President Muhammadu Buhari will depart Abuja Friday (today) to participate in the 5th Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) Summit in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea.
This was disclosed in a statement on Thursday by Mallam Garba Shehu, Senior Special Assistant to the President on media & Publicity.
Apart from the Nigerian leader, the one-day meeting will be attended by leaders of major gas producing nations of the world namely, Algeria, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Libya, Bolivia, Iran, Qatar, Russia, Trinidad and Tobago, United Arab Emirates, Venezuela, Kazakhstan and Norway, whose countries account for 70 per cent and 80 per cent of global gas reserves and production respectively.
The statement noted that the idea of the GECF was first mooted in 2001 when the First Ministerial Meeting held in Tehran, Iran, while the First GECF otherwise called Gas Summit, took place in Doha, Qatar in 2011 with Nigeria represented at the highest level.
President Buhari reportedly received an invitation to attend the summit on November 19, 2019. The invitation was said to have been delivered by the Special Envoy of President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, Mr Gabriel Mbega Obiang Lima.
Meanwhile, minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama; Minister of State, Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva; Minister of Mines and Steel Development, Olamilekan Adegbite; and the Group Managing Director, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Mele Kolo Kyari are all expected to be on Buhari’s entourage.