Estelle Shirbon
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/ 21 November 2007

Nigeria wonders if leader will keep his job

Umaru Yar’Adua looks serene in the official portrait hanging in a courtroom where lawyers in black robes are trying to unseat him as president of Nigeria. But his position may be less secure than the photograph. The presidential tribunal is a special electoral court empowered to hear petitions against his victory in April by losing candidates.

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/ 9 October 2007

Report: Guns the real instrument of power in Nigeria

Guns, machetes and looted public funds are the real instruments of power in Nigeria, where politicians backed by unelected ”godfathers” use hired thugs to win office, Human Rights Watch said on Tuesday. Nigeria returned to civilian rule in 1999 after three decades of almost continuous army dictatorship, but civilian governments have routinely abused basic human rights.

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/ 9 July 2007

Nigerian kidnappers free three-year-old girl

A three-year-old British girl was freed on Sunday four days after being kidnapped in Nigeria, and her mother said the toddler was in good health except for mosquito bites. Gunmen had snatched Margaret Hill from the car in which she was being driven to school while it was stuck in traffic on Thursday morning in Port Harcourt.