Buhari, Others To Examine US-Africa Business Relations

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President Muhammadu Buhari and other heads of state are expected at the US-Africa 10th Biennial Business Summit to be held next month, the organiser, Corporate Council on Africa, has said.

According to a statement on Wednesday, Buhari will lead some top members of his cabinet and top Nigerian business leaders to the summit.

The summit, which will hold for the first time in Africa since 2007, is slated for February 1 and 4, 2016 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

It is expected to bring together more than 1,000 private sector and government representatives, including heads of state, from all parts of Africa, the US, Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

The statement said this year’s summit would feature insightful plenary sessions, sector-focused panels, country-specific forums, peer-to-peer roundtables, site visits, exhibitions and networking opportunities.

The summit, which will be attended by other African heads of state including the Prime Minister of Ethiopia, Hailemariam Desalegn, the Liberian President, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, and senior government representatives across Africa, will immediately follow the African Union’s Annual Heads of State Summit in Addis Ababa.

According to the President and Chief Executive Officer, CCA, Stephen Hayes, this is the first time the African Union and the Ethiopian government will co-host such an event with an American business association.

He said, “We are the only US business organisation that enjoys the confidence of the African Union as exemplified by our Memorandum of Understanding. So it seems most appropriate that our 10th US-Africa Business Summit, the largest of its kind, will be taking place in Ethiopia.”

Hayes described Nigeria as a priority country for CCA members, adding that the organisation had worked to promote the US-Nigeria trade and investment for over a decade.

He noted that in July 2015, the council hosted President Buhari on his inaugural visit to the US to discuss Nigeria’s economic growth and strategy.

He added that CCA’s Vice-President, Ambassador Robert Perry, led a 14-member delegation from the US for a trade mission to Nigeria aligned with the Nigerian Economic Summit Group Summit in October 2015, featuring leading American business including Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Gilead Sciences.

The statement, listed some of the speakers for the summit as the CEO, Zenith Bank, Peter Amangbo; the CEO, Nigerian Stock Exchange, Oscar Onyema; the CEO, Seplat Petroleum Development Company Plc, Austin Avuru, and the Co-Founder, AACE Foods, Ndidi Nwuneli.

The CCA is an American nonprofit, membership-based organisation established in 1993 to promote business and investment between the United States and the nations of Africa.

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