Government gives up on reviving Ajaokuta before Buhari leaves as Russian war derails talks

NIGERIAN government officials have given up on plans to resuscitate the Ajaokuta Steel Company before the end of the Buhari tenure saying the ingoing Russian-Ukrainian war has derailed the objective that was already threatened by the Covid-19 lockdown.

Ajaokuta mill was built by the Soviets in 1979 but has since fallen into a state of disrepair, with successive Nigerian governments failing to revive it. This current government had plans to bring Russian engineers back to get the facility up and running but the combination of the lockdown and the current war has made this impossible.

Olamilekan Adegbite, Nigeria's minister of mines and steel development, said the Ajaokuta project will now not likely not be completed by the Buhari administration before it leaves office in 2023. He added that before the pandemic, the government had successfully convinced Russia, the original builders of the steel complex, to evaluate its status and consider completing it.

However, the Nigerian government could not proceed with the negotiations due to the force-majeure caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Mr Adegbite said the deal with Russia involved a $2m fee for a technical audit to ascertain the state of the facility before work could begin, pointing out that President Muhammadu Buhari had already approved the payment.

Mr Adegbite  said: “We made frantic efforts to continue the negotiations with Russia after the lockdown but progress was stalled again due to the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine." He added that the government would initiate irreversible processes to ensure the resumption and eventual completion of the steel facility, possibly, beyond the Buhari administration.