- Spain’s Ambassador to Nigeria, Alfonso Sebastian de Erice said it spent about 6.5 billion Euros last year to buy oil and gas from Nigeria. He made this statement during his visit to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt. Hon. Yakubu Dogara at the National Assembly. He pledged his country’s commitment to assisting Nigeria in its fight against terrorism.
- The Spanish authorities, appreciating the existing bilateral relations between Spain and Nigeria, expressed readiness to help Nigeria boost local production of crude oil through partnership to transform the existing refineries.
- He also expressed Spain’s readiness to partner Nigeria in the area of agricultural development.
He said: “Spain is one of the partners of Nigeria, the first or the second best client. We buy 6.5 billion euros of oil and gas. Yes we are very happy with the exchanges that we have, we need the oil but we want to diversify because we think it’s very important that our economic relations do not be only in gas and petrol, we have to diversify.
“We want to cooperate with you in agriculture, we have very good agricultural industry, we have comparative advantage in tourism, manufacturing, you have people who are very well prepared. We have several treaties that allow us to work here. It’s a domain that we will have to explore. For us the oil business is important because we need it but we want to diversity and I know that Nigerian authorities also want to diversify.”
- The Ambassador while speaking on terrorist attack in the country, said his country is ready to provide support towards combating the menace.
- He said Spain and relevant agencies in Nigeria have signed several memorandum of understandings (MoUs) on training and anti-terrorism.
- Source: NAN
