On Wednesday, President Bola Tinubu addressed the 80th United Nations General Assembly in New York. His address was delivered by his deputy, Vice President Kashim Shettima.   ,
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PRESIDENT BOLA AHMED TINUBU GCFR, THE NATIONAL STATEMENT OF HIS EXCELLENCE,
DELIVERED BY
KASHIM SHETTIMA, GCON, AND HIS EXCELLENCE
VICE-PRESIDENT, FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA,
DURING THE GENERAL DEBATE OF THE UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY’S 80TH SESSION
NEW YORK
THEME: BETTER TOGETHER: 80 YEARS AND MORE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS, DEVELOPMENT, AND PEACE
24th SEPTEMBER 2025
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Mr. Secretary-General,
Distinguished Ministers and Ministers of State and Government
Distinguished Delegates,
The world’s chaos serves as a reminder that we cannot afford to be inactionary. We would have been consumed by our differences had there been no community such as this to remind us that we are one human family. We have refused to be broken, even in the darkest of times. This community was born from the ashes of despair, a vehicle for order and for the shared assurance that we could not afford to falter again. Our unwavering faith in humanity’s redemption transcends moral superiority, not a presumption of moral superiority. It is, therefore, with profound humility that I stand before you today, as Vice-President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, to renew this pledge on behalf of my country.
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1. Nigeria joins the comity of nations in congratulating you on your election as President of the General Assembly for the 80th Session and assures you of our unalloyed support during your tenure. In these extraordinary circumstances, I commend the Secretary-General, His Excellency António Guterres, and your brother, His Excellency Philémon Yang, for their outstanding stewardship and unifying leadership.
2. This anniversary shouldn’t be a sentimental escape into the past. It must be a moment of truth, a pause to measure where we have stumbled and how we might have done better in turning our values into action that meets the demands of today. We are here to create a world where human rights are most important and are respected. We must recalibrate the delicate balance between our roles as sovereign governments and our duties as collective partners, to renew multilateralism in a world that has evolved far beyond what it was in 1945.
3. The pace of change across borders is a force without pause. It manifests in the use of technology, the flow of money, the movements of information and finance, the corrosive ideologies that promote division and violence, the climate emergency’s growing tide, and the tide of irregular migration. We must own this process of change. We must acknowledge the truth when we discuss global conflicts, small arms proliferation, fair trade and finance, and nuclear disarmament. These are stains on our collective humanity.
4. For all our careful diplomatic language, the slow pace of progress on these hardy perennials of the UN General Assembly debate has led some to look away from the multilateral model. The most sought-after voices were no longer the heads of state, as I had noticed a change at this gathering a few years ago. These are troubling signs. Nigeria is still firmly persuaded of the benefits of multilateralism, but to support that conviction requires evidence of the integrity of the existing structures. We must make real change, change that works, and change that is seen to work. The direction of our travel is already predetermined if we fail.
5. We are here to strengthen the prospects for peace, development and human rights. . . . . I want to make four points today to outline how we can do this:
One: The UN Security Council must have a permanent seat for Nigeria. This should take place as part of a wider process of institutional reform.
Two: To promote trade and financing, we must take immediate action.
Three: Countries that host minerals must benefit from those minerals.
Four: The digital divide needs to be filled. As our friend the Secretary General has said: ‘ A. I. ‘ must be pronounced “Africa Included” .
6. Regarding my first point, the UN only retains relevance when it is able to reflect the world as it is and not as it once was. Nigeria’s journey tells this story with clarity: when the UN was founded, we were a colony of 20 million people, absent from the tables where decisions about our fate were taken, today, we are a sovereign nation of over 236 million, projected to be the third most populous country in the world, with one of the youngest and most dynamic populations on earth. Our demand for a permanent seat in the Security Council is based on fairness, representation, and reform that restores credibility to the very institution on which multilateralism rests. It is a consistent partner in global peacekeeping.
7. In light of the Secretary-General’s UN80 Initiative and the Assembly’s bold decision to reform the wider UN system to improve relevance, effectiveness, and efficiency in the face of unimaginable financial strain, Nigeria strongly supports both the UN80 Initiative and the resolution adopted on July 18, 2025. We support the drive to rationalise structures and end the duplication of responsibilities and programmes, so that this institution may speak with one voice and act with greater coherence.
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8. None of us can achieve a peaceful world in isolation. The burden of sovereignty is this. Sovereignty is a covenant of shared responsibility, a recognition that our survival is bound to the survival of others. We must collaborate with our neighbors and partners to live up to this challenge. We must follow the trails of weapons, of money, and of people. Because these organizations, which are frequently driven by conceited non-state actors, stoke conflict all over the world.
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9. Soldiers and civilians of Nigeria leave a lasting legacy. They have participated in 51 out of 60 United Nations peacekeeping operations since our independence in 1960. Through the Multinational Joint Task Force, we have partnered with our African partners to resolve conflicts. At home, we confront the scourge of insurgency with resolve. One thing is clear from this protracted and difficult battle against violent extremism: While military strategies may win battles that last months or years, generations-long wars are won over by values and ideas.
10. Because we favor tolerance over tyranny, terrorists dislike us. Their ambition is to divide us and to poison our humanity with a toxic rhetoric of hate. Our differences are indistinguishable from those between the promise of order and the shadow of light, hope and despair. We do not only fight wars, we feed and shelter the innocent victims of war. We are not indifferent to the destruction of our neighbors, both close and far away, because of this. This is why we speak of the violence and aggression visited upon innocent civilians in Gaza, the illegal attack on Qatar, and the tensions that scar the wider region. Such acts of violence are intolerable because of the culture of impunity, as well as because our own bitter experience has taught us that such violence never ends where it begins.
11. We don’t think that endless debate should be a conduit to the preservation of human life. That is why we say, without stuttering and without doubt, that a two-state solution remains the most dignified path to lasting peace for the people of Palestine. This society has endured moral conflict for too long. For too long, we have been caught in the crossfire of violence that offends the conscience of humanity. We are peacemakers, not partisans. We come as brothers and sisters of a shared world, a world that must never reduce the right to live into the currency of devious politics. In a civilization seeking order, Palestine’s citizens are not collateral damage. They are human beings, equal in worth, entitled to the same freedoms and dignities that the rest of us take for granted.
12. We want to make the choice crystal clear: civilised values over fear, civilised values over vengeance, civilised values over bloodshed. We demonstrate the benefits of peace, just as extremists aim to splinter opposing religions and communities. We work through multilateral platforms within the rule of law, to build the consensus and support that makes this immensely difficult and dangerous task that much easier. In this way, we prevent our adversaries from creating tension and despair. It is our experience that this offers the best, perhaps only hope for peace, reconciliation and victory for the civilised values of a shared humanity. As a diverse nation, Nigeria also acknowledges the variation in the geometry of democracy, its various forms, and speeds. For this reason, we are working with the United Nations to strengthen Democratic institutions in our region and beyond, through the Regional Partnership for Democracy.
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13. Point two: the price of peace is eternal vigilance. Many Member States are now counting the costs of the emerging world order because of the increasingly challenging security outlook. We in Nigeria are already familiar with such difficult choices: infrastructure renewal or defence platforms? Tanks or schools? Our view is that the path to sustainable peace lies in growth and prosperity. The government has implemented difficult but necessary reforms to our economy, including removing distortions like those that favor the few over the wealthy, and removing currency controls.
14. I think the market’s ability to change is. Our task is to enable and facilitate, and to trust in the ingenuity and enterprise of the people. However, the transition process is challenging and requires unavoidable hardship. This year, we held the inaugural West Africa Economic Summit in Abuja to bring investors and opportunities together. The outcomes demonstrated what innovation can do beyond what we had anticipated, and they speak for themselves.
15. I invite the UN to reevaluate how to make the most of scarce resources in the same spirit of dynamic review. One critical area is climate change. It is not an abstract problem about a fate that will be decided at a later time. It is not even solely an environmental issue. National, regional, and international security are the topics. It is about irregular migration. This is truly an “everyone issue.” We are all stakeholders, and we are all beneficiaries of the best outcomes.
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16. This is why relevant Ministers have been instructed to work with the UN to make the best use of climate funds. We think that increased funding for resilient housing, access to technology, and funding will result in significant, shared benefits for disadvantaged communities, including the ability to participate in solutions rather than problems.
17. In recent years, Nigeria and Africa have made significant progress in putting order in our affairs. We can take that progress to the next level, a level that presents new opportunities for trade, investment and profit, if we can access reforms to strengthen the international financial architecture. To promote debt relief, we must take immediate action to ensure that there is a clear path to peace and prosperity for everyone, not just charity.
18. I want a new, legally binding system of sovereign debt management that will let emerging markets break free from the constraint of primary production and unprocessed exports.
19. Since the Lagos Action Plan foretaped a path out of debt and dependence that highlighted opportunities, which should still be looked at for local added value for processing and manufacturing in everything from agriculture to solid minerals and petrochemicals, have been decades since. The African Continental Free Trade Area is a remarkable achievement of co-operation. We continue to be fully committed to achieving the SDGs, and we are convinced that focusing on our main goal of growth and prosperity will do the trick.
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20. third point, please. We welcome steps to move towards peace in the Democratic Republic of Congo. We all share the view that international investment and cooperation can end the cycle of violence and decay. Access to strategic minerals, from Sierra Leone in the 1990s and Sudan today, has for too long been a source of conflict rather than prosperity. Nigeria is one of the countries with the most important minerals that will drive the technologies of the future, which is abundant in Africa. Investment in exploration, development and processing of these minerals, in Africa, will diversify supply to the international market, reduce tensions between major economies and help shape the architecture for peace and prosperity, on a continent that too often in the past has been left behind by the rivalries and competition between different blocs.
21 . We know in Nigeria, that we are more stable when those communities that have access to key resources are able to benefit from those resources. Our journey through the Niger Delta’s oil-producing region has been this. I believe that we will strengthen the international order, when those countries that produce strategic minerals benefit fairly from those minerals – in terms of investment, partnership, local processing and jobs. Tension, inequality, and instability fester when we export raw materials, as we have done for a while.
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22. A dedicated initiative aims to bridge the digital divide by bringing together researchers, the private sector, governments, and communities is the fourth pillar of change for which I am advocating. As we stand on the threshold of new and dramatic technological change, we are still absorbing the impact of the revolution in information and communication of the past 20 years. We now better comprehend the benefits that technology offers as well as the safeguards necessary to promote growth and reduce the risk of corrosion. Some worry about fake news. Both rich and poor countries have a lot of that, which has the potential to have devastating effects in the real world. I am more worried about an emerging generation that grows ever more cynical, because it believes nothing and trusts less. I’m calling for a new dialogue as technology transforms public administration, law, finance, conflict, and much of the human condition, to ensure we promote the best of the opportunities that are emerging, and promote the level of access that makes emerging economies more quickly, and to close a wealth and knowledge gap that is in no one’s interest.
23. I want to reassert that Nigeria’s commitment to human rights, development, unity, multilateralism, and peace cannot be overstated. For none of us is safe until all of us are safe. We are aware that the challenges facing humanity’s spirit will not be easy, and we are aware that there are no quick fixes. Yet history reminds us that bold action in pursuit of noble ideals has always defined the story of the United Nations. We have consistently found the balance between collective responsibility and sovereign rights. That balance is once again in question, but I believe that a renewed commitment to multilateralism, not as a slogan but as an article of faith, remains our surest path forward. Nigeria dedicates itself fully and without a doubt to the noble cause.
