International boundaries inherited from colonialism have given room to territorial disputes and the existing boundary conflicts in the West African Region, and are an endemic feature of Nigeria's relations with her immediate neighbours. The thesis examines the 18 border disputes that Nigeria has been involved in since independence. The thesis begins by setting the scene in terms understanding Nigeria's foreign policy principles and objectives since independence and, in particular, its policy towards border disputes across the continent of Africa such as the Congo/Katanga, Uganda/Tanzania, Ethiopia/Somalia and Morocco/Algeria (chapter 2). The thesis then moves on to consider the underlying problems that have faced Nigeria as regards its borders as a result of colonisation (chapter 3). As the history is traced of the stages in the definition of Nigeria's boundaries, it becomes apparent that many border issues were unresolved or that decisions were made that were likely to be contested in the future. In chapter 4 the thesis turns to a detailed examination of the border disputes that have arisen in the last 43 years of independence between Nigeria and her close neighbours, Benin, Chad, Equatorial Guinea, Cameroon and Niger. Chapter 5 analyses the data provided. It finds that the way the dispute was handled was closely related to the regime type. Under the liberal democratic regimes of Balewa, Shagari, Obasanjo II, disputes were largely dealt with by diplomacy and negotiation. Whereas under the autocratic regimes of military leaders such as Generals Ironsi, Gowen, Muhammed, Obasanjo, Buhari, Babangida, Abacha's and Abubaker's the disputes brought a response of a threat of force or aggressive use of force. It concludes that liberal democracy profoundly affects how border disputes are handled and is a force for peace and stability.

Thesis (PhD)--Stellenbosch University, 2014. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Background The changes in cognition, brain structure, and neurological soft signs which are characteristic of schizophrenia appear to have been present before the onset of the phenotype. They therefore find relevance as potential vulnerability markers of the disease. Neurological soft signs are of particular interest because they can be elicited quickly, reliably and cheaply. They have also been touted as markers of certain characteristics of schizophrenia. The most convincing evidence for these assertions come from prospective longitudinal studies of first episode, medication naive patients with schizophrenia. Most of these studies have been based on wholly Caucasian or mixed samples of Caucasians and other races. The present study provides important reference data on the nature of neurological soft signs in indigenous African subjects and clarifies the trait or state marking signs in this population. Method A total of 84 patients with first episode, schizophrenia, schizo-affective disorder, or schizophreniform disorder meeting criteria in the fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders were consecutively recruited. Information on demographic characteristics, personal medical and psychiatric history, as well as family history was obtained at baseline. Neurological assessment was based on the 26 item Neurological Evaluation Scale. An exploratory factor analysis of the items in the scale was conducted using the baseline measurements. The derived sub-sets of neurological soft signs were then followed up longitudinally and in parallel with the ‘functional categories’ of the signs. The study describes the profile of neurological soft signs across the one year course of schizophrenia, as well as their relationship with a wide range of clinical and outcome variables. The severity of the baseline psychopathology was evaluated by administering the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale. The overall clinical status was assessed using Clinical Global Impression. Additional assessments included the Calvary Depression Scale for Schizophrenia, Birchwood Insight Scale, Social and Occupational Functioning Assessment Scale, and the World Health Organisation Quality of Life Scale (WHO QoL-BREF). Pre-morbid adjustment was assessed using the Pre morbid Adjustment Scale, while extra-pyramidal effect of antipsychotics was assessed using the Extra-pyramidal Symptoms Rating Scale. Assessments were repeated at three monthly intervals for the full 12 months. Results Neurological soft signs were present in 96.4% of the sample at baseline. The signs loaded into a four factor structure: perceptual and motor sequencing (audio-visual integration, fist-edge palm, rhythm tapping, extinction, and right-left confusion), eye movements (synkinesis, convergence, and gaze impersistence), motor co-ordination and graphaesthesia (tandem walk, adventitious flow, and graphaesthesia), as well as stegreognosis. The scores for the perceptual and motor sequencing factor, as well as those for the sequencing of complex motor acts ‘functional category’ were stable across three measurements over 12 months (F=1.26, p=0.287, and F=1.87, p=0.158 respectively). The sequencing of complex motor act signs was not significantly correlated with the clinical and outcome characteristics of schizophrenia. However, other signs, as well as the NES total score were significantly correlated with more severe negative and disorganized psychopathology, as well as poorer outcome in terms of functioning and quality of life. Conclusion Neurological soft signs were present at a high frequency at baseline. A preponderance of the signs was associated with a more severe negative and disorganization psychopathology, as well as a poorer functional outcome and quality of life. Abnormal sequencing of complex motor act signs, and signs of abnormal cognitive processing of perceptual stimuli where resistant to changes in psychopathology, and thus may represent viable trait markers for schizophrenia in this cohort.

Thesis (MA)--Stellenbosch University, 2014. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The Population Reference Bureau (PRB) in 2011 reported a low rate of contraceptive use among Nigerian youths at 29%, despite reported high rates of sexual activity and increased awareness of the existence of contraceptive methods. This exposes the youths to the risk of contracting sexually transmitted infections and the effects associated with unwanted pregnancy. From a social constructionist standpoint, I used a mixed method research design to explore contraceptive knowledge and practices among students (18 to 25 years of age) at the Federal Polytechnic Kaduna. I see students’ attitudes towards contraception as being historically and culturally located and dependent on the prevailing cultural arrangement at that period. I thus distance myself from the position of the Health Belief Model (HBM) by recognising that individuals’ attitudes towards contraception is not only informed by the perceived benefits of contraceptive use but also by certain external social factors which could serve as barriers to the individual’s decision to use contraceptives. I collected data from 187 students out of a sample of 200 who had been systematically selected from the Departments of Mass Communication and Architecture at the polytechnic between August and September 2013. In addition, I conducted fifteen follow-up semi-structured interviews with students and three key informant interviews; two staff at the polytechnic clinic and one private pharmacist close to the polytechnic. Similar to other Nigerian studies among tertiary students, there is a relatively high level of sexual activity as well as high level awareness of contraceptive methods among students; however, they lack sufficient knowledge of how contraceptives function. Contraceptive use among sexually active students was also low either due to negative attitudes towards contraceptives resulting from inadequate or incomplete contraceptive information from friends or due to lack of easy access to contraceptive methods by students, partners’ influence or influences from cultural, including religious, beliefs and practices, thereby making students vulnerable to the risk associated with unprotected sex. There is therefore the need for interventions by relevant stakeholders that will seek to provide adequate information to students and develop in them positive attitudes towards contraceptive use. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: In 2011 het Nigerië se Bevolkingsverwysingsburo (PRB) ’n lae gebruikskoers van kontrasepsiemiddels (29%) onder Nigeriese jeugdiges gerapporteer, afgesien van die hoë koers van seksuele aktiwiteit en verhoogde bewustheid oor die bestaan van kontrasepsiemetodes. Dit stel jongmense bloot aan die risiko om seksueel-oordraagbare infeksies op te doen, sowel as aan die negatiewe gevolge wat met ongewensde swangerskap gepaard gaan. Vanuit ’n sosiaal-konstruksionistiese standpunt het ek ’n gemengdemetodenavorsingsontwerp gebruik om kennis oor voorbehoedmiddels en gebruike onder studente (18 tot 25 jaar oud) aan die Federal Polytechnic Kaduna (’n politegniese tersiêre instelling) in noordelike Nigerië te ondersoek. Ek beskou studente se ingesteldheid jeens kontrasepsie as histories- en kultuurgefundeerd en onderworpe aan die heersende kulturele reëlings van die tydperk. Ek distansieer my dus van die posisie van die gesondheidoortuigingsmodel (HBM) deur erkenning te gee aan die feit dat individue se ingesteldheid jeens kontrasepsie nie net deur die waargenome voordele van kontrasepsiegebruik ingelig word nie, maar ook deur bepaalde eksterne maatskaplike faktore wat struikelblokke kan skep by ’n individu se besluit om kontrasepsiemiddels te gebruik. Tussen Augustus en September 2013 het ek data van 187 studente uit ’n steekproef van 200, wat stelselmatig in die Departement Massakommunikasie en Argitektuur aan die Politegniese skool gedoen is, versamel. Verder het ek vyftien semigestruktureerde opvolgonderhoude met studente gevoer, asook drie sleutelinformantonderhoude, waaronder twee met personeellede by die Politegniese kliniek en een met ʼn privaat apteker in die omgewing van die Politegniese skool. Soortgelyk aan ander Nigeriese studies onder tersiêre studente het ek gevind dat ofskoon daar ’n relatief hoë seksueleaktiwiteitsvlak, asook ’n hoë bewustheidsvlak van kontrasepsiemetodes onder studente bestaan, die meeste studente onvoldoende ingelig was oor hoe kontrasepsiemiddels regtig werk. Daar is ook gevind dat kontrasepsiegebruik onder seksueel-aktiewe studente weens verskeie faktore redelik laag was, ingesluit negatiewe ingesteldhede oor kontrasepsiemetodes as gevolg van onvoldoende of onvolledige kontrasepsie-inligting (wat hoofsaaklik van vriende bekom is); ’n gebrek aan maklike toegang tot kontrasepsiemetodes; beïnvloeding deur seksmaats; asook invloede vanweë kulturele oortuigings en gebruike, met inbegrip van geloof. Die gevolg is dat studente kwesbaar is vir die risiko’s wat met onbeskermde seks gepaard gaan. Daar bestaan dus ’n behoefte aan intervensies deur die betrokke belanghebbendes wat studente van voldoende inligting sal voorsien en positiewe ingesteldhede oor die gebruik van kontrasepsiemiddels by studente sal kweek.

Thesis (MBA)--University of Stellenbosch, 2010. / The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between corporate governance and the profitability of banks in Nigeria. This has been done in line with previous studies in other parts of the world where it was discovered that the corporate governance culture of a firm does have an effect on its profitability. The corporate governance variable employed in this study was that of ownership. Four types of ownership were used as the independent variables, namely board ownership, institutional ownership, foreign ownership and government ownership. Whilst the dependent variables employed were return on assets (ROA) and non performing loans ratio (NPL). Information on banks’ return on assets and non performing loans was generated from year end financial statements and yearly bank reviews from a Nigerian based research firm called Agusto and Company. Also the banks’ ownership variables information was also pooled from financial reports, the Agusto report on banking industry as well as bank websites. A descriptive statistic data was generated to review the trend of banks’ return on assets and non-performing loan performance indicators, whilst a Pearson correlation table was generated to review the correlation between the ownership variable and the performance of banks. The results generated were found to be similar to what has previously been done. This study makes a significant contribution to research by exposing the importance of corporate governance, a concept which has been neglected in the Nigerian corporate world. Finally it provides further justification to do further research in this area in the Nigerian banking and corporate environment.

Thesis (MDF)--Stellenbosch University, 2012. / The study was carried out to find out the effect of credit risk and portfolio loan management on profitability of microfinance Banks (MFBs) in Lagos, Nigeria. To achieve the objective of the study, an econometric model was developed. A sample size of 14 microfinance banks was randomly selected, comprising four national, five state and five unit microfinance banks respectively. Five year annual financial statements of these 14 selected microfinance banks were obtained for this analysis using panel data that produce 70 observations for the period 2006 to 2010 The result reveals that the current value of all independent variables follow an expected relationship with the profitability of microfinance banks. That is, the net interest margin, asset mix proxied by ratio of loan to total asset, and ratio of equity to total assets have a positive relationship with the profitability of microfinance banks (MFBs) in Lagos state, Nigeria. Asset quality (ratio of non-performing loan to total loan) and the interest earnings to total assets ratio have a negative relationship with profitability of microfinance banks. However, the result reveals that of the five immediate past value of these independent variables, only net interest margin and interest earnings to total assets ratio maintained expected relationship with the performance (profitability) of microfinance banks. From the hypothesis test, it was found that credit risk management has a significant effect on the profitability of microfinance banks in Lagos state, Nigeria The study is set against the background and realisation that many MFBs in Lagos seem to continue to seek growth and profit without much attention to addressing credit risk issues – a necessity for their survival on a sustainable basis. The results indicated that the credit evaluation process was positively and significantly related to the quality of the loan portfolio in MFBs. The study also found out that internal rather than external to the MFB’s are more likely to provide the main explanation for MFBs’ profitability. To enhance their profitability, loan products which seem to have various defects which make loans even more risky need to be reviewed. The defects include: long loan processing procedures, absence of training to clients on proper utilisation of loans, lack of mechanisms to assess the suitability and viability of the business proposal for which loans were applied, inappropriate mechanism for assessing character for loan applicants, absence of moratorium periods between taking of a loan and repayment of a first instalment as clients were requested to repay their first instalment within the first month. The study recommended that MFBs should have a broad outlook in its credit risk and portfolio management strategy and this calls for radical reforms within the MFB’s operations and policies as well as more aggressive approaches most especially before availing credit and in its loan recovery as it had a direct impact on profitability.

This thesis assesses the significance of real bank credit in stimulating real output paying particular attention to the factors that prompt financial intermediation within the economy. The thesis contributes to the existing literature on finance and growth by providing fresh empirical evidence in the case of the Nigerian economy and Africa as a whole. In the context of Nigeria, credit Granger causes output, but the reverse is not true. In testing the factors that mobilise credit, I find that exports are negatively related to credit. Moreover, since credit usually fund non-oil exports, I also find that oil exports is negatively related to credit, whereas non-oil exports is positively related to credit. The latter also explains why capital inflows and imports are positively related to credit in my study. Extending the analysis to Africa as a whole, I find that causality is bi-directional. In examining the factors which mobilise credit (based on three measures of output); I find that output consistently exerts a positive influence on credit, whereas inflation and exports exert the opposite effect. However, the impact of government expenditure on credit is ambiguous. These results are re-confirmed when I use an alternative estimator for robustness. In line with the variables used in the Nigerian case, both capital inflow and imports positively influence credit while the impact of exports is negative for the whole of Africa. When examining the drivers of output in the African context, I find that credit and exports positively influence output whereas inflation exerts the opposite effect. The role of government expenditure is equally ambiguous. A further robustness test again confirms these results. The relationship between exports and credit in the literature is positive hence, it is important to investigate why the opposite holds in the Nigerian and African context. As such, I examine the efficiency of the banking system using three different measures, which includes loans, other earnings and other operating income since this may explain the counter intuitive result: export sales in Africa are largely intermediated by multi-national firms who prefer to obtain financing from credit markets that are more efficient than the African banking system. Across Africa, efficiency of the banking system is 74%, 76% and 92% when loans, other earnings and other operating income are respectively used as the output variables. This implies that 26% of credit is allocated in an unproductive way while 24% and 8% of expenditure could be better managed. When dividing the sample into medium and low-income countries, I find the respective levels of efficiency for each of the measures to be 94% and 11%; 83% and 0%; 90% and 0% for loans, other earnings and other operating income as the output variables respectively. This result supports bank loans as the best output variable, which I use further in the estimation. Further clues as to why there should be such differences in efficiency are obtained when the sample is split by regions, since there are regional variations in the use of credit. The Central African region is the least efficient. In these economies, resources are typically held and allocated by a few individuals.

No description available.

La guerre civile du Nigéria est l'un des rares conflits en Afrique à avoir fécondé une littérature si abondante.Romanciers, poètes, dramaturges et essayistes décrivent cette guerre dans leurs écrits selon la sensibilité qui leur est propre. Parmi eux se trouvent Cyprian Ekwensi et Ken Saro-Wiwa dont le rapport à cette guerre est mise en évidence dans l'écriture de ce phénomène. Chacun d'eux utilise des procédés qui rendent bien compte du désordre et du chaos engendrés par ce drame / Civil war in Nigeria is one of the prominent conflicts in Africa which raised so much inspiration from novelits, poets,playwrights and essayists among whom we find Cyprian Ekwensi an Ken Saro-Wiwa. Both writers depict this phenomenon with a specific language which shows the disorder and the chaos generated by this trgic event

Despite numerous studies and reviews on faculty turnover, there appeared to be no systematic investigation of factors which influenced voluntary turnover among full-time faculty members in Nigerian educational institutions such as those studied here. In addition, it appeared that Nigeria lacked faculty turnover data for use in any meaningful research study. Therefore, this study investigated factors perceived to be influential among full-time faculty members leaving their jobs or institutions voluntarily. The six facets of the Job Descriptive Index developed by Smith, Kendall, and Hulin as well as a questionnaire about commitment development by Mowday, Porter and Steers elicited data concerning: present work, pay, promotion, supervision, coworkers, job in general, and commitment. Two hundred and eight (84.21%) of 247 full-time faculty members from ten selected colleges of technology/polytechnics in Nigeria became involved in this study. Means, frequencies, percentages, one-way ANOVA set at .05 level and Scheffe Test of Multiple Comparison set at .10 level were used for the analysis of data. Based on the findings, it could be established that full-time faculty members in Nigerian Colleges of Technology/Polytechnics are dissatisfied with their conditions of service. The most influential factors for voluntary turnover were pay and opportunities for promotion. Conclusions drawn from the study indicate that the demographic characteristics (gender, age, level of education, years of college teaching experience, salary grade level, college/polytechnic of employment, and region of origin) affect full-time faculty members' work attitudes. Further studies are recommended to determine policies and practices suitable for retaining the most capable full-time faculty members in Nigerian Colleges of Technology/Polytechnics.

This study examined the relationship between love attitude and marital adjustment across five stages of the marital life-cycle in Nigerian society. The subjects for this study were 202 volunteers from six protestant churches representing six cities in the southern part of Nigeria. An average of 20 couples were representatives of each of the five marital life-cycles. Each of the subjects completed the Love Attitude Inventory (LAI), and the Marital Adjustment Test (short form) (MAT). Wilk's multivariate analysis revealed no significant differences between husbands' and wives' love attitude and marital adjustment across the five stages of the marital life cycle. Multivariate analysis split-plot 5.2 with repeated measures revealed no significant difference for the total sample among the groups, but indicated a significant difference between love attitude and marital adjustment for the total sample using sex as a factor. A univariate test of the MAT and LAI indicated that the MAT accounted for the difference. A canonical correlation indicated a significant positive relationship between husbands1 and wives' marital adjustment and love attitude within each of the five groups. The findings suggest that husbands and wives included in this study have a good understanding of their roles in the marriage relationship and that the partners have general agreement regarding those roles. The marriage partners apparently have strong influences on each other's perceptions of love attitude and marital adjustment.