Nigerian rescue workers pulled more than three dozen bodies from the water on Thursday after an overcrowded riverboat sank leaving more than 150 people missing and feared drowned.
Survivors and officials said only 20 people were rescued on Wednesday when the wooden boat ferrying passengers to a market broke apart and sank as it travelled between central Niger state and Wara in northwest Kebbi state.
“Nine more bodies have been recovered. So far 45 bodies have been found. The search continues for more bodies,” Abubakar Shehu, a local official supervising the rescue operation, told AFP news agency.
Riverboat tragedies are common on Nigerian waterways mostly due to overcrowding, weather and lack of maintenance, but Wednesday’s toll would be one of the deadliest in recent years.
President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday called the mishap “devastating” after the country’s inland waterways authority said only 20 people had been rescued and another 156 were still missing.
Ali Ibrahim Garba, wearing an orange life jacket standing near wooden boats on the river bank, said rescuers were still searching for missing people after saving as many as they could.
“Right now we are in search of three people, one male and two females,” he told AFP.
NIWA agency local manager Yusuf Birma told reporters on Wednesday the boat was overcrowded with about 180 people and went down an hour into its journey.
Local district administrator Abdullahi Buhari Wara said the boat was also loaded with bags of sand from a gold mine.
NIWA has banned nighttime sailing on the rivers to stop accidents and says overloading ships is a criminal offence, but skippers and crews often ignore the regulations.
Early in May, 30 people drowned when an overloaded boat capsized in Niger state.
The boat carrying 100 local traders also split into two during a storm as they were returning from a local market.
The Niger, West Africa’s main river travelling through Guinea to Nigeria’s Niger Delta, is a key local trade route for some of the countries.
Friday, May 28, 2021
Nigerian rescuers find dozens of bodies after boat tragedy
Wednesday, May 26, 2021
Startup teaches young Nigerians to code on smartphones
Samuel Anyaele regularly tells his students that everything they need to write a software code can be found on their mobile phones.
He writes HTML codes on his phone, which are displayed on a monitor in a tiny classroom in Lagos, Nigeria’s megacity. His students look up at the big screen and down at the smaller one in their hands.
“We are effectively giving them a tool to work whether they have a PC (personal computer) or not,” said Anyaele, who runs three-month courses.
Coding skills are seen by many young Nigerians as a way to earn money from clients based anywhere in the world. Job opportunities are scarce in Nigeria, a country of 200 million inhabitants where two-thirds of people aged 15 to 34 are either unemployed or under-employed.
Anyaele, who runs free classes for beginners and charges $210 for courses aimed at professionals, works for one of many Lagos companies offering to teach aspiring software developers. The most widely known is Andela, a software training company, that has received funding from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s foundation.
“If you don’t find jobs locally, there are international jobs,” said Joseph Agunbiade, founder of Univelcity, which also provides training.
Last year’s $200 million acquisition of Nigerian fintech firm Paystack by Silicon Valley giant Stripe, and the $1 billion valuation of local payments company Flutterwave, have shown what is possible.
Chinonso Okafor, 20, one of Anyaele’s students who is now building websites for clients, said using his phone means he can continue working after his laptop runs down when the electricity cuts out.
But some people struggle to see phones as anything more than an entertainment device, said Anyaele, who identified that perception as a mental block that many fail to overcome.
“They’re assuming it’s something childish, or something that isn’t professional,” he said.
By Angela Ukomadu
Friday, May 21, 2021
HBO explores Nigerian human rights in “The Legend of the Underground”
HBO is set to debut The Legend of the Underground, a 90-minute feature doc that examines systemic discrimination in Nigeria.
In 2013, Nigeria enacted the anti-LGBTQ law, the Same-Sex Marriage (Prohibition) Bill (SSMPA), and in the years since, it has been used to harass, imprison, extort and commit violence against anyone seen as not conforming to Nigerian societal and cultural norms.
In August of 2018, 57 men who attended a party in Lagos, Nigeria were rounded up by police, arrested and forced in front of news cameras. One of the men, James, defiantly spoke out against the government while still in handcuffs.
Meanwhile in New York, Micheal Ighodaro is part of the Nigerian diaspora and an LGBTQ rights and HIV prevention advocate. As he works in advocacy for the people and communities he left behind, James and his circle of friends struggle with the option to seek security abroad, or to stay and fight a discriminatory system.
The Legend of the Underground is directed by Nneka Onuorah and Giselle Bailey, and executive produced by Mike Jackson, John Legend, Ty Stiklorius and Austyn Biggers of Get Lifted Film Co. For HBO the senior producer is Sara Rodriguez; with executive producers Nancy Abraham, Lisa Heller.
By Kim Izzo
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Video - Nigeria's anti-gay law denounced
Police officer warns gays to leave Nigeria
Nigeria's military investigates reports of Boko Haram leader's death
Nigeria's military is investigating reports that the leader of militant Islamist group Boko Haram may have been killed or seriously injured following clashes with rival jihadists, an army spokesman said on Friday.
Abubakar Shekau has been the figurehead of an Islamist insurgency that has since 2009 killed more than 30,000 people, forced around 2 million people to flee their homes and spawned one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.
A number of reports published on Thursday in Nigeria media, citing intelligence sources, said Shekau was seriously hurt or killed after his insurgents clashed with members of Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP), which broke away from his group in 2016.
Reuters has been unable to independently verify the claims.
A Nigerian Army spokesman, Mohammed Yerima, said the military were investigating.
"It's a rumour. We are investigating it. We can only say something if we confirm it," said the spokesman.
Shekau was said to have been killed on several occasions over the last 12 years, including in announcements by the military, only to later appear in a video post.
ISWAP was previously part of Shekau's militant Islamist group before its split five years ago, pledging allegiance to Islamic State. The schism was due to religious ideological disagreements over the killing of civilians by Boko Haram, to which ISWAP objected.
Shekau's death, if confirmed, could potentially end of fighting between the two groups, enabling either to absorb the others' fighters and consolidate its hold on northeast Nigerian territory.
Leader of Boko Haram Abubakar Shekau mocks Nigeria army
Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau apparently alive - releases new video
Wednesday, May 19, 2021
Nigerian Passport Nigeria Immigration suspends accepting new applications for passports
Nigeria will not accept new applications for international passports until old applications are attended to, the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) has said.
While addressing journalists in Abuja on Tuesday, the comptroller of NIS, Mohammad Babandede, said the agency would commence the accepting new applications from June 1.
Mr Babandede said the directive was given by the Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola.
“The process of receiving and processing all fresh passport applications nationwide is suspended till 1st June 2021, when the new passport regime would have taken effect,” he said.
“The suspension of receiving and processing of fresh passport applications is to allow for clearance of every passport application that was received before 17th of May 2021.”
He said all payment portals have been closed till June 1 and a task force will be sent to passport offices to clear the backlog.
Mr Babandede said deputy comptrollers have been deployed to all passport centres to monitor the process and ensure the directive is followed.
New applications will be granted in six weeks from the time of application, he said.
Mr Babandede decorated senior officers of the NIS who were recently promoted.
By Oge Udegbunam