Turkish Ambassador to Nigeria, Mehmet Poroy, says Türkiye intends to scale up its current two billion dollars trade volume with Nigeria to $5billion.
According to the Turkish envoy, during the recent visit of President Bola Tinubu to Türkiye, agreements were signed aimed at deepening Turkish-Nigeria relations in various fields.
Speaking on Tuesday during a courtesy call to the Managing Director of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Malam Ali M. Ali, the ambassador described trade and investment as “the second most important part of Turkish-Nigeria relations.”
Poroy said that following the agreements signed, Türkiye was now working on scaling up its investment portfolios in Nigeria to hit five billion dollars trade volume target.
“As you know, the two Presidents have agreed to a bilateral trade of 5 billion dollars. This is the target we will work on.
“One of the tools that we will use is the joint declaration signed between the two ministers of trade. We will use it to establish a joint economic and trade council.
“So when this joint council becomes operational, we will discuss the possibilities of our trade,” he said.
The Turkish envoy disclosed that Türkiye already has an investment of about 400 million dollars in Abuja alone, besides some of its big companies operating in the southern part of Nigeria.
“So, there is a big potential here for Turkey, as well as for Nigeria, to increase this investment,” he stressed.
He also disclosed that Turkey’s total investment in Africa currently stood at about 10 billion dollars, adding that there was need to bolster bilateral trade with Nigeria, considering her huge potential.
The ambassador said that in liaison with authorities in Türkiye, he was already facilitating the procedures for obtaining Turkish visa, so that business people on both sides could get it seamlessly.
“Before coming here, I heard that people were complaining about the Turkish visa.
“Not only for Nigerian business people, but Turkish business people, who also need to come here in an easier way.
“They have also difficulties, so we are in discussion to see how we can further facilitate people-to-people contact,” he said.
Poroy said Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TICA) would soon open an office in Abuja to further increase Türkiye’s cooperation with Nigeria in the areas of education and healthcare, among many others.
He said that Turkish airlines, with seven flights in a week from Abuja to Istanbul, and four to five flights in a week from Abuja to Istanbul, is essential for Turkish-Nigeria trade.
Responding, Ali said he was deeply honoured by the ambassador’s visit, and expressed his desire to strengthen the partnership between the agency and the embassy.
He said that NAN, which was established 50 years ago, as the voice of Africa, was the biggest news content provider in West and, in deed, the African continent.
Ali recalled that NAN was in the forefront of the fight against apartheid, especially during the struggle for independence for South Africa, and the end of White minority rule.
He said that the agency took off with about 11 foreign offices, currently has offices across all the 36 states of federation, and 109 district offices in each of Nigeria’s senatorial districts.
“What the News Agency of Nigeria does is to take local news to national news and national news to the international stage.
“And that’s why we have several MoUs with foreign media partners, like the Turkish news agency, Andolu, the Indonesian news agency, the UK’s Reuters, the Chinese news agency, Xinhua, and so many others,” he said.
The NAN MD said he was delighted with the Turkish news agency over the MoU it signed with NAN a couple of years back for the exchange of news and capacity-building, saying it was mutually rewarding.
“This had culminated in a greater relationship between the news agency of Nigeria and the Turkish news agency.
“One of our colleagues here is going to be in your country later in April on invitation for an event. He’s the only one from Nigeria. So over time, our relationship has been mutually beneficial,” he said.
He said that NAN had pivoted to a multimedia platform, and had commenced broadcasting in indigenous languages, beginning with Hausa, which is the most widely spoken language in West and Central Africa.
The managing director also said that the agency would expand its operations in the long run to include other languages like French and Arabic.
He said that NAN would like to emulate the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT), which has become an alternative to Western media agencies, like the BBC, and is changing narratives.
“We are hoping that with time, long-term plan, the world becoming increasingly a global village, we will also start broadcasting in Turkish languages,” he added.
