On September 20, 2009 at about 6.52 a.m local time, Mr. Bayo Ohu, an assistant news editor with the private daily, The Guardian newspapers was gruesomely murdered in his home in Egbeda, a Lagos suburb by a gang of about six men who riddled his body with bullets. The assassins took away his laptop and mobile phone. No other flat or house in the area was attacked.

A large quantity of petroleum products that were not properly cleaned up after the Ijegun pipeline rupture on May 15, 2008 have found its way into water-bearing wells used by residents of the community and may soon lead to massive explosions and loss of lives. ERA/FoEN monitors that visited Ijegun, located in Ikotun Local Government of Lagos State on Sunday September 13, 2009 observed that virtually all wells within the axis of the explosion and 14 streets away had large deposits of petrol that could be ignited by the strike of a match.

The Campaign for Democratic and Workers’ Rights (CDWR), Osun State has called on the Babatunde Fashola/AC government of Lagos State to immediately recall Comrade Ayodele Akele, a former labour leader in Lagos State, in the spirit of the celebration of the life of Chief Gani Fawehinmi. If Lagos State government does not want the public to believe that it is playing to gallery, it should immediately recall Comrade Ayodele Akele.

Floods in northern Nigeria’s Adamawa state have left over 2,000 people displaced, many of them with no access to clean drinking water, leaving officials worried about a potential cholera outbreak. Five districts – Fufore, Demsa, Yola North, Yola South and Numan – were flooded in August and early September, when the River Lagdo burst its banks, according to the Nigeria Emergency Management Agency (NEMA).

Nigeria's armed group fighting for a greater share of oil wealth has decided to extend a two-month-old ceasefire in the Niger Delta by 30 days but warned a government amnesty programme had not yet addressed key issues. The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend), with an estimated 10,000-strong force, has been behind deadly attacks on oil installations in Nigeria that have disrupted production.

There is mounting evidence that the government of Nigerian President Umaru Musa Yar'adua is set to launch a full-scale offensive in the Niger Delta when a ceasefire declared by rebels ends on Sep. 15. And this time, Nigerian military forces will be using special warships, helicopter gunships and troop transports, and unmanned drone intelligence planes and ships sold to Nigeria by Israeli, Malaysian, Singaporean, Dutch and Russian companies.

An alarming rise has been recorded in the number of Nigerian girls trafficked to Italy. Last year 1,782 young girls from Nigeria arrived in Lampedusa, compared to 166 in 2007, human rights organisations say. Lampedusa, an Italian island 205 km from the Italian coast, located between Tunisia and Sicily, is used as a holding centre for migrants, particularly from Africa.

Nigeria has over the past 10 years recorded high enrolment and completion rates in primary school education. From 67 percent in 1990, enrolment jumped to 74 percent by 2000, and 91 percent by 2007. The schooling completion rate also improved from 60 percent in 1990 to 76 percent in 2003, and 82 percent by 2007. Enrolment continues to rise.

Nigeria has charged more than a dozen bank executives sacked by the central bank for causing losses that nearly crippled the country's banking industry. A spokesman for the Nigerian anti-financial crimes agency said on Monday the charges had been filed against 16 bank chiefs arrested for causing losses amounting to billions of dollars in bad loans for five ailing banks.

Women, their children strapped to their backs, defy the mid-morning sun and converge on the Primary Healthcare Centre, located on the outskirts of Farasinme village, the Badagry West Council Development Area of Lagos State. Most of the women, and a few men, have trekked to the centre, about one kilometre from the village, for free diabetes and hypertension screening and eye tests. They have come here for a free health service, initiated by the Lagos State Government, offered from time to time via various local government offices and health centres in the region.

ERA monitors visited Sabon-Barki community and Gyel District, both in Jos South LGA of Plateau State on August 5, 2009 in response to the growing call by impacted communities for a remediation of the ecological disaster and dislocation wrought on their environment and livelihood by nearly a century of tin mining and the failure of government at the federal and state levels to address the problem.

The Nigerian government will not extend the 60-day amnesty offer to the country's oil militants when it expires 6 October 2009, according to President Umaru Yar'Adua. "Those who refuse to take advantage of (the) amnesty will be on their own after October 6, 2009," the President said at the opening of the 2009 Chief of Naval Staff Annual Conference in Uyo, capital of South-east Akwa Ibom state.

An offer of an amnesty for militants in Nigeria's oil-rich Niger Delta region has come into effect. In the next two months the government hopes about 10,000 rebels will exchange weapons for a pardon and retraining. But reports suggest few rebels have surrendered on the amnesty's opening day, and it is unclear how many armed groups will take part in the amnesty.

Two months after a new round of devastating violence broke out in the Niger Delta, the Nigerian government has offered amnesty if all militants turn over all their weapons and renounce violence by October, and the militants have offered a 60-day cease fire after a key militant leader - Henry Okah - was released from prison earlier this month. These actions should be good signs that the region is taking its first tenuous step toward peace, however most experts believe that the region is not close to any such reality.

The leader of an Islamist sect at the centre of five days of fighting in northern Nigeria that has claimed hundreds of lives died in police custody last night. Mohammed Yusuf was killed hours after he was captured, according to police officials quoted by news agencies. Mr Yusuf’s death followed an assault on a mosque housing followers of the radical preacher, who demanded stricter imposition of sharia, or Islamic law, across northern Nigeria and the abandonment of secular education.

On 8 June, the oil giant Shell reached a settlement of US$15.5 million in a case brought against it in the US by 10 Ogoni plaintiffs, who accused the Anglo-Dutch company of complicity in the deaths of Ken Saro-Wiwa and 8 other Ogoni activists in 1995. In this week’s Pambazuka News, Khadija Sharife reports on a case that, as Ken Saro-Wiwa Jnr has said, ‘very clearly sets a precedent that corporations have to be very careful when they operate in places like Africa’ and that ‘you can be brought to trial in America for violations in Africa.’

The Plateau State Judicial Commission of Inquiry in Nigeria should investigate and call for the prosecution of members of the security forces responsible for the alleged killing of more than 130 people in November 2008, Human Rights Watch has said.

Nigeria's gas flare-out date has once again been extended - this time to 2011. The decision follows 25 years of political procrastination by the federal government and illegal behaviour on the part of major oil multinationals engaged in flaring associated gas (AG), the byproduct of oil production in the Niger Delta.

A leading militant group in the oil-rich Niger Delta on Wednesday declared a 60-day ceasefire and said it would seek talks with the Nigerian government. The ceasefire comes 48 hours after militants expanded their attacks beyond the delta with an assault on a fuel-importing facility near the financial district in Lagos, the commercial capital.

The Academic Staff Union of Universities ASUU began a total and indefinite strike after it became obvious that the government was not ready to sign agreements it jointly reached with ASUU through its Technical committee. Really, what does ASUU want? Why is the government acting up? Is there hope for this country?