King Mohammed VI and President Muhammadu Buhari discussed in a phone talk Wednesday the upcoming stages of the Morocco-Nigeria Atlantic gas pipeline which will bring gas from Nigeria to Morocco stretching through several West African countries over some 4,000 KM.
The two heads of State brought up the conclusions of the meeting on the project that was held under the chairmanship of King Mohammed VI in Casablanca last December, and the upcoming stages of this strategic project, said the Royal Office in a statement.
The agreement on the gas pipeline project was sealed early December during the historic visit King Mohammed VI paid to Nigeria.
The pipeline to run along the West African coast from Nigeria to Morocco, going through Benin, Togo, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Gambia, Senegal and Mauritania, will be developed by the two countries’ sovereign wealth funds.
The pipeline will help several West African countries promote electrification and will foster economic and industrial integration in the region.
During the phone talk, King Mohammed VI “assured the Nigerian President about his intention to make of the Rabat-Abuja strategic axis a framework for consultation and cooperation on all African issues,” the Royal Office statement added.
The King also enquired about the health of president Buhari, who is currently in Great Britain for medical treatment, and thanked him for his personal involvement concerning the return of Morocco to the African Union.
Furthermore, the Monarch informed president Buhari about his latest African tour as well as about Morocco’s application to become full-fledged member of the Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS, and the contacts he made in this respect with the region’s heads of states.
ECOWAS, set up in 1975, gathers Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Côte d’Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Senegal and Togo.
The member states seek to create a single, large trading bloc through economic cooperation. Their combined GDP amounts to $734.8 billion based on economic activities that include industry, transport, telecommunications, energy, agriculture, natural resources, commerce…
During the royal visit to Nigeria, King Mohammed VI and President Buhari expressed resolve to lift up bilateral cooperation to higher levels and to boost partnership within the frame of South-South cooperation.
The two Heads of State vowed to support projects aimed at promoting the socio-economic development of the continent, stressing the need to speed up the implementation of the Trans-African Tangiers-Lagos Highway.