Two weeks ago President Olusegun Obasanjo considered threats by the House of Representatives to impeach him if he didn't resign as 'a joke carried too far' by a group of politicians primarily interested in lining their pockets. Now he and his supporters c...
West Africa in general - and Nigeria in particular - is suddenly gaining from a re-evaluation of global strategy in the United States following the 11 September 2001 attacks. Relations with Saudi Arabia, previously seen as the guarantor of oil supplies, a...
Igbo entrepreneurs make lots of money and might make more but for the Feds
Igbo politics are boiling with preparations for next year's general elections. Since the dream of an independent Biafra was crushed in 1970, many Igbo have felt marginalised, and say that President Olusegun Obasanjo, a south-western Yoruba for whom their ...
Booming Christian fundamentalist sects make good business but not good politics
Nigeria's popular charismatic movement took root with Joseph Ayo Babalola's Christ Apostolic Church in the 1930s. In the 1970s, the late Benson Idahosa of the Church of God Mission ran mass crusades of healing, speaking in tongues and exorcism. What is ne...
Central Bank Governor Sanusi wants to tame his former banking colleagues
Union Bank, First Bank and United Bank for Africa control over a third of the sector. Mid-level banks range from stars to the technically insolvent. Small banks often survive and even thrive by foreign currency deals and high-risk loans to importers. All ...
The military has helped tear the country apart but civilians still defer to the soldiers and politicians
Civilian rule, even by a retired general, does not suit the army
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