The
U.S. said on Tuesday that the agenda being pursued by President Muhammadu
Buhari’s administration were in line with its expectations.
The
Deputy Director, Office of West African Affairs, Bureau of African Affairs at
the U.S. Department of State, Mr Nathan Holt, made the remarks on Tuesday from
Washington, D.C. via teleconference on: ‘Nigeria, a critical U.S. partner’.
Holt
said: “In 2015, Nigeria had a very important election. It elected Muhammadu
Buhari as president.
“This
represented the first time in Nigerian history that there was a peaceful,
democratic transfer of power from one party to an opposition party.
“It
was a milestone not only for Nigeria, but really for Africa as a whole.
“President
Buhari’s electoral platform was that he wanted to fight insecurity,
particularly the depredations of Boko Haram and other forces in the northeast.
“He
wanted to grow the Nigerian economy, create jobs for its growing population,
and he wanted to fight corruption.
“Well,
the nice thing about that agenda is that it meshes very well with our own.
“That
is – those are areas of focus that very much are consistent with U.S. interests
in Nigeria. We too want to partner with Nigeria and its neighbours to fight
terrorism.
“We
too support private-sector-led economic growth. And we are very much in favour
of President Buhari’s campaign against corruption,” the U.S. envoy on African
Affairs, said.
Holt
also spoke on his country’s decision to cut foreign aid, assistance, and
payments to UN programmes but pledged continued robust U.S. assistance to
Nigeria and other countries in West Africa.
According
to him, the U.S. remains the leading humanitarian donor in the humanitarian,
bilateral development assistance and the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS
Relief (PEPFAR)
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