At least five people have been wounded in a bomb explosion near a church in the Nigerian town of Suleja, on the edge of the capital Abuja, authorities and witnesses said. The blast went off near Christ Embassy Church on Sunday and shattered glass of five vehicles, nearly destroying them, according to the Reuters news agency. Grey ash was cast across the ground.

The fuel crisis in Nigeria proves the truism that no government ever voluntarily pursues the public good without some form of struggle by the governed. It ought not to be so.

Nigerian Islamist sect Boko Haram said Monday 13 February it killed 12 soldiers in an attack in the northeast town of Maiduguri but security forces denied any of its officers had been killed and said it shot dead sect members. Boko Haram, which wants Islamic law more widely applied, has killed more than 250 people this year in bomb and gun attacks on cities across the north of Africa's most populous nation.

Fishermen, under the aegis of Famous Fishing Organisation (FFO), have said the recent bonga oil spill had negatively affected the economy of coastal settlements in Akwa Ibom. Mr Umoekeyo Eno, legal adviser of the organisation in Oron, said that the fishermen would be compelled to seek legal redress if the oil firm responsible for the spill failed to compensate the victims. He said that he had written to Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company (SNEPCO) on the impact of the spill on members of the organisation in Akwa Ibom.

Nigeria’s military has harassed and obstructed journalists trying to report on unrest in recent days, according to local journalists and news reports. On Sunday in the city of Jos, in Nigeria’s north central region, soldiers detained Jeremie Drieu, a videographer with French television station TF1, and local journalist Ahmad Salkida after they sought permission to film in the area, The Associated Press reported. The Nigerian federal government has been enforcing a state of emergency in Jos following bloody clashes between Muslims and Christians that have claimed the lives of at least two journalists, according to CPJ research.

Thousands of children in Nigeria's northern Zamfara state need immediate medical treatment, while dozens of villages remain contaminated two years into the worst lead poisoning epidemic in modern history, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said. According to official estimates, 400 children have died, yet environmental cleanup efforts have not even begun in numerous affected villages. Artisanal gold mines are found throughout Zamfara State, and high levels of lead in the earth and the use of rudimentary mining methods have resulted in an epidemic of lead poisoning among children, HRW said.

Nigerian authorities have handled the Boko Haram crisis badly, resulting in more bloodshed. The key to resolving sectarian agitations is dialogue and not the use of force.

The burning inferno of what used to be a Chevron Corp. natural gas rig still stains the night's sky orange more than two weeks after the rig caught fire, and no one can say when it will end as swarms of dead fish surface. The environmental damage is hitting a region whose poor still rely on the delta's muddy waters for survival. A nearby clinic remains overrun with patients who are showing up with skin irritations and gastrointestinal problems.

The Department of International Relations and Co-operation says it will investigate threats against South African companies with investments in Nigeria by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend). The movement has threatened to attack the holdings of companies including MTN, Africa’s biggest cellphone network operator, and SacOil, an oil and gas exploration company, saying that President Jacob Zuma is interfering 'in the legitimate fight for justice' in the Niger River delta region.

A wave of fresh attacks by suspected gunmen of the Boko Haram sect has claimed the lives of a soldier, two policemen and two civilians. Two other policemen and a soldier have also been injured. The sect attacked the Gambouru/Ngala Police Station, Joint Task Force (JTF) checkpoint and the Nigeria Air Force Barracks, Maiduguri on Monday 30 January.

A close aide to former Nigerian military ruler Sani Abacha has been sentenced to hang for killing the wife of politician Moshood Abiola in 1996. Major Hamza al-Mustapha has been in detention since 1999 over the killing. Abiola is widely believed to have won the 1993 election, which was annulled by Nigeria's junta. His wife Kudirat was shot dead in 1996.

This article takes economist Jeffrey Sachs to task for an op-ed article in the New York Times in which he argued that despite continuing demonstrations against the government’s surprise decision on New Year’s Day to halt state subsidies of oil for millions of Nigerians, things aren’t as bad as they seem. 'Sachs had no idea what he was talking about, his knee-jerk response to the crisis celebrated policies of austerity and economic shock, and the Grey Lady gave none of it a second thought. Neoliberalism, it would seem, is alive and well.'

Even as the Occupy movement recedes in size, if not in activism, in the global North, it has, to its own surprise, opened up a new front in Africa's most populous country, Nigeria - where tens of thousands have occupied and paralysed the economy in a protest against the lifting of oil subsidies. The Arab Spring is moving south, thanks to #OccupyNigeria. If nothing else, this movement dramatises the global nature of the new wave of Occupy protests.

The press freedom watchdog, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), Tuesday 24 January condemned the killing of Nigerian journalist, Enenche Akogwu, in Kano, northern Nigeria. According to IFJ, Enenche, a reporter with the privately-owned Channels Television station, was gunned down on Friday, 20 January. 'We condemn this latest killing which shows that journalists in Nigeria need adequate protection in the face of increasing risks,' Gabriel Baglo, the IFJ Africa Director, was quoted as saying.

It may appear like business as usual but people do not experience such an outpouring of solidarity and power and remain unchanged. The apathy barrier has been broken and there has been a shift in consciousness.

Jubilant youths overran a blood-splattered police station on Wednesday 25 January after it was attacked by a radical Islamist sect, revealing a streak of popular discontent with a government that many say has failed them in Africa's most populous nation. Suspected members of Boko Haram surrounded the police station Tuesday night in Kano, ordered civilians to get off the street, began chanting 'God is great' and threw homemade bombs into the station while spraying it with assault rifles, witnesses said. The attack followed coordinated assaults on Friday that killed at least 185 people in Kano, Nigeria's second-largest city.

The IMF has issued a blunt warning that unless the European economic crisis is resolved, the global economy faces another 1930s style ‘Great Depression’ which would negatively affect frontier markets including Nigeria. This followed the failure of European finance ministers to reach a restructuring agreement with private holders of Greek debt Monday night. If Greece does not put itself in a position to receive aid funding by the end of March, it will suffer a disorderly default on its debt. A drop in global demand would affect Nigeria negatively, as the country depends almost exclusively on oil sales to fund more than 90 per cent of its budget and Foreign Exchange earnings.

In the context of widespread instability in Nigeria, this blog post raises questions about recent cases in which arms destined for the country were intercepted. In one case, a British based man was arraigned in the UK over the shipping of 80,000 rifles and pistols and 32 million rounds of ammunition to Nigeria. The shipment included 40,000 AK47 assault rifles, 30,000 rifles and 10,000 9mm pistols. In another case, Ghanaian authorities intercepted a truck loaded with arms and ammunitions heading to Nigeria. Both cases are cause for concern, argues the blogger.

The death toll from co-ordinated bombings and gunfire in the northern Nigerian city of Kano has risen to at least 178, medical sources said, making this the deadliest attack claimed by the radical Islamist group Boko Haram. Gunfire continued to echo through some areas of Kano on Saturday, despite a strict curfew imposed on Friday night which will remain in place until further notice, local officials said.

Many of the tens of thousands of civilians who have fled their homes following a string of deadly attacks by 'terrorist group' Boko Haram in northern Nigeria over recent weeks have not yet been able to return home - or been offered any shelter by the authorities. Local government authorities are wary of setting up camps for the displaced, says the Nigerian Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), as these could turn into further Boko Haram targets.