Fire destroys market in Nigeria’s second largest city, Kano

Traders salvage their goods in Sabon-Gari market in Kano, northern Nigeria, after a fire gutted some 400 shops, November 2, 2008. A fire in March has destroyed about $10 billion worth of goods at the market.

Over the weekend—near the end of the Christian observance of Holy Week—a fire broke out in Kano’s Sabon Gari market. It eventually destroyed 3,800 shops, according to the Nigeria Emergency Management Administration (NEMA), obliterated at least 2 trillion naira (approximately $10 billion dollars) worth of goods, and affected at least 18,000 traders. The NEMA director general said, “This is the biggest market fire outbreak Nigeria has ever witnessed. This is a serious calamity.” (Despite the magnitude of the disaster it has not been reported in the mainstream Western media.)

There was a previous fire in the market only five months ago. The Emir of Kano, Malam Muhammadu Sanusi II, called on the federal and state governments to investigate the causes of recent fires at Kano markets and schools. The emir is the former governor of the Central Bank who blew the whistle on the national petroleum company’s failure to remit revenue to the national Treasury during the administration of the previous president, Goodluck Jonathan.

Kano’s Sabon Gari, the “foreigners’ quarter,” is often called the largest settlement of ‘non-indigenous’ people in northern Nigeria. Its population is made up of ethnic groups from all around the country, with the Igbo especially prominent. Most of the indigenous population of Kano is Hausa-Fulani, who are typically Muslim. Sabon Gari residents, on the other hand, are often Christian. The Sabon Gari is also known for its freewheeling atmosphere in otherwise observant Muslim Kano, with the ready availability of beer and prostitutes. Kano has been the site of ethnic and religious clashes in the past. Though not of late, Boko Haram has been active in Kano.

Officials are saying that the fire is electrical in origin, and it spread rapidly because there was nobody in the market shortly after midnight. This is plausible. Market fires are common. Even this weekend, there was another large market fire in Birnin Kebbi, capital of Kebbi state. Senate President Bukola Saraki commented on March 27 that fires in markets around the country were negatively affecting gross domestic product. Nevertheless, there is speculation that the fire in Kano’s Sabon Gari market was the result of arson, and that it involved Boko Haram. Boko Haram has carried out big operations before around the principal Christian holidays, and the Sabon Gari market would be a tempting target. Arson could also have been perpetrated because of ethnic and religious hostilities. Thus far, no group has claimed responsibility for the fire. It is to be hoped that the federal and state authorities will respond positively to the emir’s call for a thorough investigation.

Hope fades for survivors as India flyover toll hits 25

The death toll from a collapsed flyover in eastern India rose to 25 on Friday, after emergency workers toiled through the night to find any remaining survivors trapped under huge slabs of concrete and metal girders.

But emergency authorities said there was little hope of finding any more survivors after pulling almost 100 people from under the rubble of the road that collapsed onto a busy street in Kolkata on Thursday, crushing cars and pedestrians.

“The rescue operation will not stop until all the blocks of concrete and iron girders have been cleared,” said deputy police commissioner Akhilesh Chaturvedi as he announced the toll had risen to 25.

“Nearly 300 rescuers, including army and disaster management personnel, are working around the clock to clear the rubble.”

The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) however said there was little hope of finding any more survivors under the rubble of the flyover, which had been under construction since 2009.

It was unclear what caused the sudden collapse, but police have registered a preliminary case against the contractor.

The state government, which is fighting for re-election in a vote that starts on Monday, pledged to take action against those found responsible.

Survivors being treated at a nearby hospital described how tonnes of metal and concrete came crashing down onto the busy street without warning.

“The flyover collapsed in front of me. When I tried to escape, I was hit,” said housewife Sabita Devi.

Hospital manager Sitaram Agarwal said many people were being treated for head and leg injuries sustained in the disaster.

But authorities initially struggled to get cranes and other large machinery through the narrow streets of Burrabazar, one of the oldest and most congested parts of the city.

– ‘Gross neglect’ –

An injured builder told AFP at the scene that he had been working on the structure before it collapsed and had seen bolts come out of the metal girders.

“We were cementing two iron girders for the pillars, but the girders couldn’t take the weight of the cement,” said 30-year-old Milan Sheikh before being taken away to hospital.

“The bolts started coming out this morning and then the flyover came crashing down.”

The disaster is the latest in a string of deadly construction accidents in India, where enforcement of safety rules is weak and substandard materials are often used.

Construction of the two-kilometre-long flyover began in 2009 and was supposed to be completed within 18 months, but has suffered a series of hold-ups.

Mamata Banerjee, the chief minister of West Bengal state, of which Kolkata is the capital, said the government “will not spare” the contractors, Indian construction company IVRCL.

Police said they had registered preliminary cases of murder, attempt to murder and criminal conspiracy against the company, whose offices in Kolkata have been sealed by investigators.

Earlier K.P. Rao, a representative of IVRCL, appeared to deny any responsibility for the disaster when he told reporters it was an “act of God”.

The Times of India said it was “another brutal reminder of (the) shoddy quality of construction and gross neglect of public safety in our cities”, calling for a thorough enquiry to determine what went wrong.

The disaster comes at a sensitive time for Banerjee, whose centre-left Trinamool Congress party is seeking re-election in the state.

Voting in the West Bengal elections begins on Monday and will be held in five phases lasting a month.

On Thursday, Banerjee blamed the previous state government under which the flyover project was started.

U.S. stands ready to help diversify Nigeria’s economy

U.S. stands ready to help Nigeria diversify its economy beyond oil, an assistant regional secretary said at the U.S. Institute of Peace. Photo by sakhorn/Shutterstock

WASHINGTON, March 30 (UPI) — The United States stands ready to assist Nigeria in diversifying its economy beyond the oil sector, a regional U.S. secretary said from Washington, D.C.

The International Monetary Fund warned the impact of lower crude oil prices were adding pressure to a Nigerian economy in need of deep structural reforms. The country’s oil-dependent economy has struggled under the strains that have emerged since crude oil prices first dropped below the $100 per barrel mark in 2014. From the pressure of oil prices alone, the government’s deficit doubled to about 3 percent of the gross domestic product last year.

About half of the Nigerian population lives on less than $1.25 per day. Plagued by problems ranging from terrorism to corruption, the country has been struggling to address deep-rooted economy gaps.

Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. assistant secretary for African Affairs, told officials gathered at the U.S. Institute of Peace the country has an “incredible” opportunity for growth if it utilizes its natural resources, including oil and gas, effectively. For inclusive and broad-based expansion, however, she said Nigeria needs to look beyond energy.

“There are areas in which we stand ready to partner with Nigeria to help the government advance important goals, including increasing non-oil revenue,” she said.

In early March, Nigerian Petroleum Minister and Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. Emmanuel Kachikwu said the state oil company would be divided into 30 independent companies in an effort to address corruption and revenue losses.

Nigeria is the No. 8 oil exporter to the United States, behind Kuwait, sending 78,000 barrels per day to the country for the week ending March 18. That’s down 251,000 bpd from the previous week, but up substantially from the 14,000 bpd sent during the same week last year.

Full-year Nigerian oil production has held steady at around 1.8 million bpd, though energy companies working in the country have had to halt operations at times because of security threats.

Shell Under Investigation in Italy Over Nigerian Oil Deal

Children play on broken pipework at an abandoned oil-flow station operated by Royal Dutch Shell in K-Dare, Nigeria.

By Eric Sylvers | Sarah Kent | WSJ/

Italian prosecutors are investigating Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s involvement in a Nigerian oil deal, a person familiar with the matter said, drawing the oil company into a corruption probe that has dogged Italy’s energy giant Eni SpA.

The prosecutors are investigating whether Shell’s piece of a $1.3 billion payment to acquire a rich oil field off the coast of Nigeria constituted a bribe, according to a person familiar with the probe. Italian and Dutch police last month raided Shell’s headquarters in The Hague looking for evidence that could be used in the case, the person said.

Shell on Wednesday confirmed it had received “notice of proceedings” from Italian prosecutors in connection with the Nigerian oil block and that its offices had been “visited” recently by Dutch authorities. The Anglo-Dutch company said it is cooperating with the investigators and is looking into the allegations.

Shell and Eni have jointly owned a Nigerian license, known as OPL 245, since 2011 to develop giant Atlantic Ocean oil fields thought to contain nine billion barrels of oil. It is a substantial project for the companies in a country that has been of historic importance to both of them.

Shell first pursued the oil fields in 2001, when it bought a stake from Malabu Oil & Gas Ltd.—a Nigerian company that was awarded the license when the African country was under military dictatorship. A new Nigerian government soon rescinded Malabu’s license, awarding Shell sole ownership and prompting years of legal disputes.

Malabu eventually reached a deal with the Nigerian government that gave it the license back, and attracted Eni as an investor. Shell agreed to drop its own legal challenges to Malabu’s ownership and together with Eni acquired the oil license in 2011 with a $1.3 billion payment to the Nigerian government.

Italian prosecutors are investigating where that money went and whether Shell and Eni knew its destination, according to Italian court documents.

The documents show the government later transferred almost all of the money to Malabu, and say the prosecution “believes that a considerable part of that sum was destined for the remuneration of Nigerian public officials.” Italian prosecutors aren’t investigating Malabu.

In 2014, prosecutors in Milan placed Eni and its chief executive, Claudio Descalzi, under investigation for international corruption in connection to the OPL 245 deal. Eni and Mr. Descalzi have denied wrongdoing.

Eni has always maintained that it paid the government directly and isn’t responsible for where the money eventually ended up. A Shell spokesman said that any payments for the license were made only to Nigeria’s federal government and any questions about where the money ended up should be directed to the government and to Malabu. Eni again denied any wrongdoing on Wednesday. The Wall Street Journal wasn’t able to reach Malabu for comment.

The long-running dispute over OPL 245 now threatens to cast a new cloud over Shell’s investments in Nigeria, where it has been present for 80 years and is the biggest Western investor in the country’s oil sector. Last year, Shell got nearly 10% of its output from Nigeria and the country remains a major pillar of its business even though it has sold some onshore assets in the Niger Delta in recent years that have been subject to attacks and theft.

Shell, which had already made large investments by 2011 developing the field, paid much less than half of the $1.3 billion acquisition price for a 50% stake in the oil field, according to Italian court documents. Italian prosecutors suspect most of the amount ended up being paid in bribes, potentially making Shell responsible for its part, the documents said.

Italian daily Corriere della Sera reported the investigation into Shell’s role in the Nigeria deal on Wednesday.

East Africa’s used-clothes trade comes under fire

The Economist – GIKOMBA market, just north of Nairobi’s downtown, is a place to buy just about anything. At its entrance, where ragged minibuses push their way through rutted red mud, stalls sell piles of pillows, plastic toys, cutlery and soap. But the most common wares are second-hand clothing. Piles of old T-shirts and jeans; winter jackets, incongruous in the equatorial heat; dresses and leather shoes; all are watched carefully by stallholders. This market is the biggest wholesale centre of the mitumba, or used-clothing, trade in east Africa. The clothes worn by the bulk of Nairobi’s population are sourced here.

Yet if the governments of the East African Community, the regional trade bloc which comprises Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi, get their way, all will change. By 2019 the EAC wants to outlaw imports of second-hand clothes. The idea is that ending the trade in old clothes—mostly donated by their former owners in rich countries—will help boost local manufacturing. On March 10th Uhuru Kenyatta, Kenya’s president, met market traders upset by the idea, and defended the need for “Kenyan manufactured apparel”. Yet the ban seems sure to fail.

Mitumba trading is a big employer for Kenyans, most of whom work in the informal labour market. By one estimate, there are 65,000 traders in Gikomba alone. Imports have increased massively over the past two decades. In 2015, according to UN data, Kenya imported about 18,000 tonnes of clothing from Britain alone. Whole-salers buy bundles for anything up to 10,000 shillings (about $100), and sort the contents by type and quality. Retail traders then come and source stock for their own stalls elsewhere in the city, to be sold on to ordinary Kenyans.

Few traders are happy with the idea of a ban. “Just let them dare,” says Elizabeth in front of her stall in a dark corner of Gikomba, piled high with women’s dresses, on being informed of the proposal. “How could they! We will remove our clothes, we will demonstrate in the streets, we will take our children.” Selling clothes is a relatively lucrative activity. A trader can make 1,000 shillings in profit a day in a part of Nairobi where many people get by on a tenth of that. And it is skilled work: traders have to put their own capital at risk, assessing how likely each item is to sell.

Mr Kenyatta argues that new, better, jobs will be created in the textile industry to make up for these losses. That is not implausible, reckons Andrew Brooks, an academic at King’s College London who has studied the used-clothes trade. Kenya had a textiles industry in the 1960s and 1970s; South Africa has a ban, and a substantial textile industry. But to work, it would rely on east Africa’s borders being effectively sealed. A more likely outcome is that cheap clothes would simply be smuggled in, and the government would lose the 35% tariff levied on their import.

Many traders think that the proposal is bluster. At Toi market, a warren of shops at the edge of Kibera, Nairobi’s biggest slum, where many of the clothes sold at Gikomba go next, Simon Kimondho runs a stall selling smart slacks and jeans. “Nothing will happen, they are just not able,” he says. Another trader, Julius Batu, opposite him disagrees. The ban will come in, he says, but he is not worried. “We can just go to China and get new clothes.”

Nigeria’s Mission to Free Boko Haram’s Hostages

NSHIRA TURKSON | The Atlantic

Nigerian refugees prepare food and go about their daily lives at a United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) camp in Baga Sola on January 29, 2015. The refugees arrived in the camp after the attack by Boko Haram millitants in the Nigerian town of Baga. (Sia Kambou/AFP/Getty Images)

Nigerian troops have freed hundreds of hostages held by the militant Islamist group Boko Haram in recent counter-terrorism efforts in Nigeria’s northeast.

The military missions, aimed at driving out terrorists and rescuing their captives,freed 829 people last week. The army rescued 520 people in the village of Kusumma, and 309 others from 11 other villages. Troops have also rescued 72 people held captive in northeast villages in two “clearance operations,” army Public Relations Director Sani Usman said in statements Sunday. The group still holds an unknown number of hostages.

“The gallant troops cleared the remnants of the Boko Haram terrorists hibernating in Kala Balge general area,” Usman said of one of last week’s missions.

Soldiers also destroyed a terrorist training camp, warehouse, and factory in Tilem, a northeast village, he added. Twenty-nine insurgents were killed and troops recovered weapons from Boko Haram hiding spots in the operations that freed 72 people.

Since 2013, Boko Haram has carried out mass abductions in Nigeria and neighboring countries in its quest to drive out Western influence and establish an Islamist state. The kidnapping of 276 Chibok schoolgirls in 2014 brought the group to global attention, birthing the viral hashtag #BringBackOurGirls. Two years later, 219 girls are still missing. Last week, one of two girls arrested in north Cameroon carrying explosives claimed to be one of the kidnapped girls.

The human-rights organization Amnesty International estimates Boko Haram has abducted about 2,000 girls and women over their seven-year history. Women are forced into marriage and sexual slavery, and are often made to carry out suicide attacks—at times in their own villages.

Earlier this month, two women blew themselves up at the Molai-Umarari mosque on the outskirts of Maidugrui, a northeast city that has long-endured Boko Haram’s violence. Twenty-four people were killed, and Nigerian officials suspect Boko Haram was responsible for the attack. The mosque had reopened just days before the attack after a near-identical bombing in October forced it to close. Two suicide bombers killed six people in that incident. One of the attackers was reportedly a woman.

Boko Haram has recently increasingly targeted public places like mosques, markets, and schools. The Global Terrorism Index 2014 Report found “terrorist activity in Nigeria has more in common with the tactics of organized crime and gangs, focusing more on armed assaults using firearms and knives than on the bombings of other large terrorist groups,” but recent months show an uptick in suicide bombings for Boko Haram. The group’s violence is said to be responsible for the displacement of more than 2 million people since 2013.

Four days after the mosque bombing in Maiduguri, Nigeria’s Information Minister Lai Mohammed said Nigerian army efforts have reduced Boko Haram’s ability to carry out large-scale attacks, in an interview with Al Jazeera.

“Before these villagers (in Maiduguri) were under the control of Boko Haram insurgents; today they have been dislodged, now they’re attacking soft targets, which is what happens with a insurgency on its way out,” he said.

Press Freedom for Ethiopian Bloggers Tested Again

Marthe van der Wolf | VOA

FILE - Ethiopian journalists hold placards as they shout slogans during a demonstration at the Ethiopian Embassy in Nairobi, May 2, 2006. — FILE – Ethiopian journalists hold placards as they shout slogans during a demonstration at the Ethiopian Embassy in Nairobi, May 2, 2006.

ADDIS ABABA—Abel Wabela, 29, and eight other bloggers and freelance journalists spent more than a year and a half in prison. They were acquitted five months ago, but life has not been easy since.

“We cannot go abroad,” Wabela said, “getting a job is very difficult. We are not allowed to work, not allowed to move.”

Wabela previously worked at Ethiopian Airlines as an engineer, but it will not take him back. His left ear is no longer functional, he says, due to mistreatment in prison.

In addition, the bloggers’ passports have been confiscated.

Back in court

Wabela was one of six bloggers and three affiliated freelance journalists who were arrested in April 2014. They were accused under the anti-terrorism law of using social media to incite violence in Ethiopia.

Although all the bloggers and journalists were acquitted, the prosecutor appealed their release. For that reason, they have to appear Tuesday in Ethiopia’s Supreme Court.

Atnaf Berahane says that even though he has been out of prison for five months, he lives in a state of fear.

“After my release I basically do nothing, because I know that every move I make will be traced,” Berahane said. “I am afraid that I may go to prison. The appeal is going on, so the appeal is like a chain to me right now. I am preparing myself for prison.”

Imprisonment called unacceptable

Ethiopia is frequently criticized by human rights organizations on its press freedom record. The government states that those imprisoned are criminals using journalism as a cover.

Zone 9 is a reference to an Ethiopian state prison with eight zones; the bloggers use Zone 9 to indicate the larger “prison” they feel makes up the rest of the country.

Africa researcher Kerry Paterson of the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists says the possible return of the bloggers to jail is unacceptable and a huge blow to press freedom in Ethiopia.

“The Zone 9 bloggers, their tagline has always been that they blog because they care,” Paterson said. “These are young people who are deeply committed to seeing a safer, freer, better, more democratic Ethiopia, and who have faced repression and crackdowns on every turn.”

Despite the belief by the bloggers that their future in Ethiopia is bleak and uncertain, Wabela, Berahane and the others are still blogging. The decision by Ethiopia’s Supreme Court on the appeal will mean they either must go back to prison, or can continue writing.

Nigeria Defense Minister: Military Made Gains Against Boko Haram

James Butty | VOA

FILE - Soldiers are seen on a truck along a road in Maiduguri in Borno State, Nigeria. — FILE – Soldiers are seen on a truck along a road in Maiduguri in Borno State, Nigeria.

Nigeria’s defense minister said the military under President Muhammadu Buhari has made enormous gains in the fight against Boko Haram.

Retired General Dan Ali said Wednesday the military has reclaimed much of the land once occupied by the terrorist group and that Boko Haram has been reduced to waging mostly guerrilla warfare. “Within one year, the coming of our president has changed the game. Look at what was happening before whereby three states, the whole eastern region, was under the terrorists. Now we may have maybe two local governments,” he said.

Ali said the military should be able to clear the terrorists out of the Sambisa Forest within two or three months.

Shortly after President Buhari was inaugurated as president in May 2015, he confidently declared that Boko Haram would be defeated by the end of the year. Before 2015 was over, Buhari announced that he had succeeded in his pledge, claiming that Boko Haram is now “technically defeated”.

Ali said President Buhari’s regional and international approach to the fight against Boko Haram has also made a huge difference. “We have been receiving specialized training and intelligence sharing. If you can remember, my president has been going around. In the fact, the five neighbors, including Cameroon, Chad, Benin, have been integrity. We are all working together and we are sharing information, and the international community is also advising us in the right direction,” Ali said.

On the identity of the would-be girl suicide bomber who told Cameroon authorities this week that she is one of the 276 Nigerian school girls kidnapped by Boko Haram in 2014, Ali said the Nigerian military has information that while the girl was captured from Chibok, she was not among the 276 captured in 2014.

“She was one of the Chibok girls but not associated with the earlier ones. We have gotten a report on that that the girl was taken from Chibok but not among those that were earlier captured,” he said.

General Ali said the Nigerian military has been trying to find the girls, but apparently Boko Haram has dispersed them in different locations.

“All along we have been trying to track them [the girls]. Specifically, if I tell you that they are in a specific place, it is difficult. Nobody can keep all 250 girls in a particular place. So these girls might have been distributed. Remember that for some time now, they have been using these girls as bombers,” he said.

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