On the surface, the recent quarrel between Nigeria and Morocco would look like a storm in a teacup, but it actually veiled a more serious matter. Morocco had recalled its ambassador from Nigeria because the latter’s foreign ministry had lied over a purported telephone chat between President Goodluck Jonathan and King Mohammed VI.
According to Morocco’s foreign ministry, the King had refused a request by Nigeria to have a telephone conversation with Jonathan “because it is part of the internal electioneering.” It meant to say that the conversation would have conferred on Jonathan some election advantages in the poll taking place this weekend.
The Nigerian foreign ministry had actually goofed because there had been no telephone conversation between the two leaders.
In a statement, Jonathan’s spokesman said the President was “shocked, surprised and highly embarrassed by the controversy… President Jonathan has neither spoken with King Mohammed nor told anybody that he had a telephone conversation with the Moroccan monarch”.
According to him, Jonathan had been speaking with some African leaders to seek their support for Nigeria’s candidate for the position of President of the African Development Bank (AfDB). “In continuation of his efforts in support of the candidacy of the Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Akinwunmi Adesina, for headship of the AfDB, President Jonathan indicated that he would like to speak with the King of Morocco, the President of Algeria and the President of Egypt. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs was consequently directed to make necessary contacts with the embassies of the three countries and arrange for President Jonathan to speak with their leaders.”
Jonathan ordered his foreign minister to undertake a full investigation of the claim that he had spoken with the Moroccan King, which emanated from the ministry, in order to “identify all those who were responsible for the unacceptable act of official misinformation which has resulted in an unnecessary diplomatic row with another country and national embarrassment.”
However, it is important to see through the smokescreen of the Moroccans’ protest. First, the whole matter was not serious enough to generate such a huff. The rush with which Morocco recalled its ambassador speaks volumes about its feelings towards Nigeria.
Its decision was an overreaction clearly aimed at demagogy and self-promotion. It was not made in the spirit of African unity and cooperation. Secondly, it is not a secret that Nigeria has not been in Morocco’s good books because of Nigeria’s role in the Western Sahara conflict.
Nigeria, together with most other members of the OAU (now African Union), supports the Polisario, the independence movement fighting for sovereignty over Western Sahara—an area of wasteland and desert bordering the Atlantic Ocean between Mauritania and Morocco over which Morocco claims ownership.
The OAU’s recognition of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), the shadow government of the Polisario, compelled Morocco to withdrew from the OAU in 1984. The AU and the United Nations have continued to support the SADR based on the historical proofs that Morocco cannot lay a legitimate claim to the territory.
But Morocco’s territorial ambitions have clouded its vision and made it to regard the Sahara as its fiefdom, with all the devastating consequences of war. Morocco has always expected Nigeria to back its claim, the refusal of which has made the two countries to maintain a frosty relationship.
It is against this background that the recent diplomatic spat should be viewed.
King Mohammed VI has no iota of influence over any section of the Nigerian electorate as to help Jonathan with a mere telephone chat. His action, an insult not only to the Nigerian government but also its people, must be resisted. Nigeria should protest this uncouth treatment through all the right channels.
Its historic support for the Sahrawis – no doubt some of the most dehumanised peoples on earth – should continue within the letter and spirit of the successive OAU/AU and UN resolutions. Giving in to the blackmail of Morocco’s monarchical disctatorship with its eurocentric foreign policy would only undermine Nigeria’s leading status on the continent.