Below The Headlines - 97
Amala and alcohol is available but restricted in Kent
This week’s edition is slightly abridged.
We dropped our second podcast on Wednesday. It was Iré Hassan-Odukale, the co-founder of the 2-Michelin starred Ikoyi Restaurant in London. If you haven’t listened yet, check it out!
I wrote about a fascinating new paper which analysed 3 million Chinese industrial policy documents over 2 decades to answer the question “what did China do to develop?”.
Happy Eid to all of you celebrating. Enjoy the usual selection below and see you next week.
Outside Nigeria
8 min documentary on the Benin Moats by the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Big feature on the delectable Ayo Edebiri with lots of really cool photos:
RO: Is there anything that you’re trying to fiercely protect now, given how much visibility you have?
AE: Just the people in my life who are like, my actual people. The Bear is my main job, but it’s my work life. I’m not going to show you guys my personal life, because you’re so weird about my work life.
People are often surprised by my boundaries because I am very open. But I’m also the type of person where if you cross it, you’ve crossed it for life. I’m so sorry. I’m that African. It is finished. It’s done. I cannot help you anymore.
RO: When was the last time you said no and you were really proud of it?
AE: My best friend, who’s now passed away, was sick and I had to go film. I was like, we have to push back. I have to be here because I’m pretty sure she’s going to die. I was like, if you have to sue me then you have to sue me, but we have to push. I have to be here when she dies or I’m going to really regret it. And I pushed. I’m really glad I did because I got to spend a lot of time with her.
When all the award stuff was happening, I was like, I actually see how easy it is to drop all your friends and be like, I hang out with Hollywood people now—because it’s fun. But my oldest friend, I’ve known her since third grade. We met in the Picture Day line. That’s my friend for life. My closest friends from college and the guys who I did improv with, those are the people who would call me out if I started acting crazy.
Whenever I’m on the red carpet and I don’t look happy, it’s really not because of how I feel. It’s probably just because I’m tired, and my eye muscles are very weak. I remember my friend being like, “Hey, you look really gorgeous in this dress. You’re tired, aren’t you?”
Quite a sad story here that hopefully gets resolved soon:
A grandma is fighting to clear her name after being sacked where she has worked for 13 years over a ‘misplaced bracelet’.
Janet Olufunke Damiro, 71, has been accused of stealing a bracelet she claims she found on a shift at the London School of Economics.
Now over 70 of her colleagues have written to the university to defend her character after Janet said it was an ‘innocent case of forgetfulness.’
The cleaner, who came to the UK from Nigeria in 1971, told Metro she forgot about the gold bracelet after she put it in her purse to keep it safe during her shift.
University management then asked her about the lost item three days later and she immediately handed it back out of her purse.
Despite profusely apologising, she was suspended and then sacked for gross misconduct at the end of April.
Janet told Metro: ‘I can’t sleep. I have never had a bad record or been to HR before in my life.
‘LSE have treated me really badly. It was my only job and I loved working there. I never expected to be suspended or dismissed.
‘I did not steal this thing. If I see any items I always hand them over.
‘This is the first time in my life I have had a problem like this since i came to this country. It is really bugging me.’
Visa refusal stories:
The Home Office has been accused of a “racist crackdown on Nigerians” after refusing a visa to a man who runs one of the west African country’s top security firms for a holiday to see his family.
Samuel Onyekachi Ibeawuchi runs BKay Security Ltd, which provides close protection for high-profile people in Nigeria and abroad. He and his wife, a successful businesswoman, had applied to come to the UK with their 18-month-old child for three weeks in the summer so they could spend time with his sister, Hope Ibeawuchi-Beales, and her husband, Nick Beales, who is head of campaigning at Ramfel, which supports vulnerable migrants.
Despite Ibeawuchi-Beales and Beales undertaking to support the family during their trip, a Home Office official turned down the visit visa application. The refusal letter states: “This sponsorship does not satisfy me of your own intention to leave the UK on completion of your visit.”
It adds that future visits are also likely to be refused. Officials also queried how Ibeawuchi, who provided the Home Office with his business registration certificate, derives an income from his business as a self-employed person.
The worst country in the world to have a baby?
At the age of 24, Nafisa Salahu was in danger of becoming just another statistic in Nigeria, where a woman dies giving birth every seven minutes, on average.
Going into labour during a doctors' strike meant that, despite being in hospital, there was no expert help on hand once a complication emerged.
Her baby's head was stuck and she was just told to lie still during labour, which lasted three days.
Eventually a Caesarean was recommended and a doctor was located who was prepared to carry it out.
"I thanked God because I was almost dying. I had no strength left, I had nothing left," Ms Salahu tells the BBC from Kano state in the north of the country.
She survived, but tragically her baby died.
Eleven years on, she has gone back to hospital to give birth several times and takes a fatalistic attitude. "I knew [each time] I was between life and death but I was no longer afraid," she says.
Ms Salahu's experience is not unusual.
The Australian Police have been on tour in Nigeria:
Nearly two dozen criminals allegedly responsible for online sextortion targeting teenagers — including those in Australia — have been nabbed in an major international sting.
Among the 22 suspects arrested in the operation were two Nigerian-based offenders linked to the suicide of a 16-year-old in NSW in 2023.
According to the Australian Federal Police (AFP), the sinister scheme saw perpetrators coerce young victims into sharing sexually explicit images before blackmailing them with threats of distributing the image if they didn’t make a payment.
The joint operation was a partnership with the AFP, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, and the US FBI, focused on dismantling the criminal network that targeted thousands of teenagers globally.
During the operation, two AFP investigators deployed in Nigeria were able to trace online activity, link digital evidence to suspects, and assist in the identification of both perpetrators and victims.
Investigators from the AFP-led Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation (ACCCE) also provided expert analysis on data seized by foreign law enforcement and supported processes to avoid overlap with local investigations.
There have been more than 20 teenage suicides linked to sextortion-related cases since 2021 in the US alone, with the criminal network also targeting teenagers in Australia and other countries.
A piece on one of the most astonishing research papers I’ve come across in recent times. Nigeria has messed education up so badly that a very cheap and simple AI intervention produced dramatic results:
The study followed 422 secondary-school students in Nigeria who took part in 12 90-minute after-school sessions over six weeks. Pairs of pupils, supported by a teacher, interacted with Microsoft Copilot, a chatbot based on GPT-4, to improve their English grammar, vocabulary and writing skills.
The results were striking: by the end of the six weeks the children in the AI “treatment” group had made progress equivalent to nearly two years’ worth of their regular schooling, according to Martín De Simone, who led the study. Overall, the AI group’s test scores were about 10% higher than the control group’s (see chart 1). In end-of-year exams—which covered topics beyond the chatbot’s material—they still did better than their peers. (The final tests were done with pen and paper; the results reflected the children’s actual learning, not their use of the tool.)
This might be, in part, a reflection of how poor the baseline is. Around the world, children typically learn less than what their time in school implies (see chart 2). On average, children in Nigeria receive ten years of schooling by the age of 18, according to the World Bank. But their learning outcomes are equivalent to roughly half of what might be expected. In countries with better-resourced schools, the same intervention with AI might yield more modest results.
Who is Format Boy?
AS SOON AS Format Boy answers the phone, I recognize his booming voice. I’ve spent weeks immersed in the influencer’s back catalog of videos and voice notes. Format Boy isn’t like other influencers: He doesn’t show his face, and he won’t tell me his real name. He isn’t posting motivational content or seeking lucrative brand deals. Instead, he’s teaching his audience how to orchestrate high-paying online scams.
Format Boy—as he styles himself on YouTube, Telegram, Instagram, and X, where he has amassed thousands of followers and racked up hundreds of thousands of views—acts as an unofficial adviser to a collective of menacing West African fraudsters known as the Yahoo Boys.
Typically these cybercriminals, mostly young men, work from their phones or laptops to con wealthy foreigners—often Americans—out of their life savings. Some have started using face-swapping and deepfakes to enhance their grifts. In one recent development, Yahoo Boys posted fake CNN broadcasts with AI-generated newscasters designed to trick people they’re blackmailing into thinking they’ve been outed on the news.
An article that lists what the US imports most from each country around the world. I was not expecting ‘raw lead’ to the biggest import from Nigeria:
For example, China’s largest exports to the U.S. — by dollar value — are electronics. But the U.S. also imports large quantities of electronics from elsewhere. Nearly 100 percent of imported baby carriages, however, come from China.
Switzerland, meanwhile, is responsible for nearly all of America’s imported precious metal watches. Ethiopia, on the other hand, sends the U.S. around 2 percent of its imported knit babies’ clothes — but that’s a larger share than for any other item it exports to the U.S.
The table below shows the item the U.S. relies on most from each of 140 trading partners. (We took out items that the U.S. also exports in large quantities, such as petroleum.)
News from Ireland:
It would be “untenable” to have an immigration system in which children could not be deported, the Justice Minister has said.
Jim O’Callaghan said it would not be a “good idea” to prevent the deportation of children as it would have a “very significant impact” on the number of people seeking asylum in Ireland.
He was speaking after five children and nine women were among 35 people deported from Ireland to Nigeria on Wednesday night.
The minister said the move, which was the third chartered flight used for deportations this year, was “value for money” at a cost of 324,714 euro.
We are going to build a big beautiful wall:
Nigeria's defence chief on Tuesday called for the country's borders with its four neighbours to be completely fenced to curb the entrance of armed groups amid escalating insecurity.
Nigeria's military has been strained by widespread security issues, particularly a 16-year insurgency in the northeast led by Islamist militant group Boko Haram and its offshoot Islamic State West Africa Province. Security forces and civilians have been attacked and killed and tens of thousands of people have been displaced.
Defence Chief of Staff, General Christopher Musa, who spoke at a security conference in the capital Abuja, said "border management is very critical," citing Pakistan's 1,350 km (839 miles) fence with Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia's 1,400 km barrier with Iraq as successful precedents.
This is the first time a top Nigerian official has publicly suggested such a measure.
"Other countries, because of the level of insecurity they have, had to fence their borders," he said.
Who is Miss Sweetheart of Arkansa:
Miss Sweetheart of Arkansas Zion Uzoh is competing in the upcoming 2025 Miss Arkansas Pageant.
Uzoh joined KARK 4 News at 4 to speak about the talent in presenting “HERStory – 1st Generation,” which reflects on being a first-generation Nigerian American.
Her community service initiative is Love Your Heart: Heart Disease Awareness, and her cousin won Miss Universe in 2011
Uzoh will be part of the excitement on the Miss Arkansas Pageant coming up on Saturday, June 14, and airing on KARK.
A nice story about Adenike Adekunle who os doing something really useful and needed with food:
Adenike “Denike” Adekunle has never been known to sit back and wait for opportunity to knock. The Nigerian-born founder of the Lagos-based fortified foods initiative, Forti Foods, can trace her solutions-driven focus, natural talent for entrepreneurship and enterprising spirit way back to when she was a teenager at high school in Dublin, Ireland.
Her journey, as you will see, has been a blend of action and resourcefulness.
Forti Foods, which provides nutrient-rich ready-to-eat convenience meals, first and foremost to stave off food insecurity in Nigeria and uplift the vulnerable, has grown from Adekunle’s research and development (R& D) journey. This evolved from an interest in health and nutrition that unfolded during four years of biomedical studies in the UK and Ireland.
All of this bubbles in a merry mix (her energy and enthusiasm are contagious) with the idea that “the best way to bring people together is around food,” which in turn inspired three separate culinary business ventures in London. Creating authentic and what would be regarded as typical foods in Nigeria, were her focus for all three.
You can have Amala 24/7 in Kent now but not with alcohol at all times:
An application for a licence to sell alcohol and to host live music at a new African restaurant has been approved but with significant changes.
Medway Council's licensing hearing panel met on May 27 to consider the proposal for Oceanic Eats X Àmàlà Buka in Cuxton Road, Strood.
Members heard from owner Esther Beyond who wanted a 24-hour alcohol licence and to be able to play live music until 3am on Fridays and Saturdays, and 1am on Sundays. The application also stated the restaurant, which specialises in Nigerian cuisine, would be open all day every day of the year.
Councillors who were against the idea of allowing round-the-clock permission to sell alcohol also addressed the panel.
Despite their fears, permission for alcohol sales and live music was granted – but with much-changed hours from those initially asked for.
The panel decided to restrict the sale of booze and live music to 9am to 11pm on Sundays to Thursdays and 9am to 1am on Fridays and Saturdays.
Another condition of the approval was that there must be a minimum of two members of staff on the premises from 8pm until closing time due to safety concerns.
It was also stipulated soundproof windows must be installed, a condition which Kent Police had also agreed before the meeting and which Ms Beyond said was in progress.
AI (or Hey Hi as I like to call it in the Nigerian context) is coming to Nigerian farming:
Something was wrong with Edemanwan Eyo Bassey’s chickens. Their movements seemed slower, more lethargic, “like they were becoming paralyzed,” she said.
But as a new farmer in a remote part of southern Nigeria, she didn’t know where to turn. Her region has a shortage of extension agents (EAs), government workers who provide expert agricultural advice.
“I couldn’t get across to my EA,” said Eyo Bassey. “So I asked AI, ‘Why are my birds walking funny?’ ”
The AI assistant told her it could be a kind of Newcastle disease, a highly contagious viral infection that can cause paralysis and death in infected poultry. Hotter temperatures and heavier rains linked to climate change can leave poultry more vulnerable to the virus.
The tool told her to try the LaSota vaccine to prevent further spread. “I was able to give treatment to the birds and save them,” she said.
The devastation from the flooding in central Nigeria last week is just too devastating to comprehend:
The official death toll after deadly floods hit the Nigerian town of Mokwa on Thursday has risen to more than 200, officials say.
Another 500 people are still missing in the town in the central Niger State however, local official Musa Kimboku told the BBC that rescue efforts had ceased because authorities no longer believe anyone could still be found alive.
The floods, said to be worst in the area for 60 years, swept through the Mokwa districts of Tiffin Maza and Anguwan Hausawa after torrential rains.
In an effort to prevent disease in the area, authorities will soon start to dig out corpses buried underground, Mokwa's district head Muhammadu Aliyu said.
Recounting scenes of catastrophe, local residents told the BBC that they saw their homes and family members get washed away.
One man, Adamu Yusuf, lost his wife and newborn baby.
"I watched helplessly as water washed away my family. I survived because I could swim," he told the BBC.