About 80 per cent of the budget set aside by the European Union (EU) for the development efforts in the country has remained unaccessed due to internal bureaucratic bottlenecks, experts revealed at the weekend.

Another calamity was averted on Sunday when a Capital Airline aircraft bound for Abuja narrowly escaped crash at the Akanu Ibiam Airport in Enugu.

Infant mortality rate in Nigeria has been described as unacceptably high.

Nigeria, if it cleans up its act, could still host Barack Obama, and United States Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton, will this week present a list of demands Washington wants Abuja to meet if it really wants the U.S. President to visit.

We do not, as patriots, intend to be spoil sports. Nevertheless, the Federal Government's N500 billion intervention fund, in collaboration with the Bank of Industry (BOI), to revive ailing industries in the country must be treated with sceptism. The initiative is belated coming after more than 144 textile firms have shut down and manufacturing plants have fled across the border into neighbouring West African countries.

Minority Leader in the House of Representatives, Mohammed Ndume, no doubt is a voice in the lower chamber that, according to opinion, has remained a constant when burning issues are being raised in the House.

The Action Congress (AC) has said the violence that swept across some states in northern Nigeria last week, leaving hundreds dead, could have been avoided if the Federal Government had been pro-active in dealing with the crisis.

THE Bauchi State Police Command yesterday said it has uncovered a house in the town owned by the Boko Haram Islamic sect opposed to western education stocked with ammunition, bales of fake military and police uniforms, three sowing machines and other sophisticated weapons.

The recent failure of Nigeria's terrestrial internet service provision, the South Atlantic 3/West Africa Submarine Cable, known as SAT-3, has been declared as a major operational risk to the banks and other organisations with a high dependency on international and internet communications.

Hillary Clinton, making her first journey to Africa as U.S. Secretary of State, begins a seven-nation visit Monday with a stop in Kenya to take part in a forum on trade and investment with senior officials from 41 African nations.

There are several things to be said about Boko Haram, the pseudo-religious sect whose adherents disdain Western education and, last week, violently demonstrated their opposition to symbols of authority.

The Central Bank (CBN) will, this week, withdraw the foreign exchange authorised dealership of three banks and suspend them from the foreign exchange market for three months for engaging in foreign exchange speculation.

The sectarian violence which broke out in several parts of northern Nigeria at the end of July has more to do with popular anger and frustration with prevailing economic conditions than religion, say religious experts and Muslim groups. Concerns have also been raised about the reaction of security forces.

It has emerged that the leader of the Islamic fundamentalist group, Boko Haram, Mohammed Yusuf, was captured alive last Thursday before the police later allegedly killed him.

A commander of the state adhoc security group, codenamed, 'Operation Flush' deployed to tackle members of the Boko Haram fundamentalist sect which last week inficted violence on Bauchi and Borno states, Colonel Ben Ahanotu yesterday said about 700 bodies have so far been recovered in Maiduguri alone after the clash between police and the radical Islamist sect subsided. The toll was previously thought to be around 300.

Questions and concerns are being raised over the death of the notorious leader of Boko Haram Islamic sect, Mohammed Yusuf who was killed, Thursday while in the custody of the Nigerian police after his purported arrest earlier that day in Maduguri, Borno State.

It will be a long war, Boko Haram Boko Haram, the group behind the latest violence in Northern Nigeria, is known by several different names, including al_Sunnah wal Jamma, or Followers of Muhammad's Teachings in Arabic, and Boko Haram, which means "Western education is forbidden" in the local Hausa language.

Mr. Godwin Ehigiamusoe is the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Lift Above Poverty Organisation (LAPO), a development micro-finance institution. He is a graduate of Sociology from the University of Benin and a masters degree holder in Development Studies from the same University. He began his involvement in micro-finance as a cooperative officer. He has consulted and offered services on micro-finance to local and international institutions like The World Bank, UNDP, UNICEF, NAPEP and Central Bank of Nigeria.

One member of the Nigerian team to the World Cup qualifier later in the year, Umoh Edet is now in Johannesburg ahead of the team's departure later in August.

Governor Gabriel Suswam of Benue State has disclosed that the state government through the World Bank assisted Local Empowerment and Environmental Management Project LEEMP, has expended well over N679.1million on the execution of community based micro projects in parts of the state.