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President Bola Tinubu met with German Federal Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, yesterday in Berlin, where he stated that Nigeria’s pursuit of German investment in targeted sectors of the economy was focused on critical growth-enabling industries in energy, transportation, and electric power production, transmission, and distribution.
Tinubu spoke on the side-lines of the G20 Compact with Africa Economic Conference in Berlin.
Recognising the success of Siemens AG in positively transforming the quantity and quality of Egyptian electric power supply, the president noted that under his leadership, the staggered and unsteady implementation of the Siemens-supported Presidential Power Initiative (PPI) would assume a new urgency with a more deliberate process of project execution.
He emphasised the need to embrace Siemens technology in all aspects of the PPI for project sustainability.
Tinubu said, “I am very much committed to pursuing all aspects of the Siemens Power project and the skill development opportunities that will emerge from that project for our talented youths who can participate in sustaining the industry.”
Conscious of the new 2,000km ultra-high-speed rail network, which Siemens is currently constructing across 60 cities in Egypt at the speed of 230km/hour, Tinubu expressed his keen interest in the role Siemens could play in modernising and expanding Nigeria’s rail network with the provision of ultra-modern trains and railways that can more than double the speed of the existing 100km/hour standard-gauge system operating in Nigeria.
To that, the German chancellor expressed readiness, but said administrative and financial hurdles brought about by governance problems in the sector emanating from successive administrations governments had to be resolved.
The German chancellor said, “I know that there is a lot of work that has been done. There is already a big production of electricity in Nigeria, but it is not getting to the population. Of course, this has to do with the need for a provision of stations and infrastructure on the grid.
“Siemens has developed the plan and is ready to deepen implementation, but it is now up to your new government to take the follow-up action that you are now committed to taking.
“On the railway plans, Siemens will be very happy to do this when more progress is made on the power project, which has been started already.”
Tinubu drew the attention of the German leader to the need for his business community to focus their attention on value-additive processing in Nigerian solid minerals, agricultural goods, automobile production, and other job-creating sub-sectors of the economy.
He stated, “Everything the world requires in terms of business environment reforms are underway in Nigeria. Perhaps, our foreign investors are still a bit paranoid that those old Nigerian issues are intractable. But my track record speaks for itself. I have transformed an entity before now. I am here to do it again, and I will.”
Scholz nodded in agreement, saying, “There is nothing too unique about the growth of China. It came down to a lot of investment from overseas that leveraged on cheap and skilled labour with adequate internal infrastructure and shipping infrastructure for imports and exports to flow easily.
“These things are possible in Nigeria. You even have abundant natural resources. Step by step, it is achievable, Mr. President.”
The two leaders of the largest economies in Africa and Europe, respectively, agreed to deepen collaboration on the utilisation of advanced biometric systems and border control technology to check irregular migration. They also agreed on the crucial role of investments in labour-intensive industries.
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