A major Nigerian opposition party that is challenging President Umaru Yar’Adua’s electoral victory in court has rejected an offer to join his government because it considers it illegitimate, a party spokesperson said on Friday. Yar’Adua invited the three main opposition parties to join his government in an effort to offset a perceived lack of legitimacy after the April polls.
The Nigerian kidnappers of a three-year-old British girl have demanded money and negotiations to secure her release are about to start, the girl’s mother told Reuters on Friday. The toddler, Margaret Hill, was snatched on Thursday morning from the car in which she was being driven to school in Port Harcourt.
Gunmen who kidnapped a three-year-old British girl in southern Nigeria said they would kill her unless her father takes her place, the girl’s mother told the BBC on Friday. ”They say I can bring my husband to swap with the baby,” Oluchi Hill, a Nigerian national, told the British broadcaster.
A Nigerian militant group responsible for most of the attacks that have crippled the country’s oil industry has called off a one-month truce, the group’s spokesperson said on Wednesday. Gunmen attacked an oil rig and kidnapped five expatriates overnight, police said.
About 20 passengers drowned in the River Benue in central Nigeria when their dug-out boat capsized after hitting an object, police said on Tuesday. The boat was carrying about 40 passengers, mostly ethnic Fulani cattle herders fleeing from the district of Guma to the Benue state capital Makurdi after a dispute with local farmers.
Tentative moves by Nigeria’s new government to subdue attacks on the oil industry have drawn mixed reactions from rebel factions in the Niger Delta and sporadic violence is hampering the fledgling peace process. A one-month truce declared by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta expires on Tuesday.
Nigeria’s President Umaru Yar’Adua declared about -million in personal assets on Thursday, saying public financial disclosures should be standard practice as his country battles to curb official corruption. Yar’Adua took power on May 29 with a promise to fight graft in one of the world’s most corrupt nations.
Nigeria’s former president, Olusegun Obasanjo, has been elected chairperson of the board of trustees of the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP), barely a month after leaving power, his aides said on Thursday. The 70-year-old retired general was elected PDP chairperson on Wednesday.
Nigeria’s main opposition party said on Wednesday it had signed a deal with ruling People’s Democratic Party to participate in President Umaru Yar’Adua’s new government. The agreement said the All Nigeria People’s Party would work with Yar’Adua towards a ”national consensus in tackling the country’s problems”.
Nigeria was slowly returning to normal on Sunday after labour unions and the government reached an accord ending a four-day general strike that had paralysed Africa’s most populous nation. The two labour umbrella organisations called off their strike on Saturday after President Umaru Yar’Adua gave a commitment on fuel prices.
Four foreign hostages employed by oil services giant Schlumberger were released unharmed on Saturday after more than three weeks in captivity, security sources said. The men, from Britain, France, The Netherlands and Pakistan, were abducted on June 1 from the company’s residential compound in Nigeria’s oil capital Port Harcourt by kidnappers disguised as riot police.
Nigeria’s crippling general strike entered its third day on Friday after overnight talks between labour unions and government ended in deadlock. Banks and schools remained closed across the country. The price of what little fuel was available on the black market continued to climb with public transport costing four times the usual price.
Nigerian troops killed 12 suspected militants and freed an unspecified number of hostages in a dawn raid on an Italian-operated oil facility in the Niger Delta on Thursday, the army said. Italian oil giant Eni had said 16 Nigerian oil workers and 11 soldiers were being held hostage at the Ogbainbiri flow station since Sunday, but the army said they found only 11 oil workers.
A strike in Africa’s top oil producer began on Wednesday after unions rejected government concessions on fuel prices as too little too late. The offices of Western oil companies operating in Nigeria were closed along with most other businesses, but oil production and exports were uninterrupted, company officials said.
Nigerian unions will start an indefinite general strike in Africa’s top oil producer on Wednesday to protest against rising prices and privatisations, the two umbrella union bodies said on Monday. The Nigeria Labour Congress and Trade Union Congress called the strike after the deadline passed on an ultimatum to the government.
Unidentified gunmen have occupied an oil pipeline-switching centre in Nigeria and are preventing local security forces from leaving, company officials said on Monday. About two dozen Nigerian workers and soldiers are being held after the attack on Sunday on a flow station in southern Bayelsa state, Italian energy giant Eni Spa said in a statement. No injuries were reported, it said.
A former Nigerian militia leader whose release has raised hopes of improved security in the oil-producing Niger Delta has pledged to continue his struggle for local control of oil wealth, but not in a criminal way. The situation in the region remains volatile despite the release of Mujahid Dokubo-Asari on Thursday.
Nigeria’s new government is moving quickly to bring its oil-producing delta region back from the brink of anarchy, but violence in Africa’s top producer is still driving away investment. resident Umaru Yar’Adua’s early efforts to build confidence among militant leaders are already showing results and two armed groups have freed a total of 19 hostages.
Nigerian militants freed 12 foreign hostages and one Nigerian in the oil-producing Niger Delta on Monday as a prelude to peace talks with the incoming government of President Umaru Yar’Adua. The release of the men, including one South African, five Britons and three Americans, was the latest sign of easing tensions in Africa’s top oil producer.
A Nigerian armed group fighting for control of oil resources in the Niger Delta region said on Monday that it will release all foreign hostages in its custody. The statement, purportedly from the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, gave the names of ten captives it said it planned to release later in the day to two powerful local leaders.
Two weeks after stepping down as president of Nigeria, Olusegun Obasanjo is hitting the books and resuming university studies, close aides said on Friday. The 70-year-old retired general, who stepped down on May 29 having served a constitutional maximum of two four-year terms, began coursework at the National Open University in Lagos on Thursday.
Nigeria filed new charges against Pfizer on Monday, seeking ,95-billion over the deaths of children who received an unapproved drug during a meningitis epidemic. The suit came after a separate court delayed two cases in which Pfizer is accused by the state of Kano of harming Nigerian children by testing them with the antibiotic Trovan in 1996.
Gunmen disguised as riot police have abducted four foreign workers from the residential compound of oil-services giant Schlumberger in Nigeria’s oil city Port Harcourt, authorities said on Saturday. Kidnapping has become an almost daily occurrence in the anarchic Niger Delta, home to Africa’s largest oil industry, and about 30 foreigners are now being held.
Gunmen kidnapped three people, including Asian expatriates, from the residential compound of chemical company Indorama in oil-rich southern Nigeria on Friday, a senior police officer said. ”There was an attack on the Indorama residential compound. Three people were taken,” Rivers State Police Commissioner Felix Ogbaudu said.
A protest by villagers at a major oil export pipeline complex in Nigeria entered a third day on Thursday and no crude was flowing through the facility, a protest leader said. Villagers from K-Dere occupied the pipeline hub at Bomu on Tuesday and forced Shell to shut 150 000 barrels per day of output.
Umaru Yar’Adua took office as President of Nigeria on Tuesday, promising to tackle a catalogue of crises in Africa’s most populous nation and conceding that his own election was ”not perfect”. In his inaugural address at a military parade ground in the capital, Abuja, Yar’Adua began by saying there were ”lapses and shortcomings” in the vote.
Umaru Yar’Adua takes office as president of Nigeria on Tuesday, inheriting a catalogue of crises compounded by doubts over his own legitimacy after a flawed election. The 56-year-old state governor was handed a landslide victory in last month’s presidential poll, described as ”not credible” by international observers.
A stay-at-home protest meant to embarrass Nigeria’s incoming president over flawed elections foundered on Monday as apathy and an unexpected public holiday diluted the effect. Nigerian cities were quieter than usual on the eve of the inauguration of Umaru Yar’Adua as president.
Nigerian oil unions have suspended a two-day strike in the national oil company after the government agreed to a pay rise and other benefits, a union leader said. The strike had threatened to halt oil shipments from the world’s eighth-largest exporter and worsened fuel shortages across Nigeria.
Nigerian oil unions pulled many staff from crude export terminals on the second day of a strike on Friday, but shipments from the world’s eighth largest exporter were uninterrupted, authorities said. The strike by union members in the national oil company and the Department of Petroleum Resources, the industry regulator, began on Thursday.
Gunmen kidnapped six foreign oil workers including a South African from a ship off the coast of Nigeria on Friday, industry sources said, bringing to 22 the number of foreigners held in Africa’s top oil producer. Shots were fired during the abduction by suspected militants in two speed boats, which took place off the coast of the Niger Delta.
Staff of Nigeria’s state oil company began an indefinite strike on Thursday over welfare and union leaders said they would target oil production if their demands are not addressed within days. The strike, which is also to protest against the privatisation of the country’s largest oil refinery last week, is expected to first hit domestic fuel supplies.