Border Closure: Nigeria Meets Benin, Niger Republics

The Nigerian government on Thursday met with foreign ministers from neighbouring Benin Republic and Niger over the recent border closure by Africa’s most populous country.

Concise News reports that the Tripartite Committee Meeting was called to consider the conditions put forward by Nigeria before the land borders can be opened for importation of goods.

The committee had yet to reveal the outcome of the meeting at the time of publishing this report.

The Nigerian government had met two weeks ago to set conditions for reopening of the country’s borders.

Nigeria’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama, had said that the conditions were spelled out by the country’s inter-ministerial committee to protect the nation’s economy by stopping dumping.

Onyeama listed other conditions to include that any import coming into Nigeria must retain its original packaging from the country of origin.

He said, “There should be no modification whatsoever to the packaging on those goods imported into an ECOWAS member state destined for Nigeria.

“So, with the original packaging, they must be escorted from the port directly and transferred to the Nigerian Customs Service.

“For goods predominantly produced in ECOWAS Member States, the rules of origin must be certified, so we have to avoid any possibilities of dumping.

“So, if goods are produced in ECOWAS member states, those goods must be in majority produced in those countries or if they are coming from outside ECOWAS, the value addition made by an ECOWAS country must be over 30 per cent.”