The Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA, Ambassador Yukiya Amano, recently made a three-day official visit to Nigeria, his first working tour since assuming office as Director-General of the agency on December 1, 2009. He said his choice of Nigeria as the first country to visit as DG IAEA is because of Nigeria’s importance in Africa and the world and what he called her great strides in the peaceful use of nuclear energy to help her people in radiotherapy and electricity generation. He pledged the IAEA’s support for Nigeria’s quest to use nuclear energy which, he said, clearly, is entirely for peaceful purposes.

IAEA being received in State House by Acting President Goodluck Jonathan

DG IAEA, Acting President Jonathan and Former S & T Minister,
Dr. Alhassan Bako Zaku

Acting President Jonathan greeting DG/CEO of NNRA during the visit

The DG, IAEA also visited other top government functionaries where he stressed the importance of capacity-building in the nuclear industry which as the Nigerian officials convinced him, is exactly what the country has been doing.

         DG IAEA with Presidential Senior Special Assistant on Foreign Affairs,    Ambassador T. D. Hart

Ambassador Yukiya Amano commended Nigeria’s First Lady, Hajia Turai Yar’Adua, for her International Cancer Centre, ICC, designed to treat cancer patients in, not only Nigeria, but the entire West African sub-region. He said that it is wrong to think of cancer as a disease of only people from the highly developed countries. He promised that the IAEA will do everything possible to assist the ICC.

 The DG IAEA also held high-level talks with the Minister of Science and Technology, Dr. Alhassan Bako Zaku, Health Minister, Prof. Babatunde Oshotimehin, and Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Muhammad Adamu Aliero. He also had a taste of Nigeria’s hospitality as he was treated to a dinner.