Africa Is In Need Of Partnership Not Aids – Yakubu Dogara

Africa is in need of partnership that will make the continent grow, not aids and grants, according to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara.

He revealed this as he received members members of the Korea National Assembly, led by its Deputy Speaker, Mr Lee Ju-Young, accompanied by the Korean ambassador to Nigeria, Mr Lee In-tae, at the National Assembly.

He begged foreign investors to see farther than the oil sector and explore other areas like solid minerals and agriculture.

His words, “Right now, the balance of trade between Nigeria and South Korea obviously favours your nation and it is like you are most interested in the area of oil.

“That is what you buy most from Nigeria but I can assure you that we have more than oil and if you go through the ERGP, you will find quite a number of opportunities there.

‘’That is what I want your country to exploit so that we can deepen economic cooperation between our two nations,”

Different nations are gifted differently and endowed with certain resources differently by the creator and we recognise the fact that your country is the number one ship building country in the world.

‘’And Korea has some of the biggest solar plants that you built but also in Nigeria, we have some areas of gifting.

“We have opportunities in agriculture, tourism, solid minerals and many other sectors that can be exploited by the business community in Korea.

“So that when we meet, we do not dwell on oil as if oil is the only thing we have in this country.

“It is not just oil and energy, there are opportunities in other fields, Agriculture, for instance, generates a lot of gainful employment opportunities for a great number of our citizens.

“What Africa needs, therefore, for so long we have been described as a nation that needs aids, now we need partners that we can work together to develop our latent potentials.’’