Presidency: Tinubu Returns Today after Two-week Absence

Olawale Ajimotokan in Abuja

The presidency has disclosed that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu will return to the country today after a two-week absence on official duty in Europe and Saudi Arabia.

Tinubu had travelled to the Netherlands on an official visit for a meeting with Prime Minister Mark Rutte. Later last month, he was in Riyadh for the World Economic Forum in Saudi Arabia.

After the WEF, Tinubu later left for an unknown European destination for an undisclosed mission that had generated some controversy.

Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, confirmed Tinubu’s return to the country.

“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, along with his aides, will return to Nigeria tomorrow from Europe,” Onanuga wrote.

It would be recalled that former Vice President and PDP candidate in the last presidential election, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, had descended on Tinubu, whom he accused of globetrotting in search of foreign direct investments.

He also dismissed the presidency’s claims of having secured over $30 billion from various companies, when nothing was allegedly forthcoming.

Atiku had said, “Rather, all manufacturing firms have been posting heavy losses while some are exiting due to his poorly implemented exchange rate unification policy, with even Aliko Dangote describing it as a huge mess at the recent annual general meeting of Dangote Sugar Refinery.

“The IMF in its latest report stated that Nigeria will by the end of the year become the 4th largest economy in Africa behind South Africa, Egypt and Algeria, a disgraceful development for a nation which was the largest in Africa by a mile when the PDP left the stage in 2015.

“Investors are seeing how local businesses are being treated and will not come to a place where their investments will not be protected. In saner climes, businesses such as Landmark would have been given at least two years’ notice in order for effective planning. But Tinubu’s eagerness to satisfy his business partners impaired his ability to coordinate the project properly.”

The presidency, which accused Atiku of distortion of facts to hoodwink the public, had said the Tinubu administration, within its first year, had attracted over $20 billion into the economy, in addition to securing over  $14 billion in new investments from Indian business leaders, when Tinubu was in New Delhi, India, for G20 Summit last year.

It claimed that substantial part of this sum was already in the country.

But Onanuga stated, “In an unmistakable vote of confidence in the economic reforms being executed by the Tinubu administration, foreign investment in Nigeria’s stock market has ballooned, from N18.12 billion in Q1 2023 to N93.37 billion in Q1 2024, an increase of 415 per cent.

“The last time Nigeria saw such level of investment was in the first quarter of 2019, when N97.6 billion was invested. The market, since Tinubu came to power, has broken records and created more wealth for the investors.

“During President Tinubu’s recent trip to The Netherlands, the Prime Minister, Mark Rutte, announced a fresh $250 million investment by Dutch businesses in Nigeria.”

Onanuga had asserted on top of claim  that different sectors of the economy, notably telecoms, manufacturing, solid minerals, oil and gas, e-commerce, and fintech, had been attracting new Foreign Direct Investments (FDIs) from discerning investors, who were convinced that Nigeria was a good market for bountiful returns.