By Dotun Olayemi

When Russia hosts the Third Russia–Africa Summit in Moscow on October 28 and 29, as usual, the speeches will be grand. There will be talk of partnership, sovereignty and mutual respect. Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said Moscow anticipates the signing of a ‘substantial package’ of intergovernmental agreements and commercial contracts at the summit. But the common man on Nigerian streets, the trader, the student or job seeker, is more interested in how such bilateral relations translate to better living for them.

Think of it like a market woman who has been promised goods on credit many times. Before she accepts another promise, she checks whether the last one was ever delivered. That is exactly how Nigeria should treat this summit.

The clearest example is nuclear power. In 2017, Nigeria and Russia signed agreements for Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear corporation, to cooperate on the construction and operation of a nuclear power plant and a nuclear research Centre in Nigeria.

The agreements followed earlier discussions between the Nigeria Atomic Energy Commission and Rosatom over four plants, estimated at about $20 billion and 4,800 megawatts by 2035. The 2017 agreements covered feasibility studies, implementation schedules and financing arrangements, with Geregu in Kogi State and Itu in Akwa Ibom State identified as preferred sites.

Nearly a decade later, no Russian-built nuclear plant has been completed, and the broader nuclear programme has no published construction schedule.

Not one. We are still counting generators and buying fuel while the lights go out.

This does not automatically mean Russia acted in bad faith. Nuclear plants are very hard to build. They need huge money, government approvals, a good site, a strong national grid and political agreement that lasts for decades. But it shows the gap between signing a paper and switching on power.

The trade numbers complicate the summit’s promise of industrial partnership. According to UN Comtrade data, Nigeria imported about $676 million worth of goods from Russia in 2024, a sharp fall from roughly $1.51 billion in 2023.

What Nigeria buys from Russia is telling. The relationship is dominated by primary and semi-processed commodities; mineral fuels and oil products, cereals, especially wheat, fertilizers, and fish. These are goods that matter for energy supply, food prices and farming, but they are not the factories, power plants, machinery or technology transfers that summit rhetoric often promises.

The most striking measure is capital goods. Available Comtrade-derived data indicate that Nigeria’s imports from Russia under the machinery, nuclear-reactor and boilers category were only about $12,690 in 2024, roughly the value of a modest piece of industrial equipment, not the foundation of a nuclear-power programme. The figure should be treated cautiously because Comtrade product categories can be revised, but the broader pattern is clear; Russia’s commercial presence in Nigeria remains overwhelmingly commodity-based rather than industrial.

For Russia, meanwhile, Nigeria is a marginal market. Russian Ambassador to Nigeria Andrey Podelyshev said Russia’s global exports rose to $434 billion in 2024. Set beside that figure, Nigeria’s $676 million in imports from Russia represents about 0.16 per cent of Russia’s worldwide exports, a useful measure of how small Nigeria is within Moscow’s global commercial map.

The imbalance is equally stark. In 2023, Nigeria imported $1.51 billion from Russia but exported only about $10.02 million to Russia, mainly cocoa products, according to UN Comtrade figures cited by Voice of Nigeria. That is not a partnership of two industrial economies trading finished goods and technology; it is largely a one-way flow of Russian commodities into Nigerian households, farms and fuel markets.

Here is the interesting part. Russia and the African Union say they will review their 2023 to 2026 action plans, look for “gaps” in what was done, and adopt a new plan for 2027 to 2029. If Russia itself admits there are gaps, Nigerians are right to ask where they are.

There is also a reason to be careful. Russia is fighting an expensive war, and sanctions make payments, shipping, insurance and buying technology more difficult. A country in that position may find it hard to fund big, slow projects abroad. So Nigeria must separate a real, financed project from a nice-looking paper that makes headlines and then goes quiet.

The proposal at the heart of this feature is a “Russia–Nigeria Promise Tracker”. It is simple. Every promise is written down with its date, who signed it, the amount, the agency in charge, where the money comes from, the deadline and its status. The status would be one of five words: funded, in progress,
stalled, cancelled or unverifiable.

It would cover five areas; defense and security, energy, infrastructure, education and technology, and trade and finance. The tests should be things anyone can see. How many megawatts were connected? How many kilometres of road or rail were built? How many bags of fertiliser arrived? How many Nigerian students got scholarships? How many local jobs were created?

Before signing anything new, Nigeria’s delegation should tell the public the full scope, cost, timeline and financing of each project, whether Russia delivered on earlier promises to Nigeria, how many local jobs will be created and what technology will be shared, what happens if the deal collapses, including exit and liability terms and a public dashboard, updated every three months.

The media has a job too. Every new announcement from Russia should be placed beside an old, unfulfilled one. A new energy deal should sit beside the nuclear agreement of 2017. New security agreements should be read beside past defence pledges. New scholarships should be compared with earlier education promises.

Nigeria is not wrong to talk to Russia. A big country can and should widen its friendships, especially when it needs investment, technology and room to manoeuvre. The real question is whether Russia is offering a partnership that can deliver, or a pile of announcements that keep its influence alive at low cost.

So after every handshake at the summit, one question should follow, and every Nigerian should be able to ask it plainly. What changes for Nigerians, and when?

Olayemi is a public affairs analyst, he wrote from Lagos, and can be reached on
[email protected]