Trump tells Buhari $496m Tucano helicopters will be delivered to Nigeria soon

On farmers/ herders conflict Trump said:  “We’ve had serious problems with Christians who have been murdered, killed …We’re going to work on that problem and working on that problem very, very hard.  All levels of governments in Nigeria, local district, national must work together to stop the killings including of Christians and Muslims,” Donald Trump said.

US President Donald Trump has assured that his country will soon release fighter jets worth $496 million to Nigeria to aid the fight against Boko Haram.

He said this just as he charged all levels of government in Nigeria, from district, local, state to national, to work hard together and stop the killings including of Christians and Muslims in the country.

Trump gave the assurance of the jet fighters delivery on Monday at a joint press conference he had with visiting Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari after their meeting in the White House.

The US leader said the aircraft would improve the fight against terrorism in Nigeria.

“We are also helping our Nigerian partners by facilitating intelligence, cooperation and providing training and military equipment to Nigerian forces. For example, we recently sold Nigeria 12 US A-29 Super Tucano aircraft, great aircraft, in the first ever sale of American military equipment to Nigeria.

“This new aircraft will improve Nigeria’s ability to target terrorists and protect civilians,” Trump said.

Asked whether he would release at least two aircraft  by 2020, Trump said: “Real soon. Part of the problem is you weren’t allowed to buy helicopters in our country and now you are. I worked that out so that now you can buy the helicopters that you want.”

“They weren’t allowed to buy the helicopters for various reasons, which frankly weren’t good reasons. Now they get them, and they get them very quickly, and they are the best helicopters in the world.”

The DEFENDER had recently reported how payment for the aircrafts by President Buhari led to some Senators of opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) calling for his impeachment.

Earlier at a meeting with Trump, President Buhari outlined several steps his government has taken to address challenges of insecurity, corruption and economy.

He said to contain the spate of insurgency in Nigeria, his administration has adopted a multi-sector al approach, involving relevant government agencies, to address the socio-economic and political dimensions of the problem.

The president said as part of efforts to address emerging cases of insurgency in Nigeria, the military adopted a non-kinetic counter terrorism/counter insurgency approach code-named ‘Operation safe corridor’ to de-radicalize, re-habilitate, and re-integrate willingly surrendered Boko-Haram members into the larger society.

“This programme is currently embarking on a number of projects including: skill acquisition centres and integrated farms; comprising poultry, fish pond and greenhouse farming, among others.  A number of international partners, including the International Organization for Migration have contributed to the success of Operation Safe Corridor.  We indicated that we would appreciate whatever support we could also get from the US,” he said.

On the violence between herdsmen and farmers, he said his government was taking necessary steps to promote their peaceful co-existence.

The president thanked the US government for cooperating with Nigeria in her effort to recover stolen funds.

He said both governments had put the machinery in place for their respective Attorneys-General to collaborate in ensuring the return to Nigeria of over $500 million of looted funds siphoned away in banks around the world.

“In this connection, we congratulated the US government on launching a Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative which was spearheaded by the US Department of Justice (DOJ) Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering. We hoped that we could continue to count on US support in this area,” he said.

He said Nigeria was grateful for the US support in the reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts in the North East of Nigeria as well as humanitarian assistance to the Internally Displaced Persons through agencies such as the United States Agency for International Development and other international partners.

He affirmed that the USA had been to date the biggest contributor to the humanitarian response and last year gave approximately $500 million in cash and in-kind contributions through the United Nations and other inter-governmental organizations.

“These have mainly supported protection activities, health, food assistance and shelter,” he said.

‘We’re working to free remaining Chibok girls’

He said his administration was doing all it could to secure the release of the remaining abducted school girls from Dapchi and Chibok.

“In this context, we will continue to welcome US collaboration in intelligence gathering, hostage negotiations and information-sharing”.

Buhari said the aim of his administration was to diversify the economy by focusing on agriculture and food security; power and infrastructure.

“We have cut the importation of rice by about 90% thereby saving a significant amount of money.   We very much welcomed increased US investment in the Nigerian economy, especially in the non-oil sector.

“Economic relations between Nigeria and the United States are anchored on three major instruments, namely: the Bi-National Commission (BNC), Trade and Investment Framework Agreement (TIFA) and the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA).  The Bi-National Commission in particular, comprising bilateral political, economic, developmental and humanitarian partnership, is a basic economic framework for engagement between our two countries.”

President Buhari said Nigeria’s trade volume with the United States stood at $6.07 billion according to 2016 statistics and comprised $4.176 billion worth of Nigerian exports to the US and $1.894 billion US exports to Nigeria, urging greater effort to increase these figures substantially.

On human rights, he said the Federal Government remained deeply committed to the principles of human rights as well as the promotion and protection of people’s freedom, even in the process of fighting terror.

“We commit to ensure that all documented cases of human rights abuses are investigated and those responsible for violations held accountable for their actions,” he said.

US President Donald Trump, while receiving Buhari at White House, said “Nigeria has massive reputation for corruption. I discussed it with the president and we agreed to do something on it. We are working to cut the corruption cases down.”

President Trump however noted that President Buhari’s fight against graft is commendable.

“We talked about that, he is working on it and they have made a lot of progress and I think they will continue to make a lot of progress.”

He said it was in the best interest of the U.S. and its businesses in Nigeria that Buhari’s anti-graft war succeeds.

Trump said, “We have a lot of people in this country that invests in Nigeria, so cutting down on that corruption element and a corrupt element is very important to us and the President will be able to do that.”

On farmers/ herders conflict Trump said:  “We’ve had serious problems with Christians who have been murdered, killed …We’re going to work on that problem and working on that problem very, very hard.  All levels of governments in Nigeria, local district, national must work together to stop the killings including of Christians and Muslims,” Donald Trump said.