The Turkish ambassador to Nigeria, Mr Hakan Cakil has said that Turkey has invested over $600million in Nigeria so far.
Of these investments, $450 million is direct Turkish investments in the country while the remaining $200 million are investments in partnership with Nigerians,
The envoy, who stated this during an interaction with some journalists in Abuja on Tuesday, October 25, said Turkey has a “strategic economic relationship with Nigeria. Nigeria is Turkey’s strategic partner in Sub-Saharan Africa. This relationship dates back to more than 50 years.”
He said in 2014 alone, the volume of trade between Nigeria and Turkey was $2.5 billion but the figure dropped to $1.5 billion in 2015 because of the crash of the crude oil prices in the international market.”
He said there are over 70 Turkish companies currently operating in Nigeria. He said Turkey enjoys a strategic business relationship with Nigeria in the oil and gas sector.
“Nigeria is one of the biggest providers of liquefied natural gas to Turkey. Turkey imports gas from Russia, Qatar and Algeria but Nigeria provides us with LNG unlike the three other countries,” Ambassador Cakil said.
He said in the forthcoming Turkey-African Business Forum scheduled for November, two sets of official delegations are attending from Nigeria.
“Unlike other African countries that have only one set official delegation, Nigeria has two sets of official delegations from the Federal Ministry of Trade and Investments and the Nigerian Investments Promotion Council (NIPC).
According to him, more than 60 businessmen are scheduled to attend the summit. This shows the level of business relationship that exit between the two countries and strategic importance of Nigeria to our country,” the diplomat said.
