State Banquet Hosted By Vietnam’s VP Vo Thi Anx Xuan In Hononur Of VP Osinbajo

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SPEECH DELIVERED BY HIS EXCELLENCY, PROF. YEMI OSINBAJO, SAN, GCON VICE PRESIDENT OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA, AT THE STATE BANQUET HOSTED BY THE VICE PRESIDENT OF THE SOCIALIST REPUBLIC OF VIETNAM, VO THI ANH XUAN IN HANOI, VIETNAM ON THE 5^TH OF DECEMBER, 2022

PROTOCOLS

I bring you very warm greetings from our President, President Muhammadu Buhari and all the people of Nigeria. I also express my heartfelt appreciation for the very warm and cheerful reception accorded me and my delegation when we arrived at the Noi Bai International Airport on Sunday. And, also Madam Vice President, your very warm reception this morning when we met for a most fruitful bilateral discussion. Thank you very much.

Earlier today, we visited the Ho Chi Min Mausoleum and paid our respects to the memory of the great leader. The experience was, for all of us, a great reminder of what it took to make Vietnam great, and to move this country from all the turbulence of its past to the peace and prosperity it is experiencing as a great economic powerhouse in this region today.

In paying respect to Ho Chi Min and all the past leaders of Vietnam, we pray that their memory will continue to be an inspiration for the greatness of Vietnam.

Our friendship with Vietnam is one that will develop and now that we have very anticipatory greater collaboration, we cherish it most dearly, and we are eager to nurture that relationship. We have so much in common that increased cooperation between Nigeria and Vietnam can only yield beneficial fruits for both of us.

Our population and tropical aspirations are agents that we have to pay serious attention to, also agriculture and manufacturing and the digital economy. The remarkable efforts of Vietnam in that regard, and your consistently high GDP growth despite strong global headwinds, are worthy of emulation.

With a youthful population of digital natives, both Nigeria and Vietnam are also drawn to innovation and technology vis-a-vis areas where we can exploit and explore more collaboration and corporation.

Trade between our two countries is growing steadily and I am happy also to note our very fruitful discussions.  We discussed the potential to deepen corporation between our two countries.

Personally, Your Excellency and I witnessed the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding on Defence Cooperation between our two countries. And certainly look forward to not just the Defence Cooperation, but several other outstanding privileges which we have already decided.

I also seize this opportunity to say thank you to the Republic of Vietnam for the very kind gesture of the donation of facemasks to Nigeria in 2021 as we struggled to contain the COVID-19 pandemic.  We truly appreciate that.

Once again, thank you very much Madam Vice President and the people of Vietnam for your hospitality and the friendship between us. And we look forward to the next months and years ahead for even greater cooperation and greater high-level visits between us.

Thank you very much.