Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Geoffrey Onyeama, on Sunday
gave assurances Nigeria's Ambassador-Designates would be posted out by the end
of 2016.
Screening of the
Ambassador-Designates ended at the Senate in July.
Onyeama spoke with the
News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in New York, on the sideline of the 71st UN
General Assembly in New York.
The Minister admitted
that there are concerns about high representations in Nigerian Missions and
Embassies across the world.
“Ideally, we should have
it done by the end of the year; that’s ideally.
“But we know, we do not
live in an ideal world; we will do our very best, but believe you me, it is a
major concern for the Ministry and for me personally.
“Its not something that
we are happy about, though it’s taken time, there are reasons for that but we
are trying to get it done quickly, ” he said.
Onyeama explained that
47 carrier diplomats have already been screened by the committees on Foreign
Relations of the National Assembly and waiting for approval from the larger
senate.
“However, the senate had
been on vacation but now that they will soon resume, we are hopeful that they
will validate what the committee has done and we hope they do that quickly and
we would start deploying those Ambassadors to various countries.
“We might, however, have
to wait a little while for the political appointees to come on board because
they will also have to go through the Senate screening.
NAN reports that Onyeama
also commended the staff of the Nigerian Permanent Mission for their hard work
towards ensuring that Nigerian’s participation at the UNGA was successful.
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