Time for Pretoria, Abuja to make up

IN a world in which regional blocs have become crucial for geopolitical stability and economic development, South Africa and Nigeria should be playing leading roles on the African continent.

Yet the two countries have spent most of the past decade competing with one another over who the rightful representative of the continent on the world stage should be.

The source of their skirmishes was the jostling over which of the two nations would take up a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, during a reform process at the world governing body intended to establish such a seat for Africa.

Then there was the creation of a new power bloc made up of some of the world’s strongest “developing” nations — Brazil, Russia, India and China. Nigeria was aggrieved that, despite its superiority in terms of population size and the fact that its economy was growing much faster than ours, it was overlooked for membership of the Brics bloc in favour of South Africa.

Tensions between the two countries further deepened with the Nigerians complaining that even though they had opened their markets to South African firms, which were making huge profits there, South Africa remained closed to Nigerian banks and other businesses because of our stringent trading rules.

Instead of all these matters being resolved amicably, they were allowed to fester and even develop into open hostility.

The poor quality of political leadership on both sides did not help.

Whereas for most of the early 2000s, Nigerian leader Olusegun Obasanjo and the then president Thabo Mbeki played leading roles in getting the rest of the continent to buy into a continent-wide political and economic reform programme known as the New Partnership for Africa’s Development, their successors were apparently too engrossed with their own internal problems to focus on co-operation.

On the Nigerian side there has been a major political shift, one that provides an opportunity for positive change.

The replacement of Goodluck Jonathan with Muhammadu Buhari as president after elections in March last year has seen Nigeria adopt a new approach to its economic development and how that links to the broader African agenda.

As the Nigerian economy continues to struggle, due partly to a depressed global oil market, Buhari is looking to the rest of the continent for partnerships that would help his country diversify its economy.

That President Jacob Zuma is the first leader to be invited for a state visit after his election shows how important Buhari considers South Africa to be to his efforts.

On the South African side, there has not been any change at the leadership level.

Although Zuma is expected to step down in 2019, his party — unlike what happened in Nigeria last year — is most likely to continue running the country.

But this does not mean that there should not be the kind of change in mentality that we have witnessed with the new Nigerian government.

Before chasing after partnerships beyond our continent’s borders, Nigeria and South Africa need to focus on mending their relations and using their collective strength to pull the rest of Africa towards a new path of peace and economic co-operation.