Basketball players classmates paid for Mothers Flight ticket to attend Graduation

Felicia Ikpum kissed her only child goodbye four years ago, sending him off to America for a chance at a better life. Already 6-foot-7 at 14 years old, Michael Tertsea had an opportunity to receive an education and play basketball at a Catholic high school in Maryland. But it meant leaving his village in Nigeria where, for as long as he could remember, his mom was his whole world. He barely remembers his father, who abandoned them when he was about 5 years old.

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More Oil pipelines Blown up in Nigeria

Militants blew up strategic gas and crude pipelines belonging to Shell and Agip on Saturday in an increasingly fierce campaign that has chopped Nigeria's oil production in half, militants and residents said.

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Angola overtakes Nigeria as Africa’s top Oil Producer

Attacks by militants in Nigeria’s oil-rich Niger Delta region have cut oil production by 800,000 barrels per day (bpd), according to the country’s petroleum minister. Nigeria’s Petroleum Minister Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu said on Monday that the attacks had cut Nigeria’s oil production from an average of 2.2 million bpd to 1.4 million bpd. The dip means that Nigeria is temporarily no longer Africa’s biggest oil producer. Angola is currently producing 1.8 million bpd, while Nigeria was recorded as producing 1.69 million bpd, in an early May research.

Nigeria President Buhari

An offshore facility run by U.S. company Chevron, which produced 35,000 bpd, was shut down in May following an attack, while Shell has reportedly evacuated some of its staff from an oilfield in the region due to the increased risk of attack. A newly-formed group calling itself the Niger Delta Avengers claimed responsibility for the Chevron attack and said, on its website, that its “major goal” is “to cripple the Nigerian economy’.

source: Times

Aluko sells USA home for $21.5M

Kola Aluko, controversial Nigerian oil tycoon, has sold his Bel-Air, Los Angeles mansion for $21.5 million, taking a $3 million loss after purchasing the sprawling residence in 2012 for $24.5 million. 

Aluko, 46, apparently sold the residence in an off-market transaction using a limited-liability company. An off-market sale in real estate refers to a property that is sold without any form of public advertising. Aluko is being investigated by Nigerian and European authorities for a series of money-laundering and fraud-related crimes.

Source: LA Times

ISIS Nigerian Recruit Killed by Coalition Airstrike

Ibrahim Uwais, the son of former Chief Justice of Nigeria, Mohammed Uwais, was killed yesterday near Aleppo, Syria as the United States battled members of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in fierce airstrikes. Ibrahim Uwais, who secretly traveled to Syria in February 2015 to join ISIS, was one of the numerous Islamist terrorists who perished as the US military aircraft bombarded known ISIS camps near the besieged Syrian city of Aleppo. He slipped from Turkey into Syria with his two Wives and children to join the fast growing army of volunteer ISIS fighters.

source: cable