Justice Minister, Abubakar Malami, has hired two American lobbying and public relations firms to plant opinion article favourable to the President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration in American newspapers, PREMIUM TIMES can report today.

Mr. Malami’s action came to light more than five years after this newspaper exposed the Goodluck Jonathan government for spending several thousand dollars on arranging interviews for administration’s officials on U.S. media outlets.

Officials at the Nigerian embassy in Washington have always wondered why administration officials preferred to waste public funds on American lobbyists rather than take advantage of the resources at the country’s diplomatic mission there.

“One of our jobs is to relate with American institutions on behalf of our country, but we are hardly used,” one embassy official said, asking not to be named for fear of being victimised. “We have extensive contacts within the media here . So why our people keep wasting money on hiring lobbyists remain unclear.”

READ MORE: EXCLUSIVE: AGF Malami hires American firms to plant pro-Buhari op-ed in U.S. papers