UK Government Supports Nigeria Counter-IED Kit Worth £1m

The fight against insurgency in Nigeria has been boosted with the United Kingdom promising to provide counter-IED kit worth £1m.

The United Kingdom’s Minister of Armed Forces, Mark Lancaster, revealed this when he met with Nigeria’s Defence Minister, Mansur Dan-Ali, in London on the sidelines of the concluded Commonwealth meeting.

The gift is part of the collaboration between the two nations to combat terrorism.
“It’s in both the UK and Nigeria’s interest that we tackle the issue of terrorism in Nigeria,” Lancaster said.

Both men are hopeful that the kit would be helpful in foiling bomb attack by Boko Haram on innocent Nigerians.

The Defence Minister said talks were held about terrorism, training of the Nigerian military and other global security issues.

Apart from security issues, Nigeria is also said to be receiving positive responses from prospective investors regarding doing business in Nigeria.

Nigeria’s Ambassador to the UK, George Oguntade, said that the recent feed back from investors were encouraging.

The Ambassador also said the process of obtaining Nigerian Visa has been made more effective.

He said visas could now be processed in only a matter of days as the delays that characterised the process in the past have been eliminated.

Oguntade said, “We had a list of applicants that ran into thousands and that created a bad feeling between applicants for passports and the High Commission. So much so that they were almost throwing stones at us here.

“But we immediately took control of the problems, ascertained what the problems were and set to work to eliminate them and thank God we have succeeded.”