Nigerian govt debunks Sanusi’s claim on US-Nigeria Investment Summit

The Federal Government has refuted reports that Ministers, who were invited to the US-Nigeria Investment Summit in Washington, DC, last Saturday, shunned the forum.

The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said in a statement in London on Monday that most of the ministers who were slated to attend the event were not invited and were not in Washington, DC, at the time, “hence the insinuation that some ministers collected estacodes without attending the forum is baseless”.

The Emir of Kano State, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, who attended the summit organised by Nigerian embassy in Washington DC, had soon after emerging from the meeting with investors, lambasted some ministers and other top government officials, who according to him were slated to be at the summit but failed to show up.

But Mohammed in the statement on Monday argued that it was not true ministers invited for the programmed shunned it.

He explained that the Ministers of Agriculture; Power Works and Housing and Budget and National Planning did not get any invitation from the organizers, even though they were listed among those who were expected to attend.

READ ALSO: This is not how you attract investors, Emir Sanusi blasts Nigerian govt

He further said that the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, who was invited, was with the President at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in London at the time of the summit, while the Minister of Finance, who was in Washington, DC, at the time, was there purposely to attend the 2018 Spring Meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

He added that, though he (Minister of Information and Culture) was invited to the forum, he wrote back to inform the organizers that he would not be able to make the trip due to conflicting schedules.

“It is clear from the foregoing that no Minister shunned the US Investment Summit and that the reports being circulated in that regard are bereft of facts,” Mohammed said.

 

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