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Boko Haram is a Temporary Irritant – Nigeria’s U.S Ambassador
- By Williams Ekanem
- Published October 10th, 2011
- Washington File
- Unrated
Nigeria is 51. Do you think we have any reason to celebrate and what would you be telling Nigerians here in the USA?
I will tell them that we have every reason to celebrate, because we continue to exist as a country. The most politically important country in Africa; member of the United Nation Security Council and a strategically important country in the continent. It is a very blessed country with all the resources that God has given us, more so in the past one year, we have conducted a very credible election; we have a cabinet with professionals in the key sectors of the economy. There is a transformation agenda that is been pursued with all vigor and the aim is to create more employment, transform the country, diversify its economic base and do things that will make life more comfortable to Nigerians.
The whole idea of the transformation agenda is to raise the standard of living, pursue the ambition of making Nigeria one of the most powerful countries in year 2020, make the economy strong, diversify, raise the standard of living and politically stable.
You do always talk of a paradigm shift in Nigeria in virtually all your public statements; can you educate us on this?
There is a paradigm shift in Nigeria in the sense that it is no longer a country of anything goes. There is a shift in attitude to responsibility, a shift in what we expect from political office holders, attitude to life, a shift in how we want to be placed among other nations of the world. Things are now done the way it should be done.
Taking the president as an example, he has appointed credible people into his cabinet. Although there is political consideration in the appointment, yet within that, there is room for quality and specialization/ the person appointed to mines and power has made his mark, the person appointed as Finance Minister is the former managing director of the World Bank, the person appointed for trade and investment was a former managing director of Goldman Sacs, the person appointed to agriculture has helped develop agriculture in many other countries . The bottomline is that the President has put square pegs in square holes. Our foreign minister has been a top diplomat all his life he knows it all. Seeing that example, it permeates down the entire spectrum of government. I have seen in your newspaper that problem in the issuance of international passport in the United States is now a thing of the past because there is now the leadership quality that things should be done properly, so Embassy is to make life more comfortable for Nigerians.
Right now, we are charged with promoting investment for the country and we in the United States are doing just that. We have had an investment forum on power, we are doing one on agric after which on infrastructure all to attract investment in the country. All we are doing now is to attract investment into the country supporting the policies of the government. It remains our responsibility to cater for the interest of Nigerians. A Nigerian cannot come here and say he is been cheated and we remain silent, we must go out there and fight for the interest of Nigerians. I have told my officers that if you conduct yourself in such a manner that a Nigerian reports you for negligence and you are able to extricate yourself, that constitutes your first warning, the next time that happens, I send you home because we are here in the interest of Nigerians. We are here because Nigerians are here, that is what an Embassy should do.
In Nigerian of today emphasis is on service. If everyone does what is expected of them the country would be greater than what we are currently. Our problem has been that of indiscipline. All those ills we have been identified with should be off, that is what I mean by paradigm shift, no longer anything goes. Everyone knows of a good government when they see one. Like I said at the United States Institute of Peace the other day, the first basis of transformation this President did was to ensure a free fair and credible election where most of those bad guys were kicked out because a system was established so that when you don’t do well you are kicked out. They know that they have four years after which if they don’t perform, they will be kicked out. In the past all they needed to do was to have a godfather that will foist them on the people.
So you now see a culture to do well so that they can be reelected by their people. So that is why you now see State governors and ministers come to the US to market their states or programmes, everybody now takes their jobs seriously. That is what I keep telling our American friends that because we had credible elections, the bad guys are out, those left are those who did well. We urge American to continue to cooperate with us in strengthening INEC so that the next election would even be better than the last. When we do well, the country will do well that is what I mean by Paradigm Shift. In the past we use to have selections not elections.
Virtually every senior government official has been to the US for investment drive in recent time. Is it initiated by the Embassy and would you say it’s been a productive trip by the officials?
We have a Bi-National Commission (BNC) agreement, the highest level of strategic cooperation with us, the United States recognize the importance of Nigeria as a strategic partner, we have four components of the BNC. First is transparency and integrity. Second is good governance which was what US did in the last election by assisting INEC to conduct a free fair and credible election which has raised the country’s profile. The next one is on ND n regional security which is to Niger Delta militants, the amnesty programme and as part of that the US gave us a Naval ship to enable us check security along the coastal areas. The next one is on energy and investment, oil and gas. While the fourth one is on food security agriculture, they all constitute the core of our economy. If we are able to achieve all that, we would have succeeded in achieving objectives of the vision 2020.
We are performing well in those areas and the State governors are following that pattern, they come to the United States to attract investments into their states. We are a federation, we assist any state that comes regardless of their political coloring and it’s been very much worth its while and we will assist them in every way we can.
The foreign minister, last week, at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) talked about Investment Diplomacy as the new big thing in Nigerian diplomatic circles. With an apparent US Investors apathy towards Nigeria, don’t you think you may run into problem?
I don’t think there is so much of a problem, it depends on how one looks at it. We had a lot of bad press that is affecting us, but I think American investors have now learned their lesson that in every business venture there is an element of risk. We had problems in the past, there was a time it was 419 and that had been driven out. There was a time it was Niger Delta, that place is peaceful now. Now it is Boko Haram, as far as I am concern, Boko Haram is just a temporary irritant, it will also pass away and that is the point I was making with the Americans. Due to the crisis in the Niger Delta, they missed out of the Information Technology revolution and now it is the imminent revolution in the power and agric sector, they should not miss out again, that is what we are telling them and they are listening because there is no country without its own challenges. . The other day, there was an attempt of the home bred terrorist here who wanted to strike, these things happen everywhere.
The bombing of the UN building in Abuja was a big one, we have learned our lessons and that will not happen again, with the cooperation of friendly government , Boko Haram would soon be thing of the past. The problem with the press here is that they always have the tendency to emphasize the negative. I keep telling them to ask those Europeans who invested in the IT industry and they will say they have never seen such ROI and am saying the profitability is twice that of IT and our message that is the train is leaving the station, if you don’t join you will miss out.
I receive all sorts of enquiries Wal-Mart came here; we are waiting for them to develop their proposals. I keep telling people that the investment climate is very good in Nigeria, come to us at the Embassy and we give you the particularly Ministry and contacts to the right places and that is what we are here for, to give those directives that would be helpful.
What is your level of interaction among your host community and Nigerians in the US?
My level of interaction with the host country is excellent, quite a lot of them were either my colleagues or students when I lectured at American University. I was a Fulbright fellow so I know many of them both at the State Dept and everywhere and they respect me for that. Due to my academic background we meet at different places and they have respect for Nigeria.
With the Nigerian community I’m very much at home with them. President Jonathan is the only African President that President Obama has met twice within a year.
I will tell them that we have every reason to celebrate, because we continue to exist as a country. The most politically important country in Africa; member of the United Nation Security Council and a strategically important country in the continent. It is a very blessed country with all the resources that God has given us, more so in the past one year, we have conducted a very credible election; we have a cabinet with professionals in the key sectors of the economy. There is a transformation agenda that is been pursued with all vigor and the aim is to create more employment, transform the country, diversify its economic base and do things that will make life more comfortable to Nigerians.
The whole idea of the transformation agenda is to raise the standard of living, pursue the ambition of making Nigeria one of the most powerful countries in year 2020, make the economy strong, diversify, raise the standard of living and politically stable.
You do always talk of a paradigm shift in Nigeria in virtually all your public statements; can you educate us on this?
There is a paradigm shift in Nigeria in the sense that it is no longer a country of anything goes. There is a shift in attitude to responsibility, a shift in what we expect from political office holders, attitude to life, a shift in how we want to be placed among other nations of the world. Things are now done the way it should be done.
Taking the president as an example, he has appointed credible people into his cabinet. Although there is political consideration in the appointment, yet within that, there is room for quality and specialization/ the person appointed to mines and power has made his mark, the person appointed as Finance Minister is the former managing director of the World Bank, the person appointed for trade and investment was a former managing director of Goldman Sacs, the person appointed to agriculture has helped develop agriculture in many other countries . The bottomline is that the President has put square pegs in square holes. Our foreign minister has been a top diplomat all his life he knows it all. Seeing that example, it permeates down the entire spectrum of government. I have seen in your newspaper that problem in the issuance of international passport in the United States is now a thing of the past because there is now the leadership quality that things should be done properly, so Embassy is to make life more comfortable for Nigerians.
Right now, we are charged with promoting investment for the country and we in the United States are doing just that. We have had an investment forum on power, we are doing one on agric after which on infrastructure all to attract investment in the country. All we are doing now is to attract investment into the country supporting the policies of the government. It remains our responsibility to cater for the interest of Nigerians. A Nigerian cannot come here and say he is been cheated and we remain silent, we must go out there and fight for the interest of Nigerians. I have told my officers that if you conduct yourself in such a manner that a Nigerian reports you for negligence and you are able to extricate yourself, that constitutes your first warning, the next time that happens, I send you home because we are here in the interest of Nigerians. We are here because Nigerians are here, that is what an Embassy should do.
In Nigerian of today emphasis is on service. If everyone does what is expected of them the country would be greater than what we are currently. Our problem has been that of indiscipline. All those ills we have been identified with should be off, that is what I mean by paradigm shift, no longer anything goes. Everyone knows of a good government when they see one. Like I said at the United States Institute of Peace the other day, the first basis of transformation this President did was to ensure a free fair and credible election where most of those bad guys were kicked out because a system was established so that when you don’t do well you are kicked out. They know that they have four years after which if they don’t perform, they will be kicked out. In the past all they needed to do was to have a godfather that will foist them on the people.
So you now see a culture to do well so that they can be reelected by their people. So that is why you now see State governors and ministers come to the US to market their states or programmes, everybody now takes their jobs seriously. That is what I keep telling our American friends that because we had credible elections, the bad guys are out, those left are those who did well. We urge American to continue to cooperate with us in strengthening INEC so that the next election would even be better than the last. When we do well, the country will do well that is what I mean by Paradigm Shift. In the past we use to have selections not elections.
Virtually every senior government official has been to the US for investment drive in recent time. Is it initiated by the Embassy and would you say it’s been a productive trip by the officials?
We have a Bi-National Commission (BNC) agreement, the highest level of strategic cooperation with us, the United States recognize the importance of Nigeria as a strategic partner, we have four components of the BNC. First is transparency and integrity. Second is good governance which was what US did in the last election by assisting INEC to conduct a free fair and credible election which has raised the country’s profile. The next one is on ND n regional security which is to Niger Delta militants, the amnesty programme and as part of that the US gave us a Naval ship to enable us check security along the coastal areas. The next one is on energy and investment, oil and gas. While the fourth one is on food security agriculture, they all constitute the core of our economy. If we are able to achieve all that, we would have succeeded in achieving objectives of the vision 2020.
We are performing well in those areas and the State governors are following that pattern, they come to the United States to attract investments into their states. We are a federation, we assist any state that comes regardless of their political coloring and it’s been very much worth its while and we will assist them in every way we can.
The foreign minister, last week, at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) talked about Investment Diplomacy as the new big thing in Nigerian diplomatic circles. With an apparent US Investors apathy towards Nigeria, don’t you think you may run into problem?
I don’t think there is so much of a problem, it depends on how one looks at it. We had a lot of bad press that is affecting us, but I think American investors have now learned their lesson that in every business venture there is an element of risk. We had problems in the past, there was a time it was 419 and that had been driven out. There was a time it was Niger Delta, that place is peaceful now. Now it is Boko Haram, as far as I am concern, Boko Haram is just a temporary irritant, it will also pass away and that is the point I was making with the Americans. Due to the crisis in the Niger Delta, they missed out of the Information Technology revolution and now it is the imminent revolution in the power and agric sector, they should not miss out again, that is what we are telling them and they are listening because there is no country without its own challenges. . The other day, there was an attempt of the home bred terrorist here who wanted to strike, these things happen everywhere.
The bombing of the UN building in Abuja was a big one, we have learned our lessons and that will not happen again, with the cooperation of friendly government , Boko Haram would soon be thing of the past. The problem with the press here is that they always have the tendency to emphasize the negative. I keep telling them to ask those Europeans who invested in the IT industry and they will say they have never seen such ROI and am saying the profitability is twice that of IT and our message that is the train is leaving the station, if you don’t join you will miss out.
I receive all sorts of enquiries Wal-Mart came here; we are waiting for them to develop their proposals. I keep telling people that the investment climate is very good in Nigeria, come to us at the Embassy and we give you the particularly Ministry and contacts to the right places and that is what we are here for, to give those directives that would be helpful.
What is your level of interaction among your host community and Nigerians in the US?
My level of interaction with the host country is excellent, quite a lot of them were either my colleagues or students when I lectured at American University. I was a Fulbright fellow so I know many of them both at the State Dept and everywhere and they respect me for that. Due to my academic background we meet at different places and they have respect for Nigeria.
With the Nigerian community I’m very much at home with them. President Jonathan is the only African President that President Obama has met twice within a year.
