FG Explains Absence of Ministers at US-Nigeria Investment Forum
We were not billed to attend summit, say Kachikwu, Fayemi
The federal government has explained why the Nigerian Government officials were absent at the United States Nigeria Investment Summit in Washington, DC, on April 19. 2018.
In a statement issued in London yesterday, the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said most of the ministers who were slated to attend the event were not invited and were not in Washington DC at the time.
He also dismissed as baseless, the insinuation that some ministers collected estacodes without attending the forum.
Mohammed said the Ministers of Agriculture; Power Works and Housing and Budget and National Planning did not get any invitation from the organisers even though they were listed among those who were expected to attend.
Mohammed said the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, who was invited, was with President Muhammadu Buhari at the Commonwealth Heads of
Government Meeting (CHOGM) in London at the time of the summit, while the Minister of Finance, who was in Washington DC at the time, was there to attend the 2018 Spring Meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
He said though he (Minister of Information and Culture) was invited to the forum, he wrote back to inform the organisers that he would not be able to make the trip due to conflicting schedules.
‘’It is clear from the foregoing that no minister shunned the US- Nigeria Investment Summit and that the reports being circulated in that regard are bereft of facts,’’ the minister said.
There were reports that Nigerian representatives were absent at an investment programme organised by the Nigerian embassy in Washington DC last Saturday.
The government officials, who were supposed to have sessions at the event, were conspicuously absent, raising worries that Nigeria might lose investment opportunities by their absence.
The report further claimed that officials who were billed to have sessions at the programme but were absent included the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo; the Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun; Minister of State for Petroleum, Ibe Kwachukwu; Minister of Agriculture, Audu Ogbeh; Minister of Science and Technology, Ogbonnaya Onu; Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed; Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Kayode Fayemi; and the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Okechukwu Enelamah,
The Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido, who was at the event, found it outrageous that Nigerian Government’s officials were not there to represent the country.
He said: “For the person sitting in London and who has a billion dollars to invest, he’s got Nigeria, he’s got Ghana, he’s got Rwanda, Kenya, South Africa. You may be the biggest economy, but he may decide that rather than go through the hassle of investing $500 million in Nigeria, why not put $100 million in Ghana, $100 million in Rwanda, $100 million in Cote d’Ivoire, just to have diversification benefit and the benefit of reaching out.
“We had a meeting today with investors, we were supposed to start by 9a.m. we started at 10a.m. When I came in, they took me to the ambassador’s office to sit down, when investors were waiting down there. We had a list of people who were to be here, vice president, ministers, some of them are in town, but they haven’t come up.”
Sanusi, a former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), said the ministers’ absence was not good for Nigeria’s efforts to attract investment opportunities to the country.
He said: “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. If you have this forum in the Rwandan embassy, I assure you President Kagame himself would be there telling people to come to Rwanda.
“Sometimes it is about how we market ourselves, how we package ourselves. There is absolutely no reason for the Nigerian embassy to arrange a Nigeria is open for Business forum with ministers in town, with governors in town and not have the coordination that they are actually here to meet with these investors.
“There is no reason why we should start one hour late, and there is no reason why the public address system should not work. Because at the end of the day, this is the first point of the country, he hasn’t even come to Nigeria so what will be his experience in Abuja and he is saying if I am having this experience in Washington, what will happen when I go to Abuja, when I go to Kano, how do I get to see the governor will it take me 10 hours?”
The event had in attendance Wilbur Ross, United States Secretary of Commerce; Sergio Pimenta, IFC Regional Vice President ( Middle East and Africa); C.D Glin, President and CEO, U.S African Development Foundation ((USADF), among others.
Also yesterday, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Kachikwu and his coounterpart in the Ministry of Mines and Steel Development, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, stated that they were not scheduled to attend a USNigeria Investment Summit organised by the Nigerian Embassy in Washington, DC, and so, they could not have been said to be absent from it.
A statement from the Director of press in the ministry in Abuja, Mr. Idang Alibi, stated that Kachikwu was not invited for the summit which most Nigerian federal ministers reportedly failed to turn up for, a development that was widely condemned by Nigerians including the Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II.
The statement from the ministry stated that: “The office of the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu, has recently been beleaguered with various media reports concerning the absence of the Minister of State at the recent US-Nigeria Investment Summit held in Washington DC.
“It is important to note that Kachikwu was not in the US as reported and was not billed to attend the summit. He was in the United Kingdom where he had just concluded the facilitation of a key investment meeting between President Buhari and the Royal Dutch Shell Plc. led by the CEO, Bernardus Van Beurden, in London, United Kingdom.”
The statement further stated that Kachikwu was committed to delivering the major aspirations of the government for the country’s petroleum industry as contained in the 7BigWins of which it said business and investment drive is a key theme.
On his part, Fayemi in a statement through his Special Adviser on Media in Abuja, hinted that he did not confirm attendance at any investment forum in Washington DC, USA, hence cannot be accused of shunning the event.
According to it, “Attention of the Media office of the Minister of Mines and Steel Development has been drawn to media reports, quoting Sanusi as criticising some ministers for their absence at an investment forum organised by the Nigerian Embassy in Washington DC, USA.”
It further revealed that, “in the reports, the respected Emir who is a former CBN Governor, had expressed his disappointment with some ministers, including Fayemi, for failing to attend the forum, despite being in Washington DC during the time of the event.
“We however deem it necessary to correct some wrong impressions created in the reports as a result of incomplete information. This is important for the sake of the public, who deserve to know the true position as follows:
“As a matter of fact, the Minister and a few of his colleagues, during the said period were attending some investment forum organized by the Nigeria Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC) on the sidelines of the Commonwealth Head of Government meeting (CHOGM), in London, UK.
“There have been instances where names of Ministers and top government officials were announced as participants in some events without proper invitation and confirmation of attendance. This is certainly the case with the Washington event.
“So, to suggest that that Fayemi was in Washington and chose not to attend the event could not have been an accurate account of what transpired. He was certainly nowhere near America and the organisers cannot say he confirmed to be at the event.
“Organisers of important events should not always assume they have put the necessary steps in place when they simply have not taken the pain to invite and also confirm attendance at an event.”