By Louis Achi
President Bola Tinubu will depart Abuja for Riyadh, capital of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, this week, to attend the Saudi-Africa summit and the Arab African summit both scheduled to be held on November 10 and 11, 2023, respectively.
According to Ajuri Ngelale, Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, in a press statement, Sunday, Tinubu’s appearance at the summits marks fresh moves to engage Arab nations to attract businesses and additional Foreign Direct Investment to Nigeria.
Ngelale said, “ President Bola Tinubu will be heading to Riyadh, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, to attend two major summits.
“The first of which is the Saudi-Africa Summit, at which several areas of mutual concern will be addressed with respect to the economic ties between the regions with respect to the issues of counterterrorism, the environment, agriculture, and many other areas of mutual concern.”
Ngelale further disclosed that the aim of Tinubu’s participation is to accelerate the level of trade and investment between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the African continent.
His words: “Obviously, President Tinubu is very keen on ensuring that the Federal Republic of Nigeria within the context of the continent is in a position to maximally leverage on opportunities that will be afforded by the implementation of the African continental Free Trade Agreement, where we will be having a single trade market of over one billion Africans.
“The expectation according to the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa is that by the year 2050, our market here on the continent would have surpassed $29tn.”
Tinubu will attend the Arab-African summit to be held on November 11 in his capacity as the chairman of the ECOWAS Authority of Heads of Government.
His participation, Ngelale said, will deepen the partnership between the League of Arab nations and the African Union.
“This would foster integration in terms of infrastructure, facilitation and the establishment of a new high speed train network that would tie Arab nations from the Middle East and Northern Africa, to the rest of the continent,” he added.
“I want to assure the Nigerian people today that President Bola Tinubu is going to do everything he can to reinvigorate the Nigerian economy, through the instrumentation of his leading participation in these two important summits,” the presidential aide added.
