The Language Express, Inc developers of the Award winning programme, “The Social Express” today announced its partnership with Prognari, an Africa-focused education value-add organization that seeks to develop social, emotional intelligence capabilities and life skills in children and young adults. This strategic partnership supports both companies’ objective of equipping the 21st century African child with the skills required to be successful in school and life.

The Social Express is an animated Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) software designed to teach children and young adults how to think about and manage social interaction situations. It helps them develop meaningful social relationships and ultimately succeed in life.

In addition to equipping children with SEL abilities, Prognari is working with The Language Express to reduce the incidence of bullying in schools through the Cool School  programme. Cool School is an interactive and animated anti-bullying programme designed for elementary school learners; Cool School’s six week curriculum has been designed to teach young students about bullying through interactive videos and offline activities. The program also addresses bystander behavior and how it can contribute to and increase bullying within the school environment.

Nigerian banks are likely to face more challenges as the nation’s benchmark interest rate continues to rise, global credit rating agency, Fitch Ratings, has said.

The Central bank of Nigeria’s Monetary Policy Committee had on Tuesday increased the interest rate from 12 per cent to 14 per cent in a move to curb inflation and strengthen the naira. The move has been widely criticised by economists.

The CBN’s Monetary Policy Rate (benchmark interest rate), which hovered around six per cent from 2001 to 2011, has risen steeply.

In a statement on Friday, Fitch said, “Rising rates are likely to put additional pressure on banks’ asset quality. Almost all lending is extended at floating rates and banks should be able to reprice their loans quite quickly but borrowers will face more difficulties in servicing their debts.

“Impaired loans are already high in the Nigerian banking sector, where average non-performing loan ratios reached 6.2 per cent at end-March 2016, partly reflecting the impact of currency depreciation on businesses as well as higher oil-related problem loans at some banks.”

Fitch expects loan growth (excluding foreign-exchange translation effects) to slow during the second half of 2016 and into 2017.

Banks have already tightened underwriting standards as economic conditions in the country worsen.

The nation’s Gross Domestic Product contracted by 0.4 per cent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2016 and Fitch forecasts the GDP growth to fall to 1.5 per cent in 2016.

Facebook has disclosed that it could owe billions due to an IRS investigation into the way it moved assets to an Irish subsidiary to avoid higher taxes.

The tax issue was first disclosed publicly three weeks ago when the U.S. Justice Department filed a lawsuit forcing Facebook to comply with the ongoing IRS investigation. No figures were provided at the time for possible penalties.

The investigation dates back to 2010 when Facebook shifted the rights for its worldwide business, excluding the U.S. and Canada, to Facebook Ireland as part of a complex maneuver to reduce its tax payments.

That transfer included certain hard to quantify assets like its “user base, online platform and marketing intangibles.”

MTN has appointed  Citigroup and Standard Bank  as advisers on a planned listing in the Nigerian local stock exchange. This is largely to fulfill part of the deal to settle a record fine.

Africa’s biggest mobile-phone operator is targeting a listing of the Nigeria unit in 2017, “subject to suitable market conditions,” the Johannesburg-based company said in a statement on Thursday. Stanbic IBTC Capital, the Nigerian arm of Johannesburg-based Standard Bank, will be the lead issuing house, while a full syndicate including Nigerian parties will be appointed in due course.