From market stalls to classrooms, many girls in Oyo State are forced to juggle schooling with survival. Drawing on personal stories, data and expert insights, Funmi Ogundare examines how poverty, hidden education costs, weak policy enforcement, menstrual health challenges and social norms continue to push girls out of school and the interventions struggling to keep them in. Rihanat Kolawole should have been in class. Instead, the 15-year-old was weaving through a dusty market in Olodo, an area in Oyo State, South-West Nigeria, clutching a small nylon bag of pepper her mother had sent her to deliver, right in the middle…
Author: Development Reporting
By Aminat Miskilu As the Joint Health Sector Union (JOHESU) strike enters its ninth week, the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC) has rejected the decision of the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare to stop the salaries of striking JOHESU members, warning that the move could trigger nationwide industrial action. In a statement jointly signed by the TUC President General, Festus Osifo, and the Secretary General, Nuhu Toro, the congress condemned the ministry’s implementation of the “No Work, No Pay” policy through the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), scheduled to take effect in January 2026 .…
By Aminat Miskilu Lagos State is yet to meet the blood supply required for its annual healthcare needs despite sustained awareness campaigns and repeated calls for voluntary blood donation, the Commissioner for Health, Akin Abayomi, has said. Mr Abayomi said Lagos, with an estimated population of about 30 million people, requires between 200,000 and 250,000 units of blood annually but recorded only about 141,000 units in the last donation cycle, roughly 70 per cent of its target. He warned that the shortfall leaves hospitals vulnerable, particularly during medical emergencies that require immediate blood transfusions. The commissioner spoke at a voluntary…
Public secondary schools in Oyo State, Southwest Nigeria, have become zones of neglect and quiet suffering due to lack of basic water systems. As schools become unsafe, girls are forced into bushes to change menstrual pads, while state government support remains absent. African Angle’s Chief Correspondent, Adedokun Theophilus, reports. Seated among nearly three hundred pupils in an overcrowded classroom, Kaosarat Fajobi, a Junior Secondary School Three (JSS3) student of Community Grammar School, Moniya, tried her best to focus on lectures as a Basic Science teacher droned on at the front of the classroom. Though the air was thick, dusty, and…
From Abidjan to Morocco and soon across Europe, award-winning biker, Bamba Christine popularly known as “Bambina” is using motorcycling to challenge gender barriers, push for safer roads and demand freer cross-border movement for Africa’s growing community of riders. By Nagis Regis, bird story agency On a well-paved road in Cocody, an upmarket suburb of Abidjan, Bamba Christine pulled on her biker gloves, adjusted her helmet over her distinctive blue-rimmed glasses and face mask and hit the start button on her 900 cc Yamaha Tracer. Then she headed out across town from her residence close to the Ébrié Lagoon. The biker,…
Regarded as an orphan disease- Lupus, a chronic autoimmune disease that can affect many parts of the body, is dangerously wreaking havoc in Nigeria, without necessary interventions from the government. In this report, Aminat Miskilu, who has related with many Lupus patients, share the story of their pain, sorrow, and prayers In 2022, Nollywood actress Kemi Afolabi brought lupus into Nigeria’s public consciousness when she revealed her diagnosis and had only five years to live. She disclosed that she had travelled to the United States for treatment at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Maryland. Her story highlighted a critical reality that…
The Lagos State Government has announced plans to begin a statewide measles-rubella vaccination campaign on 20 January, targeting about 10.5 million children aged between nine months and 14 years. The exercise will run for 10 days, with an additional two days set aside for mop-up, as part of efforts to reduce the burden of vaccine-preventable diseases in the state. Measles, a highly contagious viral disease, remains a major cause of death among young children globally. It infects the respiratory tract and then spreads throughout the body. Symptoms include a high fever, cough, runny nose and a rash all over the…
By Adedoyin Oguntade The management of Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ile-Ife, Osun state, Nigeria has confirmed the death of an 18-year-old 300-level student of the College of Health Sciences, Department of Medicine and Surgery, Timilehin Toromade, disclosing that an investigation has been launched to determine the cause of his death. Mr Toromade with matriculation number CLI/2022/133, was found dead in the early hours of Tuesday, 6 January, according to a statement issued by the university’s Public Relations Officer, Abiodun Olanrewaju. The university described the incident as shocking and devastating. Found in Fajuyi Hall The deceased was a resident of Room…
By Sodiq Mojibola & Aminat Miskilu Nigerian scholar and critic, Biodun Jeyifo, has called for the republication of a missing preamble from the 1979 Constitution, saying its removal marked a retreat from Nigeria’s original commitment to social democracy, equitable development and wealth redistribution. Mr Jeyifo, an emeritus professor of English and African Literature at Cornell University and of African and African American Studies at Harvard University, made the call at a symposium hosted by the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism (WSCIJ) in Lagos to mark his 80th birthday. The event, themed “Pedagogy, Curriculum and Decolonisation: Then and Now,” brought…
By Aminat Misikilu As Nigeria enters the new year, the Joint Health Sector Union (JOHESU) strike has stretched beyond six weeks, paralysing routine services across federal teaching hospitals, and general hospitals, leaving patients stranded in facilities operating without the workforce that keeps them functional. From delayed diagnostic tests to stalled emergency care, patients are paying the price for a dispute that remains unresolved between the union and the Federal Government. At the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), a 34-year-old patient battling systemic lupus erythematosus, Veronica Ikusika, whose autoimmune condition has severely affected her liver, kidney, and heart, said her routine…