Abuja/Berlin - German President Horst Koehler leaves Friday on a six-day visit to Nigeria, during which he will take part in a conference on Africa and hold political discussions with his hosts.

The German-sponsored fourth Africa Forum of the Partnership with Africa initiative is likely to be overshadowed by fighting between government forces and rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo, which has turned more than 200,000 people into refugees.

Abuja - German President Horst Kohler is expected in Nigeria on Friday to participate in the German-sponsored fourth Africa Forum of the Partnership with Africa initiative.

The German embassy in Nigeria said Thursday that Kohler would also discuss bilateral issues with Nigeria's President Umaru Yar'Adua.

"Our political relations are on a solid basis and we are still working very hard to improve and to deepen these relations," Germany's ambassador to Nigeria, Joachim Schmillen, said.

Abuja - Nigerians were jubilant Wednesday after Barack Obama was declared the 44th president of the United States of America.

Many Nigerians stayed glued to their television sets to monitor the election.

The moment Obama was announced to have won Ohio and Pennsylvania, cheering erupted in beer parlours and homes across Africa's most populous nation.

Lai Mohammed, spokesman of Action Congress, Nigeria's main opposition party, whose 2007 presidential candidate is still contesting the election of Umaru Yar'Adua, hailed the poll as an example to other nations.

Abuja - Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua on Wednesday sacked 20 of his 39 cabinet ministers.

Yar'Adua spokesman Olusegun Adeniyi said that the ministers were dropped as part of efforts to rejuvenate Yar'Adua's administration.

He said that the decision, taken after Wednesday's cabinet meeting, was meant to reposition and strengthen the administration to better deliver services to Nigerians.

Nairobi/Abuja - The Nigerian government decided in a special session late Friday to introduce drastic cuts to the national budget following a series of rebel attacks in the country.

Finance Minister Shamsuddeen Usman did not give any immediate details of the cuts, according to media reports on Saturday.

Rebels in the resource-rich Niger Delta have been attacking the facilities of oil companies and pipelines for months.

Vatican City  - Africa can claim some of history's greatest biblical centres, but today the holy scriptures remain unaffordable to many of the continent's people, a Nigerian cleric on Tuesday told the Roman Catholic bishops Synod meeting.