Purpose: – The purpose of this paper is to examine the mediating role of perceived employability in the relationship between core self-evaluations (CSEs) and job search behaviour (preparatory and active job search). Design/methodology/approach: – A cross-sectional survey data were obtained among a sample of 254 employed and unemployed graduate students from a university in Southeast Nigeria. Findings: – Results of the hierarchical multiple regression show that CSEs was significantly and positively associated with only preparatory job search behaviour but not active job search behaviour. CSEs was positively associated with perceived employability. Perceived employability was positively associated with the preparatory job search but not active job search. Perceived employability also mediated the relationship between CSEs and preparatory job search but failed to mediate the relationship between CSEs and active job search. Research limitations/implications: – The study makes important contribution to the literature on job search by augmenting our understanding on the mechanism that govern core self-evaluation and job search behaviour relationship. Practical implications: – Human resources practitioners can use the insights of the present study in understanding aspects of jobseekers’ personality and perception that may be relevant in job search behaviour. The study has also implications for career development practice especially in the areas of counselling of job seekers in environments where there is high level of unemployment. Originality/value: – There has been rarely any previous attempt at investigating the possibility that the relationship between CSEs and job search behaviour is mediated by perceived employability.

While the activities of multinational oil corporations contribute significantly to oil pollution and environmental degradation in most oil-producing countries, the extent to which illegal artisanal refineries contribute to the environmental problems in Niger Delta remains unclear. Extant literature attributes this to the expanding activities of the artisans as well as the use of crude technology in illegal oil refining. Given the widespread nature of the artisanal oil-refining economy in the Niger Delta region, we assess its contribution to the growing environmental pollution in the region. By artisanal oil refining, we mean small-scale crude oil processing or subsistent distillation of petroleum that is often outside the boundaries of the state law. This study links the continual failure of the clean-up programme in the Niger Delta to the booming artisanal crude oil-refining economy in the region. Using predominantly qualitative methods of data collection and content analysis, we adopted the enterprise value chain analysis to underscore the underlying local economic interests and external economic opportunities that sustain oil bunkering, oil theft and petro-piracy. We conclude that these illegal refining processes significantly undermine the Ogoniland clean-up project and make the remediation programme unsustainable in Nigeria.

This article makes a case for the nexus between water resources and terrorism. Using Boko Haram activities in the Lake Chad region, I question the conventional arguments linking religion to the root cause of terrorism. I argue that there is an economic dimension of Boko Haram terrorism, which is based on two interrelated indicators: the attack on the Nigerian oil exploration team in the Lake Chad basin, and the continuous exploitation of oil and gas by Chad, Niger, and Cameroon in the region. Building on economic incentives and natural resources theoretical debates along with a historical enquiry into Boko Haram, the article concludes that economic interests, rather than religion, are partly the impetus to the activities of Boko Haram. The findings have significant implications for both the security of the Lake Chad region and counterterrorism at large.