NDI is seeking to hire a Country Director to oversee the implementation of its legislative strengthening program in Nigeria. The Director will be based in Abuja and will serve as principal liaison with the donor community, representatives from the executive and legislative branch of the Nigerian government, local non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and the US Embassy.

Nigeria's National Assembly has stopped further deliberations on a draft law, "Journalism Practice Enhancement Bill, 2004", which would threaten media freedom by imposing sanctions, jail terms, fines and suspensions on journalists and media establishments found guilty of sensational reporting on violent conflicts, parliamentary or inter-governmental disputes, natural disasters and other "negative trends and tendencies".

Nigerian officials announced on Monday that Nigeria was not going to be handing over the disputed and potentially oil-rich Bakassi Peninsula to the Cameroonian government by the previously set date of 15 September 2004. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled in 2002 that the Peninsula belonged to Cameroon,therefore demanding that Nigeria withdraw its armed forces and civilian administration.

Over the past week armed State Security Service (SSS) agents have raided the offices of two independent publications, have confiscated equipment and have arrested and detained editorial staff for their critical reportage on President Olusegun Obasanjo and other government officials.

In more ways than one, the post-military Nigeria of today is a fractured national society. From all accounts, never in the history of the country since the end of the fratricidal civil war of 1967 - 1970 has it been terribly divided in peacetime across the cleavages and fault lines of ethnicity, religion, state, region, politics and class as in this uncertain era. Inevitably, these divisions have generated distrust, suspicion, bitterness, antagonism, tension and identity-driven conflicts among the various social groups in the country.

Oil communities and other stakeholders in Delta state rounded up a three-day seminar in Warri on "Multinationals and Ethnic Conflicts in the Niger Delta (Delta)" recently, maintaining that the ways out of the crises in the region are for the oil-bearing communities to be part of the control of their oil resources and the Federal Government to amend the obnoxious, repressive and draconian laws in the statute books that conferred unilateral powers on the centre over the said resources.

In 1991, the Nigerian president announced that his country was going to lead the way in Aids treatment. In many respects his government scheme has been successful, but what happens when the money runs out? It is no surprise that those who are getting the subsidised drugs are enormously grateful - whatever the programme's flaws - and those who are not are desperate to join the scheme. So what is the score-card so far?

The Supreme Council of the Izala sect, a Muslim organisation founded by Sheikh Ismaila Idris, has approved the establishment of an Islamic University and the school of Nursing and Midwifery in the Bauchi, Bauchi State.

Controversy over a bill to amend Nigeria’s trade union laws surfaced again this week, when a modified version of the measure was passed by the country’s senate. The House of Representatives has yet to vote on the bill, which may also be vetoed by President Olusegun Obasanjo.

At least 100 people have been killed and more than 6,000 displaced from their homes in Nigeria's oil city of Port Harcourt as a result of gang violence over the past month and attempts by the security forces to suppress it, a local human rights group said on Friday. The Lagos-based Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR) said thousands of residents in Port Harcourt and nearby villages had been forced to flee their homes as a result of these clashes.

The Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC), Justice Mustapha Akanbi, stated that it would not be possible for the Commission to prosecute past heads of state, such as former President General Ibrahim Babangida, with corruption as this would be considered retroactive legislation and undemocratic.

Led by the President of the Nigerian Information Technology Practitioners in the Americas, Professor Manny Aniebonam, a group of Nigerians in the diaspora plan to invest in the establishment of 40 ICT parks in 39 universities across the country over the next three years. The newly created company, AfriHub Nigeria Ltd aims to increase the technological capabilities in Nigeria through the support of American universities and companies.

In Nigeria where abortion is illegal and the criminal code strictly prohibits any form of procurement of abortion except in saving the life of a woman, there are indications that induced abortion is still widely practiced. The absence of legal backing to willingly support any woman's desire to undergo abortion without being punished or victimized by society, has, to a great extent, contributed to the continuation of unsafe abortion with the resultant increase in maternal mortality.

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has taken over the investigation of the alleged $180 million bribe paid by a consortium of foreign companies to win contracts for the construction of the Bonny Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) plant, in Rivers State. In the latest move by the Nigerian government to unravel the bribe case that is also a subject of international inquiry, the House Committee on Public Petition has also recommended that the TSKJ Consortium, the company in the centre of the matter, be barred from working on the expansion of the LNG plant, until the end of the whole inquiry.

Some 13 million children in northern Nigeria are being vaccinated against polio in a bid to wipe out the disease. About 250,000 technicians are making house calls to reach all children under five in eight states, which have become the world's polio epicentre.

On 4 September 2004, State Security Service (SSS) officers raided the editorial offices of "The Insider Weekly" news magazine, based in Lagos, and arrested its production manager, Raphael Olatoye, after sealing up the offices. The security agency later accused the magazine of treason, sedition and subversion over a string of articles critical of President Olusegun Obasanjo and his government.

African churches in Dublin are growing in size and number. They reflect not only a growing community, but also one that is putting down strong roots, establishing its own amenities and services. It is thought there are around 15,000 Nigerians in Ireland, with most of them living in the capital.

Halliburton Co., once run by Vice President Dick Cheney, said an internal probe found information suggesting that members of a consortium it helps lead considered bribing Nigerian officials to win business. The world's No. 2 oilfield services company, which is also fighting accusations it overcharged on contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan, said this week the probe concerns the multibillion dollar TSKJ Bonny Island liquefied natural gas plant project.

The Nigerian senate has gone on strike for two days - demanding President Olusegun Obasanjo sacks a minister who called them foolish. Outspoken minister for Abuja, Nasir El-Rufai, is one of President Obasanjo's most controversial appointees. He has been criticised for ordering the demolition of illegal structures in Abuja, as well as dismissing hundreds of workers in his ministry.

The Director-General of the Institute of Peace and Conflict Resolution, Dr Sunday Ochoche, has said that political corruption is the main cause of major conflicts in Nigeria. Speaking during a two-day seminar entitled "Peace in Ebonyi State - I am a Stakeholder", Ochoche said that in order to actualize their ambition, politicians have stimulated many conflicts that have caused so much havoc in the country.