"Nigeria has a huge housing deficit, across the country it’s supposed to be 17 million units of housing that are missing. In Lagos alone it’s estimated at 5 million units of housing that are missing and of course we’re talking about housing in the formal sector and since it’s so difficult to access affordable housing in the formal sector, communities that are informal tend to spring up and tend to exist in order to provide for the basic needs that people have shelter." - Megan Chapman

You can read the transcript: Challenging Gentrification Through Legal Aid And Legal Education Training: An Interview With Megan Chapman Of JEI

The story of the relationship between Dr Hazel Chapman and the Nigerian Montane Forest in Taraba state, Nigeria is a story that can simply be put as “as fate would have it”, just like Dr Chapman said during my interview with her. It is interesting to know that a childhood experience has become a lifelong career and hobby. When Dr Chapman decided to visit Nigeria in the year 2002, little did she know that she was going to embark on something that would not only be life changing to her but would be a bee-hive of activities for Nigerian and international: PhD researchers, postgraduate and undergraduate students, and the host communities of Ngel Nyaki in Taraba state as a whole.

Yo can read my blog post on the interview: As Fate Would Have It: The Story Of The Nigerian Montane Forest (Ngel Nyaki)

"The Ekopolitan project...is a project about migrant communities in 19th century Lagos and I’m interested in a few different migrations; people who are migrating as refugees from wars, people who are migrating to settle in that kind of a free land if they had been enslaved previously, people who are migrating to rediscover their home if they were in their lifetime had been taken away or coming back in the same life time. So that kind of project I think connects Lagos as an island which was, maybe – the most densely populated place in the region at that time – connects that space to other territories in West Africa, other territories in Yoruba land." - Dr Abosede George 

You can read the full transcript here: Lagos Migrant Histories: An Interview With Dr Abosede George

This is a podcast show on educational issues and research on Nigeria in particular and Africa in general.