$700bn Minerals: Ex-Envoy Warns FG Against Making Nigeria A Pawn
$700bn Minerals: Ex-Envoy Warns FG Against Making Nigeria A Pawn
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu
A former Nigerian envoy has warned the Federal Government against allowing the country to become a pawn in the rivalry between the United States and China as it pursues cooperation with the US in the solid minerals sector.
Ambassador Akinremi Alade Bolaji, a former Director of Economic, Trade and Investment at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Nigeria’s former High Commissioner to Singapore, said the government must ensure that its engagement with major global powers is guided by national interests rather than external political and economic rivalries.
He spoke with THE WHISTLER while assessing the diplomatic and economic implications of the Nigeria-US strategic cooperation framework in the solid minerals sector.
Nigeria and the United States signed the framework on September 23, 2026, on the sidelines of the 81st United Nations General Assembly in New York.
The agreement, signed by Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake, and US Deputy Secretary of State, Christopher Landau, concerns cooperation in geological exploration, mineral development and processing, infrastructure and technical capacity-building.
The Federal Government estimates the country’s mineral resources at about $700bn. It has clarified that the figure represents the estimated value of Nigeria’s mineral endowment, not the value of the agreement or minerals being sold to the United States.
Ambassador Bolaji said Nigeria should pursue the partnership with the US without jeopardising its existing relations with China, which already has commercial interests in the country’s mining sector.Buy Maps
He described the growing competition among major powers for access to critical minerals as a major diplomatic consideration for Nigeria, warning that the country could lose room to pursue its interests if it allowed the rivalry to dictate its foreign economic policy.
“Nigeria must adopt a policy of strategic non-alignment in great-power economic competition, supported by active, principled and interest-driven multi-alignment,” he said.
The former envoy said Nigeria’s cooperation with the US should not be viewed as an attempt to displace China, noting that its relationship with China extends beyond mining to infrastructure, trade, manufacturing, telecommunications and other sectors.
He said the government should also be open to partnerships with the European Union, Japan, South Korea, India and other countries, provided their investments meet Nigeria’s development priorities and regulatory requirements.Buy Maps
“Our foreign policy should not be pro-American or anti-Chinese, nor pro-Chinese or anti-American. It should be unequivocally pro-Nigeria,” Bolaji said.
He said the United States was also pursuing its own economic and strategic interests through the agreement to diversify critical mineral supply chains and reduce dependence on concentrated sources of production and processing.
Some of the critical minerals are used in electric vehicle batteries, renewable energy systems, advanced electronics, telecommunications, aerospace and defence technologies, which make them an increasingly contested resource among major economies.
Bolaji said Nigeria’s geological potential, geographical position and economic prospects had made it strategically relevant to the US, but urged the government to negotiate terms that would deliver tangible benefits to the country.
He identified local processing and industrialisation, technology transfer, investment, employment, access to international markets and stronger regulatory institutions as priorities for the government.
He said Nigeria should move beyond extracting minerals for export by developing domestic processing facilities and industries capable of retaining more economic value within the country.
“The strategic objective must be to transform Nigeria’s mineral endowment into Nigerian industrial capacity, not merely into foreign supply-chain security,” he said.
The former diplomat warned that Nigeria risked repeating the experience of the crude oil industry, where the country exports natural resources while much of the value addition, technological development and industrial benefits take place elsewhere.
He also stressed the need for the agreement to build Nigeria’s technical capacity and guarantee meaningful participation by local businesses across the mining value chain.
Speaking further, Bolaji said Nigeria must retain sovereign ownership and regulatory authority over its mineral resources, urging the government to ensure that all investment arrangements comply with the Constitution, the Nigerian Minerals and Mining Act 2007 and other applicable laws.
He warned against transfer pricing, tax avoidance, illicit financial flows and the under-declaration of mineral exports, saying the government must ensure that the country receives appropriate revenue from its resources.
He also called for clear provisions on environmental protection, community participation and the security of geological information, which he described as strategic national assets.
The ex-envoy said the government must strengthen coordination among relevant ministries, agencies and security institutions to tackle illegal mining, mineral smuggling and criminal networks operating around mining communities.
On the diplomatic implications of the agreement, he said the partnership could deepen Nigeria-US relations by extending cooperation beyond traditional areas such as security, counterterrorism, trade and development assistance.
However, he cautioned against treating the signing of the framework as evidence that investment, technology transfer or industrial development would automatically follow.
“I would distinguish between the diplomatic promise of an agreement and its actual economic value,” he said.
“The signing of a framework does not, by itself, guarantee investment, technology transfer, employment or industrial development. These outcomes depend on the quality of implementation, the commercial arrangements that follow and the safeguards built into the partnership.”
He urged the Federal Government to make the framework accessible to the public and provide regular updates on its implementation, saying Nigerians should be able to assess the terms of the partnership and the benefits accruing to the country.
“Transparency is not a concession to public pressure; it is an obligation of responsible governance,” he said.
The Federal Government inaugurated the Nigeria-US Strategic Cooperation Committee on October 27, 2026, to coordinate the implementation of the framework.
Bolaji stressed that the government must maintain its engagement with the US without compromising its relationship with China or shutting out other international partners.
“Ultimately, Nigeria must graduate from being merely a country endowed with strategic natural resources to becoming a country that exercises strategic influence through those resources,” he said.
