Speaker of the HOUSE of Representatives Femi Gbajabiamila is in Ghana to meet with his Ghanaian counterpart over the misunderstanding between the two countries.
He told journalists at the Presidential Villa after a meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari that he was at the Villa to rub minds with the President on the diplomatic row. He said his planned visit was a “Legislative Diplomacy”.
He had last week described the closure of Nigerian shops in Ghana as a contravention of Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) trade protocols and called for a decisive solution between both countries.
He said, “It is a usual engagement, like we always say when issues come up. I see Mr. President and find out and run things by him and we discuss issues. One of the issues we discussed today is that I will be leaving for Ghana tomorrow (Wednesday) to meet with the Speaker of the Parliament in Ghana to look at the issues on the ground as they affect our citizens. Then, we will try and calm things down and see if there’s a way forward.
“I’ll meet with the Speaker tomorrow. I informed the President and he’s aware of every single step that we are taking all the way. We hope that we’ll come to an amicable settlement, one way or the other.
“It’s called Legislative Diplomacy. If you remember very well, during the days when I was Leader of the House, I led the delegation to South Africa during the crisis there with Nigerians. We were able to accomplish quite a bit, to simmer things down at that time,” he said.
Gbajabiamila added that his consultation would involve demands to the Ghanaian government, saying “No demands; we are just going to discuss in the spirit of African Parliaments and we’ll be looking at issues from time to time as they affect African countries. This is one of them.”
The speaker declined comments on the relationship between the two countries.
