Hon. Yakubu Dogara, Speaker of the House of Representatives, has asked the South Korean government and other developed nations to widen their interest in Nigeria and indeed Africa beyond oil exploration.
Dogara made the call while receiving members of the Korea National Assembly, led by its Deputy Speaker, Mr. Lee Ju-Young, accompanied by the Korean ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Lee.
According to Vanguard, he also called for support for Nigeria’s Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) which is geared towards sustaining economic growth that has been achieved by the present government, adding that Korea and its citizens can exploit the plan to deepen the Economic relations of both countries.
“Right now, the balance of trade between Nigeria and South Korea obviously favours your nation and it is like you are most interested in the area of oil and that is what South Korea buys most from Nigeria but I can assure you that we have more than oil and if you go through the ERGP which you spoke to, you will find quite a number of opportunities there that I would want your country to exploit so that we can deepen economic cooperation between our two nations.”
On the issue of security, the Speaker requested for assistance to tackle challenges such as security and the attendant problem of internal displacement of persons, especially in the Northeast region.
"At the moment, we are grappling with a lot of challenges as you are obviously aware of. Security is one of those issues that we are grappling with and as they say, the promise of democracy is life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Security is, therefore, vital to the sustenance of democracy and we want to call on your nation to cooperate and offer some help in this area through intelligence sharing or through support that you normally extend in such situations.
"Obviously, we also have the crisis of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). We recently made the effort to establish the North East Development Commission, I am sure you have heard of the Boko Haram crisis that has led to people fleeing their communities and being hosted in other communities in Nigeria, Cameroon and the rest. This is another area that I feel we may need support of your country."
