By Ebuka Onyekwelu, Ph.D
About a week after his earlier comment that his country speaks better English than Nigeria, the President of Kenya, William Ruto, has taken another shot at Nigeria, pointing out that despite the country’s vast oil reserve and oil-producing status, Nigeria struggled with petrol scarcity until they were rescued by an “African”. President Ruto made this comment while he was addressing guests at the Infrastructure Summit in Nairobi, the capital of Kenya. According to Ruto, “Nigeria has been a producer of oil for all the years that we know. Yet, when you went to Nigeria, there were queues of people looking for fuel in petrol stations for a long time. Until one African steps forward and builds a refinery. Aliko Dangote, here”, President Ruto said.
The Summit, which was attended by Nigerian businessman and Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, was convened by the President of the East African country for conversation on the path to energy alternatives for his country and the region. Kenyan and Tanzanian leaders are supporting Dangote, a Nigerian businessman, to build a refinery in the region to serve East Africa. So far, there are indications that the two countries and Dangote have agreed to a 650, 000 bpd refinery in the region.
Commending Dangote, Ruto insists that Africans have what it takes to solve their own problems internally and meet their needs if they can leverage what it already has.
However, President Ruto’s comment that carefully removed Dangote’s Nigerian origin while mocking Nigeria’s inability to meet the fuel needs of its people for a long time, even as an oil-producing country, leaves more to be desired, particularly given his recent comment on Nigeria’s spoken English.
