Relationships
Three-day trip to Africa: Scholz wants gas from Nigeria
For Olaf Scholz, it is the third major trip to Africa since taking office. photo
© Michael Kappeler/dpa
Africa as a side note in German foreign policy? Those days are over. Chancellor Scholz is visiting the continent for the third time in two years – and does not want to return empty-handed.
“Nigeria has the largest gas reserves in Africa,” Scholz told the Nigerian newspaper “The Punch”. “German companies have an interest in gas supplies from Nigeria and look forward to working with Nigerian gas companies.” Germany is also relying on joint initiatives to advance the production of hydrogen as an energy source of the future.
Third trip to Africa in almost two years
Scholz arrived in the Nigerian capital Abuja in the afternoon. After political discussions there, he wanted to travel on to the economic metropolis of Lagos with its 20 million inhabitants and then to Ghana on Monday. This is his third major trip to Africa in his almost two years as Chancellor. His predecessor Angela Merkel (CDU) had just completed a visit to the neighboring continent at the same time in her term of office.
Scholz has decided to devote significantly more attention to the long-neglected continent than before. He also wants to broaden Germany’s international relations as a lesson from Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine. As a consequence of the Russian attack, Germany is now also purchasing liquefied natural gas (LNG) from various parts of the world. Dependencies on individual countries should also be reduced in trade relations – as is currently the case with China.
His first two trips to the continent went to South Africa, traditionally Germany’s most important African partner country, to Kenya in the east and to Senegal and Niger in the west of the continent. In Senegal, Scholz already campaigned for cooperation in the development of gas fields off the country’s coast. This was criticized by climate activists because it is a fossil fuel that generates gases that are harmful to the climate. The federal government argues that gas is still needed for the transition phase to renewable energies.
West Africa: Oil and gas – but also terrorism
Since the end of a military dictatorship in 1999, Nigeria has proven to be one of the most stable democracies in the coup-ravaged region. But the country is slipping further and further into a dangerous mix of economic crisis and ever-worsening uncertainty. In the northeast, the state has had limited success in the fight against Islamist terrorist groups such as Boko Haram for over a decade.
According to the UN, almost 3.5 million people are on the run within the country, and 300,000 Nigerian refugees are in the neighboring countries of Niger and Cameroon. The economic crisis with the highest inflation in almost 20 years is making the situation worse. Experts warn of more migration.
Low recognition rate for asylum seekers from Nigeria
For many years, thousands of refugees from Nigeria applied for asylum in Germany every year. Recently, Nigeria was no longer one of the ten main nationalities for initial applications. From January to September of this year, more than 1,800 initial asylum applications were made by Nigerians in Germany. However, the recognition rate is comparatively low. Almost 14,000 are considered obliged to leave the country. However, repatriation to their home country is difficult because most of them have no papers. This year, 262 Nigerians were deported by the end of September.
Nigeria is therefore one of the countries with which Scholz wants to accelerate the return of migrants who are obliged to leave the country. “We finally have to deport people on a large scale,” said Scholz recently in a “Spiegel” interview. The EU Commission is currently negotiating a repatriation agreement with Nigeria. A bilateral agreement between Germany and Nigeria would then also be possible.
Steinmeier and Faeser also travel to Africa
The Chancellor is not the only member of the government who will be traveling to Africa in the next few days. Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD) is traveling to Morocco on Monday together with the special representative for migration agreements, Joachim Stamp. There, too, it will be about how an agreement can be reached that makes deportations easier and at the same time simplifies the immigration of skilled workers.
Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier also sets off for Africa on Monday. In Zambia and Tanzania the aim is to expand existing partnerships and establish new ones. “The Federal President is in complete agreement with the Federal Chancellor on this,” says the President’s Office.