Uhuru: Kenya, Nigeria headed towards special bilateral partnership

By PSCU

NAIROBI; KENYA: President Uhuru Kenyatta Friday night hailed the growing bilateral relations between Nigeria and Kenya saying the two countries were headed towards a special bilateral partnership.

Speaking at a state banquet he hosted in honour of visiting Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan at State House Nairobi, President Uhuru said their visit signalled the strengthening of bilateral relations between the two countries.

“In every sphere of our interaction, we are seeing growth. Indeed, the last few months have been marked by the highest level of bilateral interactions ever witnessed between Kenya and Nigeria,” said President Uhuru.

He particularly cited the inauguration of a Joint Venture in textiles between the two nations and the decision by Nigerian tycoon Aliko Dangote to invest USD400 million (about Sh34 billion) in a cement processing plant as an indicator that an “exciting journey has begun”.

“As we bring down the barriers to interactions between our peoples, we usher prosperity into our lands,” said President Uhuru.

He said that while Kenya was a world renowned athletics champion, Nigeria was a soccer giant and expressed hope that both countries could learn from each other in those sporting fields.

“It was an undiluted delight to see our athletics team in Moscow beat the Nigerian team at the World Athletics Championships. However, my rejoicing was quickly tempered by the knowledge that come football, Nigeria's fine sportsmen would pay back,” he said.

He said Nigerian literary giants like Chinua Achebe inspired Kenyan literary counterparts like Ngugi wa Thiong’o, and young Kenyan artists and writers were involved in collaborations with Nigerians that have altered writing in Africa.

“Across generations, I know that our young artists and writers are involved in intense collaborations which have already altered the landscape of African writing. We want a proud Africa to stand on the solid foundation of prosperity and real African achievement,” he said.

He continued: “We must put together a sturdy, distinctive and resonant African drum on which our people shall beat out the pace-setting tattoo for the grand march into the future”.

President Uhuru visited Nigeria in July. Earlier on Friday, the two leaders held formal talks.

President Jonathan described the discussions with President Uhuru as fruitful.

He said of great concern to the two leaders was low inter-African trade which stood at between 10 to 20 per cent.

"While trade between Africa and the European Union (EU) stood at 70 per cent and 20 per cent with East Asian countries, inter-African trade was so low. This trend must be reversed," he said.

He said Kenya's discovery of petroleum would propel it to join the elite club of oil producing nations of the world but warned against abandoning Kenya's agricultural and tourism economic mainstay.

"We relied on agriculture but we abandoned it when we struck oil. Today we are going back to the land. We still go to Malaysia to study how they produce and make more money from palm oil than we make from petroleum,” he said.