March 2021

26 March 2021
BBC
Nigeria’s kidnapping industry
Since December, more than 600 students have been abducted from schools in north-west Nigeria, highlighting a worrying development in the country’s kidnap-for-ransom crisis…

Guardian Nigeria
Soldiers protest over unpaid allowances, obsolete equipment
Some Nigerian soldiers on Thursday protested against the non-payment of allowances and poor equipment, Channel TV reported…

Sahara Reporters
Bandits shoot dead Niger state accountant
Bandits have struck again on the Minna-Kontagora Expressway in Niger State, killing an account officer, Abdullahi Isah, who worked with the Niger State Development Company…

24 March 2021
ThisDay
Security: ONSA, military stand firm
Frequently described as overstretched and underfunded, Nigeria’s military forces are fighting jihadists in the North-East and armed gangs in the North-West as well as dealing with communal conflicts in central regions, separatist tensions in the South-East and piracy in the nearby Gulf of Guinea…

23 March 2021
The Africa Report
Buhari’s legacy is one of ‘missed opportunities and inaction’ says analyst
29 May 2021 will mark six years since Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari took office with a promise to safeguard the lives of the electorates, fight crippling corruption and improve livelihoods in Africa’s most populous nation…

Al Jazeera
Nigeria’s booming kidnap-for-ransom enterprise threatens security
Since December 2020, a total of 769 students have been taken in at least five school kidnappings in northern Nigeria…

Wall Street Journal
Kidnapping Schoolchildren in Nigeria Becomes Big Business
The kidnap for ransom business is booming across northern Nigeria, and schoolchildren are its hottest commodity…

22 March 2021
HumAngle
Why Nigeria needs to replace CCTVs with UAVs for better security
Around midnight on March 12, 2021, terrorists attacked the Federal College of Forestry Mechanisation, Afaka, in Kaduna State, Northwest Nigeria. By March 13, it was confirmed that over 30 people were kidnapped…

21 March 2021
Premium Times
Nigerian health experts debate concerns about AstraZeneca vaccine
The flurry of suspensions by some countries, mainly in Europe, of the AstraZeneca vaccine following reports that a small number of people had developed blood clots after receiving the jabs has drawn a debate among health experts in Nigeria…

20 March 2021
BusinessDay
Any lesson for Nigeria from Asari-Dokubo’s Biafra stunt
For so long, the Federal Government of Nigeria has allowed a minor wound to fester. Successive governments have paid a blind eye to the cry of marginalisation by certain sections of the country. Over the years, many ethnic nationalities have clamoured for self-determination. Some have asked for an opportunity to exit the forced marriage they entered into. Government has neither changed its oppressive ways nor heeded the secession cry…

Premium Times
How ESN’s attack on Orlu market led to orgy of violence
On January 25, 2021, many Hausa traders in a market in Orlu, Imo State, barely had a moment to process what they were seeing as vehicles stopped with a screech, masked gunmen jumped off and started shooting directly at them. The gunmen later set the market on fire…

19 March 2021
HumAngle
Tiv: The rise of self-help groups and how it expands the circle of violence (2)
Less than two months after the Nigeria Defence Headquarters revealed that its troops raided a suspected Tiv militia camp in 2020, Salome Solomon from Tsokondi, Taraba State, said in an interview that gunmen alleged to be Tiv militia killed her three children on their farm…

18 March 2021
The Cable
Buhari: Border closure failed to stop smuggling of illegal arms into Nigeria
President Muhammadu Buhari says if Libya remains unstable, illegal arms and ammunition will continue to flow into the Sahel region of the African continent…

17 March 2021
Sahara Reporters
How Biafra agitation broke into factions under Kanu, Mefor, Dokubo over money, others
The factions springing up in the Indigenous Peoples Of Biafra among Nnamdi Kanu, Asari Dokubo and Uche Mefor, are largely because of financial resources and control, according to a report by the SB Morgen Intelligence…

16 March 2021
Al Jazeera
Abducted students in Nigeria’s Kaduna state are safe: Governor
The governor of the northwest Nigerian state of Kaduna says nearly 40 students kidnapped last week are “safe”, adding his government will not “negotiate with the bandits” for their release…

ICIR Nigeria
Why IPOB split into Kanu, Dokubo factions
In the South-Eastern part of Nigeria, several groups are seeking the actualisation of a nation called Biafra…

Guardian Nigeria
Nigeria inflation continues to rise, surges to 34-month high
Nigeria’s inflation rate has climbed to a 34-month high, rising to 17.33% in February from 16.47% in January 2021, the latest figures published by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) have shown…

Nairametrics
Over 50% of Nigerians say they will take Covid-19 vaccine – NPHCDA
The National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) has announced that over 50% of Nigerians have admitted that they will take the Covid-19 vaccines, compared to earlier studies which showed that up to 75% of Nigerians said they will not take it…

Nigeria Info Lagos
Can the PH-Maiduguri Railway and the Bonny Deep Sea Port revive the Eastern Economic Corridor
Here’s today’s Big Hard Fact: The Federal Government says the Bonny Deep Sea Port will cost $461,924,369. Can the PH-Maiduguri Railway and the Bonny Deep Sea Port revive the Eastern Economic Corridor..?

Stand
Is the kidnapping crisis in Nigeria exposing performative activism
In April 2014, 276 female students were kidnapped by Boko Haram, an Islamic terrorist group, from a secondary boarding school in the northern Nigerian village of Chibok…

15 March 2021
Al Jazeera
Gunmen raid school in Nigeria’s Kaduna, seize three teachers
Attackers have stormed a primary school in the northwestern Nigerian state of Kaduna and seized three teachers but no children, according to a state official…

BusinessDay
Nigeria’s 33% record unemployment leaves more youths desperate
Tunde, a 28-year-old graduate of Economics that has not been able to get a job despite finishing university with good grades, is one of the millions of causalities in Nigeria’s failing attempts to curb unemployment. In order to survive, he has engaged in menial jobs…

Sahara Reporters
Gunmen abduct 10 women, children in Niger, take food vendor and her food along
Gunmen suspected to be bandits have struck Chaza community in the Suleja Local Government Area of Niger State, abducting no fewer than 10 persons…

Wall Street Journal
Nigerian gunmen kidnap primary-school teachers in latest abduction
Gunmen kidnapped three teachers from a primary school in northwestern Nigeria on Monday, government officials said, as parents of students kidnapped in another school four days earlier staged a protest demanding the government bring their children home safely…

13 March 2021
Daily Maverick
Nigeria has a kidnapping epidemic fuelled by terrorists, criminals and ‘bandits’
Seven years ago the world finally sat up and took notice when the violent jihadist extremist group Boko Haram kidnapped 276 girls from a girls’ school in Chibok, in Nigeria’s Borno state…

12 March 2021
Al Jazeera
Gunmen abduct dozens from forestry college in northwest Nigeria
Gunmen in northwest Nigeria kidnapped about 30 students from a forestry college near a military academy, in the fourth mass school abduction since December, authorities said…

The Africa Report
Why is Nigeria’s fintech revolution creeping at a snail’s pace?
It is a familiar story: Nigeria has the potential but progress is not coming quickly. It has a huge economy and the continent’s biggest population, and yet South Africa has the biggest banks and Kenya leads the continent in mobile-money use…

Wall Street Journal
Nigeria gunmen abduct students in latest mass kidnapping
Gunmen kidnapped dozens of female students from a college in northwestern Nigeria late Thursday, state officials said, the fourth mass abduction in as many months in a region that is suffering from a worsening security breakdown…

11 March 2021
Rest of World
Nigeria can’t decide what to do about the rise and rise of cryptocurrency
When the Central Bank of Nigeria sent out a circular on February 5 warning the public about the dangers and risks of cryptocurrencies, it stirred local banks and the fintech community into a frenzy. In one stroke, the central bank seemed to have barred financial institutions from dealing in or enabling crypto transactions…

The Sun
Gunmen killed 53 traditional rulers in 10 years
A new report by SBM Intelligence, Nigeria’s geopolitical intelligence platform, says 53 traditional rulers were killed in violent attacks in Nigeria in the past 10 years…

10 March 2021
Punch
53 traditional rulers killed in violent attacks in 10 years
In the decade since November 2011, 53 traditional rulers have been killed in various violent incidents across Nigeria, a report by SBM Intelligence, published on Wednesday states…

The Cable
53 traditional rulers killed in violent attacks in 10 years
A new report by SBM Intelligence, Nigeria’s geopolitical intelligence platform, says 53 traditional rulers were killed in violent attacks in Nigeria in the past 10 years. In the report issued on Wednesday, the organisation said 35 of them were killed in the last five years — indicating an accelerating trend…

9 March 2021
DW
Nigerian kidnappings reach crisis point
Abductions have become more indiscriminate across northern Nigeria as local criminal gangs view victims as a source of income, and the villagers — who have been ignored by the government — as disposable…

Guardian Nigeria
Civilians own more arms than security officials in Nigeria
In Nigeria civilians are in possession of more arms than security officials, a report from SBM Intelligence said…

7 March 2021
BusinessDay
Illicit arms movement: The root of Nigeria’s insecurity crisis
Research shows that there are more than a billion small arms in circulation globally with 87.5 percent of those weapons in the hands of civilians…

6 March 2021
Premium Times
As Nigeria commences vaccination, many citizens remain sceptical
Daniel Ogala, an Abuja resident, said he will not take the COVID-19 vaccines that Nigeria recently acquired because he believes it is an orchestrated plan by the ‘Western world’ to monitor Africans…

5 March 2021
Sahara Reporters
Bandits abducted 12 women, children in Niger State in fresh attack —Shehu Sani
Gun-wielding bandits have reportedly attacked the Erana community in the Shiroro Local Government Area of Niger State, abducting at least 12 women and children in an overnight raid…

3 March 2021
CNBC Africa
Demystifying Nigeria’s security challenges
The Nigerian Army repelled an attack by Boko Haram insurgents in the rice-cultivating town of Dikwa in Borno state. The town hosts the United Nations humanitarian activities in Borno state…

Public Radio
With Nigeria’s economy in crisis, kidnapping-for-ransom is a growth industry
In recent years, northern Nigeria’s kidnapping-for-ransom business has steadily grown, putting more and more vulnerable schoolchildren in harm’s way. But with ransom payments increasing and authorities appearing helpless to stop the abductions, it seems these kidnappings will grow even more frequent…

2 March 2021
AFP
All 279 kidnapped Nigerian students released: governor
All 279 girls kidnapped from their boarding school in northern Nigeria have been released and are on government premises, the local governor told AFP Tuesday…

Al Jazeera
Children seized. Towns attacked. Can Nigeria fix security crises?
Swirls of dust, whipped up by a construction site nearby, envelop Ibrahim Usman’s stationed commercial tricycle. But the 26-year-old, who runs a shuttle service between Galadimawa, a suburb of Nigeria’s capital, Abuja, and other satellite towns, is unperturbed…

Kidnapped schoolgirls released, says governor
Kidnappers have released girls who were abducted from a boarding school in the northwestern Nigerian state of Zamfara on Friday, governor of the state told Al Jazeera…

Guardian Nigeria
Okada riders still rule Lagos roads one year after ban
When, on February 1, 2020, Lagos State, Nigeria’s commercial capital, banned commercial motorcycles and tricycles from major routes, officials said the move was aimed at securing lives and sanitising transportation in the city…

New York Times
Nigeria’s boarding schools have become a hunting ground for kidnappers
When nearly 300 Nigerian schoolgirls were kidnapped from their boarding school by the Islamist group Boko Haram in 2014, the world exploded in outrage…