00:00Warm welcome to you, Honourable Minister, Foreign Minister of Nigeria, Yusuf Tuka.
00:06Thank you for having me.
00:08Germany was one of the first countries to start diplomatic relationships with your country 65 years ago.
00:16How important is that relationship today?
00:19It's very, very important.
00:22Nigeria is Germany's second largest trading partner in sub-Saharan Africa.
00:30We, modern Nigeria was built by a lot of German companies.
00:37So Strava, Burger Billfinger, these are companies that built our roads, airports, even the capital city.
00:49So this is what, the backbone was built by Germany.
00:54And of course we do a lot of trade beyond oil, which we're trying to diversify from.
01:00And today we have a situation where Germany has the opportunity to apply its knowledge, its technology, in terms of metals refining, to Nigeria.
01:14Particularly the electro-minerals.
01:17So if we talk about lithium, we talk about copper, there is a lot of opportunity.
01:24Of course, this is an area where both countries are looking for deeper corporations.
01:29As you said, Nigeria has lithium and copper.
01:32How far could German technology and investment allow you to move forward?
01:37Very much so, because our priority is job creation.
01:45It's food security, then job creation.
01:48Because we have a very youthful population.
01:51Our population is 230 million.
01:54We're expected to be 400 million by 2050.
01:58That's only 25 years.
01:59And we would be the third largest country in the world.
02:03And this is something, so it's a race against time.
02:07But it's a match made in heaven.
02:10Because at the same time, Germany has an aging population.
02:14And it has a lot of world-class middle stands.
02:17So these are the sort of businesses we're looking to apply.
02:20And already, there are quite a number of them that are doing interesting things in Nigeria.
02:27It's important for the two governments to pay attention to what the private sector is doing
02:32and to support that in order to reinforce it.
02:36Yeah, and it takes time to implement everything to get critical minerals, especially.
02:41There are many preparatory stages.
02:43What needs to be done urgently to accelerate that process?
02:46First and foremost, exploration to give the businesses the confidence to come and invest
02:59and to exploit the minerals, the electro-minerals especially.
03:05Secondly, the funding needs to be arranged.
03:09And this is why we are partnering with Germany on this green guarantee group
03:14that we were invited to co-chair.
03:17Because African countries are scared of sovereign guarantees.
03:26They don't want to run into trouble, into debts.
03:28And you can see that we have another wave of debt crisis that some are even referring to
03:37as a development crisis.
03:40But if you have guarantees that are not attached to any sovereign pledge,
03:47then it makes it easier and it has a multiplier effect by almost a factor of five.
03:55So it's something that we could work together on.
03:59What you have been describing, the population dynamics, is also a political weight.
04:05So we need to talk about geopolitics too.
04:08And the German foreign minister, Wadervo, compared this relationship, Germany and Nigeria,
04:14to a wedding anniversary, the iron wedding anniversary.
04:18How does German-Nigerian couple adapt to those challenging geopolitical times?
04:25We have focused our approach on strategic autonomy,
04:32resting on the four pillars of democracy, demography, development and diaspora.
04:37And we feel that with strategic autonomy, it's safer for countries like Nigeria
04:44because through it you avoid ideological entanglements that could end up in trouble
04:55for us and for our neighborhood.
04:57We don't want to see private military companies operating in our neighborhood
05:02and we end up being the playground of others or the battleground, I should say, of others.
05:09So that's why with strategic autonomy, we want to engage with as many countries as possible
05:17based on shared interests, based on a convergence of needs.
05:24And the more, the merrier.
05:26And that way trade flows and you're not confined to one thing or the other
05:32and you end up having to fight other people's conflicts.
05:37I think there are much more urgent issues for us.
05:41This youthful population, feeding them, providing them with jobs, that's our priority.
05:47Still, the U.S. has always been a strong partner too for you.
05:51In recent time, the U.S. president has been criticizing Nigeria.
05:56How seriously do you counter the allegation by Donald Trump
06:02that your government is not doing enough against radical Islamists
06:06killing Christians in Nigeria, Nigeria?
06:09I think we've explained ourselves and my president put out a statement
06:13that explained everything.
06:17It speaks for itself.
06:19Nigeria's orientation itself is suited and is favorable to the United States of America.
06:34People like me forget the fact that I even went to school in America.
06:39I actually grew up.
06:43The era during which I grew up, it was American music,
06:47it was American mode of dressing.
06:49So we are favorably disposed to the United States of America.
06:55But we also understand the workings of U.S. domestic politics.
07:03The whole thing about Nigeria being listed on the countries of particular concern
07:12emanated from the legislative arm of the U.S. government.
07:16We were in touch with the executive arm and they did not appear to be disposed to supporting that.
07:26But something may have changed.
07:28Maybe it's not having enough information.
07:33Maybe it's not understanding how much the government was doing to fight terrorism in Nigeria.
07:41You can see that the terrorists and the area that they operate in is the northeast of Nigeria.
07:50It's a complex cross-border area.
07:53So they go back and forth.
07:56They run into Niger or into Chad or into Cameroon.
08:02And then sometimes they run back into Nigeria.
08:05And, you know, you've got the Lake Chad there with hundreds of islands.
08:09So it's a very complex terrain.
08:11This is where Boko Haram operates.
08:13And that area is heavily populated by Muslims
08:19because all the other countries also have a lot of Muslims there.
08:25But again, when you talk about herders and farmers, this is not some biblical conflict.
08:35It's not Cain and Abel.
08:37It's not that all the farmers are one religion and all the herders are the other.
08:46Nigeria is much, much more complex than that.
08:48It's, you know, it's a mixture.
08:50And a lot of these herders are pagan.
08:54They don't even have any religion.
08:56They don't subscribe to any religion.
08:58So, and the same thing with farmers.
09:01You have a lot of farmers that are not religious.
09:04So, you know, but it requires a lot of understanding.
09:07And maybe this would present an opportunity for the world to look more at what is going on
09:16and have a better understanding.
09:17And that way it turns out to be a positive thing for Nigeria.
09:21Yeah, I've been talking with German government also about security cooperation.
09:26How far did you go?
09:28How can Germany help you with fighting terror?
09:30Is that still on the table?
09:33Well, you heard what Minister Johan Weidepoel said in his statement in German.
09:40He commended Nigeria for what it was doing in the fight against terrorism.
09:47And Germany has always been supportive of that and has made it clear that it will continue
09:55to support our efforts in fighting terrorism, in fighting banditry, you know, in supporting
10:01us to tackle some of these security challenges.
10:05A lot of these security challenges are actually brought about by exogenous factors, outside
10:12factors.
10:13It's not something that we have necessarily done wrong in Nigeria that has brought them
10:18about.
10:19But we're in the neighborhood, we're right next to the Sahel, so we have to contend with
10:24these issues.
10:25Yeah, let's talk about the developments in Mali, for example.
10:29It's in the Sahel.
10:30And the German army was there in the field as a part of United Nations missions until
10:352023.
10:36But we now see Germans are gone.
10:39Everybody is gone.
10:40Russians are still there.
10:42We now see Islamist groups blocking fuel supplies.
10:45How dangerous are those developments for your country?
10:48It's very dangerous.
10:49We already have groups like the Lakorawa that have moved into Nigeria from Mali.
10:56Because, you see, people forget that the distance from a Nigerian border to Mali is only maybe
11:03a couple of hundred kilometers.
11:06It's not that far.
11:07There's a slither of Niger in between us.
11:11But beyond that, it's the same neighborhood.
11:16And at the moment, we're very concerned about what is going on.
11:22And we're looking, as usual, to support the government in Mali, in whichever way we can.
11:31So even though the AES states have left ECOWAS, we continue to try our best to work with them
11:38in terms of security, in terms of other concerns of the region as a whole.
11:45Nigeria is a member of the African Union.
11:48Germany is a member of the European Union.
11:51Is your country planning to also be a member of the BRIC states, who are more and more empowered
11:58in recent times?
11:59We want to join as many of these global platforms that allow for dialogue, that can bring about
12:12development.
12:13So we've been pushing to become a member of a G20.
12:19We've been pushing to become a member of BRICs.
12:22Now we're just a BRICs partner.
12:25We're not a member.
12:26And we get invited regularly to G20 meetings.
12:31President Tumbo is going to the G20 summit in Johannesburg next week.
12:39So it's something that we feel Nigeria, by virtue of its size, by virtue of its population,
12:46the size of its economy, and looking into the future, the role it will continue to play.
12:51It needs to be on the decision-making table when decisions are to be made about the economy,
13:01about global politics.
13:03We need to be there.
13:04And others on the continent trust us because we represent them well.
13:10Please give me, at the end of this interview, your impression of how is the best case for
13:20Nigeria in like two years or five years?
13:24And how is the worst case?
13:26Best case is that we become a member of the UN Security Council with veto powers like the Permanent Five.
13:42We join G20.
13:48We join BRICs.
13:50We create hundreds of jobs by partnering with countries like Germany through business process outsourcing,
14:02through all these services that are provided digitally.
14:09We partner with others to invest in food production, to provide for our food security,
14:19as well as exporting.
14:22And we tackle the issue of electricity because we have a lot of gas.
14:28And of course, we have a lot of sun as well.
14:29So we produce enough electricity to cover the whole of Nigeria and also continue to provide for our neighbors.
14:41So that because Nigeria at the moment supplies gas to Benin, Togo, Ghana through a pipeline.
14:51Nigeria supplies electricity also from the Kayinji Dam built in 1964 with German collaboration, I might add, to Niger Republic.
15:04So because it's not enough for us to just take care of our country.
15:08We also have to look after the neighborhood.
15:11And that way it's better for us.
15:15And the worst case?
15:16There's no worst case.
15:18I'm an optimist.
15:21I read Voltaire and I candide, the optimist, and I have a different take on Voltaire and Candide.
15:32Let's leave it here.
15:34Thank you for your time, Honorable Minister.
15:38Thank you. Appreciate it.
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