Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA) has sought urgent review of the nation’s foreign policy, to reflect domestication and economic development.The institute also emphasised the need for Nigeria to adopt a sound economic strategy as prerequisite for effective foreign policy.

This was the crux during NIIA’s roundtable, themed ‘Charting the Way Forward: Nigeria’s Foreign Policy under President Bola Tinubu’, held in Lagos, yesterday. NIIA Director General, Prof. Eghosa Osaghae, said economic condition is an intricate part of foreign policy, as citizens’ satisfaction has domestic and external dimensions. He said there has to be strong nexus between domestic and external environment, and demands of policies.

“There is need to strengthen the home base, in terms of capacity, and have an effective showing in the global arena. We need economic diversification, development, and it involves everyone playing a role,” he said.

Osaghae added that the topic was timely because Nigerians have communicated high expectation concerning foreign policy.

Research Fellow at NIIA, Dr Omotola Ilesanmi, advocated a Nigeria-centric foreign policy, saying the nation should focus first on its domestic front by addressing current challenges, which would then produce a ripple effect externally.

According to her, the country’s poor economy and a plethora of domestic challenges incapacitate its external relations. She said foreign policy under the current administration should be premised on transforming Nigeria into an economic and industrial hub in Africa because without economic power and political stability, the country would not be respected globally.

Associate professor, NIIA, Dr. Joshua Bolarinwa, while presenting a paper on ‘Nigeria’s Foreign Policy Challenges, 1999 to 2023’, recommended that the policy be reviewed urgently and repackaged in the light of new challenges in the world order.

He said since all foreign policies spring from the economic base of a state, Nigeria’s economic base should be re-orientated in a manner that the country’s dependency structure would be removed and a national economy that is capable of sustaining a realistic foreign policy goal would be built.

He explained: “It is politically logical that Nigeria matches her foreign policy with her real economic status, and not an imaginary one. With debt burden and crisis bugging the country, and with attendant appalling state of social infrastructure, it is time the foreign policy objectives were skewed in favour of economic determinism. It simply does not make sense for Nigeria to continue with her ‘Spray Diplomacy’, while she still takes foreign loans.”

Research Professor, NIIA, Femi Otubanjo, speaking on ‘Nigeria’s Foreign Policy and Security Imperatives in the Sahel’, urged the Tinubu administration to understand underlying factors of instability and insecurity, which he listed as neo-colonialism, international Jihadism, mineral resources, debts and dependence, desertification, migration and weakness of national and regional responses capacities.