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By Lawrence Agbo
Former Nigerian permanent representative to the UN in Geneva, Ambassador Humphrey Orjiakor, has stated that President Donald Trump’s transactional approach and strategic access in Nigeria shape US-Nigeria diplomacy.
Amb. Humphrey made this statement during an interview with ARISE NEWS on Wednesday.
“President Donald Trump, as noted by many analysts, is a transactional president. The calculation he and his officials are doing tends to be where the transaction is most profitable; they concentrate effort there.
“However, there is something many of us outside the diplomatic practice miss. Take a country like Nigeria. If an acting envoy is given free access to the commanding authorities, including the President and Vice President, he is accomplishing on the cheap what a plenipotentiary would be lobbying for. Sometimes I see that playing out. In Nigeria, a first secretary can walk straight to the Villa and get the information they want and send it back to Washington.
“The downside is that if there is no plenipotentiary, their word doesn’t carry the same weight. When the Americans dropped Tomahawks in Sokoto, some reports said it was based on information from a ‘screwdriver seller.’ That is ridiculous. The ridiculousness may arise because there was no plenipotentiary of the US government here whose word would carry weight over lobbyists”, he explained.
The lack of a confirmed ambassador weakens Nigeria’s relationship with the US, according to Ambassador Humphrey, who emphasised the necessity of a plenipotentiary to enable successful diplomacy.
“There is no gainsaying, foreign policy is one of the key instruments any government has to resolve domestic and external problems. A plenipotentiary is a trustee of the President. Something substantial gets lost when diplomacy is handled by acting envoys”, he stated.
When asked if Nigeria could legitimately protest delays in ambassadorial assignments, given that it has experienced comparable difficulties, Amb. Humphrey responded as follows:
“The government has finally rethought that. They’ve appointed and screened people through the Senate, but there is a process: agrément. The host government has to agree to accept the person. You can’t just travel until you get that document. Waiting this long was definitely a strategic miscalculation, especially for strategic missions like Washington.”
When asked if he was pleased with the calibre of ambassadors-designate, Ambassador Humphrey responded as follows:
“Something is going on in the diplomatic community right now. Retired career ambassadors are quarreling over the ‘bastardization’ of the title. Everyone answers ‘Ambassador’ now, even if they are just an ambassador of a brand. If you go out of your way to appoint people with controversies about their character, you are raising a problem for the mission and the community. Even traders can now be seen as an authority because Nigeria had no legitimate authority to speak for it in Washington. Lobbies cannot substitute for the President’s representative.”
In response to a query about whether the US is giving China and Russia strategic ground, Ambassador Orjiakor cautioned that it is risky to leave diplomatic voids in important areas.
“Even for a superpower, leaving a vacuum in strategic places like the Sahel down to Nigeria is dangerous. The American mission in Abuja is one of the biggest in the world. To keep it vacant ignores the strategic significance Washington once placed on it. When you leave that open, you see the kind of complaints Congress sent to President Trump lately about the influence of China and Russia. That is a vacuum the US created”, he explained.
In response to President Tinubu’s three-year delay in filling important diplomatic positions, Ambassador Orjiakor called the extended vacancy “unprecedented in his 35 years in the foreign service.”
“In my 35 years in the foreign service, I don’t think there was any time Nigeria had vacant missions like this”, he stated.
Adding: “We hear excuses about funding and budgetary difficulties, but in diplomatic circles, that is a hard sell, especially when it’s all missions with no exceptions. I’m hoping that since names have been sent, they are just waiting for the agrément to arrive”, he said.
Amb. Humphrey also reaffirmed how crucial it is to wait for official approval before making posting announcements because doing so too soon can cause serious diplomatic issues.
“It is prudent to wait for the agrément before announcing a posting. I’ve seen cases where a posting to London was announced in advance, the British government said ‘no’, and it caused a lot of trouble. I’ve seen people hope for China and get sent to Vienna, which causes hell with their local supporters who wanted to do business in China. It is a fascinating world”, he remarked
