Nigeria

A lawsuit filed against the US company Pfizer alleges that it violated international law by testing an experimental drug on children during a meningitis epidemic in northern Nigeria in 1996, news organisations reported on Thursday.

The Federal Government has said that it has powers to make laws on items contained on the Exclusive Legislative list, which includes laws on anti-corruption.

AS the Federal Government embarks on an overhaul of the country's contract tendering system, the World Bank has sought to insulate ministers from compliance with its new system. The overhaul is aimed at stemming the widespread corruption that attends the country's tendering process. This was disclosed yesterday by Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, who added however that the World Bank report has been rejected by the government.

Over the past four weeks a series of intercommunal clashes in central and northern Nigeria has left many dead or wounded and forced an estimated 65,000 people to flee their homes in Nasarawa, Benue, Bauchi and Kaduna states. Working with the Nigerian Red Cross Society, since the beginning of July the ICRC has distributed relief supplies such as blankets, buckets, soap and mats to a total of 22,500 displaced people living in improvised camps.

Under the project supported by The FUTURES Group International/POLICY Project Nigeria and the National Action Committee on AIDS (NACA), Journalists Against AIDS (JAAIDS) Nigeria is conducting on the Nigeria-AIDS eForum, a six-month long open discussion of key HIV-related issues among HIV/AIDS activists and advocates as well as governmental, non-governmental, multilateral and community-based organisations in Nigeria.

Pages