Human rights lawyer Omoyele Sowore has said President Bola Tinubu’s trip to the United Kingdom offers no benefit to Nigeria, describing it as a “diplomatic excursion”.
Tinubu is currently in the UK on the first official visit by a Nigerian leader to the country in decades. However, Sowore, the presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) in the 2023 election, argued that the visit adds no value.
“These visits are nothing more than diplomatic excursions. Perhaps the president will also see his doctors; he has not travelled in about a month,” Sowore said during an interview on Channels Television’s The Morning Brief on Wednesday.
“I’m just saying, beyond the fanfare you are seeing on TV, it’s not bringing anything to Nigeria that Nigeria cannot get or should not have. That’s the point I’m making, and we are just deceiving ourselves all the time by saying this time we travel.”
President Tinubu has undertaken several foreign trips since assuming office in 2023, which his administration says are aimed at attracting investment.
However, Sowore, a vocal critic of the president, insisted that no “single dime” has been brought into the country as a result of those trips.
He described the travels as wasteful, saying Nigeria is “just burning fuel in the air with our aircraft”.
“The cost of these travels is far more at the end, outweighing whatever we come from the so-called investment they claim is going to happen,” Sowore said.
“If you have it right, investors will come to your country. You don’t need to travel.”
He added that Nigerian musicians and entertainers often generate more revenue for the country during their international tours.
“Sometimes, some of these our musicians who go and perform in the UK bring more money into the country than when the president travels to the UK or anywhere,” he said.
Tinubu is expected to meet King Charles III as part of the first state visit between Nigeria and the UK in nearly four decades.
The president has visited Britain several times during his tenure, with both countries maintaining strong ties in trade, aid, and defence. London is also home to a large Nigerian diaspora.
Tinubu and his wife, Oluremi, arrived on Tuesday at London’s Stansted Airport.