Junior oil minister of Nigeria Timipre Sylva has resigned

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nigeria's Timipre Sylva has resigned as the country's minister of state for petroleum to seek a new term as governor of oil-producing Bayelsa State in the southern Niger Delta, ministry and presidency sources told Reuters on Thursday.

Sylva's resignation comes at a time of political transition in Nigeria, with President Muhammadu Buhari serving his final weeks in office before giving way to President-elect Bola Tinubu on May 29.

Sylva handed his resignation letter last week to Buhari, who doubles as petroleum minister, and stopped coming to the office, said two sources who did not want to be identified.

They said he would be seeking the ruling All Progressives Congress ticket to run for Bayelsa governor in party primaries scheduled to take place on April 14.

Sylva could not be reached for comment and the petroleum ministry declined to comment.

Sylva served as governor of Bayelsa for one full term between 2008 and 2012. At the time, he was a member of the People's Democratic Party, which was then in power at the federal level but is now in opposition.

Appointed junior oil minister in August 2019, Sylva oversaw major reforms in the oil sector, including the passing of legislation that overhauled the sector's fiscal regime in a bid to spur investment.

During his time as minister, Nigeria's oil output fell to its lowest in decades due to crude theft and pipeline vandalism. Angola overtook Nigeria as Africa's biggest oil producer and exporter for a few months last year.

By Camillus Eboh, Reuters

Fulani terrorists in Nigeria kill Pastor and kidnap wife

Fulani herdsmen killed a pastor last Thursday in Kaduna state, Nigeria, two weeks after terrorists killed a Baptist pastor’s son in the same state, sources said.

The Rev. Musa Mairimi of the Evangelical Church Winning All (ECWA) in Buda 2 village, near Kasuwan Magani in Kajuru County, was killed in his home and his wife kidnapped, said the chairman of the Kaduna state chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), the Rev. Joseph Hayab.

“The herdsmen and terrorists invaded the community on Thursday, March 23, and killed the pastor in his house,” Hayab said. “His wife was taken into captivity at gunpoint.”

Hayab said that more than 100 Christians have been kidnapped in Kaduna state’s Kauru, Jaba, Kachia, Kagarko and Kajuru counties.

“Who will we cry to and who will we run to for help except God?” he said. “Imagine that since the carnage of kidnapping of Christians started in Kaduna state, no arrests have been made.”

Area resident Istifanus Ma’aji requested prayer.

“Let us pray for the safe return of the wife, the pastor, and other Christians taken captive by the herdsmen and bandits,” Ma’aji said.

Pastor’s son killed

In Kaduna state’s Karimbu-Kahugu village, Lere County, terrorists on March 10 broke into the home of Baptist Pastor Dadi Babas at 1 a.m., killed his son and kidnapped his wife and three other family members while the pastor was attending the funeral of this brother in Bauchi state, he said.

Pastor Babas said in a text message that he was informed of the attack at 4 a.m. and that his wife has been released.

“My son was brutally killed by the terrorists, while my wife, my daughter-in-law, who is nursing a baby, and two other members of my family were kidnapped,” he said. “As I send this message, three members of my family remain in captivity with the bandits, while my wife was abandoned by the terrorists because of her illness.”

He said the terrorists are demanding a ransom of 5 million naira ($10,841) for the release of his remaining family members.

Peter Mukaddas, vice chairman of the Kahugu National Development Association, identified the assailants as “Muslim bandits.”

“We are fervently praying to God to touch the hearts of the terrorists so that they can release the Christians,” Mukaddas said in a text message.

Nigeria led the world in Christians killed for their faith in 2022, with 5,014, according to Open Doors’ 2023 World Watch List report. It also led the world in Christians abducted (4,726), sexually assaulted or harassed, forcibly married or physically or mentally abused, and it had the most homes and businesses attacked for faith-based reasons. As in the previous year, Nigeria had the second most church attacks and internally displaced people.

In the 2023 World Watch List of the countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian, Nigeria jumped to sixth place, its highest ranking ever, from No. 7 the previous year.

“Militants from the Fulani, Boko Haram, Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) and others conduct raids on Christian communities, killing, maiming, raping and kidnapping for ransom or sexual slavery,” the WWL report noted. “This year has also seen this violence spill over into the Christian-majority south of the nation. … Nigeria’s government continues to deny this is religious persecution, so violations of Christians’ rights are carried out with impunity.”

Numbering in the millions across Nigeria and the Sahel, predominantly Muslim Fulani comprise hundreds of clans of many different lineages who do not hold extremist views, but some Fulani do adhere to radical Islamist ideology, the United Kingdom’s All-Party Parliamentary Group for International Freedom or Belief (APPG) noted in a recent report.

“They adopt a comparable strategy to Boko Haram and ISWAP and demonstrate a clear intent to target Christians and potent symbols of Christian identity,” the APPG report states.

Christian leaders in Nigeria have said they believe herdsmen attacks on Christian communities in Nigeria’s Middle Belt are inspired by their desire to forcefully take over Christians’ lands and impose Islam as desertification has made it difficult for them to sustain their herds.

Morning Star News

Related story: Church security guard killed, pastor kidnapped by radicals in Nigeria

 

Banknotes Dispensed in Nigeria to Reduce Three-Month Cash Crunch

Nigeria’s central bank increased the supply of banknotes to lenders to end shortages that have hampered individual and business transactions and crippled the cash-based economy since January.

Most lenders including United Bank for Africa Plc, Zenith Bank Plc and FBN Holdings Plc called in staff on Saturday and Sunday to help customers access cash in banks or via automated teller machines.

The disbursement, in compliance with a central bank directive, is being monitored “personally” by Governor Godwin Emefiele, according to spokesman Isa Abdulmumin. Residents should have unfettered access to cash within the weekly withdrawal limits and terms, he said by phone from the nation’s capital, Abuja.

Africa’s most populous nation was hit by a cash shortage late last year after the central bank began replacing old 200-, 500- and 1,000-naira notes with new ones in a bid to mop up excess liquidity, promote electronic-based payments and rein in inflation. Some state governors challenged the program in court and the Supreme Court extended a Feb. 10 deadline set to phase out old notes until year-end.

Although the court ordered the central bank to redistribute old notes amounting to 2.2 trillion naira, or 70% of cash in circulation, to ease shortage, residents still struggled to access banknotes as of last week as few banks and ATMs had supplies. It prompted the Nigerian Labour Congress, the umbrella workers union, to call for protests at central bank offices from March 29.

The improved distribution is expected to balance the supply and demand for cash in the economy and halt further impediments to personal and business transactions. About 90% of transactions in Nigeria’s informal economy are conducted using cash.

Citizens withdrew cash from automated teller machines in the business district in Nigeria’s commercial hub of Lagos on Monday without the usual long queues. “After what I went through in the past to withdraw my own money, what I see here today is like magic; it’s a big relief,” said Adebisi Erimipe, who withdrew 10,000 naira ($21.69) in old 500 naira notes within few minutes at Unity Bank Plc’s ATM located on the Island in Lagos.

The central bank will keep weekly withdrawal limits at 500,000 naira for individuals and 5 million naira for companies to discourage residents from holding excess money, Abdulmumin said. A processing fee of 3% for individuals and 5% for companies is charged for those seeking to withdraw cash above the limits. 

By Emele Onu, Bloomberg

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Nnamdi Kanu’s brother loses London court challenge

Jailed Biafran separatist leader Nnamdi Kanu’s family lost a legal challenge against the British government in a London court regarding his detention in Nigeria.

Kanu’s brother Kingsley Kanu had brought a judicial review against Britain’s Foreign Office over its alleged refusal to acknowledge that Nnamdi Kanu, who holds Nigerian and British citizenship, was the victim of extraordinary rendition from Kenya to Nigeria in June 2021.

Kingsley Kanu’s lawyers argued that the Foreign Office should reach a judgement about whether his brother was the victim of extraordinary rendition so it could properly assess how to assist the family.

Judge Jonathan Swift dismissed the case on Thursday, saying the Foreign Office’s decision not to express a firm view about Nnamdi Kanu’s treatment, either privately or publicly, was a matter for the government.

However, the judge added that the British government’s approach will also now be informed by a ruling from Nigeria’s Court of Appeal on October 13 that found that Nnamdi Kanu had been unlawfully abducted and sent to Nigeria.

Nigeria’s Court of Appeal also dropped seven charges against Nnamdi Kanu, who remains in detention pending an appeal against that decision by the Nigerian government.


Britain’s Foreign Office and Kingsley Kanu’s lawyers did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Nnamdi Kanu founded the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) to press for the secession of the Igbo ethnic group’s homeland, which covers part of southeastern Nigeria.

Authorities view IPOB as a “terrorist” group and banned it in 2017. IPOB says it wants to achieve independence through non-violent means. It has authorised sit-at-home orders on Mondays since July 2021, which have crippled small businesses in the region.

A splinter faction established a paramilitary wing, the Eastern Security Network, which has been accused of human rights violations, abductions and violent attacks on offices of Nigeria’s electoral commission.

The region tried to secede from Nigeria in 1967 under the name of the Republic of Biafra, triggering a three-year civil war in which more than a million people died, mostly from starvation.

Al Jazeera

Nigerian politician Ike Ekweremadu, wife, and a doctor guilty of organ trafficking to UK

 

 

 

 

 

A senior Nigerian politician, his wife, and a doctor have been convicted of organ trafficking, in the first verdict of its kind under the Modern Slavery Act.

Ike Ekweremadu, 60, a former deputy president of the Nigerian senate, his wife, Beatrice, 56, and Dr Obinna Obeta, 51, were found guilty of facilitating the travel of a young man to Britain with a view to his exploitation after a six-week trial at the Old Bailey.


They criminally conspired to bring the 21-year-old Lagos street trader to London to exploit him for his kidney, the jury found.

The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, had been offered an illegal reward to become a donor for the senator’s daughter after kidney disease forced her to drop out of a master’s degree in film at Newcastle University, the court heard. Sonia Ekweremadu was found not guilty.


She cried in court as her parents were sent down from the dock.

In February 2022 the man was falsely presented to a private renal unit at Royal Free hospital in London as Sonia’s cousin in a failed attempt to persuade medics to carry out an £80,000 transplant. For a fee, a medical secretary at the hospital acted as an Igbo interpreter between the man and the doctors to help try to convince them he was an altruistic donor, the court heard.

The prosecutor Hugh Davies KC told the court the Ekweremadus and Obeta had treated the man and other potential donors as “disposable assets – spare parts for reward”. He said they entered an “emotionally cold commercial transaction” with the man.

The behaviour of Ekweremadu, a successful lawyer and founder of an anti-poverty charity who helped draw up Nigeria’s laws against organ trafficking, showed “entitlement, dishonesty and hypocrisy”, Davies told the jury.

He said Ekweremadu, who owns several properties and had a staff of 80, “agreed to reward someone for a kidney for his daughter – somebody in circumstances of poverty and from whom he distanced himself and made no inquiries, and with whom, for his own political protection, he wanted no direct contact”.

Davies added: “What he agreed to do was not simply expedient in the clinical interests of his daughter, Sonia, it was exploitation, it was criminal. It is no defence to say he acted out of love for his daughter. Her clinical needs cannot come at the expense of the exploitation of somebody in poverty.”

Ekweremadu, who denied the charge, told the court he was the victim of a scam. Obeta, who also denied the charge, claimed the man was not offered a reward for his kidney and was acting altruistically. Beatrice denied any knowledge of the alleged conspiracy. Sonia did not give evidence.

WhatsApp messages shown to the court revealed Obeta charged Ekweremadu 4.5m naira (about £8,000) made up of an “agent fee” and a “donor fee”.

Ekweremadu and Obeta admitted falsely claiming the man was Sonia’s cousin in his visa application and in documents presented to the hospital.

Davies said Ekweremadu ignored medical advice to find a donor for his daughter among genuine family members. He said: “At no point in time was there ever any intention for a family member close, medium or distant to do what could be paid for from a pool of donors.”

The judge, Mr Justice Jeremy Johnson, will pass sentence on 5 May.

The chief crown prosecutor, Joanne Jakymec, said: “This was a horrific plot to exploit a vulnerable victim by trafficking him to the UK for the purpose of transplanting his kidney.

“The convicted defendants showed utter disregard for the victim’s welfare, health and wellbeing and used their considerable influence to a high degree of control throughout, with the victim having limited understanding of what was really going on here.”

DI Esther Richardson, from the Metropolitan police’s modern slavery and exploitation command, said: “This is a landmark conviction and we commend the victim for his bravery in speaking against these offenders.”

This story was amended on 23 March 2023 to reflect the fact that Sonia Ekweremadu was found not guilty in the case. It was further amended on 24 March 2023 as it was an Igbo interpreter, not a translator, who was involved.

By Matthew Weaver, The Guardian

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