Transcript of Justin Welby's remarks on Nigeria

Transcript of the Archbishop of Canterbury's interview with BBC World Service's Newsday for its special programme on the Nigerian economy
08 Jan 2014

BBC World Service Newsday interview, Monday 6 January 2014, approx. 7.30am

Interviewer: Just tell us a bit about your history with Nigeria.
Justin Welby: Well, I first went to Nigeria in I think either the end of 1978 when I was in the oil industry and visited there for several years, working on a particular project there; and then have been going back quite regularly over the last, many years now as a clergyman working in areas both of reconciliation and also issues of development in the Delta in the north and in the Middle Belt.

Interviewer: Archbishop, how big a deal is the problem of security in Nigeria, because you regularly speak to people because of course there’s an insurgency in the north.
JW: Well, I think what we heard illustrates a very typically Nigerian response to this. There was the courage, the determination, the realism, but also the sort of vigorous approach, which means that people are not deterred by it. It’s a real problem, a very serious problem; people don’t travel so much at night, and the sort of violence is used to intimidate, as the Finance Minister was saying, to try and intimidate her. But we also heard in those two interviews the reality of the Nigerian determination, which is not to be overcome by that.

Interviewer: And with colleagues you’ve been speaking to in northern Nigeria, because quite often it’s very difficult to get information from northern Nigeria, especially in the far north-east where there are troubles. What are you hearing from there? the rest at Anglican Ink