What Nigeria will be doing at the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro today and tomorrow
A mission sheet from the president’s office has described Nigeria’s inclusion as a guest country under Brazil’s 2024 G20 Presidency as underscoring the nation’s increasing influence in global affairs.
World leaders are gathering at the G20 Leaders’ Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil right now which then means that spanning the next couple of days, President Bola Tinubu will be hanging in the southeast capital having pulled off a diplomatic feat by hosting the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi back home in West Africa a night before. It is unusual to witness a Nigerian physical presence at the exclusive club, so what is the catch?
It is not the idea that Nigeria associates with the G20 clique of advanced economies that is so odd because that has happened virtually with President Tinubu’s predecessor. This time around, it is the mutual desire between his country and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s Brazil that is driving the course of things.
Back in February, the two leaders met each other to deepen ties between their countries. And so Nigeria’s president touching down at a Brazilian airport alongside his wife and the First Lady Oluremi Tinubu could be seen as doing just that. The opportunity to link up with the Group of 20 certainly sells a story to the president’s critics at home and abroad that he is up and doing.
The G20 Summit is the moment when heads of state and government approve the agreements negotiated throughout the year and point out ways of dealing with global challenges. This year the G20 Leaders’ Summit will be held between November 18 and 19, 2024 and the representatives of the 19 member countries like South Africa, the United States, France, Germany, and India, added with the African Union and the European Union will all be attending.
For now, camera lenses are only just focusing on guests arriving, and a moment earlier came for the President of Nigeria to enjoy a firm handshake from his host off the event’s banner. This year’s theme harps on “Building a Just World and a Sustainable Planet” and the Nigerian presence there is expected to engage in conversations that return measurable benefits home, but as a Presidency statement on the opening day already shows, there are more specifics to Mr Tinubu’s attendance.
A mission sheet from the president’s office has described Nigeria’s inclusion as a guest country under Brazil’s 2024 G20 Presidency as underscoring the nation’s increasing influence in global affairs.
Having hosted the leader of the world’s largest democracy Prime Minister Narendra Modi overnight on Saturday, November 16, and earning a seat with the Group of 20, just one more significant international engagement of global value would have completed a hat trick of diplomatic feats that Bola Tinubu would have scored in just a month.
This participation strengthens Nigeria’s aspirations for permanent G20 membership reads the presidency’s interpretation of one of the strategic opportunities which attending the summit presents.
When the president eventually gets in front of a microphone to speak to the gathering, it is expected that he will discuss a key issue his government can’t seem to find a visible solution back home which is combating hunger and poverty.
Sadly, 18months into Mr Tinubu’s governing the country, the people still lament about starvation partly down to his policies, and then global inflation, but Nigerians do not really care for excuses about what the problem is.
The way it seems from the surface, there is a split in reactions when considering the proportion of the Nigerian population that wants to give their president more time to fix the economy and as a consequence hunger. The population of those tired of waiting appears far more and they are wondering how many summits it’s going to take before premium motor spirit for instance can be cheaper than what is averaging at ₦1,030 per litre which wasn’t the case before Bola Tinubu became president.
Under his predecessor, Muhammed Buhari, the citizens thought the country was hard because the dazing effect of COVID-19 pandemic hadn’t worn off yet based on the lightness of their bank accounts when they buy goods but living in the present, they now realise it was a much milder time getting up to May 2023 when the former’s regime ended.
President Bola Tinubu looks to be prepared to ride out the ill feelings and deep dissatisfaction from the public that he has been mostly getting. While it is the state governors that are positioned closer to these masses, it is his federal office that the attention usually points to.
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It is the fact that patience would certainly have to go both ways – the president on his part has been preaching allowing a moment for the vintage wine to breathe before taking a sip. This means people should give his economic policies time to germinate as two years in office is still rather very much early days.
When criticisms directed towards him over wasting taxpayers’ money on a foreign trip stop? He will also need to be patient until the positive results he promised start to show.
