Africa will develop if intra-Africa trade expands – Envoy
DT: Nigeria and Namibia established full bilateral relations in 1990. Twenty-six years on, what’s your sense of the cooperation between both countries? Shipoh: Since the establishment of full diplomatic relations between Namibia and Nigeria, we have actually been enjoying a healthy, steady and excellent relation. We started our mission in Lagos and when the FCT […]
DT: Nigeria and Namibia established full bilateral relations in 1990. Twenty-six years on, what’s your sense of the cooperation between both countries?
Shipoh: Since the establishment of full diplomatic relations between Namibia and Nigeria, we have actually been enjoying a healthy, steady and excellent relation. We started our mission in Lagos and when the FCT was moved to Abuja, we also moved our mission to Abuja. Nigeria has been part of Namibia since the era of pre-independence and after our freedom, Nigeria established full diplomatic mission in Namibia. Since then, we have been enjoying excellent relation.
DT: Nigeria stood firmly with Namibia during its struggle against apartheid colonialism till the very end. How do you feel with important role?
Shipoh: Our independence struggle started actually as petition to the United Nations. Namibia was first colonized by Germany after the 1884 Berlin Conference. After the World War 1, Germany was defeated, and the world, under the umbrella of the League of Nations, handed over Namibia to Britain to administer the country and prepare it for self administration. Unfortunately, Britain did not play that role but rather handed over the country to the South African Authority. With the advent of apartheid, South Africa became so selfish that instead of fulfilling that mandate given to them by the Britain, they decided, in a special way, to rule Namibia, exploiting the resources and people of the country.
Nigeria and other African countries stood firmly in supporting the cause of the Namibian people to liberate themselves. After the first bullet was fired on August 26, 1966, many of our people went into exile. Some were imprisoned and eventually landed in Robin Island in South Africa. That led to the new wave of people leaving Namibia.
That was how I left Namibia in September 1974. However, the youths were advised to drop their guns and take up their books in order to prepare themselves to administer the country after liberation. We were given the opportunity to continue our studies up to tertiary education in other countries.
Nigeria accepted us. We came to Nigeria and were distributed to various government colleges. After granting us that opportunity, Nigeria decided to join the Southern African group called the Frontline States. The group comprised of Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Zambia and Tanzania. Nigeria, from distance, volunteered itself to be part of the Frontline States and immensely contributed morally, financially, diplomatically; supporting the cause of Namibia, up to the time the country liberated itself from South Africa.
We remain grateful to Nigeria and its people. The independence we are enjoying today will go down in the annals of history that Nigeria had been a contributor to our freedom. I did my secondary school in Federal Government College, Enugu in 1978. I’m now back as a representative of my country here in Nigeria as the head of mission.
DT: Nigeria and Namibia in 2014 proposed to set up a joint oil refinery to maximise cooperation in energy. What’s the level of the project at the moment?
Shipoh: The project was actually mothered 10 years ago. The effort was to assist Namibia not to fall into the hands of big sharks when it comes to the supply of petroleum products. It was important for Namibia to have its own refinery and when it imports crude, it could refine it within the borders of the country.
It was in 2014, during the visit of the former president Goodluck Jonathan to Namibia, that we should conclude the agreement and establish a joint oil refinery. It was and still to be championed by the private sector. It was never meant to be government-government affairs. But government has to create conducive environment for the refinery to be constructed and for the private sector to champion the process. Unfortunately, there was an issue with one chapter of the agreement which was not finalised technically but the two heads of state insisted that the agreement should be finalised and ready for signing. Eventually we were informed that everything is ready but because of the technicality of that one chapter of the agreement, it was not signed. And it remained unsigned.
However, it has not taken the back seat. I have been consulting here. It is unfortunate that since the coming to office of President Muhammadu Buhari, the ministry charged with the responsibility of the project has not met with the other ministry in Namibia. But at the moment, we are engaging one another to ensure that the project sees the light of the day. I manage to see the people that matter in the ministry. There is that interest. The question really is after the refinery has been constructed, who will supply the crude oil.
DT: Is that not included in the agreement?
Shipoh: That’s the technicality. In order to sign the agreement, we need to finalise the body that will supply the crude oil. And that’s why the agreement was not signed because the time was too short to iron out the issue. I think this is the only stumbling block there now. It came at a time we have change of government, and what needs to be done now is for the two governments to review the agreement and instruct the technical arms of the government to sort out the grey areas.
DT: How soon do you see this project becoming feasible?
Shipoh: Well, recession is in both countries. It is difficult to actually predict how soon that can be. We also need to know from the champions, the private sectors, how ready they are. If they say they are ready, we will leave it for them. For us as governments, Nigeria and Namibia will only ensure that we create conducive environment for the private sectors to champion the project.
DT: Which area of the Nigeria-Namibia relation do you plan to improve?
Shipoh: Trade. If Nigeria is an oil producer, it should sell crude oil to Namibia. When it comes to other issues, we have to ask ourselves, 26 years of our relations, what have we been trading in? Is the intra-Africa trade flourishing? And if the answer is yes, then we should establish the list. In my view, I think that the diplomatic relations between the two countries is very excellent but our people need to trade with one another. Nigeria is a huge and attractive market for Namibian products. Namibia finds itself in the Southern African, drought-stricken area. In 2014 and 2015, Nigeria was the only country in the world that donated drought relief materials to help the Namibian government distribute to the vulnerable population. Namibia decided that it would like to buy more food materials from Nigeria and we have placed an enquiry to Nigerian authority to sell maize grains to us. Though we are cognizant of the fact that maize grain is a prohibited export product from Nigeria, but because of the good relations between both countries, we are optimistic that we will get it. However, we have not done enough in terms of trading with one another.
DT: What legacy would you like to be remembered for at the end of your tenure?
Shipoh: When I came here, I was energetic, saying I will do this, I will do that. But I cannot do it alone. Both Nigerian and Namibian authorities that are involved in allowing goods and services to enter our countries have to work together and recognize that Africa can only be developed by Africans; therefore we need to trade with one another. The legacy that I will like to leave here is that with the short time that is left for me, if we can make a breakthrough to increase the trade volume, in terms of quantity and value, I will be very happy. Our people need to be fed, clothed and empowered. The training and empowerment of our youth, for them to fend for themselves, is very important. We all know that if we do not treat the youth very well in terms of empowering them, we are nursing a time bomb. This is what I have done when I was the Permanent Secretary of Ministry of Youth in Namibia. I will like to see it continuing as I’m here so that we can avoid having unemployed youths.