As part of efforts to address food security occasioned by Russia-Ukraine war and to further strengthen ties, Nigeria and Poland have signed a bilateral agreement.
The agreement is a further bolster to the 60-year-old bilateral relations between the two countries.
Persecondnews reports that Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari and his Polish counterpart, Andrzej Duda, and senior officials signed the agreements at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, on Tuesday.
Buhari expressed satisfaction that both countries have agreed to increase collaboration in the areas of agriculture, energy and defence.
He thanked the Polish Government for receiving Nigerian students whose studies were disrupted by the Russia-Ukraine crisis to continue their education in the country.
On his part, President Duda, who noted that his visit was the first official visit to be paid by any Polish President to Nigeria in 60 years since both countries established diplomatic relations, described as unjustifiable the ongoing Ukrainian war.
According to him, the agreement was imperative to fight food security crisis arising from war.
On energy security, the Polish President expressed the hope that Nigeria with its huge gas and oil potential will intervene and ensure a steady supply of LNG gas and oil to Poland and the European Union.
Duda said: “And for that very reason, this is a truly important visit to me. And once again, let me stress, is a huge honor Your Excellency.
“Nigeria is the only African country with which Poland has signed an agreement on Strategic Dialogue. And actually a very good part of this strategic dialogue is the memorandum of cooperation in the area of agriculture that we have just signed a couple of minutes ago.
“It is immensely important piece of document, especially in the light of the food security crisis that is faced right now and not only by Nigeria, but also by the entire African continent.
“And the 10 most pivotal aspects that we raised in our conversation today both in our private tete-a-tete meeting with Mr. President, as well as during the plenary session was how to provide food security and energy security nowadays.
“Both of these topics, of course, stem from the situation that we are faced with today in Europe and to be more precise in our part of Europe. That is the aftermath of the Russian aggression and the war in Ukraine.
“And the Russian aggression against Ukraine, which is totally unjustified, has sparked off a very serious food crisis and a very serious energy crisis.
“As the country who is also a member of the United Nations, it is so important to support Ukraine in its export of grain and food products out of the country. But it’s equally a burden to us to provide our support to Africa and in particular to our partners country, that is Nigeria.’’
Duda, who spoke through an interpreter, also stressed: “That is why it is so important to us to further strengthen the relations between Poland and Nigeria right now and one element in strengthening that relations is the memorandum that we have signed today.
“It is very important for the future of our relations, but also for the future of the food security in Nigeria and at large. It can also contribute to the modernization and increasing the efficiency of Nigerian economy and Nigerian agriculture but it also can serve as a vehicle for sharing experiences.
“And speaking about those natural resources, Nigeria is indeed very wealthy and I want to also add that the first is applies of the LNG gas to our LNG gas terminal from Nigeria had already happened just like the import of crude oil performed by our oil company Latos.
“Those shipments did happen in recent years and that means well for the future because we do want to further develop this cooperation, we want to increase the supplies from Nigeria to Poland. This way, we also want to contribute to the development of economic relations between both our countries.”
He was hopeful that the talks and meeting with representatives of business sectors both from Poland and Nigeria would yield very fruitful outcome.
Still on the working relations between the two nations, the Polish leader said: “This has happened due to many Nigerians studying in Poland, but also due to this case of Polish scientists and also due to the input of Polish engineers in the building of infrastructure in Nigeria.
“I do believe that these good people-to-people relations will also spill over on other fields and they will contribute to the development of the economic relations between both our countries which are so immensely important nowadays.”
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