Below The Headlines - 29
Below The Headlines - 29
Detty December at risk due to rising airfares and Japa is now a word
This week on 1914 Reader, Tobi wrote a fantastic essay on the elusive dividends of democracy in Nigeria. I urge you to read it. I wrote about sweet talk as a missing ingredient in Nigeria’s democratic development. I also wrote another short instalment in the 10% Less Mediocrity series.
Enjoy the coming week and don’t work too hard. Save your energy for December shenanigans, but remain law abiding.
Inside Nigeria
News from Somolu:
A man, Michael Adams, was on Wednesday arraigned at the Yaba Magistrate’s Court for allegedly ordering drinks worth N113,000 at a bar in the Shomolu area of Lagos State and refusing to pay the bartender.
Adams was arraigned by the police before Magistrate O.Y. Adefope on one count bordering on obtaining and drinking alcohol and others by the pretence that he would pay later.
According to the prosecutor, Haruna Magaji, Adams and his friends entered the VIP section of the bar and ordered drinks, and after drinking, they were given their bill but he refused to pay.
Adams, in his statement, said it was one of his friends, who asked him to order the drinks, who was supposed to pay and not him. However, the said friend fled the bar while Adams was arrested.
And in another case of a Nigerian fleeing their bill:
The Ogun State Police Command is on the trail of a patient of the Federal Medical Centre, Idi-Aba Abeokuta, in Ogun State, identified as Saba Elizabeth.
PUNCH Online gathered that the patient reportedly absconded on Saturday due to her inability to pay her medical bills after receiving treatment for an undisclosed ailment at the medical centre.
How did Sunday Igboho escape the DSS raid on his residence in July 2021? He’s not revealing but he is telling us how he did not do it:
Yoruba Nation agitator Sunday Igboho finally broke silence on the reports that he transformed into a cat during a midnight raid conducted by the Department of State Services (DSS) on his residence in July 2021.
Igboho, in an interview with Punch, debunked the report, saying nothing like that happened during the DSS raid.
He said the DSS indiscriminately fired bullets during the raid, leading to the deaths of several cats.
The activist said the DSS mission was to either kill or arrest him and take him to an unknown destination.
He said, “It is true that some cats were killed during the attack? Because the DSS just kept firing bullets in all directions. I was rearing cats as pets, and I had many of them in my house. So, anything or movement attracted sporadic gunshots.
Detty December is going to be quite challenging this year given how expensive it is to travel across the country:
Airfare hurdles await domestic travellers this festive season as local airlines have again doubled airfares on high-traffic seasonal routes.
The airfare that surged to an average of N100,000 per one-hour Economy flight ticket in October, has hit N200,000 for flights on the East and Southern routes. Its round-trip variant now sells for between N350,000 and almost half a million, subject to seat availability.
Man who runs a large poultry operation calls for government protection of the poultry industry. More as we get it:
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo wants the federal government to close its doors to those who want to make the country a dumping ground for all sorts of poultry products.
Daily Trust tracks 16 accidental bombings by the Nigerian military over the last 9 years, with the most recent one the most deadly in the series (see more in story in next section):
No fewer than 416 unarmed citizens have been killed by accidental airstrikes of the Nigerian military within the space of 9 years in 16 communities located in the northern region of the country, findings by Daily Trust Saturday have revealed.
Although the military high command and the Nigerian Air Force had consistently maintained that there was no way collateral damage won’t occur at a time an asymmetric warfare is ongoing, stakeholders disagreed, saying many of the cases were avoidable.
The stakeholders, who spoke on different incidents, argued that collateral damage happened when there is crossfire between the troops of the military on warfront and the enemies, noting that such situations are understandable.
They also maintained that the number of casualties involved won’t be of that magnitude if the troops had carried out their intelligence and operations as expected
Ogun State House of Assembly passed a resolution banning the importation of adire. How they plan to enforce this remains to be seen but we will continue to observe. At the same time they called for more exports of the state’s own products:
The sponsor, Hon. Babatunde Tella, while opening the debate, decried the influx of imported /foreign adire into the local market which had been eroding the rich cultural heritage of the people of the State.
He, therefore, called on the Ministries of Trade and Investment, Culture and Tourism as well as Women Affairs to investigate the matter, while pleading with the State Government to partner with the Federal Government in assisting the local adire fabric makers to have smooth export of their product to protect the nation’s growing economy.
NURTW claims it has transitioned away from thuggery to become a lawful and democratic organisation following its recent elections:
Speaking on the significant of holding rancour-free state delegate conferences simultaneously in all the state councils of the union, the Acting General secretary of the union, Comrade Kayode Agbeyangi explained that” the fact that the NURTW was able to conduct a peaceful and well accepted delegate conferences simultaneously in all the state councils of the union clearly showed that the NURTW is one and indivisible. It also show that all members of the union are solidly behind the national leaders of the union
“It equally showed that our union has come of age. Our members have embraced democracy and peace. Gone were the days when change of leadership in the union is doing with force whereby members would using guns and cutlasses to effect change of leaders. Now everything is done democratically with any iota of violence or thuggery.”
Nigerian Police claims it has arrested the policemen in the embarrassing video of them asking a Dutch motorbike tourist for money that went viral recently:
He described the action of the officers as ‘unpolice’, saying the Nigeria Police Force would never tolerate such unprofessionalism.
“Such an act is unpolice and would never be tolerated in any manner.
An illustration of how birth dates are often just suggestions that can be changed at will in Nigeria:
Five thousand Federal Government workers may not receive their November and December salaries on time due to discrepancies in their records.
The National President of the Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria (ASCSN), Tommy Okon, disclosed this in Abuja on Tuesday, November 28.
He said 2,772 workers had been confirmed and sent to the integrated payroll and personnel information system (IPPIS) for payment. However, there were still discrepancies in the dates of birth and first appointments of about 5,000 federal workers.
Outside Nigeria
The Nigerian Airforce mistakenly killed around 120 people with a drone strike in Kaduna state. Things like these impact on ability to buy weapons from the US:
Last year, the Biden administration approved a nearly $1 billion weapons deal with Nigeria, the largest ever made to the country. But several U.S. lawmakers have since called for a review of the U.S. security partnership with Nigeria in light of human rights abuses.
“Despite reports of civilian casualties from Nigerian Armed Forces airstrikes and other concerns, the flow of U.S. weapons into Nigeria has not slowed,” said researchers at Brown University and the Center for International Policy, a Washington-based nonprofit group, in a report published last year.
Yet any change of attitude from the United States is unlikely, analysts say, because Nigeria is seen as a reliable security partner in a region riddled with coups and Islamist insurgencies.
Another piece on Chef Kwame Onwuachi. This time in his own words:
We first lived on Bruckner Boulevard in the Bronx. My father, Patrick, was from Nigeria and worked as a construction-project manager. My mother, Jewel, worked first as an accountant. After she and my father separated when I was 2—they had never married—she started a catering business and worked two jobs.
My sister, Tatiana, is five years older than me. She had a different dad who died in a car crash before I was born. We were close as kids and still are. She always looked out for me.
Japa made the shortlist for The Economist’s word of the year for 2023:
Our senior correspondent in Africa suggested coup as the word of the year—there have been two successful ones there in 2023. But an honourable mention should go to the Yoruba verb japa, used colloquially in Nigeria to describe making a quick escape from a precarious situation. Recently it has been extended to mean escape from Nigeria itself, which is plagued by misgovernment
Crude has been delivered to the Dangote Refinery:
Nigeria’s Dangote refinery, one of the largest in the world, has edged closer to production after it received its first batch of crude from Shell’s oil trading arm. It marks a key moment for the $20bn refinery, funded by Africa’s richest man Aliko Dangote, after years of delays and budget overruns. The delivery from Shell’s trading arm of 1mn barrels from one of Nigeria’s offshore fields represents the first tranche of 6mn barrels of crude due to be supplied to the facility from a range of suppliers, the Dangote Group said in a statement on Friday.
P&G is restructuring its global operations and taking a hit of $2.5 billion to do so. It is perhaps sobering that the bulk of this hit is coming from just two countries:
The company said it expects charges of between $1 billion and $1.5 billion after tax related to the restructuring of its Argentina and Nigeria operations as it deals with difficult macroeconomic conditions.
Number of nurses working in the NHS is at an all time high. Between 2018 and 2023, the number of Nigeria-trained nurses working in the NHS went up by almost 1,300%:
Some 808,488 nurses, midwives and nursing associates are now registered with the Nursing and Midwifery Council – a rise of 37,091 in a year.
This includes 748,528 nurses, 42,974 midwives and 10,560 nursing associates – all more than ever before.
But it comes amid a rise in the number of people joining the register from so-called 'red list' countries, such as Nigeria and Ghana.
Nice story of a Nigerian family that recently moved to Canada:
When Beatrice Agbonavbare, her husband Senator and their five-year-old son Michael immigrated to Swift Current, Sask., from Nigeria in February, they were looking for security and a better life.
They knew it would be hard, but it turned out to be less difficult than they imagined thanks to locals who went out of their way to make sure the family felt like they belonged.
"Generally I would say the people of Swift Current are amazing. They are so loving. They are so welcoming and accommodating," Agbonavbare said.
The Agbonavbares chose Swift Current because of its moderate population and because they felt it would be a good place to raise a family. They spent the first three months there living in a motel.
Someone tried to fly an incredible amount of skin bleaching creams from Nigeria to South Africa. The consignment was intercepted at the airport:
Mmemme Mogotsi, spokesperson for the BMA, said the team intercepted 865kg of skin lightning products as well as unregistered medicine on Thursday.
Skin lightening products are prohibited in South Africa as they cause harm to the skin. The products came in a flight from Nigeria and will be destroyed.
Cocoa prices are on a high at the moment so farmers in Nigeria are now dealing with increased theft and other ‘sharp practices’:
Growers in Nigeria are witnessing a similar frenzy for profits. Land owners in the south-eastern part of the country, which account for 30% of the nation’s 285,000-ton annual output, are pushing up rents, sometimes looking for quadruple the current prices.
“My landowner is asking for 450,000 naira per year on the 2-hectare farm for which I currently pay 200,000,” said Attangba Bonjo, who grows cocoa on leased land in Ikom in Nigeria’s southeast. “Cocoa farmgate prices have risen to about 4 million naira from 2.7 million naira per ton in the last two months, which I believe the land owners want to have a taste of.”
More than a fifth of the 18,000 farmers in the area are impacted by the rent hikes, according to John Kalu, the zone’s coordinator for the Cocoa Association of Nigeria. The growers will be hurt by this “if cocoa prices were to fall below their current levels.”
India is negotiating with Nigeria to sell some of its home-made fighter jets:
India’s state-owned Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. is in talks with at least three countries to export its homemade multi-role fighter jets as Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeks to more than triple the South Asian nation’s overseas defense sales.
Discussions with Nigeria, Philippines and Argentina to export the Tejas fighter jets are progressing, C. B. Ananthakrishnan, chairman of Hindustan Aeronautics, told reporters in New Delhi. Egypt has also shown interest in the light combat aircraft but talks are at a preliminary stage, he said.
But according to a recent report in The Economist:
Narendra modi, India’s prime minister, often dons fatigues while visiting troops in Kashmir. On November 25th he went one better by squeezing into a flight suit and taking a sortie over Bangalore in a Tejas fighter jet. The Indian-designed plane embodies Mr Modi’s push for India to make more of its own weapons. It also embodies much of what has gone wrong with the country’s defence. The jet is 20 years behind schedule, underpowered, and disdained by Indian pilots.
Libya deported 147 illegal migrants to Nigeria:
The Libyan Illegal Migration Control Department on Monday announced the deportation of 147 illegal migrants back to Nigeria.
"A group of 147 illegal migrants from Nigeria were deported via Tripoli Mitiga International Airport to their country," said Fathi Shnebbu, head of the Department's information and documentation office.
He said the deported migrants include 122 women and 25 men.
"Those migrants were involved in criminal groups and committed crimes of drug trafficking, firearms trafficking, and prostitution," Shnebbu said.
Earlier this year, a family travelling to Nigeria via Cairo from Dulles Airport, Washington, had almost $70,000 undeclared cash seized from them by Customs and Border Protection:
CBP officers conducted outbound inspections of passengers departing on a flight to Cairo, Egypt, when they encountered the family. Officers explained U.S. currency reporting laws and asked the family how much currency they had in their possession. The father reported that the family possessed $10,000 and signed the FINCEN 105 form formally reporting that amount.
During a subsequent inspection of the family’s carryon bags, CBP officers discovered currency in multiple envelopes, in addition to the currency that the family presented to the officers. The total currency amounted to $68,216.
Officers seized the currency and remitted $216 to the family as a humanitarian release. CBP officers released the travelers to continue their journey.
US Customs and Border Protection
Report linking the surge in online gambling in Nigeria to influencers who have no scruples about promoting the highly addictive pastime:
Toheeb Badmus, a sophomore at the University of Lagos, earned around 50,000 naira ($63) over the past three months from a tutoring gig. By now, he has lost about 60% of that money to online sports betting, he told Rest of World. “I had to gather the money from my part-time teaching salary and got some loans to play the game in August,” he said. “My gambling history for the past few months has been bad. I’ve been losing for the past few months, playing often and losing steadily.”
But he has no plans to stop.
“Your attitude will change when you see most of [the influencers] win big, and you, who play with little money, will feel like putting huge amount of money so that you can have it, too,” he said. Badmus is inspired by Mr. Banks, a faceless X account with more than a million followers. Mr. Banks also runs a Telegram group with over 300,000 members. “[You see them] win 60 million naira,” Badmus said. “You also want to win that — even though the risk is high.”
The ride-hailing app Bolt has suspended about 5,000 drivers:
According to the country manager, the idea is to put an end to customer insecurity and harassment. He noted that the drivers were suspended in its recent campaign to enhance the security standards on its platform with a special focus on passengers and drivers.
A story about women’s experiences in doing more traditionally male jobs:
Adewale, 45, left her own teaching job two years ago to sell locust beans in a store to try to boost their income. But it helped very little. After saving and borrowing money, she managed to pay half of the price of a rickshaw, amounting to 350,000 naira (£356). The seller agreed to let her take the vehicle, provided the balance was paid within seven months.
“My friends were amazed when I decided to become a tricycle rider last year. They questioned why I would even consider taking up a job typically seen as meant for men. Some even laughed at me, thinking it was a joke,” she says.