Wednesday 15 April, 2026
Nigeria borrowed $460m for Abuja's security. The cameras don't work. The loan does.
Nigeria borrowed $460 million from China in 2010 to put surveillance cameras across Abuja. This week, the company that installed them told parliament it cannot confirm whether any of them still work.
The loan is still running. Jonathan signed it. Buhari inherited it. Tinubu is still paying it. And today a man who sold petrol in Maiduguri got 10 years in prison for terrorism financing after spending 10 years in detention waiting for that verdict.
Both stories are connected. Not by coincidence. By the same habit: Nigeria's state collects, promises protection, and leaves the bill for everyone else to carry.
That's what's in today's edition. Let's go.
1. THE EMPTY EYE
Nigeria borrowed $460 million from China's Exim Bank in 2010 and handed the contract to ZTE Corporation to install CCTV cameras across Abuja. This week, ZTE's representative appeared before a House Ad-Hoc Committee and said he cannot confirm whether the cameras are currently working.
As of March 2026, ZTE was still owed $15.37 million in outstanding loan repayments. The CBN has now been directed to freeze further disbursements. Nigeria doesn't have a verified inventory of what was installed, where, or who was trained to run it.
The cameras were supposed to watch Abuja. Abuja kept getting less safe. The loan kept running.
2. FORTY-EIGHT NAMES
Nigeria published a list of 48 terrorism financiers and 12 corporate entities this week through the Nigeria Sanctions Committee. This week also, 227 suspects appeared before 10 judges at the Federal High Court. Five have been sentenced. The most visible conviction: Babagana Habeeb, a former Borno senatorial candidate, who got 10 years for selling petrol to Boko Haram.
Habeeb told the court his attendants may have made the sales without his knowledge. He had been in detention for over 10 years before the trial began.
The northeast has been waiting 15 years for the names of the people who funded the insurgency at scale. The most visible name on the sentencing sheet is a petrol dealer.
3. STRIPPED
Nigeria's telecoms sector lost 656 critical power assets to theft in 2025, including 152 generators, according to NCC data reported this week. Criminal networks are targeting base stations and backup power infrastructure. The network that keeps you connected is being dismantled faster than it can be replaced.
The companies absorb the cost. They rebuild. They get hit again. No coordinated infrastructure protection programme exists.
You pay for it through your airtime. The people who took the generators pay nothing.
4. FASTER NOW
Nigeria signed a migration deal with the UK in March that lets Britain use "UK letters" instead of waiting for Nigerian emergency travel documents before deporting Nigerians. Annual return rates have already nearly doubled to 1,150. More than 961 Nigerians have exhausted their asylum appeal rights. Over 1,100 Nigerian offenders are in the active deportation queue.
Nigeria agreed to recognise the UK's documentation. The process that once provided some delay is now shorter by design.
Your government removed the administrative brake that was slowing the removal of its own citizens.
5. ₦1,275
Dangote's petrol hit ₦1,275 per litre this month after global crude prices surged. Then the US announced a conditional ceasefire with Iran. Brent crude fell 13%. Dangote's price came back to ₦1,200 within 24 hours.
Nigeria has Africa's largest single-train refinery. Import licences were suspended so the country would depend on it. The refinery prices with Brent crude.
The 75 Naira swing wasn't caused by anything that happened in Nigeria.
6. THE NIGERIAN IN THE ROOM
Ademola Lookman scored the goal that eliminated Barcelona from the Champions League last night. Atlético Madrid lost the match 2-1 but won the tie 3-2 on aggregate. Lookman converted a first-half cross from Marcos Llorente to restore Atlético's lead after Barcelona had drawn level.
It was his 8th Champions League goal. Only Victor Osimhen and Obafemi Martins have scored more as Nigerian players in the competition's history.
Atlético are in the semi-finals for the first time since 2017. A Nigerian put them there.
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