Nigeria have failed to qualify for the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations after falling to a 1-0 defeat in Egypt in their Group G match on Tuesday.
With just one game remaining and only the group winners to qualify, Nigeria cannot make up their five-point deficit to table-toppers Egypt.
Ramadan Sobhy's 65th-minute winner puts Egypt on the verge of qualification.
Egypt face Tanzania in June and will book their place in Gabon with any result better than a 3-0 defeat.
Nigeria won the Nations Cup in 2013 but have now suffered back-to-back eliminations in qualifying.
They threw everything forward to find an equaliser on Tuesday and came close when West Ham winger Victor Moses crashed a shot against the post in the 84th minute.
The match in Alexandria became a virtually all-or-nothing tie for Nigeria after Chad withdrew from the group on Sunday, citing financial difficulties, and all results from their matches were erased.
That left only three teams in Group G and in accordance with the rules of the Confederation of African Football only the winner would qualify for the finals.
Egypt have seven points with one match to play, against bottom club Tanzania, who have only one point but two games remaining.
To have any chance of qualification Tanzania would need to beat Egypt by a better scoreline than the 3-0 defeat they suffered in Egypt last June because head-to-head records would come into effect if the sides finished level on points.
Tanzania would still have to beat Nigeria in their final match in September.
BBC
Tuesday, March 29, 2016
Nigeria plans to send a man to space by 2030
It might sound like the set-up for some kind of email scam, but it’s not: Nigerian Minister of Science and Technology Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu has announced that his country plans to send its first astronaut into space before the year 2030.
The announcement comes roughly a month after a highly-circulated email con claiming that a Nigerian astronaut was after secretly being sent to space in 1989, according to the Toronto Sun. The email went on to claim that this astronaut had been kept alive thanks to care packages, but now really wants to come home and needs financial assistance to do so.
Of course, none of that is true, but Nigeria does actually have a space program, and as Channels TV and Quartz reported over the weekend, they want to join the US, India, China, Japan, Russia, Canada and the member states of the European Space Agency as governing bodies that have sent humans beyond the Earth’s atmosphere and the Karman Line (62 miles above sea level).
During a meeting with the Nigerian Defense Space Agency in Abuja last week, Dr. Onu said that spaceflight was “very important for a country like Nigeria” and that the government was working to create the infrastructure needed to pull off a manned mission, according to Channels TV.
He added that space was “a major asset which nations like Nigeria must also be involved in for the purposes of protecting national interest,” and that the ministry would need to “work very hard in the years ahead... to ensure that the nation plays a role” in space travel in the near future.
As Quartz pointed out, however, a Nigerian astronaut actually has already traveled into space – sort of. In 2006, the website explained, the country sent a 17-year-old girl named Stella Felix to an altitude of six miles (10 km), during which time she experienced 30 seconds of weightlessness and was called the first Nigerian to experience a “space flight,” according to BBC News.
Semantics aside, the plan seems to be to launch an astronaut using rockets developed by Nigerian engineers and built domestically through their own space program, which was originally founded in 2001 and launched its first satellite in 2003. It may sound like a tall order, but experts with the program have been working with China to help launch their satellites in exchange for training.
Dr. Onu, for one, is confident that he and his colleagues can pull off the feat, telling This Day, “on or before 2030, we can do it before with the program and infrastructure that we have,” and that all the funding needed to implement was a program had been included in a recently-passed budget.
“We have developed the capacity to design” and “assemble” spacecraft, he continued. “The last stage is the capacity to launch and we believe very strongly that with the support from President Muhammadu Buhari, we will utilize whatever limited resources that we have in a very efficient manner to make sure that we make the nation proud.”
Red Orbit
The announcement comes roughly a month after a highly-circulated email con claiming that a Nigerian astronaut was after secretly being sent to space in 1989, according to the Toronto Sun. The email went on to claim that this astronaut had been kept alive thanks to care packages, but now really wants to come home and needs financial assistance to do so.
Of course, none of that is true, but Nigeria does actually have a space program, and as Channels TV and Quartz reported over the weekend, they want to join the US, India, China, Japan, Russia, Canada and the member states of the European Space Agency as governing bodies that have sent humans beyond the Earth’s atmosphere and the Karman Line (62 miles above sea level).
During a meeting with the Nigerian Defense Space Agency in Abuja last week, Dr. Onu said that spaceflight was “very important for a country like Nigeria” and that the government was working to create the infrastructure needed to pull off a manned mission, according to Channels TV.
He added that space was “a major asset which nations like Nigeria must also be involved in for the purposes of protecting national interest,” and that the ministry would need to “work very hard in the years ahead... to ensure that the nation plays a role” in space travel in the near future.
As Quartz pointed out, however, a Nigerian astronaut actually has already traveled into space – sort of. In 2006, the website explained, the country sent a 17-year-old girl named Stella Felix to an altitude of six miles (10 km), during which time she experienced 30 seconds of weightlessness and was called the first Nigerian to experience a “space flight,” according to BBC News.
Semantics aside, the plan seems to be to launch an astronaut using rockets developed by Nigerian engineers and built domestically through their own space program, which was originally founded in 2001 and launched its first satellite in 2003. It may sound like a tall order, but experts with the program have been working with China to help launch their satellites in exchange for training.
Dr. Onu, for one, is confident that he and his colleagues can pull off the feat, telling This Day, “on or before 2030, we can do it before with the program and infrastructure that we have,” and that all the funding needed to implement was a program had been included in a recently-passed budget.
“We have developed the capacity to design” and “assemble” spacecraft, he continued. “The last stage is the capacity to launch and we believe very strongly that with the support from President Muhammadu Buhari, we will utilize whatever limited resources that we have in a very efficient manner to make sure that we make the nation proud.”
Red Orbit
Monday, March 28, 2016
Video - Rise in deaths by cancer in Nigeria
The World Health Organization says there's been a huge rise in cancer deaths in Nigeria.
Disaster averted as 40,000 football fans occupy 16,000 capacity stadium in Nigeria
Listed as a 16,000 capacity venue, the stadium in the north west of the country was subject to a heavy military presence after a pitch invasion marred the last international there in June.
But a decision by the Kaduna State government to open the gates to fans to attend the crucial 2017 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier for free created a frenzied atmosphere.
Hours before kick-off supporters started arriving, with some scaling fences to find their way in. Some were even pictured clambering up floodlight scaffolding to gain a vantage point.
“I felt the game was not going to take place because I thought the number of people on the pitch side was going to cause encroachment,” Rotimi Akindele, a reporter for Beat FM, told Goal.com.
In the end the match passed without major incident off the pitch, although Nigeria’s captain, John Obi Mikel, accused Egypt’s players of “cheating” after Mohamed Salah’s late equaliser kept the Pharaohs on top of Group G.
Oghenekaro Etebo had put the Super Eagles in front on the hour and looked like claiming a crucial win as the match entered the dying minutes. But with Godfrey Oboabona having limped off injured, Egypt’s players refused to kick the ball out and Salah was able to score after being played in by Ramadan Sobhy.
“I think we played very well but we lost a lot of chances that we created that could have fetched us total victory in today’s match against Egypt,” Mikel said.
“Everybody is saying we lost the game in the last three minutes but all I can say is that fair play is fair play, it doesn’t matter, fair play is fair play.
“OK, you can say we should have concentrated a little more but Fair Play is Fair Play. This is cheating, that is all I can say. It happens in Egypt, it happens everywhere. It doesn’t matter how many minutes it is, you have to allow it. It is the referee that controls the game.”
The Arsenal youngster Alex Iwobi was brought on as a late substitute by the Nigeria coach, Samson Siasia – an appearance that means he can no longer represent England on the international stage.
Elsewhere there were victories for Tunisia, Mali and Ivory Coast over Togo, Equatorial Guinea and Sudan respectively, while Leicester’s Riyad Mahrez started for Algeria as they thrashed Ethiopia 7-1 in Blida.
Guardian
Related story: Video - Nigeria draw with Egypt 1-1 in Africa Cupf of Nations qualification match
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