News -- George W. Bush to make history: White House confirms visit to Nigeria

The White House at the weekend formally annou-nced that President George W. Bush will embark on an official visit to Nigeria and four other African countries from July 7 and 12 this year.

The planned visit will also take the American president to Senegal, South Africa, Botsw-ana, and Uganda, the statement said. The brief announcement added that the five-nation trip underscores the administration's "commitment to working towards a free, prosperous, and peaceful Africa."

The trip which was originally slated for January was postponed for no clear reasons. But the postponement may not be unconnected to the Iraqi war situation.

Although the itinerary has not been announced, the US president is expected to spend his first night in the Senegalese capital Dakar, before flying to South Africa for three nights, during which time he will visit Botswana next door. He will make brief stops in Kampala, Uganda and in the Nigerian capital, Abuja.

Bush's visit will be the third by an American president to Nigeria. The fiirst was in 1978 by President Jimmy Carter who was received by General Olusegun Obasanjo, then military head of state.

Bill Clinton visited the country in 2000, barely 12 months after Obasanjo assumed office as elected president. Obasanjo will also be on hand to receive Bush when he visits the country next month.

This will be Bush's first trip to Africa as president. In 1992, he represented his father at an independence anniversary celebration in the Gambia.

Although the Bush trip coincides with the annual summit of African heads-of-state from July 10 to 12, the US president is not expected to stop in Maputo, Mozambique, where the gathering will take place.

In December, the White House announced that the president would visit Africa in early 2003, before announcing a day later that the trip would be postponed "due to a combination of domestic and international considerations."

While the itinerary for this voyage is similar to that planned for January, two countries on the earlier agenda have been dropped, Kenya, due to security considerations, and Mauritius, because Bush was going there to speak to a forum on the African Growth and Opportunity Act that drew participants from three-dozen African countries.

The administration in recent months has placed increased emphasis on its policy on Africa. A $15-billion commitment for fighting HIV/AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean in the next five years, which Bush announced in his State of the Union address in January, was approved by Congress last month and signed by the president on May 27.

During the summit of industrialized nations in France this month, Bush urged other G8 members to join the effort. Both Britain and France have announced increased contributions, and French President Jacques Chirac has said he will ask the European Union summit later this month to approve an additional one million Euros for the Global Fund to combat AIDS and other diseases.

Prior to the G8 summit, the White House released new figures showing that the United States is the only major world trading nation "whose share of exports from Sub-Saharan Africa has increased from 1996 to 2001."

Exports of manufactured goods from sub-Saharan Africa to the United States increased by eight percent, while exports to the European Union dropped about 1.5 percent. Much of the growth was in apparel imports, the statement noted. The rate is largely attributable to the trade provisions of the African Growth and Opportunity Act passed by Congress and signed into law by President Clinton in 2000.

A section of the White House web site that focuses on relations with Africa says Bush has met 25 African heads of state, "more than any previous president." Next week, the US leader is scheduled to receive President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, one of the nations that backed the United States on Iraq and joined the "coalition of the willing" that the administration cited as a reflection of international support.

Leaders of the three countries slated for the July presidential visit opposed the US Iraqi intervention without United Nations endorsement, as did most other African governments. However, their positions differ somewhat. Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade has been a leading voice in condemning terrorism, and immediately after September 11, 2001 he hosted a conference of African leaders to discuss anti-terrorism actions.

Like Wade, President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria spoke out for an international approach on Iraq, a position also taken by South African President Thabo Mbeki. But South Africa was more outspoken and pro-active on the issue, dispatching a diplomatic mission to Baghdad and lobbying the United Nations Security Council to hear the views of non-Council member states as the war approached.

"We understand when governments disagree with us," one White House official said recently, contrasting Mbeki's role with that of Obasanjo and other leaders. "But when you mobilize against us, we don't like that."

However, on other issues, Washington and Pretoria have cordial ties. Wade, Obasanjo and Mbeki were all invited to Evian, France by Chirac to meet with G8 leaders, and Mbeki returned home with praises for the summit outcome.

The leaders agreed to all the requests presented to them by the African presidents, he said, and there was no evident tension over Iraq. Bush invited Mbeki and the others to take part in next year's summit in the United States, the South African president told a press briefing in Pretoria.