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Obasanjo’s biological father an Igbo man from Onitsha — Rtd. Col. Majekodunmi
“If you look at Obasanjo’s past, you see that he has been very fair, more than fair, to the Igbos. He went to campaign for the Igbo party presidential candidates at Onitsha.”
Chief (Dr) Sunday Adekunle Majekodunmi, the current Aare Ona Kakanfo of Egba-land and the Otun Ba’asegun of Egba-land has spoken on sacred subjects that border on life, medicine, politics and nationhood as he celebrates his 90th birthday tomorrow, Monday, March 18.
Majekodunmi, who is a former Chief Medical Officer to the General Officer Commanding (GOC), TY Danjuma, bares it all, in a chat with Daily Independent leaving no topic too controversial as he weighs in on the current state of the nation and his hopes for life after death.
Tell us about your early life.
I was born on March 18, 1934 at Ijebu-Ode because my father was working with UAC; he was selling motor parts and that is where he met my mother. I spent many years in Ijebu-Ode before I moved to Abeokuta where I spent my early years. I attended a missionary school in Ikereku area, and after secondary school I went to Oke-Ona United School (OUS) at Ibereke, Abeokuta. I was in the school till 1947 December. When I was young, I moved with a bad gang and we won’t go to school. Ogun River was close to the school, and before exams, we would visit a Babalawo (herbalist) to give us voodoo that would help us remember the answer in the examination hall and he would give us a handkerchief to wipe our faces and we honestly believed him then.
Unfortunately, I was only being promoted on trial each year. One of my big cousins, who was a teacher in the school, was the one who exposed me at home and told my family that I was not reading rather, it was voodoo that I was depending on.
That was how I found myself in Ibadan Boys High School in 1948. When there was no ‘babalawo’ anymore, I started studying. During the first year leaving certificate examination in 1951, I came first and because I was doing well, my father got me a school where I will have my secondary education in the United Kingdom (UK), because we were under colonial rule.
I did not take any Unity School exam; if I had taken, I would have come first again.
While my father was planning on taking me abroad to study, one of his aunts ‘Iya Ibadan’ visited and he told her of his plan for me and the woman said to her younger brother, that, if you want to send Sunday (that is my name) abroad to study, you must include in his baggage, a woman or a girl because women will not allow him to study well and that put an end to my ambition to go overseas. I ended up in Lagos Boys High School in 1952 where I spent one year.
In 1956, I finished my school leaving certificate and was employed at Adeoyo Hospital in Ibadan as a clerk. My father used to tell everybody that his son was going to be a medical doctor.
I got to the UK on December 2, 1957, during winter. At that time, you could only go overseas officially through Western Region. It was part of what Baba Awolowo did for us, and I was met at Liverpool by a representative of Western Region.
When I was in Nigeria, I was working with the Ministry of Health, so they took me to a health center in the South of England.
While I was in the UK, there was nobody to supervise me, we were just moving from one dancing hall to another. So, I moved to London to finish all my papers for O’ level. I heard about Coventry Technical College, which is now a university and I saw some of the boys there who were my classmates, not in the same school, but from different schools. So, I prepared for my GCE.
• Chief (Dr) Sunday Adekunle Majekodunmi, during his wedding
By 1960, I passed my subjects, so by October 1, I was already in the University of Glasgow. I stayed in Glasgow for six years to do medicine. I completed it on June 1, 1966.
In 1963, I was passing out blood in my urine after my second Masters in Bachelor (MB), and they thought it was schistosomiasis. It’s a disease that we get when you go to swim in the Ogun River, which I did a lot.
They discovered that I had congenital disease of the bladder, which I was born with it. They call it cystitis cystica.
I heard the professor tell the registrar that it’s not curable.
They said I had 10 to 15 years plus or minus in the medical field. What it means is that I can only live 10 to 15 years. When they finished talking, I didn’t wait for a prescription because it was not curable, so I went back to Glasgow. I don’t want to tell you what I did then, I mean, for someone who was waiting to die.
Every weekend, we must have a party at number 42, Buckley Street, Glasgow.
From there, I did my house job, surgery in Glasgow, and then medicine in Leeds in England. In my final year, I had a girlfriend, a white girl, Jennifer. She came to do midwifery. I got her pregnant and she gave birth to my first son. Even though we were never married, she was really my first wife. I returned home to Nigeria on July 28, 1967.
You have a vivid memory, how are you able to stay sharp even at your age?
I ascribe it to a good life. I don’t get involved in something I cannot handle. I have been careless in the past, nobody’s perfect. I also believe in destiny; if God says you are going to reach one place, you will get there. I mean, I didn’t know that I would even reach this my present age because of what they told me in the theater, that I have 10 to 15 years, plus or minus. So, every year, I celebrate my birthday. My wife used to ask me why, and I tell her I don’t know, I just feel like I’m someone that was told he will die and is still alive today.
I joined the Army in April 1968, I came home the same month in the middle of the war, and University Teaching Hospital Ibadan (UCH) paid for my ticket, Jennifer and our son, Mark.
When I got home, my mother said I must not marry the white girl. Along the line I met my Nigerian wife whom my mother approved of, and we got married on April 7, 1969.
How did you join the Nigerian Army?
Remember I told you that I was sent to Lagos to assist with the war effort. They used to bring casualties from the war front, and we helped in removing their bullets. That was during the Civil War.
By January 1,1968, I was already in Lagos at the Military Hospital, Yaba. I was their first Commandant.
When I saw the way the war was going, with Ojukwu promising to have breakfast in Lagos. I said, ‘over my dead body’.
So, I joined the Army by April 26, 1968. I was commissioned as a Captain. I was shipped to 44, Military Hospital, Kaduna as a General Duty Medical Officer (GDMO).
After staying there till the war finished in the first week of October 1970, I went to the UK to do a postgraduate in Preventive Health Medicine. I spent two years there. My wife also got a scholarship at LUTH, so she joined me there. She’s a professor of ophthalmology.
We came back home together, and while she went back to LUTH, I went back to the Army because we were both on scholarship.
When I got to Lagos headquarters, they shipped me to 3D. It used to be 3 Marine Commando but now, 3 Armored Division as the Chief Medical Officer to the General Officer Commanding (GOC), TY Danjuma as the CO 3 Field Ambulance in Port-Harcourt before we moved to Jos in 1975.
Tell us about serving in the Nigerian Army; the good and the bad.
What I will say about the Nigerian Army is that not all the people that were killed were guilty of mutiny or coup plotting, some of them were just unfortunate to be there at the wrong time. I remember the case of a young officer. He was a night duty officer who went to submit a report but he was unfortunate to be in the room where the coup plotters were just coming from. They saw him and said he was among them.
Nonetheless, the army is a nice place, you just have to be content with your life. Don’t get involved with stealing. There was one Major Yaya, who was a Kano boy under my command at the Military Hospital. He was a lousy officer, who didn’t watch what he said. He was in a Nigerian plane from Ghana with other officers and he was naive enough to say he dreamt that there was a coup and Ibrahim Babangida (IBB), who was always afraid of his own shadow, got wind of it from his boys. So, when they came to arrest Yaya, I said, the only weapon he had was the one he signed for at the hospital armory where we kept ammunition, so, he couldn’t have been planning a coup. Why would he? He was in the Pharmacy Department. I wanted to go and pleaded on his behalf, but one of the officers asked me to be careful and that I should not take part, because they had made up their mind on what to do with Yaya.
But I still wrote something nice, because I knew he was naive. However, they didn’t kill him, they just retired him. So, what I’m saying is that somebody should be careful about what he says and where he says it at any given time.
Are there any memorable events that come to mind?
Oh yes. It was about T.Y. Danjuma in 1973. I was allotted a plot of land in Surulere by the LSDPC, through my mother-in-law for just about N4,000, in Bode Thomas. Honestly, I didn’t have a penny to my name as a young officer then, so I approached one of the senior officers. I was going to die within 10 or 15 years, so I was not thinking of tomorrow. I approached Major General Bajowa and I told him I needed N4,000. I had so many things I could use that were not in the record, that were given to us during the war effort. Bajowa said I should not go to that area. He told me to write a letter to T.Y. Danjuma who was my boss, but he warned me that if he wasn’t in good mood, I should not submit my application for a loan. We have what we called welfare vote, we called it ration cash allowance, that was not auditable.
But some officers like Abacha will not buy the idea. That was why I decided to retire, when Abacha was going to be made the Chief of Army Staff. I said I can’t work with him.
So, I watched Danjuma, because I have to brief him virtually every day on what is happening in the division. I had my application in my pocket and entered his office, saluted him and when I saw that he was in a good mood, I said, sir, I have a problem. I asked for 10,000 from the welfare, and when he read the letter, he said, ah! And approved N10,000. I thanked him and went to the paymaster who said there was no money that time. He gave me only N5,000, which I sent to my wife in Lagos so that she can pay for the land.
I will never forget that about Danjuma unlike Abacha. There was a time I was sent from Lagos as an assistant director of Army health to Mokola barracks where there was a suspected waterborne disease, Cholera before it was confirmed. The children in the barracks were dying from dehydration. So when I got to the barracks, I took some samples and it was confirmed that the children were dying of dehydration and electrolytes imbalance. I realised that they do not have pipe-borne water, they were drinking from a river behind the barracks. I knew we needed to buy some drugs, so I asked the paymaster if there was money to purchase the vaccine for cholera and he said yes. So instead of going to Lagos to get the vaccines, I went to give Abacha the report of my findings and asked him to give his Chief Medical Officer money to purchase the drug. I was careful not to mention the name of the paymaster who told me they had money to purchase the drug, else he would have removed him.
You need to hear what he said; he was unlike TY Danjuma. If he was in that situation, he would be the one to even ask you about what to do to cure the sickness. I could not work with him. It was six months before my retirement in 1998. I got a hint that he was going to become the Chief of Army Commander. I decided to retire because I can’t work with him.
Would it be right to say that you retired from the Nigeria Army because of the inhuman nature of Abacha?
That was what capped it all. Despite how tough Obasanjo was, he did not joke with anything that had to do with welfare, same as TY Danjuma, Abacha was the only different one among them. I was not asking for personal money but money to treat his people. He insisted that if I did not move to Lagos to get the vaccine, he would put me on house arrest.
I had to rush to Lagos to get the drugs and have it sent to his barracks.
At some points, Obasanjo and Abacha led the nation. What is your opinion on their leadership roles in Nigeria?
Obasanjo was a fine officer. It was Abacha that sent Obasanjo to Yola Prison, but it served him right because he was the one that promoted him citing balancing being an Hausa man. All his report after training has always been that he was not grade-able.
Abacha shouldn’t even have gotten beyond the rank of a Major. He was trained on lots of things abroad, but this officer was said not to be grade-able.
Abacha and IBB did not like opposition, but I like Obasanjo for always saying what’s on his mind. He criticises appropriately.
Meanwhile, Obasanjo comes from a very poor family. He never liked us the Yoruba people that were in the army. You cannot say this is what Obasanjo did for us because he sorts of antagonised us.
There was this police officer who was a DPO at Lafenwa that had an affair with Obasanjo’s mother. But at that time, the Igbos didn’t intermarry with Yoruba. He was posted out. After she had the child, his adopted father now adopted him (Obasanjo). Obasanjo’s biological father was an Igbo man from Onitsha and from a royal family for that matter.
If you see the picture of Obasanjo and the ex DPO of Lafenwa, you will see that they look alike.
When they ask him, he doesn’t talk about it. You see some Igbo people like a former governor had once referred to Obasanjo as his cousin because he’s from there. Obasanjo left Yoruba people to Igbo land to go and campaign for Peter Obi at Onitsha.
If you look at Obasanjo’s past, you see that he has been very fair, more than fair, to the Igbos. He went to campaign for the Igbo party presidential candidates at Onitsha.
He has so many things that we know that he doesn’t like to be reminded of. When he was joining the Army it was the DPO that gave him the backing and a good recommendation. That’s how he left when he passed his GC in Form 5 and he got into the army.
But when you are talking about brave officers, you are thinking of TY Danjuma.
Abacha was the greatest problem Nigeria ever had. Remember I said earlier that it was Obasanjo that promoted him to Lieutenant Colonel because they said he was not grade-able.
Abacha was also a good coup planner. You will see him on the television accusing the civilian government of neglecting medical care, yet he didn’t do better when he was there. He was a very wicked officer. He has a team of killer squad headed by Al-Mustafa. Whatever Al-Mustafa is saying, he’s just telling lies. Many people left the country through the escape route via Cotonou.
Abacha and IBB were not tolerant, and I think Abacha was probably the most dangerous of them all.
So since the day he said that he was going to lock me up because I asked for welfare vote money to buy a vaccine for the cholera that was raging in Mokola Barracks and he refused, I knew I could not work with him.
So when I knew he was going to become the chief of army, I said, no, I can’t work with him.
Despite all Obasanjo did for Abacha, he was the one that sent him to prison.
As I said, Abacha couldn’t tolerate opposition. You know he was not lettered as such, but he knew Obasanjo could finish him internationally because he travels a lot and he’s more educated and the world will believe whatever he says.
So Obasanjo was criticising him and he didn’t like that. In fact, Obasanjo was lucky that they didn’t kill him like some people that they killed with the vaccine, the one that has no cure. Obasanjo, apart from his small, small problem, is not a wicked officer. But when he stands by something, he works it down. (Excerpts from Daily Independent)
By Samson Ezea
The Nigeria Education Loan Fund (NELFUND), the Federal Government of Nigeria’s institutional framework for providing interest-free student loans to Nigerians who need financial support to access higher education and skills training, is a welcome development, no matter how one views or interprets it, particularly as it concerns the South-East region and the manner in which the scheme has fared in the region.
It is an axiomatic fact that, for many years, the cost of tertiary education in Nigeria has created significant financial barriers for students, particularly those from low-income families. The idea behind a national student-loan system was to ensure that lack of money would not prevent a qualified Nigerian from pursuing higher education.
Before NELFUND, Nigeria had the Nigerian Education Bank framework, but the Federal Government eventually moved towards a dedicated student-loan system.
The major objective was to create a sustainable mechanism through which students could obtain financial support for their education and repay the loans later when they become economically productive.
The major breakthrough came under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu in June 2023, when the Student Loans (Access to Higher Education) Act, 2023 was enacted to provide interest-free loans to Nigerians seeking higher education. President Tinubu signed the original Student Loan Bill into law on June 12, 2023, amidst commendations, mixed feelings and scepticism, all of which were expected whenever governments introduce new laws, programmes and policies.
The policy initiative was presented as a means of ensuring that no Nigerian student would be forced to abandon tertiary education simply because of an inability to pay school fees.
However, the 2023 law was not immediately operationalised in its original form. Several issues were identified concerning governance, eligibility, administration, application procedures, funding and repayment. This eventually led to the 2024 repeal and re-enactment of the law, giving birth to NELFUND as we know it today.
The Federal Government and the National Assembly subsequently reviewed the 2023 legislation, and President Tinubu signed the Student Loans (Access to Higher Education) (Repeal and Re-enactment) Act, 2024, on April 3, 2024. This is the legislation that established NELFUND in its current institutional form.
The 2024 Act introduced several significant changes, including:
Establishing NELFUND as a body corporate capable of entering contracts and legally administering and recovering student loans.
Giving NELFUND responsibility for providing loans for tuition, institutional charges and upkeep.
Extending support beyond conventional university education to vocational and skills-acquisition programmes.
Removing the previous family-income threshold.
Removing the requirement for a guarantor.
Creating a Board of Directors and a professional management structure headed by a Managing Director.
Establishing a funding mechanism that includes 1% of taxes, levies and duties collected by the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) accruing to the Federal Government.
From Legislation to Actual Student Loans
Following the 2024 Act, NELFUND moved from being primarily a legislative framework to an operational institution. The NELFUND student-loan portal was launched on May 24, 2024, and applications subsequently commenced for students in tertiary institutions across Nigeria. Loan disbursement commenced in February 2025, according to NELFUND’s official timeline.
The fundamental philosophy behind the scheme is simple: access to education first, repayment later. Rather than requiring students to have the money before entering or remaining in school, NELFUND provides financial support to enable eligible students to continue their education. The loans are interest-free, with repayment generally commencing when beneficiaries become gainfully employed and begin earning an income.
As beneficial, helpful and laudable as this policy programme is, particularly considering its potential to promote human capital development and unhindered access to higher education, it appears not to have received the level of awareness, campaigns, sensitisation and enlightenment it deserves across the country, especially in the South-East region.
This raises serious questions about the role of political leaders, clergymen, academics, parents, state governors, heads of tertiary institutions and National Assembly members in ensuring that their people take advantage of opportunities provided by the Federal Government.
Whether this situation is intentional, conspiratorial, hypocritical, political or simply an act of negligence is, to me, immaterial. What matters is that the money available under the scheme is Nigerian money. It is our collective patrimony. It does not belong to any particular geopolitical zone, political party, religion or ethnic group. It is our national cake, and every qualified Nigerian student has a legitimate right to benefit from it.
Why, therefore, is access to NELFUND apparently so low among students in South-East tertiary institutions?
Why are some South-East leaders, heads of tertiary institutions, lecturers, parents, clergymen and even students not talking sufficiently about the scheme or encouraging their children, wards and relatives to take advantage of it?
I know many people may wonder why I am writing in this manner. I am doing so out of genuine shock, disappointment and concern over what I witnessed recently.
I was privileged to accompany my boss, Senator Ikeje Asogwa, and other members of the National Assembly Joint Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and TETFund and the House of Representatives Committee on Student Loans, Scholarships and Higher Education Financing to the South-East National Sensitisation Programme on the Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND) at the Moot Auditorium, University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus (UNEC).
The event brought together heads and leaders of tertiary institutions in the South-East, undergraduates, NELFUND officials and other stakeholders.
It was an incisive, interactive, expository, informative and revealing engagement.
What shocked me most was the revelation by one of the South-East senators, Senator Tony Nwoye, representing Anambra North Senatorial District, that the South-East region reportedly ranks lowest among Nigeria’s six geopolitical zones in the number of students accessing the NELFUND student loan.
According to the figures presented by Senator Nwoye and attributed to NELFUND, the reported figures were:
North-West — 450,000 beneficiaries
North-East — 378,103
South-West — 360,000
North-Central — 324,908
South-South — 198,000
South-East — 108,000
If these figures are accurate, then the situation is not only disappointing, but also calls for urgent intervention.
Senator Nwoye, visibly concerned by the development, challenged heads of tertiary institutions, clergymen, parents and students to embrace the policy. He reminded stakeholders that the fund belongs to Nigerians and is not the property of any political party, religion or ethnic group.His frustration was palpable.
Also speaking, the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and NELFUND, Senator Dandutse Muntari Mohammed, appealed to stakeholders and students to embrace the scheme. He also disclosed that, as part of efforts to ensure adequate funding for NELFUND, l that proceeds from recovered assets and unclaimed dividends, among other sources, be channelled towards funding student loans.
I was deeply shocked by these revelations.
What is even more troubling is that I have yet to see any compelling reason why the South-East, despite its reputation for educational advancement and high literacy levels, should be at the bottom of the table in accessing an educational opportunity of this nature.
Since that event, I have been trying to understand why awareness and access to NELFUND appear to be relatively poor in the South-East, despite the potential relief the scheme can provide to students, parents and guardians.
I recently spoke with a cousin of mine studying at a federal university in the North-West. I asked him if he knew about NELFUND.
He said yes.
I asked whether he had ever benefited from it.
He told me that he had applied once and received upkeep support, while his institution’s charges were also covered, amounting to about ₦490,000 in total.
I then asked him why he had stopped accessing the scheme.
His response surprised me.
He said he was afraid that having a student loan could somehow affect his ability to travel overseas after graduation or create an obligation that could “hang over” him.
I had to educate him that such a fear, without evidence, should not prevent him from accessing a legitimate educational support programme. I asked him whether he believed that all the thousands of Nigerian students benefiting from NELFUND would automatically be prevented from travelling abroad after graduation.
The fundamental point is that a loan is a financial obligation, not a criminal record.
Students should, however, understand the terms and conditions of any loan they accept and comply with the applicable repayment requirements after graduation and employment.
I reminded him that the fund is Nigerian money, not APC money, not President Tinubu’s personal money, and certainly not Hausa, Igbo or Yoruba money.
It is a national student-loan programme established to support eligible Nigerian students.
There are undoubtedly many students across the South-East who may harbour similar misconceptions or simply lack adequate information about the scheme.
That is why our parents, political leaders, traditional and religious leaders, academics, university administrators, media practitioners and other stakeholders must urgently take the message of NELFUND to every corner of the region.
The politics and hypocrisy surrounding the avoidance or discouragement of our students from accessing NELFUND cannot benefit anyone.
It is time for the South-East to wake up from this apparent slumber and face reality.
We must stop viewing every policy of the Federal Government through the prism of partisan politics.
If a policy is good for our people, we should embrace it. If it has shortcomings, we should demand improvements. If there are legitimate concerns, we should raise them constructively.
But rejecting an opportunity simply because it was introduced by a government or political party we do not support is not leadership; it is self-inflicted deprivation.
NELFUND should not be regarded as an APC programme or a Bola Tinubu programme. It is a national policy designed to address a national problem.
The South-East cannot, on the one hand, complain about marginalisation and lack of opportunities while, on the other hand, failing to take advantage of opportunities that are already available to its students.
There is nothing wrong with scrutinising government policies. There is everything wrong with allowing political resentment, misinformation or indifference to prevent our children from accessing legitimate opportunities.
NELFUND is also, in many respects, more accessible than traditional scholarship programmes, which often have limited slots and stringent eligibility requirements.
A student-loan programme can potentially reach a much larger number of students who may otherwise struggle to finance their education.
And let us be honest: even in many developed countries, students take educational loans to finance their studies and repay them after graduation when they secure employment. What should matter is whether the terms are fair, transparent and sustainable.
South-East governors, members of the National Assembly, commissioners, local government leaders, university administrators, lecturers, religious leaders, traditional rulers, media organisations, student unions, parents and community organisations must intensify sensitisation about NELFUND.
Our universities and other eligible institutions should not merely wait for students to stumble upon information about the scheme. They should actively educate them about the application process, eligibility requirements, benefits and repayment obligations.
Our political leaders should put politics aside, when the welfare and future of our children are involved.
Our parents should ask questions.
Our students should seek information.
Our media should report the opportunities and also interrogate the challenges.
And our religious and community leaders should use their enormous platforms to educate young Nigerians.
The objective should not be to promote President Tinubu or any political party. The objective should be to ensure that no qualified South-East student misses an educational opportunity, because of ignorance, misinformation or unnecessary political sentiment.
The South-East has historically distinguished itself through education, enterprise, intellectual capacity and an extraordinary determination to succeed. It would therefore be a painful contradiction for a region celebrated for valuing education to rank last in accessing a national student-loan programme designed to make education more accessible.
We cannot continue to complain that our people are being excluded, while simultaneously failing to take advantage of opportunities available to them.
Education is too important to become a casualty of politics.
If NELFUND has weaknesses, let us expose them and demand reforms. If there are legitimate concerns about repayment, let us seek clarification and better safeguards. If students are inadequately informed, let us educate them. But let us not reject the opportunity itself because of who introduced it.
The question should no longer be “Who introduced NELFUND?”
The question should be:
“How can our children benefit from it?”
The fund belongs to Nigeria. The opportunity belongs to Nigerian students. The future belongs to our children.
Let us therefore put aside hypocrisy, misinformation, partisan sentiments and nonchalance.
Let the South-East wake up. Let our leaders speak. Let our institutions sensitise. Let our parents encourage. Let our students apply.
Because when politics ends, it is our children who will have to live with the consequences of the opportunities we either embraced or rejected today.
NELFUND is not about APC. It is not about PDP. It is not about North or South. It is about Nigerian students, Nigerian education and the future of Nigeria.
Our children must not be allowed to lose tomorrow because their parents and leaders failed to recognise the opportunity available to them today.
Ezea, Director, Media To Senator Ikeje Asogwa writes from Independence Layout, Enugu State
News
Niger junta regains control as gunshots, explosions rock Presidential Palace, Airport in failed coup
• Russia helps junta to retake military base – Report
Niger Republic’s ruling junta on Saturday said that it “gradually took back control” after mutinying soldiers attacked key sites around the capital including the presidential palace, after the city was rocked by hours of heavy gunfire.
Reports claimed the members of Niger’s presidential guard, helped by Russian forces, recaptured a key military base in the capital, Niamey, from the mutinous soldiers.
“The presidential guard has retaken control of the air base with the help of the Russians,” a diplomatic source told AFP.
The source added that several of the rebelling soldiers had been killed.
As the clashes broke out, soldiers blocked access to the presidential palace and national television, with Tele Sahel going off air for just over an hour yesterday morning before being restored around 10:00 am (0900 GMT).
“There was an attempt by insurgents from the Nigerien armed forces to enter the presidential palace,” a security source told AFP, adding that “they were pushed back by the presidential guard”.
Niger’s Defence Minister, General Salifou Mody, in a statement read on state television, said a group of soldiers held some troops hostage at a barracks in Niamey and opened fire at “certain sensitive sites” in the city, without naming them.
“The prompt reaction of the defence and security forces made it possible to contain this heated moment and they gradually took back control of these sites,” he added.
Mody’s statement called on the people to “remain calm and freely go about their business”.
Niger has been ruled for three years by a military junta that has struggled to contain jihadist violence flaring in the West African country for around a decade.
An African diplomat in Niamey said for now the presidential guard was still loyal to ruler General Abdourahamane Tiani.
“Everything is calm again, we can’t hear any more shooting,” a resident of the Yantala district close to the presidential palace said late Saturday morning.
Gunfire began in the early hours of Saturday morning, prompting the military to issue a statement on its social media pages urging people to stay calm and “avoid sharing unverified information”.
“Our defence and security forces have been mobilised for the defence of the homeland,” the statement said.
One local resident told AFP that there was “heavy gunfire and explosions” at Base 101 in Niamey, a claim confirmed by several other witnesses.
The first shots were heard at about 1:00 am local time and continued until daybreak, according to a video published by a local journalist filming the area around the airport.
Another local resident said he heard “bursts of gunfire” at about 7:00 am local time, adding that the weapons heard” are not the kind that terrorists on motorbikes can carry”.
“I went to get credit for my phone. I saw a military vehicle heading towards the base that had to turn back,” he said.
Another resident west of Niamey said he heard sporadic small arms fire at about 5:00 am.
Videos online showed armoured vehicles deployed to reinforce the neighbourhood near the airport.
Niamey airport has been targeted twice this year by jihadists, first by the Islamic State in the Sahel (EIS) in January, then in late June by its rival, the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM), the Sahel branch of Al-Qaeda.
The jihadist groups not only target civilians and the military but are also struggling for dominance over each other in the Sahel, and especially in Niger.
Twenty assailants were killed and four soldiers wounded in the January assault, authorities said at the time.
Following years of foot-dragging on a FOI petition filed by Mr Greenspan in 2023, the FBI on Friday complied with a court order directing it to release Mr Tinubu’s records.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has hand delivered records of President Bola Tinubu’s 1993 drug-trafficking and money-laundering case to Judge Howell Beryl of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, saying they are for her eyes only, court filings seen by Peoples Gazette indicated.
The FBI secretly submitted the records on Friday to avoid disobeying a court order while sidelining transparency campaigner, Aaron Greenspan, who petitioned the Bureau for the Nigerian leader’s records in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.
Following years of foot-dragging on a FOI petition filed by Mr Greenspan in 2023, the FBI on Friday complied with a court order directing it to release Mr Tinubu’s records. Mr Greenspan worked with Nigerian journalist, David Hundeyin, to file the petition in 2023.
The records submitted as “under seal, ex parte, in camera declarations were hand delivered to the Court on August 28, 2026 in compliance with this Court’s Minute Order dated August 20, 2026,” filings showed.
Ms Beryl lost her patience with the FBI after the bureau missed several deadlines , giving excuses on why it could not immediately provide the records.
She issued August 28 as the final ultimatum to the FBI, which prompted the FBI’s decision to comply, showing it “in camera” to the judge alone, without carrying along the petitioner.
Earlier this week , FBI claimed that submitting the records would violate Mr Tinubu’s privacy and argued that FOI was established to screen the operations and records of government institutions, not necessarily private individuals.
For decades, Mr Tinubu has avoided speaking on the drug affair, refusing to clarify controversies surrounding his involvement in a case that saw him forfeit hundreds of thousands of dollars to the U.S. government.
Mr Tinubu also sought to block the release of his records, asserting his rivals only sought to use them to discredit him in a Nigerian presidential election. He begged the court to protect his privacy rights.
The United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in 2023 released documents holding Mr Tinubu’s encounter with American authorities over allegations of narcotics trafficking and money laundering.
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