By Meletus EZE
The Ambassador designate of Czech Republic in Nigeria, Marek Skolil, has pledged to strengthen and sustain bilateral relations between his country and Nigeria.
Skolil said this after a meeting with the Foreign Affairs Minister, Geoffrey Onyeama in Abuja on Friday.
The envoy also pledged to work towards increasing the trade volume between the two countries which he said was about 45 million dollars in the last five years.
“This is the beginning of my mission in Nigeria I was seeking the minister’s advice, his support, and also spoke of the bilateral relations between Nigeria and my country.
“We have very strong political ties between the two countries, also we have excellent bilateral relations we have very solid economic and trade relation in defence security, agriculture and energy.
“So there is always plenty of room to develop this ties further, we are interesting in developing joint ties with Nigeria to tackle challenges,” he said.
He said that more Czech companies are expected in Nigeria to explore business opportunities for long term cooperation to increase the trade volume.
“Because this is the interest of our Nigerian counterparts to develop, not only in dealing with products or services but to also increase avenue of increasing Nigerian export to my country.
“In the last five years the trade volume was more than one billion Korunas about ($45, million),” he said.
Onyeama in his remarks said that the envoy was in the ministry to intimate him with his appointment as the Czech ambassador to Nigeria.
“We review the relation between the two countries, we have strong relations in the area of education, security and defence and the need to strengthen the bilateral relations.
“I informed him about our initiative in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs which is Nigerian Economic Diplomacy Initiative and he is interested in that.
“We are going to see how that will be publicised among the Czech business community and that will increase cooperation between Nigeria and Czech businesses.
“Another area we are expecting under his watch is that he will strengthen even further the relations between Nigeria and Czech republic; people to people contacts to enhance economic and trade relations between the two countries,” he said.
