provision in the last five years. The government has really underinvested in healthcare.”
Nigerian authorities took early steps to try to contain the outbreak of Covid-19. But cases are steadily rising, doubling in the past three weeks to 12,000 infections.
A number of challenges have undermined its test and trace strategy, including too few test kits. Just 80,000 tests have been administered, far lower than the country’s health officials want.
The Nigerian Centre for Disease Control has said 75% of infections are occurring in communities without an identifiable trace.
Adding to the challenges are issues with morale among some health staff.
Fifty doctors and nurses at a key Covid-19 response centre in Lagos University teaching hospital say they have not been paid the allowances promised to workers caring for coronavirus cases since April. The allowances are paid on top of their usual salaries.
According to staff who spoke on condition of anonymity, the delay in receiving allowances was making it difficult to recruit health professionals to fight the virus.
“We were assured payments for the Covid response. We started in April, but we’re in the third month and we haven’t been compensated,” said one member of staff.
Many had not seen their families in three months to prevent spreading the virus, and were furious that their payments are not being prioritised.
“We’ve put our lives on the line here, now for us not to be paid is inhumane,” the health worker said.
Government officials said they are working to address the payment delays.
“They have assured us they are working on this but such issues are causing much disillusionment,” said Ujah. “No matter what, in a healthcare emergency, motivation is a very important component.”
The Guardian
Monday, June 8, 2020
This agricultural enterprise is helping Nigerian farmers expand their business
Babban Gona which means 'Great farm' in Hausa language, spoken in West Africa, provides services such as loans, agribusiness training, and provision of storage facilities for subsistence farmers in rural communities.
Yohana, whose farm is in Kaduna state in northern Nigeria, told CNN that since he joined the enterprise as a member he has been able to grow his maize farm from two hectares of land to four.
A hectare of farmland is about the size of the average football field.
"They (Babban Gona) taught me how to farm better, they taught me the best way to store my maize and they supplied me with fertilizers and pesticides," he said.
Promoting Agriculture
Farmers like Yohana make up one of the largest sectors of the Nigerian economy as agriculture contributes 21.9% of the country's overall gross domestic product, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.
Founder of Babban Gona, Kola Masha says the enterprise was established in 2012 to promote agriculture and reduce the rate of unemployment in the country.
Out of a population of 202 million people, 39 million in Nigeria were unemployed, according to a 2018 report by the NBS.
Masha told CNN that Babban Gona's objective is to bring down the unemployment numbers by expanding crop production in rural communities, thereby creating room for more jobs in the country.
"We set a goal for ourselves that we will create around 10 million jobs by 2030 ... We firmly believe that agriculture is Nigeria's job-creation engine because it is massive, labor-intensive, and has tremendous growth potential," he said.
Babban Gona, which specializes in supporting maize farming is present in six Nigerian states and has so far provided its 100,000 farmer members with different farming-related services to improve their business.
One of the services offered is the provision of storage facilities for farmers during harvest season. Due to insufficient storage facilities for community-level farmers, a lot of farm produce is often wasted.
Investing in spaces to store maize ensures that farmers don't lose their produce and by extension, their income.
"We invested in over 60,000 tonnes of storage where the farmers can store their harvest," Masha said.
Farmer training
Babban Gona also trains all its farmer members on some of the best farming techniques to improve their production of maize.
The company has a large number of field agents across small communities in northern Nigeria. These agents specialize in teaching water retention, soil analysis, seed planting, and sustainable farming.
Once a farmer joins Babban Gona, he automatically becomes eligible for this training.
Masha says anybody can join as a farmer member and that some people apply to become a part of Babban Gona on their own.
"Our team is actively out there at the grassroots level engaging with tens of thousands of farmers to get them to join. So, it is really a community effort, going from village to village, sharing with people about the potential of how Babban Gona can help," he explained.
When a farmer indicates interest in joining, they are subjected to a psychometric test where they are evaluated based on their maize production skills, personality traits, job potential, and abilities.
Those who pass become member farmers.
Yohana, who has been a Babban Gona member for about five years says he has been able to increase his net income as a result of the incentives provided by the enterprise.
"You know I used to plant one maize seed per hole but during my training with Babban Gona, I was taught that I could plant more than one seed with appropriate spacing," he explained.
He said he used to harvest only 40 bags of maize during harvest season, but he now harvests up to 200 bags.
Farmer members like Yohana are offered access to credit for their business and information on the best ways to market and distribute their products, according to Babban Gona founder, Masha.
"We help them to start thinking about turning their farm into a large business, to start making the necessary investments that will make their farms profitable," he told CNN.
Funded by financial institutions
The farmers are charged a small margin for the different services provided to them.
And according to Masha, the social enterprise is funded by leading financial institutions and governments such as the Nigerian Sovereign Wealth Fund, the German government, the Entrepreneurial Development Bank, among others.
Through the funding received, Babban Gona has been able to provide credit facilities for 55,000 farmers and aims to reach a million more by 2025.
CNN
Why Nigerians are muting their mothers on WhatsApp
Just a few years ago, local comedians had a field day with jokes about elderly Nigerian mothers and their nonchalant attitudes towards their mobile phones.
They needed their children's assistance to type and send text messages or log in to their accounts and read emails.
And their frequent excuse for missed calls was: "My phone was in my handbag."
These days, the jokes have upgraded to Nigerian mothers and their infatuation with WhatsApp, the most popular messaging app in Africa.
Nigerian comedians like Maraji have been making skits about them.
"My mother spends her entire morning on WhatsApp," 39-year-old Udo, whose home is in Lagos, told me.
"Throughout while she's having her breakfast and drinking her tea, she's checking people's status updates and watching videos."
'Relevant messages'
Unlike Twitter and Instagram, WhatsApp can work even when internet connections are iffy, as is often the case in many parts of Nigeria.
And it requires no profiles or passwords, so the generation that mostly retired from active life before access to the internet became common in Nigeria finds it easy to use. In fact, it is their internet.
A common complaint among younger Nigerians is the number and nature of WhatsApp messages they receive from their mothers.
"You just wake up in the morning and you see 10 videos from your mother," 41-year-old Ihuoma, who lives in Nigeria's capital, Abuja, told me.
"And each one begins with: 'You must watch this!' 'This will help somebody!' Those are always the opening lines."
Her 76-year-old mother, Patty, told me that all the messages she forwards are "relevant".
"I don't send frivolous messages at all," she said.
"Why I send those things to my children, it is a form of education, lifting up of minds, sharing knowledge, experiences. I consider it a sort of fellowship, sharing with my children."
Ihuoma has since muted her mother's WhatsApp account and rarely opens her messages.
For many Nigerian mothers, the ability to broadcast ready-made messages via WhatsApp is like a superpower.
It enables them to transmit unsolicited prayers, advice and opinions.
One woman who complained on Twitter about her mother putting onions in the corner of every room in the house - touted on WhatsApp as a way to absorb toxins - received replies saying their mothers had also followed the erroneous advice.
"In our family group, my mother was always forwarding me and my siblings different health suggestions, concoctions to mix and drink," said Udo.
"When I pointed out to her that some of them are questionable, she replied: 'You never know, just try it and see.'"
Her mother also forwarded gory videos of kidnap victims and crime scenes, insisting that her children needed to see these to be aware and beware.
"That's when I left the family group and felt I could not do this any more," Udo said.
"My brother blocked her, which hurt her a lot. But she wouldn't listen. She keeps forwarding."
Thongs, cancer and other fanciful warnings
A number of people told me that they also had blocked their mothers on WhatsApp but did not want to let them know.
"I was once involved in an online debate about this," Ihuoma said.
"Some people were of the opinion that they wanted to block their mothers but couldn't get themselves to do that to someone who had carried them in the womb for nine months."
They were tired of the advice and cautions, mostly from conservative or religious mothers who have always had a problem with their more liberal-minded children's lifestyles.
Warnings, for example, signed by unknown medical experts, explaining how wearing thongs can cause cancer and how tight skirts can lead to heart attacks.
And of the most implausible stories:
. People told me of their mothers who are convinced that Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari died long ago and had since been replaced by a body double from Sudan, known as "Jubril".
. That Russian President Vladimir Putin sent a lion into the streets of Moscow to prevent people from flouting the coronavirus lockdowns.
. That Queen Elizabeth has been pictured around the UK wearing face masks that are the same bright colours as her clothes, shoes and handbags.
All stories accompanied by videos and photos.
Affordable internet access became common in Nigeria just a few years ago, so this generation of elderly Nigerians was hardly exposed to the wonders of Photoshop and the ingenuity of idle minds that invent stories just for fun and clicks.
The Wuhan 'dragon'
And so, they tend to believe most information they come across, especially when there is visual "evidence".
"My mother sent me and my siblings a video of a dragon-like creature fleeing towards the sky," said 40-year-old Grace, who lives in Lagos.
"She said we should see, that coronavirus was finally leaving the earth."
Grace was shocked that her well-educated, 76-year-old mother could actually believe that the coronavirus was captured on camera, finally fleeing the Chinese city of Wuhan through the clouds and into the sky.
"She asked me how I knew that it wasn't true and I said: 'Mummy, the coronavirus is not a flying reptile!'
"She acknowledged that I was right and we just kind of laughed over it."
Hardly any of the ongoing efforts here to combat fake news and improve digital literacy focus on older Nigerians - and so the burden must continue to rest on younger family members like Grace to correct and enlighten their parents.
But, sometimes, even this is impossible.
"Sometimes when I correct her, my mother tells me that I'm being rude," said Udo. "She complains that I'm being insulting."
BBC
Thursday, June 4, 2020
Nigerian Reggae Star Majek Fashek Dies at 57
The singer's manager, Omenka Uzoma, told the BBC that Fashek (born Majekodunmi Fasheke), died in his sleep in New York. In an Instagram video, Uzoma reconfirmed the news, praising Fashek for all he did for Nigeria.
Singer/songwriter Fashek was born in the Edo state of Benin in 1963 and rose to prominence in 1988 when he released his solo debut, Prisoner of Conscience (his backing band was known as the Prisoners of Conscience), which included the award-winning single "Send Down the Rain."
With a high, quivering voice that drew comparisons to reggae great Bob Marley, and a conscious vibe in keeping with Marley's push to uplift, Fashek quickly gained a reputation as a voice of righteousness.
He furthered that image with the dancehall-spiked anti-apartheid song "Free Africa, Free Mandela," from his 1989 album I&I Experience. He achieved a rare cross-over success in the United States in 1991, when he signed with Interscope Records and released the Little Steven Van Zandt-produced breakthrough Spirit of Love. That effort included his biggest international hit, "So Long Too Long," an uplifting anthem that opened with the exhortation, "Arise from your sleep Africa/ Arise from your sleep America/ There's work to be done Africa."
The song, which Fashek performed on tour while opening for Tracy Chapman and on The Late Show with David Letterman, directly paid homage to Marley's legacy of activist lyricism with lines such as, "Remember, remember, Marcus Garvey/ Who had a dream for you Africa/ Remember, remember, Martin Luther King/ Who had a dream for you America/ They say you are black, they say you are brown/ They say dem white, they say you are brown/ But only the Angels of God is white now/ Only the Angels of God is white."
In 2016, Fashek wrote the song "We Are Not Afraid," which was the soundtrack to an all-star fundraiser video for victims of religious and political violence around the world directed by photographer Bob Gruen that featured more than 200 artists, including Keith Richards, Robert Plant, Bruce Springsteen, Yoko Ono, Robert DeNiro, Sting, Patti Smith, Dr. Jane Goodall, Iggy Pop, Peter Gabriel, Jackson Browne, Chuck D,Joe Walsh, Bonnie Raitt, Darlene Love, Debbie Harry, Dion, Elvis Costello, Grandmaster Flash, Jeff Tweedy and Susan Sarandon, among others.
At press time the cause of Fashek's death was not released.
Nigerian singer Burna Boy paid tribute to one of his biggest influences, writing, "The lyrics to his song 'So Long, Too Long' remain true as a wake up call to Africans still today."
By Gil Kaufman
Billboard
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