Why we were absent from investors summit – Adeosun, Emefiele

The Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun and the Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Godwin Emefiele said they were unaware of a scheduled engagement with investors at the Nigerian Embassy in Washington D.C.

The two officials made the clarification during a joint press conference at the Nigeria Office, World Bank in Washington D.C. They were reacting to the widely circulated report of their absence at the US- Nigeria Investment Summit 2018, organized by the embassy of Nigeria with a private firm tagged, “Nigeria is open for Business.” The summit was designed to bring under one roof, decision makers from Nigeria, United States officials, entrepreneurs, investors, Chief Executive Officers of renowned corporation and their representatives, the academia and other interested individuals and groups.

The Emir of Kano Muhammadu Sanusi, had described as unacceptable, the attitude of Nigerian ministers and governors, who were billed to speak at the summit to attract investors to the country at the Nigerian House in Washington.

Sanusi said, “We have a meeting today with investors, we were supposed to start by 9am we started at 10. When I came in they took me to the ambassadors office to sit down, when investors were waiting down there. We had a list of people who were to be there, vice president, minsters, some of them are in town, but they haven’t come up. You invite top investors, your ministers are in Washington and they do not come to talk to the investors about Nigeria. That is not how you attract investors.”

In her response, Adeosun said, “There has been some controversy over the scheduling; I wasn’t due at any event. I was here as a governor of the IMF and member of IMFC to represent the 23 African countries and that schedule is what I must adhere to. I think maybe there were some scheduling challenges there.”

Emefiele said, “We are here to attend the statues meetings. For the minister of finance and for me being the governor of the CBN, what takes pre-eminence is the meetings in the IMF as well as the meeting Bank.

“When I arrive in Washington the officials of the embassy spoke with me that there was going to be a US-Nigeria summit and I said will check my schedule because I was not consulted when this summit was being organized. What one would have expected is that they would have checked my schedule and that of the finance minister if they thought that our presence at the summit was very necessary. They could have checked our schedule to see that there was no conflict.”

He said the summit was meant to hold between 2pm and 3pm whereas the World Bank development committee plenary session, which is an assembly of ministers and governors of at the World central banks was to hold between 2.15 and 5pm. “There was no way the minister of finance and myself could have been at those meetings.”

“I think it is important to say, it is unfair for people to begin to cast aspersions without understanding our schedules. The main reason we are here is because of the statues meetings of the IMF and the World Bank. We are not irresponsible people and please we apologize to those investors who had gathered at the Nigerian embassy for the summit. My apologies but I know we also held some side meetings with some investors and there will always be lots of opportunities to meet with them. But I want to say this is not the fault of the minister of finance and myself the CBN governor.”