I was writing the piece below as the news flashed that the Minister of Foreign Affairs in Nigeria has resigned. I am impressed with her grace her sense of integrity and the way she has maintained her honour.
This is all because a bumbling patriarchal president had turned his cabinet into a chess-board full of pawns that could be moved and sacrificed with impunity.
It is a loss to Nigeria that a technocrat of that worth and values should be frustrated out of service to her homeland, whilst we hear that Nigerians in Diaspora should return to help build the nation.
Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala would be the banner to the fact that we do not have the kind of government that helps develop the worthy and patriotic cause of serving our great nation of Nigeria. It is a sad day indeed.
As the debate heats up on Ayoke’s Exodus; about the importance of the Foreign Ministry in relation to Finance Ministry in Nigeria.
One must once again look at the situation where the erstwhile Finance Minister who is now the Foreign Minister was stripped of the leadership of the Economic Management Team.
My view is that developing economies have more to gain in promoting trade and development which is linked to the management of resources and consequently their economies than trying to peddle vacuous influence without requisite backing of good governance and sensible economic policies.
With Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala being stripped of this economic profile and then being advised to concentrate on the Non-Aligned Movement, this makes interesting reading on deeper analysis.
The Non-Aligned Movement does not include any country in the West, probably; the only countries of note would be Nigeria, South Africa and India, with China as an observer.
The rest of the list which consists of 55% of the UN lists the poorest and the most deprived countries that require aid to keep things together, including the State of Palestine. I must say, it includes all the OPEC countries.
However, in a new world order where globalization, makes every economy susceptible to global financial swings and machinations, one wonders the value of the NAM apart from the kindred spirit of having been colonized or having once had their economies shackled to IMF poison pills.
Also, the 14th NAM summit is in Havana, Cuba between September 14-15, 2006, whilst the 2006 Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group is in Singapore between September 18-20, 2006.
No marks for thinking the more familiar face of a former vice-president of the World Bank could help a lot more in the negotiations than a meeting Nigeria would be the proverbial one-eyed man
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