The main militant group in Nigeria's oil producing Niger Delta region has scoffed at an amnesty offer announced on Thursday by President Umaru Yar'Adua, describing it as "unrealistic". "Such an offer by a government known for its insincerity must first be given to those who are being held captive by the Nigerian state for the rest of us to take seriously," the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) said in a statement e-mailed to journalists, in an apparent reference to its leader, Henry Okah, who is being tried for treason by the government.

A lecturer in African Politics at the Oxford University, England, Dr. Abdul Raufu Mustapha has called on Nigeria to be cautious in its relationship with China, a technological giant and rising world power. He said that while the technology and friendship of China could be beneficial, Nigeria and Africa must be discerning enough not to allow China undermine their interests.

On 24 March 2009, Akin Orimolade, the Abuja bureau chief of "National Life" newspaper, regained his freedom after one week of detention, when a Magistrate's Court sitting in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa state capital, rescinded a warrant of arrest issued for him and two others over a publication involving Governor Timipre Sylva of Bayelsa state.

Nigeria and China have signed a contract for a new communications satellite that will replace one sidelined by a power failure, a newspaper reported Wednesday. According to the contract signed in Beijing on Tuesday, the replacement satellite has been named NIGCOMSAT-1R and is due to be launched by 2011 with no cost to Nigeria, the Lagos-based Guardian reported. The new space vehicle will replace NIGCOMSAT-1, which was launched on May 14, 2007, but was displaced on Nov. 10, 2008, because of a solar power failure that occurred on one edge of the satellite.

On April 27, 2009 the Ogoni people of Nigeria will finally have their chance at justice when the families of famed activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and his colleagues, who were sentenced to death in a sham trial in Nigeria and hanged in 1995, will show that Royal Dutch Shell was at the very least complicit in their deaths and likely colluded with the Nigerian military to quell peaceful protests through murder, torture and destruction of villages. The plaintiffs’ attorneys will use a U.S. law on the books since 1789 called the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) that allows violations of international law to be tried in U.S. courts.

Dutch customs officials have seized a consignment of generic antiretroviral (ARV) drugs bound for Nigeria, raising the health risk to HIV-positive people in need of the life-prolonging medication. Claiming that the drugs were counterfeit and violated patent rights, Dutch authorities seized the shipment at the end of February as it passed through Schipol Airport in Amsterdam en route to Nigeria, where the drugs were to be distributed by the Clinton Foundation, an implementing partner of the country's HIV/AIDS programme.

The Archbishop of the Anglican Church of Nigeria, Reverend Peter Akinola has lauded the Same Gender Marriage Prohibition Bill which aims to do away with homosexuality in Nigeria. In a paper, recently submitted to the Nigerian Parliamentary Committee, stating the Church’s position, Akinola demonstrated his support for this controversial bill which seeks to punish whoever enters into a same gender union in Nigeria.

Nigeria's cabinet has rejected reforms that would have empowered the judiciary to pick the chairman and board members of the electoral commission. President Umaru Yar'Adua's cabinet insisted he should retain those powers. Democracy activists called the decision a U-turn and said it raised fears for the fairness of the next federal elections, due to be held in 2011.

Nigeria and other developing countries face a financing shortfall of $270-700 billion to pay for their imports and service their debts this year, as the global economy falters and foreign investors withdraw, the World Bank has said. In a report published yesterday ahead of a March 14 meeting of Group of 20 finance ministers, the World Bank also said only one quarter of the most vulnerable countries have the resources to prevent a rise in poverty.

In Nigeria, Africa's most populous country and biggest oil producer, low crude prices are dragging down growth expectations, foreshadowing a dramatic slowdown in an economy that was teetering even in the good years. Nigeria has long struggled with a fractious federal system, endemic corruption and ramshackle infrastructure -- all factors that kept the commodities boom from lifting living standards significantly for most of the co

Delta is now awash with British and American private military companies (PMCs) engaged in security services for their clients in the oil and gas industry, is particularly chilling. The story titled The mercenaries take over and published on February 22, says no fewer than 10 such companies, prominent among them Control Risk—which has on its payroll the former body guard of Diana, the late Princess of Wales, Erinys International and ArmorGroup, currently operate in the restive Niger Delta, some through spurious partnerships with local companies.

cc The Nigerian government's alleged approval for field testing of genetically modified cassava plants by a US-based plant science centre puts Nigeria in danger of trading away its food future to colonialists under the guise of agricultural biotechnology, Friends of the Earth Nigeria/Environmental Rights Action (FoEN) have warned. They and over 30 local civil society groups have called for an immediate end to the trials, to be conducted by the National Root Crops Research Institute with the reported approval of the National Biosafety Committee – a body that currently has no legal power to grant such an approval. In addition to its concerns about the effects on biodiversity and human health of GM crops, FoEN says that Nigerian food security lies in building the capacity of its farmers, not in GM foods.

Independent Advocacy Project (IAP) has urged President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua to publish the report of the Justice Muhammadu Uwais Electoral Reforms Panel, set up in 2007 to propose ways for credible elections. The group has also called on the president to reconsider its decision to reverse the recommendation of the Uwais Panel on the appointment of the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

A former state governor in Nigeria, Olusegun Agagu, has been arrested by anti-corruption investigators. Mr Agagu is a leading member of the governing People's Democratic Party. He is suspected of embezzling millions of dollars of public funds, say officials at the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.

The total death toll from the outbreak of cerebro-spinal meningitis and lassa fever in Nigeria has risen from 300 last month to 338, according to the Minister of Health, Babatunde Osotimehin. The Minister told journalists in the capital city of Abuja on Wednesday that 333 people have died from meningitis, which has broken out in 22 of the country's 36 states, while five persons have died from the 12 cases of lassa fever.

Even though the documents presented by the Indian firm to prove its acquisition of the Nigerian Steel Company was overlooked on Tuesday by the arbitrators that made up the London panel, the Nigerian government is furious at the Indian company over its possession of what is considered a classified document. According to Chief Michael Aondoakaa, the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, "The Federal Government’s dispute with Global Steel over Ajaokuta had to do with what the government felt that the contract was entered not in conformity with our laws here.

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Calm has returned to the northern Nigerian city of Bauchi following two days of sectarian clashes that killed 14 people, displaced 4,500 and left 100 hospitalised, according to police and the International Committee of the Red Cross. The violence erupted on 20 February, with youths burning mosques and churches, according to residents of Bauchi, the capital of Bauchi state, about 300km northeast of the capital Abuja.

Nigerian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ojo Madueke, has recently denied the existence of gay people in Nigeria. He said this at the United Nations’ Universal Periodic Review meeting, held in Geneva from 2-13 February, where he claimed that gay people are not visible in that country and that they do not have any registered organisations.