Below The Headlines - 26
Below The Headlines - 26
Rejoice, Nicki Minaj is coming to Nigeria and Saheed Azeez is now bisexual
Hope you’ve all had a great week. I wrote a short post on the practice of hypothecating taxes in Nigeria using the example of a new payroll deduction for health insurance that seems to have gone under the radar.
Enjoy your weekend, in line with the presidential directive.
Inside Nigeria
The charges against Godwin Emefiele have been ‘amended’. When you read between the lines however, you can conclude that he’s been sold out by one of his (former) people:
The anti-graft agency had in August, charged Emefiele and one Mrs Sa’adatu Yaro and a company, April 1616 Investment Limited, purported to belong to Mrs Yaro, on alleged breach of the procurement Act in respect of the purchase of some vehicles but the arraignment could not go on because of the reported ill health of Mrs Yaro.
However, when the matter was called yesterday, EFCC’s lawyer, Rotimi Oyedepo, SAN, drew the attention of the court to an amended charge dated November 8, 2023.In the new charge Emefiele was the sole defendant and the charge reduced from 20 to six, to which the former CBN boss pleaded not guilty.
In count one, he was alleged to have used his position as governor of CBN to confer a corrupt advantage on Sa’adatu Ramailan Yaro, a staff of the Central Bank of Nigeria by awarding a contract for the supply of 37 Toyota Hilux Vehicles at the cost of “N854,700,000.00 only” to April1616 Investment Ltd, a company in which the said Mrs Yaro is a Director and thereby committed an offence.
Nicki Minaj is planning a concert in Nigeria and the nation’s mood is instantly lifted:
On Friday, Minaj released presale tickets for her much-anticipated tour which she earlier announced would start in 2024. After the release, a Nigerian fan noted on Twitter that no African country was listed as one of her stops for the tour.
Nicki promptly responded and directed the fan to another portion of the website for bookings.
“Abeg sign up where it says (if you don’t see your city) so that when I get to Africa your city/country will be there,” the rapper tweeted. in pidgin.
The fan, @RamatVictory expressed appreciation and said, “Abeg no vex Nicki, I no go complain again. Oya Naija 🇳🇬 barbz, make una go sign up sharp sharp.”
The “Anaconda” rapper replied again in pidgin, “Naija no de carry last.”
Plateau state government spent billions on a new agriculture services training centre that had greenhouses and everything else you can imagine. Everything was going on well and farmers found it really useful until Nigeria said ‘we don’t do that here’:
Multiple sources told our correspondent that insecurity, which has been bedeviling the state for more than 20 years, is one of the two major reasons the management staff of the programme left the state for Ogun and other states of the federation.
The sources added that aside the security challenges, stealing the properties of the company by hoodlums was also a source of concern that contributed to the collapse of the programme.
Regular readers of BTH will by now be used to stories of courts passing judgements on internet fraudsters and demanding they return pathetic sums of money to their victims. The latest is from Kano:
The charge against Udeagwu reads, “That you Benjamin Udeagwu, sometime in September 2023 in Kano within the jurisdiction of the High Court of Kano with intent to defraud, obtained the sum of $50 by fraudulently impersonating as Brad George a citizen of United States of America which pretence you knew to be false and you thereby committed an offence of cheating by personation contrary to Section 321 of the Penal Code Law and punishable under Section 324 of same law.”
A truly weird story. EFCC claims it arrested some suspected internet fraudsters. Air Force officers then went to EFCC’s office to try to rescue the fraudsters and they were also arrested. Then the Air Force sent a larger ‘commando’ style contingent to rescue the officers and the fraudsters:
I seem to see stories about boat accidents claiming lives every week in Nigerian papers. ICIR has now put some data together:
OVER the past six years, Nigeria has witnessed a troubling trend in boat accidents, with 1,204 lives lost between January 2018 and October 2023; data collated by The ICIR Data shows the grim reality of safety concerns on the nation’s waterways.
This means 17 people die monthly from boat mishaps when 1,204 is divided by the 70 months within the review period.
In the past six years, media reports have recorded boat accidents and casualties in 25 of Nigeria’s 36 states, plus the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). Fatalities include women and children, although efforts were made to rescue many.
News from Lagos:
Lagos State Government said it has recorded no fewer than 340 cases of wives beating their husbands to submission, in the last year.
Education in Nigeria is going through hell. On the one hand teachers are badly trained and the curriculum is not fit for purpose. On the other hand, the current economic crisis has made it impossible for parents to afford better alternatives. And then you have stuff like this:
Another resident of the area, Tobi Fagbemi, lamented that the setbacks of other secondary schools in Ikotun have been taken over by those hawking alcoholic beverages and gamblers.
“These traders have taken over all the setbacks in most of the secondary schools. Especially the Ikotun High School. It started gradually and now if you go around these schools, you will see people hawking herbal concoctions and alcohol in sachets. They also have gambling (Baba Ijebu) and sports betting kiosks.
“During school hours, you will see these students who are supposed to be in their classes learning subjects, sneaking out to hang around these joints. Even after closing hours, they still go there to spend their pocket money, and you’ll see them sipping alcohol in sachets. The government has to ban these shops around schools,” he told our correspondent.
An Ibadan man has lost his money:
“I was conned by a scammer who used Facebook to lie to me. She told me she would visit me, but it was all a ploy to get my money.”
“I feel violated and betrayed. I should have been more cautious, but I got caught up in the fantasy of what she was promising me.”
“Once I sent the money to her, she disappeared and stopped communicating with me,” he said
What shall we say to this?
It was a nightmare for the people of Madakiya village in Zangon Kataf Local Government Area of Kaduna when a 20-year-old man, David Felix killed his father for allegedly appearing to him in his dream as a bird.
I hope the person who started this trekking business is ashamed of what they unleashed on Nigeria:
A young man, Pirfa Durfa, yesterday, trekked over 200 kilometres from Mile four village in Langtang South Local Council of Plateau State to Jos, the state capital to express his excitement over the victory of Hon Vincent Venman Bulus at the Court of Appeal.
The Missing Manhood Madness (MMM) has now abated but it’s good to see those who actively participated in beatings and false accusations now facing the law:
The Chief Magistrate’s Court II, sitting in Port Harcourt on Friday, remanded John Shadrack, 22, and William Isaiah, 33, for assaulting Felix Tuoyo, 70, over an alleged missing manhood.
The defendants were remanded on a two-count charge of conspiracy and assault.
The prosecuting officer, Inspector M. Ebirie, told the court that on October 24, at SPAR Shopping Mall in Port Harcourt, the defendants assaulted Tuoyo and his wife, Susan Tuoyo, and accused him of taking Shadrack’s manhood.
Outside Nigeria
Adéwálé Májà-Pearce has a long and interesting read on Lagos, the Atlantic Ocean, Eko Atlantic, displacement of people and plenty more:
Locals regard their displacement not as potential futurity, but as full-force reality. Three years before the suit was filed, a huge tidal surge destroyed most of the makeshift structures at Kuramo Beach, for instance, and swept sixteen people, including a six-year-old girl, out to sea. All were presumed dead, and residents had no doubt that the dredging required to build Eko Atlantic was directly responsible
A Nigerian guy, Saheed Azeez, who was granted refugee status in the UK after claiming he was being persecuted by Boko Haram for being gay is now facing up to 6 years in jail for being part of a scam that stole £220,000 from people. There’s also this:
Azeez fled his native Nigeria and was allowed to settle in the UK after claiming he was being persecuted over his sexuality by Boko Haram militants. After being granted asylum Azeez settled in Wigan, Greater Manchester, where he fathered three children by three different women.
His lawyer also argued (if you laugh, you’re going to hell):
He now has three children in the UK by three different mothers and is married to the mother of the third child. He has parental responsibilities to all the children. He now considers to himself to be bisexual
From a recent art auction in New York:
Jadé Fadojutimi broke her artist record with Quirk my mannerism (2021) during a rare moment of excitement, selling for significantly above its $800,000 high estimate at $1.9 million.
The New York Times profiles 12 African artistes it says are driving a cultural renaissance across the continent. Unsurprisingly, 5 of them are Nigerians. Here is a (surprising) excerpt from the section on Mr. Eazi:
While Mr Eazi has been releasing singles, collaborations and mixtapes — with well over a billion streams online — it wasn’t until October of this year that he released what he called his debut studio album, “The Evil Genius.”
Pramod Mittal wanted to be like his big brother Lakshmi so bad. So he followed him into the steel business and ended up in so much debt all his assets were going to be seized (a wicked person tells me the Nigerian government thought it was dealing with Lakshmi all the while. One Mittal is as good as another Mittal, no?) Until he got a bailout courtesy of Nigeria and Ajaokuta. A sad and messy story:
As a UK court weighed Moorgate’s request to declare Pramod personally bankrupt three years ago, the London-based Indian national held out the prospect of a payout from the Nigerian state to clear his debt. The judge was unconvinced at the time, but the settlement subsequently reached with Nigeria last year now looks like the 67-year-old’s best route out of insolvency. Still, while payments from the Nigerian government have reached GSH’s liquidators, as of Oct. 4, Moorgate had yet to see any of those funds despite having asked for them, court documents show.
There was a pro-Palestinian march in Kaduna and of course someone died:
Clashes between police and a pro-Iranian Nigerian Shiite group protesting against Israel's incursion into Gaza left one person dead and several injured on Thursday in Kaduna, northern Nigeria, AFP learnt from both sides.
Hundreds of members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN) took to the streets of the city on Thursday, carrying Palestinian flags and mannequins representing dead children, in a show of solidarity with the Palestinian people and denouncing Israel in the war that has pitted it against Hamas since 7 October.
The inquest into the death of the British aid worker, Faye Mooney, at Manchester Coroner’s Court is now complete. It ruled that she was caught up in a gunfight between Police and bandits trying to raid the Kajuru Castle resort she had been staying in with her Nigerian boyfriend:
He said the information he had was that the incident happened around 22:30 when the resort was approached by about 10 individuals who entered the grounds, possibly armed with AK47 machine guns.
A gunfight broke out with two armed policemen, who were acting as security for the resort, and Ms Mooney and her boyfriend left their room.
"Sadly, they were both caught with gunfire during this," DCI Cottam added.
He said the information he had suggested the raid was not terror-related but motivated by "kidnap and ransom", which had been a problem in that part of Nigeria.
Six Nigerians were arrested at the airport in Brazil with hundreds of capsules of cocaine in their abdomen:
Federal Police agents were performing routine checks of passengers waiting to board a flight for Ethiopia at Guarulhos International Airport in the southeastern city of São Paulo when they notice that one of the suspects was behaving strangely.
Authorities searched the man and his hand luggage, and then subjected him to a test through a drug and explosive trace detection device which showed that he had come into contact with cocaine.
The individual confesses to having swallowed the small plastic bags containing the Type-A party drug.
His six accomplices, all males, underwent the same test, confirming that each had contact with the powdery narcotic.
Another day and another Nigerian has set a new Guinness World Record. This time for the world’s longest handmade wig:
Williams, a wigmaker for eight years, is one of many people in Africa’s most populous country consumed with the idea of setting obscure world records. Guinness has been inundated with applications from Nigeria since May, when Hilda Baci, a chef, completed a cookathon lasting 93 hours and 11 minutes, becoming a household name overnight and attracting more than two million Instagram followers.
The company said it had received 1,500 applications in the two months after the feat by Baci, who was awarded a year’s free travel by a Nigerian airline. An Irish chef, Alan Fisher, subsequently beat her record by cooking for 119 hours and 57 minutes.
Review of Rema’s concert at The O2 in London:
The issue, though, is whether prioritising artistic passion pays off for the audience. There is no doubt that Rema is a phenomenal performer – performances of Lady and Beamer, where he is dynamic and passionate singing “fire dey your body oh”, are testament to this. But the show lacks cohesion overall, and it swallows him; the sexy gyrating heart-throb who loves “nyash”, and the masked, misunderstood emo-zombie are personas too opposing to reconcile. Transition breaks are also far too long, especially after a frustratingly late start, and the mismatch between Rema’s enthusiasm and the crowd’s occasional stillness and confusion is awkward; he wants the O2 jumping, but crowdpleasers Dumebi, Woman, Bounce, and Calm Down don’t feature until they’re crammed at the end, past the 11pm curfew
The Economist looks ahead to Africa’s future and does not find a lot to look forward to. On Nigeria:
Yet Nigeria is still battered by jihadism and kidnapping, and Mr Tinubu’s government is muttering about controlling petrol prices again. Debt remains a headache. In 2022 Nigeria spent 96% of tax revenues servicing it. Even without burning $10bn a year on the fuel subsidy, it will still spend over 60% of revenues on debt service in 2026.
Small detail about the 2025 Osaka Expo:
The so-called Type A pavilions, in which participating countries design and build their own installations, are supposed to be one of the event's key attractions.
Nigeria has also given up on a self-built pavilion, according to a source from the African nation.
Nigerian food continues to enjoy a quiet internationalisation and the New Yorker is at the forefront of the effort:
Nigerian cuisine is not a monolith—the foodways of the Yoruba are distinct from those of the Igbo; the dishes of Calabar aren’t those of Lagos. Still, the country’s expanse of stews and fritters and braises are tied together by a vividly flavorful pantry: heady spices, preserved seafood, the seductive florality of red palm oil