Meeting in Abuja to review Nigeria's foreign policy.(Conference news)

Text of report by Nigerian newspaper Daily Trust website on 8 August

[Report by Bello Muhammad Zaki: "Economic Diplomacy and Nigeria's Foreign Policy"]

A Foreign policy review summit kicked-off in Abuja last Monday with policy experts and professionals, diplomats, bureaucrats and civil society organizations in an all-stakeholders conference to review the nation's foreign policy trust. The summit was organized by the Presidential Advisory Council on International Relations in collaboration with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Olugbenga Ayodeji Ashiru, told pressmen the previous weekend, prior to the summit, that the August meeting would address issues from four identified needs of the nation's foreign policy posture: The economic wellbeing of Nigerian citizens, their enhanced security and massive foreign investment inflow into the country; the issues of Nigeria's political interests and its leadership role in the West African sub-region and in Africa; the issue of reciprocity, in which countries benefiting from Nigeria's assistance would equally reciprocate the gesture by giving their support to the country's aspirations at international fora, and the place of professionalism in Nigeria's foreign mission. This piece shall dwell on the economic well being of Nigerian citizens at the backdrop of global economic diplomacy.

Economic diplomacy, as correctly defined by Kishan S. Rana, is "the process through which countries tackle the outside world, to maximize their national gain in all the fields of activity including trade, investment and other forms of economically beneficial exchanges, where they …