Ken Saro-Wiwa's son has passed away

The son of renowned Nigerian environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, who was executed more than 20 years ago, has died in London.

Ken Saro-Wiwa Jr, 47, passed away after suffering a stroke, his family say.

He was a journalist who became an adviser to three presidents.

The 1995 execution of his father by a military government for leading protests against environmental degradation caused by the oil industry sparked global outrage.

Saro-Wiwa Sr led the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (Mosop), which accused oil multinational Shell of destroying the environment in his home region of Ogoniland in south-eastern Nigeria.

His execution after a secret trial under Gen Sani Abacha led to Nigeria being suspended from the Commonwealth.

Noo Saro-Wiwa, sister of the late journalist, told the BBC: "It is with great sadness that we announce that Ken Saro-Wiwa Jr passed away suddenly. His family are devastated and request privacy at this difficult time."

Funeral arrangements are yet to be worked out, the family says.

Ken Saro-Wiwa was first appointed in 2006 as a special adviser on peace and conflict resolution by former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo.

He later served Mr Obasanjo's successor, President Umaru Yar'Adua, as an adviser on international affairs and stayed on under President Goodluck Jonathan until he lost last year's election.

His willingness to work with the federal government marked him out as less militant than his father.

But like his father, he was committed to the cause of the Ogoni people.

In a 2015 opinion piece for the UK's Guardian newspaper, he wrote that the effects of the oil pollution on Ogoniland had still not been cleared up.

"If my father were alive today he would be dismayed that Ogoniland still looks like the devastated region that spurred him to action.

"There is little evidence to show that it sits on one of the world's richest deposits of oil and gas."

A 2011 UN report said Nigeria's Ogoniland region could take 30 years to recover fully from the damage caused by years of oil spills. The study said complete restoration could entail the world's "most wide-ranging and long-term oil clean-up".

It added that communities faced a severe health risk, with some families drinking water with high levels of carcinogens.

Shell has accepted liability for two spills and said all oil spills were bad for Nigeria and the company.

BBC

Video - Nigerian student runs taxi service outside school hours for income

A young man in Nigeria who was frustrated with the lack of job opportunities, has taken his future into his own hands. Research by the United Nations Population Fund shows that the rapid growth of Nigeria's cities has led to a scarcity of jobs. It's prompted many young people to start their own businesses.

Video - Nigeria's Shooting Stars defender Izu Joseph killed in shooting

Nigerian footballer Joseph Izu has been killed in the Niger Delta, after being caught up in the crossfire between the Nigerian army and oil militants.

Video - Nigeria's government aims to privatise stadium management

Nigeria's government says it will move to privatise management of its national sports stadiums. Sports minister Solomon Dalung says the federal government can no longer afford the maintenance costs of the stadiums spread across the vast west African country.

Nigerian football player Izu Joseph shot dead

Nigerian footballer Izu Joseph has been killed after being shot in the south of the country.

Joseph, a central defender with Premier League club Shooting Stars (3SC), was hit by a stray bullet when gunmen attacked a market in his hometown of Okaki in Bayelsa State.

"Today is a very sad day for us," Rasheed Balogu, 3SC's general manager, told ESPN FC: "This was a young boy with a lot of promise and we are devastated.

"We are still getting confusing reports about what happened exactly but we have been told that the stray bullet came from the JTF [Nigerian Joint Task Force]."

The club's official account tweeted on Monday: "A Shooting STAR is gone! Izu Joseph is gone! Flamboyant defender is gone! RIP, brother. What a life! May God strengthen his family #Tragedy."

Jubril Arowolo, media officer for the club, told sportingtribune.com: "The news came as a shock to us around 11:00 p.m. on Sunday that Izu Joseph was shot by gunmen, though we are yet to get details from the family, hopefully we will make an official statement once we get across to his family later in the day,"

The player, who was home on holiday after the end of the Nigerian football league season, was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital.

ESPN

Video - Released Chibok girls reunite with their families

Some of the 21 Nigerian schoolgirls abducted by the armed group Boko Haram have reunited with their families, following their release after 30 months in captivity.

Cries of joy filled the room as the freed girls, who had been kidnapped along with more than 200 other pupils in the town of Chibok in April 2014, met their relatives in Abuja on Sunday.

The girls were freed on Thursday, but it took days for most of the families to reach the capital for the reunion.

At the meeting, the parents of one of the girls spoke of their excitement at seeing their daughter.

"When we heard they found some of the girls, and that our daughter was among them, we slept as if the day is not going to break," Muta Abana, a father of one of the Chibok girls, told The Associated Press news agency.

"We wanted the day to break quickly, to see if the government is going to call us, to come and see that our daughter was among them."

Hawa Abana, the mother, said that Boko Haram abducted her daughter and hundreds of other schoolgirls, because "they did not want them to succeed in life".

"By God's grace she is back," she said. "She will go back to school. Boko Haram has no power again."

Eleanor Nwadinobi, women and girls manager at the Nigeria Stability and Recognition Programme, said the girls will now undergo treatment which must be tailored to individual needs, including trauma counselling and health and nutritional requirements.

"It is important that they are not attended to in isolation," she told Al Jazeera.

"They will need individual attention as the needs of one girl will differ from the other."

Also on Sunday, a presidential spokesman said a splinter branch of Boko Haram is now willing to negotiate the release of 83 more of the girls.

"The faction said it is ready to negotiate if the government is willing to sit down with them," Garba Shehu, spokesman for President Muhammadu Buhari, told Reuters news agency.

Brokered deal

Boko Haram seized 276 pupils from the Government Girls Secondary School in Chibok in northeastern Borno state on April 14, 2014. Fifty-seven managed to escape in the immediate aftermath of the abduction, but nearly 200 other girls are still missing.

The deal for the release of the girls was brokered by the Swiss government and the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Following their release, they were then taken from the northeastern city of Maiduguri and flown to Abuja to meet state officials.

On Thursday, Lai Mohammed, Nigeria's information minister, denied reports that the state had swapped captured Boko Haram fighters for the release of the girls.

He also said that he was not aware of any ransom being paid.

Mohammed said that a Nigerian army operation against Boko Haram would continue.

In recent days, the Nigerian army has been carrying out an offensive in the Sambisa forest, a stronghold of Boko Haram.

The armed group controlled a swath of land around the size of Belgium at the start of 2015, but Nigeria's army has recaptured most of the territory.

The group still stages suicide bombings in the northeast, as well as in neighbouring Niger and Cameroon.

Al Jazeera

Boko Haram release 21 kidnapped Chibok schoolgirls

Nigerian officials say 21 Chibok schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram extremists more than two years ago have been freed.

Presidential spokesman Mallam Garba Shehu tweeted Thursday that the girls are in the custody of Nigeria's Department of State Services.

He said the release is a result of negotiations between the government and Boko Haram, brokered by the Swiss government and the International Red Cross. He said negotiations will continue.

The abduction of 276 schoolgirls in April 2014 brought international condemnation of Boko Haram, Nigeria's home-grown Islamic extremist group. Dozens of the girls escaped, but most remain missing.

Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau has said the girls would only be released if the government swaps them for detained extremist leaders.

CBC

Nigeria set to enjoy zero interest on all IMF loans

Nigeria will now enjoy zero interest on all concessional facilities of the International Monetary Fund until 2018. The IMF's Managing Director, Christine Lagarde, disclosed this yesterday at the ongoing IMF/ World Bank 2016 General Meeting in Washington D.C. Nigeria's Finance Minister, Kemi Adeosun, has been negotiating to borrow from multilateral institutions to fund capital projects in the country. The cheap loans will be used to bridge the nation's infrastructure deficit in critical sectors.

Nigeria Super Eagles escape gunfire at airport

Four Premier League stars reportedly escaped a shooting after an armed man claiming to be a police officer opened fire on their group in Nigeria.

The Nigerian football team, including Chelsea’s John Obi Mikel and Arsenal’s Alex Iwobi, were on international duty with Nigeria on Monday morning when two men saying they were police officers reportedly confronted their party.

The men are said to have told the group they were under instructions to arrest Shehu Dikko, the Nigeria Football Federation's second vice president.

But after team officials demanded to see a warrant and identification, one of the men is alleged to have become angry and fired shots into the air.

A witness told the Sun: “One of the detectives pulled out his gun and threatened to shoot anyone interfering with his job.

“With tempers flaring, he repeatedly fired shots into the sky.”

The team, which also included Manchester City striker Kelechi Iheanacho and Leicester forward Ahmed Musa, were quickly scrambled into a bus outside Abuja airport, which raced away from the scene.

No-one is thought to have been injured in the incident.

The alleged shooting followed Nigeria's world cup qualifier win in Zambia, with Iwobi and Iheanacho scoring in their 2-1 victory.

Evening Standard

Baby trafficking on the rise in Nigeria

As 16-year-old Maria strained under the anguish of labour in southeastern Nigeria, a midwife repeatedly slapped her across the face - but the real ordeal began minutes after birth.

"The nurse took my child away to be washed. She never brought her back," the teenager said, gazing down at her feet.

Maria said she learned her newborn daughter had been given up for adoption for which she received 20,000 naira ($65.79) - the same price as a 50 kilogram bag of rice.

And Maria is far from alone.

A Thomson Reuters Foundation investigative team spoke to more than 10 Nigerian women duped into giving up their newborns to strangers in houses known as "baby factories" in the past two years or offered babies whose origins were unknown.

Five women did not want to be interviewed, despite the guarantee of anonymity, fearing for their own safety with criminal gangs involved in the baby trade, while two men spoke of being paid to act as "studs" to get women pregnant.

Although statistics are hard to come by, campaigners say the sale of newborns is widespread - and they fear the illegal trade is becoming more prevalent with Nigeria heading into recession this year amid ongoing political turbulence.

"The government is too overstretched by other issues to focus on baby trafficking," said Arinze Orakwue, head of public enlightenment at the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP).

Record numbers of baby factories were raided or closed down in the southeastern states of Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo this year, NAPTIP said.

A total of 14 were discovered in the first nine months of 2016, up from six in 2015 and 10 in 2014, the data showed.

But despite the growing number of raids, the scam exploiting couples desperate for a baby and young, pregnant, single women continues with newborns sold for up to $5,000 in Africa's most populous nation where most people live on less than $2 a day.

Cultural barriers are also a factor in the West African nation, with teenage girls fearing they will be publicly shamed by strict fathers or partners over unwanted pregnancies if they do not give up their children, experts say.

"In southeastern Nigeria a woman is deemed a failure if she fails to conceive. But it is also taboo for a teenager to fall pregnant out of wedlock," said Orakwue.

Maria said in the home in Imo state where she gave birth pregnant teenagers were welcomed by a maternal nurse who liked to be called "mama" but went on to sell the babies they delivered.

"(After I gave birth) somebody told me that mama collected big money from people before giving them other people's babies," Maria told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in the grounds of a school compound in her village.

"I do not know where my baby is now," said Maria, using a false name for her own protection.

A lot of the trade is carried out in Nigeria but authorities suspect babies are also sold to people from Europe and the United States because many foreigners continue to seek infants there despite the controversy around Nigerian adoptions.

HIDDEN PROBLEM

The U.S. Department of State alerted prospective adoptive parents to the issue of child buying from Nigeria in June 2014 after Nigerian media warned that people were posing as owners of orphanages or homes for unwed mothers to make money.

"The State Department is aware of a growing number of adoption scams," an alert on its website read.

Over 1,600 children have been adopted from Nigeria by U.S. citizens since 1999, according to the State Department website, about a third of them aged between one and two years old.

The U.S. State Department did not respond to requests for information on whether any scams affected U.S. adoptive parents.

In Britain a couple was found by the High Court to have "fallen under the spell" of an elaborate fraud after paying 4,500 pounds ($5,600) for herbal treatment in Nigeria that caused the woman's stomach to swell, media reported in 2014.

The couple only realised they had been duped nine months later when presented with a baby in Nigeria that actually was not theirs, the Daily Mail newspaper reported.

Babies, whose biological parents or backgrounds are unknown, are offered to women who have not been able to conceive naturally, according to NAPTIP and interviews with three women.

The British government said it was committed to stamping out what it calls the "miracle babies" phenomenon.

"Specially-trained teams are working at the UK border to identify and safeguard babies and children who may be at risk of trafficking," said a spokesman for the Home Office (UK interior ministry) in a statement.

Denmark suspended adoptions from Nigeria in 2014 citing concerns over forgery, corruption and lack of control by the authorities.

Apart from the illicit trade in babies, Nigeria also faces the problem of domestic and international trafficking in women and children.

Human trafficking, including selling children, is illegal in Nigeria, but almost 10 years ago a UNESCO report identified the industry as the country's third most common crime after financial fraud and drug trafficking - and the situation appears to be getting worse, according to campaigners.

The Nigerian government has not ratified an internationally recognised set of rules known as the Hague Adoption Convention which meant the laws governing adoptions remain murky and complicated, campaigners said.

"There is corruption in the adoption process and that is the individual (Nigerian) states' responsibility," said NAPTIP's Orakwue in a phone interview

"But central government should step up its funding to NAPTIP so we can increase support to victims," Orakwue said.

HERBAL TREATMENT

Sophie, who was not able to conceive, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation she started to develop the symptoms of pregnancy after visiting a herbalist in Enugu state in 2014.

However the traditional doctor told Sophie her swollen stomach contained gas resulting from the herbal treatment rather than a foetus - but she could arrange to buy a baby.

"(The herbalist) said that she would bring me a newborn baby, girl or boy, depending on which one I wanted," she said in the grimy sitting room of her apartment in southeastern Nigeria.

The woman said a girl would cost 380,000 naira ($1,250) while a boy would cost 500,000 naira ($1,645), said Sophie who opted for a girl.

But a sense of obligation to the woman who brought her a child prevented her from reporting the crime, she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

"I considered everything and thought to myself 'why should I report (the herbalist) to the police?' She had helped me," she said.

NAPTIP does not have data on the number of domestic adoptions that have taken place, a figure it says is not held by central government.

"In the southeastern states, the sale of babies is unarguably very prevalent as recorded by the agency," said Cordelia Ebiringa, NAPTIP's commander in Enugu state.

DEADLY GAME

Men are also involved in the process of illicit baby trafficking, with sperm donors impregnating surrogate mothers who then sell their babies, according to two Nigerian men.

Surrogacy is illegal in Nigeria.

Jonathan, 33, said he was paid 25,000 naira ($82) by his boss or "madam" every time he conceived a child.

"I don't see it as somebody exploiting me. The madams pay me for my work," said Jonathan, who withheld his full name.

Jonathan said he did not know whether the women gave their babies away or went on to sell them although he was concerned what he was doing could be illegal.

"I often think 'what if the police catch me?'"

Nigeria's anti-human trafficking agency said it did not have data or information on the role of sperm donors, but many women they spoke to did not want to reveal how they fell pregnant.

"NAPTIP has no records of studs that impregnate the women at the baby factories as most of the pregnant women rescued and interviewed in such cases claimed unplanned pregnancies," said Ebiringa.

Little information was made available by the Nigerian police or authorities in southeastern states about the number or identity of the people who run the "baby factories".

No data was provided on the number of arrests by police in southern states of Enugu and Abia on baby trafficking offences despite repeated requests by the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

But the dangers involved, both from the law and from trafficking gangs, are palpable, according to Jonathan, who estimates he has fathered about 15 children as a "stud".

"These (baby traffickers) can be dangerous," said Jonathan, who was once threatened by a group of thugs who found out what he was doing. "They are ready to kill anybody if you stand in their way."

Trust

Car bomb kills 8 in Maiduguri, Nigeria

About eight people were killed and 15 wounded when a car laden with explosives hit a taxi in northeastern Borno state's capital of Maiduguri, birthplace of a seven-year-old Islamist insurgency, military and medical sources said.

Five people were inside the taxi in a convoy to Gamboru, a town near the Cameroon border, police said in a statement. Cars in Borno state often travel in convoys organized by the military to minimize the risk of Boko Haram ambushes in rural areas.

The army has retaken much of the territory initially lost to the militants but Boko Haram still stages suicide bombing attacks and plants roadside bombs.

"We evacuated eight dead bodies and about 20 other injured persons," said a rescue worker. A hospital official put the number of wounded at ten.

Boko Haram, which has pledged alliance to Islamic State, has killed about 15,000 people and displaced more than 2 million in its attempt to create a state adhering to strict Islamic laws.

It controlled a swathe of land in northeast Nigeria about the size of Belgium at the end of 2014 but was pushed out early last year by Nigerian troops, supported by soldiers from neighboring countries: Niger, Cameroon and Chad.

Reuters

Video - Thousands in Nigeria affected by insurgency in need of psychosocial support

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Judges arrested in Nigeria for corruption charges released

Senior Nigerian judges arrested as part of a corruption investigation have been released, the head of the country's bar association and a security agency official said on Tuesday.

The Department of State Services (DSS), the country's security agency, on Saturday said it seized $800,000 in cash found during raids targeting judges from the supreme, appeal and high courts.

Abubakar Mahmoud, who heads the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), on Tuesday said all of the judges held had been released, although he did not confirm the number or when they were freed.

A DSS official, who did not want to be named, said seven judges were released on bail on Sunday and reported to the security agency on Monday.

"I cannot say when they will be arraigned in court but as soon as we are done with investigations, we will send the files to the attorney general's office which will advise accordingly and act," said the official.

The judiciary has been the subject of longstanding corruption allegations but the nature of the raids has been criticized as being unconstitutional, with the NBA accusing the DSS of a "Gestapo-style operation".

President Muhammadu Buhari, a former military ruler, has pledged to crack down on corruption since taking office last year but critics say he is conducting a witch-hunt against his political opponents.

His spokesman said the raids were part of an anti-corruption drive and were not an attack on the judiciary.

Related story: Nigeria seizes $800,000 in cash from judges

Banks in Nigeria in credit crisis

Seven Nigerian banks may be under-capitalised and in deficit The Nigeria’s banking industry is said to be experiencing a “full-blown financial crisis” as failed fiscal and monetary policies lead to a credit crunch, according to Arqaam Capital. According to the Bloomberg report Monday, two banks are close to being insolvent, while lenders anthor two “will need a dilutive capital hike,” Jaap Meijer and Tarek Sleiman, analysts at the Dubai-based investment bank and brokerage, said in an e-mailed note on Monday.

Capital ratios are set to worsen because of currency depreciation and souring loans, they said Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN in July replaced the management of Skye Bank after the lender breached liquidity thresholds, spurring concerns about the health of small- and medium-sized lenders, and reviving memories of bank rescues by the government after the financial crisis in 2009. 

Nigerian banks are grappling with a devaluation of the naira, rising bad loans and an oil-dependent economy that’s set to record its first annual contraction in more than two decades. “Our acid test reveals seven under-capitalized banks” with a deficit of as much as 1 trillion naira ($3.2 billion) in the financial system, Meijer and Sleiman said. 

A stress test identified one of the banks as the most under capitalized lender with Unity, Diamond Bank Plc, Skye, FCMB Group Plc, Sterling and Fidelity Bank Plc also showing deficits if they were to fully provide for non-performing loans, according to Arqaam. “Our bank is strong,” Ikechukwu Mike Omeife, a spokesman for Diamond Bank, said by phone from Lagos. “Our capital-adequacy ratio and non-performing loans are within the statutory requirements.” 

Common Challenges 

Moody’s Investors Service said on Monday that Nigeria’s five biggest banks share common credit challenges related to the economic slowdown. Moody’s expects non-performing loans to increase to about 12 percent over the next 12 months. 

The ratio of non-performing loans to total credit rose to 11.7 percent at the end of June from 5.3 percent at the end of 2015, the Abuja-based Central Bank of Nigeria, which requires banks keep the measure below 5 percent, said in a report on its web site The five largest lenders, which together hold 57 percent of the country’s banking assets, “are able to absorb all losses under our severe stress scenario,” Moody’s said. Guaranty Trust Bank Plc showed “the greatest resilience” and the other four banks were Zenith Bank Plc, Access Bank Plc, United Bank for Africa Plc and First Bank of Nigeria Ltd., the ratings company said. 

To create a capital buffer, Sterling Bank is planning to issue a 27 billion-naira bond and “if the interest rate looks better, we will do it this year,” Abubakar Suleiman, the lender’s chief financial officer, said on phone. “We will do it if the rate goes down to around 15 percent or 16 percent. We don’t want to raise it at a very high rate. If we do it, it will take our capital adequacy ratio to over 15 percent.” 

Buy and sell rating: 

Arqaam rates FBN, Skye, Sterling, Stanbic IBTC Holdings Plc, Unity and Ecobank Transnational Inc. as sell, according to the analysts’ report. Zenith, Access and United Bank are rated buy. CBN’s spokesman Isaac Okorafor didn’t immediately answer his phone or respond to text messages. Diamond, Unity and Fidelity didn’t answer calls. Moses Obajemu, a Lagos-based spokesman for Skye, didn’t immediately reply to questions sent to him by text message, as per his request. Meanwhile, Diamond Bank , Fidelity Bank , Wema Bank Plc, FCMB Group Plc, United Bank and Skye recorded declines in their shares traded on the Nigerian Stock Exchange, NSE, with Zenith ranking as the most traded stock among the 171 securities on the exchange. 

Diamond Bank fell 5.5 percent, Fidelity dropped 4.3 percent, Skye Bank slid 4.6 percent and Unity Bank slipped 4.1 percent. Union Bank Nigeria Plc, which is part owned by London-based Atlas Mara Ltd., was the second-biggest gainer.

Vanguard

Nigeria selling two presidential jets

President Muhammadu Buhari, after months of being questioned about its size, is finally pruning Nigeria’s presidential air fleet which includes several jets and helicopters. While it is unclear how many aircraft the fleet currently holds (reports suggest there are 10), the president has put two of the jets—a Dassault Falcon 7x executive jet and a Beechcraft Hawker 4000—up for sale.

The presidency is branding the sale as part of efforts to “cut waste” in government spending but, given Nigeria’s difficult times (its first recession in decades, a spiraling currency and falling oil exports), Nigerians will likely see the move more as a desperate attempt to raise foreign exchange (interested buyers will be quoted in dollars) amid a biting shortage.

BudgIT, an advocate for transparency in Nigerian government, has suggested that the government currently spends more on maintaining the presidential fleet than is allocated to any of the federal universities.

It could be argued the president’s office has enough planes to start a national carrier which would be ironic given reports president Buhari has asked the ministry of aviation look into restarting a national carrier.

Typically, cost-cutting moves by government are lauded in Nigeria but this has been met with a lukewarm reception as many see the move as being several months late. Buhari’s presidential campaign, hinged on a strong anti-corruption message and championing his austere lifestyle, led many Nigerians to hope that the government’s excesses would be quickly reduced under his administration. But much of that enthusiasm has slowly sipped away. Nigeria’s senate, the poster-child of the high cost of government in Nigeria, has so far refused to cut its annual $364 million budget despite ranking among the world’s best paid lawmakers.

Under Buhari, the cost of running the presidential state house has also gone up, with millions budgeted for line items repeated from last year, such as the “installation of electrical lighting and fittings.”

Quartz

UAE stops issuing visas to Nigerians

Indications have emerged that the authorities of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have stopped issuing visas to Nigerians, following the stabbing of a police officer by a group of six boys.

The incident which took place in Deira, the hub of business in Dubai, resulted in the massive arrest of blacks irrespective of their nationalities.

The officer was said to have died immediately from the injuries he sustained from the incident. A source who in the region during the incident, warned Nigerians to careful in order to avoid arrest. "Those of you have relatives in Dubai should be warned. The atmosphere is so hot especially for those without permit," he said.

This Day

Video - Nigeria beat Zambia 2-1 in World Cup Qualifier

Nigeria seizes $800,000 in cash from judges

Nigeria's security agency says it has seized $800,000 (Ј645,200) in cash in raids targeting senior judges suspected of corruption.

The DSS agency says the raids were carried out in recent days and several judges were arrested.

The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) accused the authorities of carrying out a "Gestapo-style" operation, demanding the release of those arrested.

President Muhammadu Buhari has pledged to tackle widespread corruption.

In a statement, the DSS said: "The searches have uncovered huge raw cash of various denominations, local and foreign currencies, with real estate worth several millions of naira and documents affirming unholy acts by these judges.

"We have been monitoring the expensive and luxurious lifestyle of some of the judges as well as complaints from the concerned public over judgment obtained fraudulently and on the basis (of) amounts of money paid."

The statement said the judges were from the supreme, appeal and high courts.

The names of the suspects have not been released.

Reacting to the raids, the NBA called on President Buhari to "immediately caution all the state security agencies and to respect the rule of law".

NBA head Abubakar Mahmoud told reporters: "We are not under military rule and we cannot accept this unholy event and Gestapo-style operation."

Since taking office last year, Mr Buhari has vowed to tackle the rampant official corruption, which has stunted economic growth across the country, the BBC's Martin Patience in Nigeria says.

As part of that campaign a number of former senior officials have been charged. But their cases have largely stalled in the courts.

Widespread corruption within the legal system makes it extremely difficult to convict powerful individuals, our correspondent adds.

BBC

Video - Nigeria's tertiary education fees vary according to type of institution

In Nigeria, tertiary education is not free. However the amount students pay depends on whether they are studying at a university owned by the federal government a state government or a private institution.

Nigeria projected to get out of recession by 2017

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has projected that Nigeria’s economy will be out of recession in 2017, growing by 0.6 percent that year.

According to the IMF World Economic Outlook (WEO) released on Tuesday in Washington, the fund projects that the current economic recession will outlast 2016, with a gross domestic product (GDP) contraction of 1.7 percent.

“Sub-Saharan Africa’s largest economies continue to struggle with lower commodity revenues, weighing on growth in the region,” IMF said.

“Nigeria’s economy is forecast to shrink 1.7 percent in 2016, and South Africa’s will barely expand. By contrast, several of the region’s non resource exporters, including Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Senegal, are expected to continue to grow at a robust pace of more than 5 percent this year.”

IMF also forecasted a GDP contraction and subsequent recession for Russia and Brazil throughout 2016.

The fund added: “Growth in emerging Asia and especially India continues to be resilient. India’s gross domestic product is projected to expand 7.6 percent this year and next, the fastest pace among the world’s major economies.”

Maurice Obstfeld, IMF chief economist and economic counsellor, who spoke on the outlook, said global economic growth would remain subdued in 2016, following a slowdown in the United States and Britain’s vote to leave the European Union.

Obstfeld also stated that the fund forecasted a slight pickup in 2017 and beyond, driven mainly by emerging market strength.

“Taken as a whole, the world economy has moved sideways,” he said. “We have slightly marked down 2016 growth prospects for advanced economies while marking up those in the rest of the world.”

Nigeria’s economy was earlier projected to contract by 1.8 percent in 2016, but the October version of the WEO has seen that reviewed positively to a contraction of only 1.7 percent.

The country has recorded a 0.36 and 2.06 percent contraction in the first and second quarter of 2016 respectively, plunging into its worst recession in 29 years.

The Cable

Nigeria selling two presidential jets 'to cut waste'

Nigeria is selling two of its 10 presidential jets in a bid to "cut down on waste", President Muhammadu Buhari's spokesman has said.

Adverts for the Falcon 7X executive jet and Hawker 4000 are to appear in newspapers, Garba Shehu said.

Some of the other presidential aircraft are be handed to the Nigerian air force to boost its operations, he said.

The country is one of Africa's leading economies but it is now suffering from its worst economic crisis in years.

In a Facebook post, Mr Shehu said the downsizing of the president fleet had been a campaign promise made by Mr Buhari before his election last year.

The president had requested a compact and reliable aircraft for transporting government officials on special missions, he said.

"This exercise is by no means complete," the spokesman added.

BBC Abuja bureau editor Naziru Mikailu says the advert for the jets will ask potential buyers to bid in US dollars, not the local naira currency.

Nigeria's economy slipped into recession in August.

The government depends on oil sales for about 70% of its revenues - and the slump in global oil prices has hit the West African nation hard.

A planned luxury 4bn rand (Ј185m) aircraft for South Africa's Jacob Zuma was widely criticised last year as were plans by Swaziland's King Mswati to acquire a second private plane. By contrast, former Malawian President Joyce Banda was widely praised when she auctioned her official jet in 2013 and vowed to hitch rides with other leaders.

The need for a US presidential jet, nicknamed Air Force One, is rarely questioned.

But not every country has a private jet for their leader.

The first jet for a British prime minister was inaugurated in July. The UK had been the only country in the G20 group of the world's major economies not to have one.

BBC

Video - Made in Nigeria festival kicks off in the country

Nigeria has launched a week-long Made in Nigeria festival. It's promoting the idea that the country could look inward to lift itself out of recession. The campaign encourages Nigerians to buy locally produced items. It's also aimed at urging producers to export items made in Nigeria, reducing pressure on the country's foreign exchange reserves.

Militants in Nigeria are getting ready to strike again

If the Nigerian government wants to fight militants blowing up oil pipelines, it should send troops into the creeks and mangrove swamps of the Niger River delta. Not the city.

That’s the suggestion of Babalola Olarewaju, a taxi driver who plies the airport route in Port Harcourt, the largest city in the restive oil-rich region.

“We’re talking about people who blow up pipelines in the night and then disappear,” said Olarewaju, 41, as he perched on the hood of his rickety cab outside the Le Meridien Hotel in the city center, referring to three T-72 tanks, Nigeria’s main battle tank, parked about a mile away. “What has a tank got to do here in the city?”

Dozens of tanks and 3,000 more troops have joined existing forces in and around Port Harcourt in the past month, a sign the government is pulling out the stops to quell a new wave of violence in Africa’s second-largest oil producer. So worrisome are the attacks that OPEC allowed Nigeria to be exempt from production curbs the cartel agreed on last week, the oil ministry said.

A six-week-old cease-fire show signs of weakening: The Niger Delta Avengers, responsible for more than 90 percent of all attacks this year, on Sept. 23 claimed responsibility for an attack, its first since July 24, on a key supply pipeline to Royal Dutch Shell Plc’s Bonny export terminal, a few miles outside Port Harcourt, in a statement on its website. The authenticity of the website, which has proved reliable before, couldn’t be verified.

There’s a lot at stake. Exxon Mobil Corp. is planning to resume some shipments at its Qua Iboe terminal, the country’s largest, at the end of September and expects repairs on the 400,000 barrel-a-day main export line will be completed in December. Shell also expects its Forcados terminal, out since February, to come back on line any time now. The company earlier this month lifted a delivery halt on its Bonny terminal shipments it had imposed in August after saboteurs breached its main supply pipeline.

The crucial challenge for the government is to appease a plethora of militant groups, some of whom never signed on to the cease-fire, such as the Niger Delta Greenland Justice Mandate. President Muhammadu Buhari, elected last year, is loathe to negotiate with the militants and is skeptical they are adhering to the truce. While Oil Minister Emmanuel Kachikwu, who helped broker the truce and also hails from the delta region, favors peace talks, the country’s security chiefs are averse to negotiation. Army chief Lieutenant-General Tukur Burutai would rather deploy more troops to put down the conflict. At least an additional 10,000 will be sent out in 2017, he said Sept. 9.

More Troops

“I do not see a willingness to engage,” said Ledum Mitee, a lawyer and Niger delta minority rights activist who’s part of the peace talks. “The response of the government is to send more troops to the region. There is a growing frustration within various groups that the government is not ready for negotiations and this may lead them back to attacking pipelines.”

In all, output is now estimated to average about 1.5 million barrels a day “at best,” Kachikwu said on Aug. 12. That’s potentially 23 percent lower than last year.

The resurgence of armed conflict in the delta mirrors a 2006 to 2009 campaign by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, or MEND. Attempts by then-president Umaru Yar’Adua to quell the militancy using troops escalated the violence. Attacks were curbed only after a state pardon and monthly stipend was granted to fighters willing to disarm. Violence resurfaced after Buhari stopped the payments and ended pipeline security contracts worth millions of dollars that former President Goodluck Jonathan negotiated with the militants.

Pipeline Knowledge

This has come to haunt the government. The militants today are more sophisticated and their attacks more precise. Led by the Niger Delta Avengers, the groups, now familiar with the layout of oil pipeline networks from their security operations, have in six months struck companies including Shell, Exxon Mobil, Chevron Corp. and Eni SpA where it hurt most: hard-to-fix export pipelines and oil-gathering hubs. So far this year, Forcados, Qua Iboe, Brass River and Bonny oil terminals have made declarations of force majeure -- a legal term that allows companies to miss export commitments -- after attacks on crude supply pipelines.

“A resumption of hostilities in the Niger delta would be disastrous for the government,” said Malte Liewerscheidt, senior Africa analyst at U.K. security consultants Verisk Maplecrost. “Sending the military is no solution.”

The conflict, combined with lower oil prices, has blighted the economy, sending it into a recession for the first time since 1991. Output contracted by 2.1 percent in the second quarter compared with 2.35 percent growth a year earlier. The oil industry shrank by 17.5 percent as production fell to 1.69 million barrels a day from 2.05 million barrels in the period. Nigeria depends on oil receipts for two-thirds of government revenue and more than 90 percent of foreign-currency income.

Brent, the benchmark for half the world’s crude trading, has lost about 45 percent in the past two years. Prices were down 0.3 percent at $50.75 a barrel as of 12:43 p.m. Singapore time on Tuesday.

Buhari, a former military ruler who came into office on an anti-corruption platform, pledged to boost security across Africa’s second-largest economy and most populous nation. He’s vowed to “deal” with the militants “as we dealt with Boko Haram,” a reference to a military offensive against a seven-year Islamist insurgency in the country’s northeast.

Security operations in the delta “are aimed at getting rid of all forms of criminal activities” in the region, according to army spokesman Sani Kukasheka Usman.

Shell will continue to monitor the security situation and take all necessary precautions, said Precious Okolobo, a Lagos-based spokesman. “The safety of our staff and contractors in Nigeria remains our highest priority.” Ogechukwu Udeagha, an Exxon Mobil spokesman, said “all inquiries on security be referred to government security agencies.” Chevron Corp., Total SA and Eni SpA didn’t immediately respond to inquiries seeking comments.

With troops already thinly stretched fighting the Boko Haram insurgency in the northeast and violent clashes between nomadic herders and farmers across the country’s central region in recent months, the government risks dragging the army into another protracted campaign, said Pabina Yinkere, energy analyst and head of research at Lagos-based Vetiva Capital Management Ltd., as the militants are on home turf with better knowledge of the delta terrain.

Nigeria military spokesman Brigadier-General Rabe Abubakar didn’t respond to calls and text message.

“The government needs to come up with a concrete plan to develop the Niger delta and create economic opportunities for the people,” Yinkere said. “The security situation is still fluid and if the government does not approach this tactfully, it risks further escalating the tension.”

Bloomberg

GE to invest $150 million in Nigeria

U.S. industrial firm General Electric (GE.N) plans to invest around $150 million in Nigeria by 2017, a senior executive said on Monday.

"There are development projects where we are investing," Jay Ireland, chief executive of General Electric in Africa told the FT Africa Summit in London. GE would also invest in oil and gas industry projects.

Growth in Nigeria - an OPEC member whose economy, the largest in Africa, is in recession for the first time in more than 20 years due to low oil prices - has been stunted for decades by a lack of investment in its road and rail network.

Ireland said the Nigeria investment was part of a plan to spend $2 billion in Africa in coming years.

But the $150 million Nigerian investment falls short of the sum Nigeria's government has said GE would invest.

President Muhammadu Buhari, on Saturday in a speech marking Nigeria's independence day, said GE was "investing $2.2 billion in a concession to revamp, provide rolling stock, and manage" some of the country's railway lines.

Reuters

Nigerian actress banned after on-screen hug

A leading Nigerian actress has been banned from the Hausa-language film industry because of her "immoral" behaviour, the main industry body says.

Rahama Sadau caused offence by "hugging and cuddling" pop star Classiq in a video, it added.

The industry, commonly known as Kannywood, has been under fire from conservative Muslim clerics who accuse it of corrupting people's values.

They regard it as taboo for men and women to hold hands or kiss in public.

Ms Sadau, who is said to be on a holiday in India, has not yet commented on the ban imposed by Motion Pictures Practitioners Association of Nigeria (Moppan).

Its chairman, Muhammadu Kabiru Maikaba, told the BBC Hausa service that the ban was "total".

"This is not the first time that she has been doing these wayward things. We have been warning her, but she still went ahead to dent our image," he said.

The Kannywood star appeared in the video with Classiq, in a song entitled I Love You.

In it, the Nigerian pop star is smitten with a vegetable seller in a market, acted by Ms Sadau.

Initially, she rejects his advances, batting him away with a bunch of vegetables, but he eventually wins her over.

They hold hands and engage in a bit of cuddling that would be considered demure in a Western film.

In a statement, Moppan said it hoped Ms Sadau's expulsion would serve as a deterrent for other actors.

Its code of conduct requires actors to avoid doing anything which violates Islamic and Hausa culture, reports the BBC's Isa Sanusi from the capital, Abuja.

Many people in northern Nigeria felt she had gone too far with Classiq in the music video, he adds.

Classiq cannot be banned because he is not a member of Moppan.

BBC

Video - Nigeria marks 56 years of independence

Africa's most Populous Nation, Nigeria, rolled out drums to celebrate its 56th Independence Anniversary. However, it was a Low keyed Ceremony held at the Presidential Villa.

Video - Niger Delta Greenland Justice Mandate claims responsibility

Nigerian militant group the Niger Delta Greenland Justice Mandate has claimed responsibility for the latest attack on a pipeline in the oil-producing region. The Niger Delta has been plagued by vandalism, which has seen the country's oil production plummet. Together with other economic factors, it's plunged Nigeria into a recession.

Video - MTN denies it repatriated $13.92 billion from Nigeria

Telecoms giant MTN has denied accusations of illegaly moving $13.92 B out of Nigeria, saying the claim has no merit. The allegation threatens to raise tensions between Nigeria and MTN, yet again. It's just three months since the company agreed to pay a reduced fine of $ 1 B, for failing to have cancelled millions of unregistered SIM cards. MTN is the largest mobile phone operator in Nigeria, and the country accounts for around one third of MTN's revenues. The company had threatened to pull out of Nigeria during the unregistered SIM card dispute. MTN shares fell by over 3% on Tuesday. So far this year, MTN's JSE-listed share are 10% lower.

Nigeria can't afford to participate in World Cup qualifier

As it stands, Nigeria's 2018 World Cup qualifying campaign may be over before it even begins.

With the country in the midst of a crippling recession triggered by weak oil prices, funding for its men's national football team has suffered to the point that it risks World Cup disqualification.

Although the Super Eagles -- who are led by Chelsea star John Obi Mikel -- have had their bonuses suspended for six months, the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) now says it is so broke that it cannot afford to fly its players to Zambia for next month's third-round qualifier.

Although many of its squad earn lucrative salaries playing for clubs in Europe, the NFF is courting a sponsor to raise $270,000 in order to charter a plane to Ndola, Zambia for the match on October 9, according to Nigeria's Guardian newspaper.

"As we speak, we don't have any kobo (a denomination of Nigeria's naira currency) in our purse," an unnamed member of the NFF told the newspaper, adding that they were appealing to regional telco giant Globacom for aid.

"The charges for the Airline alone is $200,000 for a 140-seater plane, and it will be on ground with the team for two days," the spokesman added. "We need between $6,000 and $10,000 for flight ticket(s) to bring in the players (from Europe)."

The NFF member also noted that players will be due a further $95,0000 each in bonuses, and said the only way forward is to receive stronger backing from the Nigerian government.

"The federal government still has to play its part, because this is the beginning of our campaign for the 2018 World Cup qualifying ticket. If we must get it right, every hand must be on deck," he told The Guardian.

The Nigerian Statehouse did not immediately respond to CNN's request for comment on the matter.

Nigeria has been one of the most successful African countries when it comes to the World Cup, reaching the round of 16 in three out of its five appearances -- most recently in 2014.

The Super Eagles have had even greater success at the Olympics, winning a gold medal at Atlanta in 1996, a silver at the 2008 Beijing Games, and a recent bronze medal at Rio 2016.

Reaching the bronze medal match in Rio de Janeiro prompted one Super Eagles superfan to donate $390,000 as charitable aid.

Learning of the team's financial hardship, Japanese plastic surgeon Katsuya Takasu flew in from Tokyo for Nigeria's bronze medal match against Honduras, which it won 3-2.

"I was so happy and cried for their winning. Japanese are sentimental," Takasu told CNN in August.

Takasu personally delivered the checks to Nigeria's captain, Mikel and coach Samson Siasia after being impressed by the team's resilience when they emerged victorious in the Olympic football group stage despite nearly missing the tournament.

The team were stranded at their Atlanta training base and arrived just seven hours before their opening match against Japan, which they won 5-4, due to a logistical mix up -- the airline hired to charter the team to Brazil, it turned out, had not been paid on time.

CNN

Alex Iwobi wished he played for Nigeria in the 2016 Olympics

Alex Iwobi wishes Arsenal would have let him play at the Olympics with Nigeria, but realises that going to Rio may also have hampered his progress with the Gunners.

Iwobi, 20, was blocked from joining the Nigeria squad for the Rio de Janeiro Games in August as it would have ruled him out of the start of the Premier League season, a decision that Iwobi accepted.

"I would like to have played in the Olympics -- doing that would have been a big thing for me," Iwobi told the London Evening Standard. "If I had gone, I would have missed a couple of Arsenal games at least and the boss [Arsene Wenger] didn't want that. I wish I did go but at the end of the day I did what the boss wanted and I am happy to be where I am. If I had gone, I might not be where I am now."

Iwobi started Arsenal's season-opening game against Liverpool only to sustain a thigh injury that ruled him out for three weeks. But he has been an integral part of the team's success since his return to fitness, including in the 3-0 win over Chelsea on Saturday.

After breaking into the first team last spring, he is now a regular first-choice starter for Wenger and seems to still have plenty of room for development.

"I don't even look at how far I've come. I wouldn't say I'm in a daze right now but I'm just enjoying it as it comes and whatever happens, happens," Iwobi said.

The attacking midfielder was born in Lagos but his family moved to London when he was four years old and he joined the Arsenal academy while still in primary school. Despite playing for England's youth teams, Iwobi opted to represent Nigeria internationally after being first called up in 2015.

And his uncle, Nigeria legend Jay-Jay Okocha, still offers him advice on how to deal with his newfound success.

"When I was growing up, he helped me a lot on the pitch," Iwobi said. "He gave me game advice a lot but the older I am getting, he is helping me off the pitch more so I can be professional and focus on the football.

"He's always telling me what could happen, what you are about to face. He always says 'concentrate on the football first -- the rest is just luxury stuff that comes with it."

ESPN

Militants blow up oil pipeline in Niger Delta

A Nigerian militant group claimed an attack on Thursday on a crude pipeline operated by state oil firm NNPC in the Niger Delta.

Attacks on Nigeria's energy facilities by groups calling for the Delta region to receive a greater share of the OPEC member's oil wealth have cut crude production, which stood at 2.1 million barrels per day at the start of the year, by a third.

The Niger Delta Greenland Justice Mandate said it bombed the Unenurhie-Evwreni delivery line in Ughelli, Delta state, at around 01:00 a.m. (0000 GMT) on Thursday. The line is operated by NPDC, a subsidiary of NNPC.

A military source said dynamite was used to blow up the pipeline. An NNPC spokesman could not immediately be reached for comment.

It comes days after Niger Delta Avengers, which has claimed responsibility for most of the attacks on energy facilities in the region since the start of the year, said it carried out its first attack since declaring a break in hostilities in August to pursue talks with the government.

The Avengers said on Saturday there had been no progress in meeting their demands.

The Greenland Justice Mandate, which has never agreed to cease hostilities, said in a statement it had blown up the pipeline "to prove to the wicked and ungrateful multinational oil companies and their Nigerian military allies... that we own our lands".

Reuters

Video - Nigerian currency trading at 440 Naira to the U.S. dollar

The Nigerian Naira traded much lower on Monday in the unofficial black market at 440 to the green back. This comes as dollar shortages persist in the economy. Despite removing the peg and floating its currency in July, forex shortages continue to be a serious challenge. Deji Badmus looks at what is driving the rapid depreciation of the naira.

Believed to be dead again Boko Haram leader resurfaces in new video

Nigeria's most wanted man is making the headlines again. Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau surfaced in a video over the weekend - at least the fifth time he's disproved official claims that he's dead. The military now says Shekau is mentally unstable.

Nigeria urges US to lift ban on crude oil

THE Federal Government has pleaded with the United States to lift its ban on the importation of Nigeria’s crude, describing the action as antithetical to the flourish of trade and economic cooperation upon which  Africa Growth and Opportunity Act, AGOA, was founded.

The Minister of Labour and Employment, Senator Chris Nigige, who made the plea, also told the American government to demonstrate stronger commitment to improve economic ties with African nations through balanced trade relations. 

Senator Ngige made the plea at a Ministerial Roundtable meeting on Africa Growth and Opportunity Act at the Department of Labour Building, Washington D.C, United States. He said the stoppage of Nigeria’s crude importation had led to low foreign exchange receipts and consequent technical recession in some African countries. 

Ngige, who led Nigeria’s delegation at the meeting to the round table, titled Trade and Worker Rights: Inclusive Economic Growth in Africa Through Trade on the Day One of the Roundtable, said the capacity of Nigeria to tackle anti-labour practices, such as child labour, cheap labour and human trafficking, was being hampered by dwindling resources, which the stoppage of the import of the Nigerian crude by the US had accentuated. He said poverty at the low income levels made the fight against anti-labour practices at the base difficult. 

He urged the US to assist African countries in the entire agricultural value food chain of production, processing and preservation as well as give increase educational assistance to farmers. He said:  “The founding ideal of AGOA is to foster a symbiotic economic cooperation between Africa and the United States. However, the capacity of the Africa nations such as Nigeria to effectively tap into the full potentials of the body is being checkmated by limited resources. 

“There is need therefore for America to rethink initiatives that once made AGOA attractive to African countries. ‘’Rescinding her decision on Nigerian crude is one of such steps that could be taken to buoy up our economy and regain enough capacity to protect workers rights and promote decent work in an inclusive economic growth. 

“The US must do more to assist junior partners by extending some labour projects and technical aide being executed in some African countries such as Madagascar, Zambia and Kenya to Nigeria.” 

Speaking further on Nigeria’s initiatives for improving internationally recognized workers right, the Minister said Nigeria had ratified and domesticated eight core conventions of the International Labour Organization, ILO, dealing with child rights and fair labour practices, drawing the attention of the international community to the strong backing for fundamental freedoms and labour rights enshrined in the constitution, especially in section 40. Earlier in his address of welcome, the US Secretary of Labour, Tom Perez, pledged the commitment of the United States to the growth of AGOA and urged African countries to strive towards the recognition of workers rights as an essential element of inclusive economic growth.

Vanguard

Leader of Boko Haram Abubakar Shekau mocks Nigeria army

Boko Haram's embattled leader, Abubakar Shekau, appears in a new video to deny reports of his death and to taunt the parents of the nearly 300 school girls the group kidnapped from their boarding school in 2014.

"To the despot Nigerian government: Die with envy. I'm not dead," Shekau says in the video.

An ISIS flag is visible in the background. That terrorist organization has said it is supporting Shekau's rival, Abu Musab al-Barnawi, as the legitimate leader of the Nigerian ISIS-affiliated terrorist movement.

The video was a response to the Nigerian army's claim that it "fatally wounded" Shekau in a raid August 19. The army dismissed the video Sunday as evidence of Shekau's desperation.

"The video has shown beyond all reasonable doubt the earlier suspicion that the purported factional terrorists' group leader is mentally sick and unstable," the army statement said.

CNN cannot independently confirm when the video was shot, or confirm its claims.

The attack that brought Boko Haram international notoriety was when Shekau's forces captured approximately 300 girls -- between the ages of 16 and 18 -- from a boarding school in the town of Chibok in Borno state in April 2014.

Boko Haram, which opposes western education, wants to set up an Islamic caliphate in Nigeria.

In the video, Shekau teases parents of the Chibok schoolgirls about whether their daughters will be released and insists detained Boko Haram fighters must be released for the return of the schoolgirls.

The kidnapping sparked global outrage and prompted global figures, including activist Malala Yousafzai and US first lady Michelle Obama, to support the campaign to #BringBackOurGirls.

For a year after they were taken, the abducted girls were kept together, Amina Ali, an escaped schoolgirl told CNN in August. Then some of the teenagers -- including her -- were "given" to the terrorists as wives.

Shekau, however, is still shrouded in mystery. A Boko Haram insider told CNN in August the group had split after new leader al-Barnawi broke with Shekau and left with some followers, a move which the insider said left Shekau with most of the fighters in the Sambisa forest and also in control of the schoolgirls, a powerful bargaining chip for the group.

The army contends Boko Haram is significantly weakened and has been "irrational and unreliable" in negotiations over the schoolgirls.

CNN

Video - Nigerian military still engaged in the battle for Mallam Fatori

Fighting is still underway to drive Boko Haram from a town near the Nigerian border with Chad. Troops from the region's multinational force are engaged in the battle for Mallam Fatori. Both sides claim to have inflicted heavy casualties.

Suicides in Nigeria on the rise due to bad economy

In the past few months, there have been six reported cases of Nigerians committing suicide, and two attempts. This trend is troubling many in a country where suicide rates are usually low.

Some Nigerians seem to have resigned themselves to fate, believing there was no option to hold on to, to keep afloat. A member of a family living in Akwa Ibom State killed himself recently. His body was found hanging from a rope tied to the ceiling of his bedroom.

When the man's younger brother, David (shown above), hadn't seen him for a while, he became very worried.

When I didn't see him for three days, I sent a small boy to look around for him. The boy found his door locked and saw him through the door hanging," he said.

Relatives and friends of the victim believe that it is the poor economic situation in the country that drove him to suicide.

Many asking 'why?'

There are disagreements in the local community as to whether the man left a suicide note. One camp argued that he wrote about economic challenges caused by President Muhammadu Buhari's administration as reasons for his suicide. Another camp said that there was, in fact, no suicide note at all.

"Two people broke the door and didn't find any note. Now you hear wrong stories everywhere, saying that man left a note, saying he killed himself because of the bad situation in this country," said Oturu Odaibo, a local youth leader.

Before he ended his life, the man sold local wine and cigarettes in his community. A local chief, Edet Asoquor Iyang, said that he knew why the man decided to kill himself.

"He hanged himself and broke his neck because things are difficult in Nigeria today. No job, no money, nothing. Nigeria has turned upside down and everybody is a beggar," he said.

Whether the man committed suicide to escape his difficulties is still unclear. What is clear, however, is the increasing number of suicide deaths in the country. In the past month alone, there are reports of five people who have committed suicide due to economic hardship.

According to a 2012 report from the World Health Organization, an estimated 6.5 people kill themselves each year in Nigeria per 100,000 people compared to 9.1 in Germany, 12.1 in the US and 19.5 in Uganda.

Everyday hardship

The current economic crisis in Nigeria has forced businesses to close. Many blame the government's policy to ration foreign currencies for the recession. This crisis has now trickled down to the ordinary man and woman. Many are now living below the poverty line which leads to anxiety, depression and frustration.

Emmabong Eme Effiong, a local farmer in Akwa Ibom State, said she hasn't experienced this level of difficulties in her entire life.

"I am a farmer and I if I do not farm, I won't eat. I want the government to help us live because this is too difficult for us. Just two cups of rice costs over 100 naira (29 dollar cents or 32 euro cents). I want the government to make the price of rice go down," said Effiong.

Maru Godwin Worlu, an economist and lecturer at the Port Harcourt Polytechnic in Rivers State said the difficulties are being felt in every corner of the country.

"For you to really understand if the government is doing well or not, just look at the ordinary people on the street," said Worlu.

He went on to recount the story of a woman with three children who was forced to beg for money to feed them. One day she had had enough and went and bought sleeping pills and gave them to the children.

"All three children died in their sleep. They just died," he said.

DW

Video - Nigeria and U.S. Presidents vow to end Boko Haram insurgency

U.S. President Barack Obama and his Nigerian counterpart Mohammadu Buhari have met and discussed ways of countering the Boko Haram militant group. The two leaders held a bilateral meeting on the side lines of the 71st edition of the UN General Assembly. While thanking America for help rendered in the area of security President Buhari said the country was open to support in combating the humanitarian crisis currently ravaging the region. President Obama then went on to commend Buhari on his achievements in combatting Boko Haram, promising to help him end their insurgency.

Video - Nigeria holds exhibition held to popularize local health care

Nigeria’s health service providers have joined hands to showcase their capabilities and discourage the massive departure of patients seeking specialized care abroad. The providers held a healthcare exhibition in the capital Abuja and CCTV's Kelechi Emekalam was there.

Nigeria looking to ease recession by taxing internet use

Making phone calls, surfing the web and watching TV in Nigeria could be about to become more expensive.

With national revenues shrinking due to the global crash in oil prices over the last couple of years, Nigeria has been forced to consider how to diversify its revenue sources. In a search for a new pot of gold, the government appears to have settled on squeezing its communications industry as lawmakers are discussing a bill to tax communications services, including phone calls, texts, internet data and cable television. Nigeria’s telecoms sector alone is responsible around 8% of GDP.

It’s not the first time the Nigerian government has been accused of leaning on its vibrant telecoms industry for new revenue. Late last year it fined Africa’s largest mobile operator, MTN, $5.1 billion for SIM card irregularities. Both sides settled in June for $1.7 billion.

Making phone calls, surfing the web and watching TV in Nigeria could be about to become more expensive.

With national revenues shrinking due to the global crash in oil prices over the last couple of years, Nigeria has been forced to consider how to diversify its revenue sources. In a search for a new pot of gold, the government appears to have settled on squeezing its communications industry as lawmakers are discussing a bill to tax communications services, including phone calls, texts, internet data and cable television. Nigeria’s telecoms sector alone is responsible around 8% of GDP.

It’s not the first time the Nigerian government has been accused of leaning on its vibrant telecoms industry for new revenue. Late last year it fined Africa’s largest mobile operator, MTN, $5.1 billion for SIM card irregularities. Both sides settled in June for $1.7 billion.

But amid Nigeria’s first recession in decades, low-income Nigerians are likely to be most affected. Ojobo Atuluku, country director of advocacy group, ActionAid says if passed, the bill and increased strain on low income Nigerians will be “akin to punishing the poor for the sins of the rich.“

Quartz

Nigeria willing to get help from U.N. in negotiating kidnapped Chibok girls release

Nigeria's president said on Thursday he would be open to U.N. bodies coming in to act as intermediaries in any talks with Boko Haram Islamist militants on the release of about 200 kidnapped schoolgirls.

Muhammadu Buhari has vowed to free the girls, whose abduction almost two and a half years ago from the northeastern village of Chibok triggered international campaigns and piled pressure on his predecessor Goodluck Jonathan.

Nigeria would "welcome intermediaries such as U.N. outfits, to step in", Buhari told U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on sidelines of the annual U.N. General Assembly in New York, a statement issued by the president's office said.

Buhari last year said for the first time his government was ready to negotiate over the girls. In August said he would let the Islamist militant group choose a non-profit organization as an intermediary but the group has not commented on the proposal.

Any negotiations would be the first publicly known talks between the government and Boko Haram, whose seven-year insurgency to create an Islamic state in the northeast has killed 15,000 people and displaced more than two million.

"The challenge is in getting credible and bona fide leadership of Boko Haram to discuss with," said Buhari.

Boko Haram pledged allegiance to Islamic State last year but signs of a rift emerged after IS announced a new leader for what it described as its West African operations. Boko Haram's hitherto leader Abubakar Shekau appeared to contradict the appointment in a later video message.

"The split in the insurgent group is not helping matters. Government had reached out, ready to negotiate, but it became difficult to identify credible leaders," said the president.

Nigeria's failure to find the kidnapped children prompted an outcry at home and abroad. Critics of Buhari's predecessor, Goodluck Jonathan, said his government was too slow to act.

Boko Haram published a video in August which apparently showed recent footage of dozens of the girls and stated that some had been killed in air strikes.

Authorities said in May that one of the missing girls had been found and the president vowed to rescue the others.

Nigeria is battling the jihadist group on the ground and with air strikes. A multi-national joint task force - comprising troops from Nigeria and neighboring Niger, Cameroon, Chad and Benin - is also fighting the militants.

Reuters

Children in Nigeria dying of hunger as no one notices

It's a crisis the world has largely ignored, despite some 20,000 deaths and an estimated 2.6 million people forced from their homes.

Northeast Nigeria is facing famine, the collateral damage from seven years of Boko Haram's deadly insurgency and a problem aid agencies have long been warning about.

Children are starving. Whole villages and towns in desperate need of assistance are out of reach because of insecurity and fighting, despite military gains in recapturing territory lost to the Islamists.

Aid agencies talk of a looming humanitarian catastrophe. Those on the ground say it's already happening.

This week, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will make a renewed appeal for funding to stave off the crisis.

Some $559 million is needed between now and the end of the year to provide food, shelter and vital health care for those in need, not just in Nigeria but also in neighbouring Cameroon, Chad and Niger, where the violence has spread.

"It's devastating," said Doune Porter, from the UN children's fund UNICEF, speaking to CBC News from Nigeria's capital, Abuja.

"It's really bad…. For the immediate crisis, just in Borno state alone there's 244,000 children who will suffer this year from severe acute malnutrition. Children are basically just clinging to life."

Three months ago, UNICEF said one in five of those 244,000 — nearly 50,000 children under five — could die if nothing was done.

Estimates are of a possible 130 deaths every day. But money is needed, and with Nigeria's economy officially in recession, the funding is going to have to come from elsewhere.

"This is too big for the Nigerian government to handle, too big for UNICEF to handle on its own, too massive a crisis — and the world needs to mobilize," said Porter.

But with so many other humanitarian crises dominating the headlines, such as Syria and migrants in Europe, there's no guarantee the world will sit up and take notice.

Nearly three years ago, Nigeria became Africa's leading economy after it rebased (updated the way it measures) its GDP.

But then global oil prices crashed, leaving the continent's most populous nation, which depends on crude export sales for 70 per cent of government revenue, desperately short of cash.

State sector salaries have gone unpaid, much-needed infrastructure projects shelved and the country's currency, the naira, has plummeted in value. Inflation has soared to above 17 per cent. Everything from fuel to food is more expensive.

After years of inaction and inept reaction from the previous government, President Muhammadu Buhari, who came to power in May 2015, has at least achieved successes in curbing Boko Haram's almost daily bloodshed.

But the years of conflict have taken their toll: rural northeast Nigeria — already desperately poor even before the insurgency — has been devastated: farmers have been killed or have fled; land for crops has not been sown or harvested for years.

The resulting food shortages have driven up prices in local markets, while the influx of the displaced to cities such as Maiduguri, the capital of Borno state, has heaped pressure on local authorities, leaving them struggling to cope.

Some 1.5 million people have sought safe haven in Maiduguri, more than doubling its population. Most have been taken in by friends and family or forced into overcrowded and unsanitary camps for the displaced.

The state and federal government response has been patchy: food such as rice and maize has reportedly been stolen and resold by corrupt officials; often it has not materialized at all.

There have been deaths in the camps from measles outbreaks and other preventable diseases because of low vaccination rates. During the current rainy season, typhoid, malaria and cholera are constant threats.

Host communities and volunteers have done what they can, even as the international aid effort has scaled up.

The American University of Nigeria, based in Yola, Adamawa state, has run feeding programs for the displaced for several years. In August it said it fed 75,000.

But AUN president Margee Ensign said the money to do so has now dried up — and those who previously returned to their homes in the countryside are coming back to the city in an even more desperate state.

"The problems related to famine, out-of-school children, lack of infrastructure are now far bigger," she told CBC News.

"We are seeing people come back to Yola malnourished and dying. There is a rapid increase in children on the streets."

A woman weak with hunger asked one AUN staff member to raise her one-week-old child. She later died. The employee took in the child, Ensign said.

The last time the world paid attention to Nigeria was after more than 200 schoolgirls were kidnapped from the remote town of Chibok, in Borno state, in April 2014.

The abduction sparked a huge online campaign — #BringBackOurGirls — featuring U.S. first lady Michelle Obama and Hollywood celebrities. But more than two years on, 217 of the 219 are still in captivity. UNICEF says some 7,000 children have been abducted.

Now, the images of Boko Haram are its child victims, those born into the conflict, starved to the brink of death by its consequences, leaving them little more than skin and bone or swollen by protein deficiency through lack of food.

Money is required — and fast — not just a hashtag.

CBC

Video - Nigeria's Central bank retains benchmark interest rate at 14%

Nigeria's central bank kept its benchmark interest rate at 14 percent on Tuesday, resisting the finance minister's call to lower borrowing costs. Policymakers urged the government to spend more to drag Africa's top economy out of recession. The West African nation is going through its first recession in more than 20 years, brought on by low oil prices, and inflation accelerated to an 11-year high of 17.6 percent in August. The naira has traded at a record low of 425 to the dollar on the parallel market since last week.Finance Minister Kemi Adeosun said on Monday that the central bank should lower interest rates so that the government can borrow domestically to boost the economy.

Video - Fulani herdsmen and farmers in Nigeria fighting over resources

Decades of fierce competition for natural resources has left thousands dead, property damaged and villages desolate in Nigeria's Benue state. Fulani herdsmen are fighting with farmers in another row over scarce resources. Both sides have repeatedly fought over farmland, access to grazing areas and water.

Video - Nigeria drops from fourth to seventh largest cocoa producer

Nigeria's Cocoa Association has confirmed that the country has dropped to the world's seventh top producer of the crop. This is after its projected output for the 2015-2016 season was lowered to 190,000 metric tons. The International Cocoa Organization had previously ranked Nigeria as the world's fourth biggest cocoa producer. The downgrade was attributed to the exchange rate policy, the lack of reliable data and low synergy between the public and private sectors. The ICCO had initially projected Nigeria would produce 270,000 metric tons of cocoa in the current season.

Nigeria must consider selling oil assets - Saraki

Nigeria must consider selling stakes in joint ventures with oil majors and other assets as talks to borrow abroad have not succeeded yet and would in any case not generate enough funds to stimulate economic recovery, the leader of the Senate said.

Senate President Bukola Saraki, the third most powerful official in Africa's biggest economy, also said the oil producer might struggle with recession for up to nine months or even longer unless it got serious about attracting investors.

The government said this month it had approved loans from China, the World Bank, Japan and the African Development Bank, but Saraki, whose relations with the president have cooled since last year, said such talks were still ongoing with no deals yet.

"There is a big hole now in the fiscal deficit because that funding is not coming through. So we've got to look for alternative ways to fund that," Saraki said in a joint interview with the Financial Times on Monday when asked about the loans.

The government has said it plans to borrow as much as $10 billion, with half of that coming from foreign sources, including a planned $1 billion Eurobond issue, to fund a budget deficit of 2.2 trillion naira ($7.21 billion) and boost an economy hammered by low oil prices and hard currency shortages.

Saraki said that even if the loan talks succeeded, the amount raised would not be enough to plug the hole in public finances. "My take is that even if it does come through, it's money too little, too late," he said, referring to the loan talks.

He said Nigeria needed to sell stakes in oil and gas joint ventures, oil exploration contracts and refineries to raise funds. "In my view, I really can't see any other pathway to recovery. We need investors, we need to raise capital."

Such an asset sale would be necessary even if global crude prices recovered to $70 a barrel and Nigeria managed to restore oil production to 2 million barrels per day (bpd) with an end to militant attacks in the Niger Delta oil hub, Saraki said. Officials say the attacks have reduced output by 700,000 bpd.

Saraki said Nigeria could overcome recession in six to nine months if swift action was taken -- a more downcast view than that of the government, which has forecast a quick recovery.

Central bank governor Godwin Emefiele was due to hold a news conference at around 1315 GMT (09:15 a.m. EDT) after a meeting of the rate-setting Monetary Policy Committee. The finance minister said on Monday the central bank should lower interest rates so that the government can borrow domestically to boost the economy.

Economists polled by Reuters last week predicted that the central bank would keep its key interest rate at 14 percent and reiterate its focus on resuscitating growth.

The government has said it is considering asset sales, but has given no details.

"If we do things right, the confidence will come in," Saraki said. "If we carry on waiting for government revenues to go up, if we don't do anything seen as thinking out of the box" the recession could drag on longer.

Nigeria's 2016 budget was the largest in the nation's history, but the oil price drop and Delta attacks have left the government scrambling for funds.

Saraki is from the same ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) as President Muhammadu Buhari, who was elected in March 2015 on a promise to end graft and mismanagement in the West African nation.

But relations between the two have been strained since Saraki ran unopposed for the position of Senate president last year, mainly with the backing of the opposition. He was not the APC's preferred candidate.

(1 = 305.0000 naira)

Reuters

Boko Haram claimed to have killed 40 troops in Nigeria

Nigeria's army claimed victory Wednesday in "a fierce battle" in a remote desert trading post where Islamic extremists said they killed 40 troops from a multinational force.

Army spokesman Col. Sani Kukasheka Usman said troops recaptured Malam Fatori town on Tuesday and killed several extremists, but the insurgents regrouped at the nearby border with Niger.

The Islamic State's West Africa Province, one faction of the Boko Haram extremist group, hours earlier claimed it had annihilated "a convoy of the African Coalition Crusader forces" at Malam Fatori, killing more than 40 soldiers and wounding dozens, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors extremist communiques.

There was no way to independently verify either side's claim.

Tuesday's battle was the first Nigeria attack claimed by the Islamic State group since August, when it named a new caliph in Nigeria, provoking a leadership struggle. Leader Abubakar Shekau pledged Boko Haram's allegiance to IS in 2015, giving the Islamic State its first sub-Saharan franchise. But IS last month announced it had replaced Shekau in a dispute around his indiscriminate killings of Muslims.

The town of Malam Fatori has changed hands many times in the seven-year Boko Haram uprising that has killed more than 20,000. Many residents fled to Niger in 2014 after soldiers in a punitive raid burned down hundreds of huts because a wounded extremist was given refuge there.

Tuesday's was the fourth insurgent attack in northeast Nigeria in three days.

Eighteen people were killed Sunday and Monday when extremists gunned down Christians leaving a church service, beheaded a village head and his son and ambushed a convoy within miles of Maiduguri, the biggest city in the northeast.

No one has claimed responsibility for those attacks.

ABC

Video - Nigeria's state-owned oil company accused of evading payments

Nigeria’s state-owned oil company, NNPC and 22 other petroleum firms, reportedly owe the government 86.4 billion naira. The government agency tasked with fighting corruption says the debt is the result of years of collusion between NNPC officials and private oil companies.

Nigerian makes Miss Transsexual final

Miss SaHHara was born in the wrong country, and in the wrong body. Repression in her native Nigeria almost drove her to suicide, but this weekend she was cruising down the runway in a cream dress – one of several finalists at the Miss Trans Star International beauty pageant in Barcelona, Europe’s main such event. Set up in 2010 in the Spanish Mediterranean seaside city, the fifth edition of the contest this weekend crowned Brazil’s Rafaela Manfrini as this year’s transsexual queen, although winning was secondary for participants who have often experienced discrimination and repression.

“Here all of us are winners already, we won our life,” said runner-up Tallen Abu Hanna from Israel. Persecuted by their governments, victims of discrimination or rejected by their own families, many of the 25 candidates went through hell and high water before summoning up the courage to strut their stuff in swimsuits or evening gowns. “This is an attempt to engage society,” said Thara Wells, the contest founder. “We want to go beyond beauty and tell the life story of each girl.”

Escape or death 

Among the candidates were transsexuals from Japan, South Africa, Colombia, Turkey, and Nigeria, whose activist chat stood out. Sporting a cream dress with a plunging neckline, Miss SaHHara glided down the runway without a hint of shyness, drawing in the 300-strong audience with her light-green eyes. Nothing much remained from the young 19-year-old man who fled Nigeria for London more than a decade ago. “I had severe disphoria. 

My breasts weren’t growing, I didn’t have a vagina, I looked at myself in the mirror and I did not feel comfortable with my body,” she told AFP before the gala final Saturday. Miss SaHHara, as she is known, always knew she was a woman. She would put on make-up and wear her mother’s high heels. But in Nigeria, where homosexuality and transsexuality are illegal and punishable by 14 years in jail, her situation was tough. “In the street, they were always attacking me, harassing me,” she said. “I came back home and my family would harass me, they said ‘you’re wrong, you need to change, act like a man’.” 

She twice attempted suicide and says she was imprisoned in Nigeria for wearing women’s attire before escaping to London, first as an illegal migrant, then as a refugee. “There was no way I could have survived in Nigeria, this is why I had to leave,” she said. In Britain, she underwent surgery to become a woman with long, curly blond hair, big breasts and full lips. 

She works as a model and singer, and also manages her own NGO to help transsexuals. “London gave me the opportunity to pursue my dreams and be my true self,” she said. “I’m hoping that by speaking out and coming to Miss Star, I will try to influence people or perhaps influence my government to revoke 14 years imprisonment for LGBT inNigeria.” 

2,000 murders since 2006

In recent years, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people have scored small victories around the world. Nepal, Argentina, Bolivia and Ireland are just some of the countries to have approved laws recognising transgender people and the United States is considering allowing them into the army. But there is still a lot to do. LGBT people are still persecuted in some 80 countries, and more than 2,000 transsexuals have been murdered since 2006, according to the Trans Murder Monitoring Project, part of the Berlin-based Transgender Europe NGO. “We have very few opportunities in life, very few,” said contest founder Wells. Israel’s Tallen Abu Hanna concurred, saying transsexuals have huge difficulties in finding jobs. “In the end, lots of them have to have sex for money.” 

She has been lucky though

A Christian Arab Israeli, she has become a celebrity since winning a transsexual beauty pageant in her country, and wants to take advantage of this fame to inspire Arab people, who like she once did may feel trapped “inside a cage.” “I became a woman and I found peace between my body and my soul.”

Vanguard