Title:
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Africa the Centre-piece of Nigeria's Foreign Policy
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This thesis examines Nigeria's foreign policy framework as it relates to
Africa. Nigeria sees Africa as the main focus ofits foreign policy. It focuses on
what constitutes Nigeria's foreign policy objectives and how over the years the
said objectives have been played out. Therefore the aim is to understand how
Nigeria has been able to translate foreign policy pronouncements into action
based policies.
The theme of the thesis is that Africa is the centre point of Nigeria's
foreign policy which does provide Nigeria a leadership role within. the
continent. A role believed to have been bestowed upon Nigeria given her size, population of over 120 million people and endowment in natural resources.
There is no doubt that Nigeria enjoys such a position and has played quite some
significant positive role in decolonisation, fall of apartheid, racism and
economic development in Africa. From the ECOWAS sub region where
Nigeria has hegemonic influence to the extra regional UN, Nigeria remains
constant in her championing ofAfrican issues
Nigeria realjses the dilemma in which African states find themselves, and
that their international relations carry the burden of having to deal with the
drastic effect of colonial rule. Many weaker African states are relegated to the
background in virtually all spheres of life, and hence they often operate from
dependent positions with the rest of the world; however an afro-centric posture
has continued to dominate Nigeria's international politics.
The dynamism in Nigeria's foreign policy is depicted clearly in the fact
that since independence in 1960 Africa has continued to remain a constant
feature in the practice ofNigeria's foreign policy. It also seems that Africa will
in the years to come continue to receive high priority as a national interest in
Nigeria's foreign policy objectives.
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