Impact of Policy and National Interests: The Centerpiece in Nigeria's Diplomacy

This essay reexamines the issue of foreign policy and the centerpiece question in Nigeria. The current contribution therefore actually borders on the reexamination of a subsisting debate in Nigeria’s foreign policy dispositions. The problem of the study emanates from a supposition that Nigeria’s foreign policy is currently at grievous loose ends, or at best, only residing in the mysterious imaginations of the nation’s international relations managers. The central research question of this work is accordingly concisely denotable as follows: Whither foreign policy and the centerpiece question in Nigeria? Consequently, the objectives of the study are to (i) interrogate the issue of foreign policy and the centerpiece question in Nigeria (ii) revisit the issue of Africa as the centerpiece of Nigeria’s foreign policy and (iii) make recommendations on the way forward for the Nigerian state in purposeful foreign policy designs. Data for the study was generated from secondary sources, and the data analys is framed on systematic argumentation. The theoretical framework of the paper is the realist theory of international relations. The paper finally proposes a reimagined reintroduction of Africa as the centerpiece of Nigeria’s foreign policy, in opposition to the current foreign policy uncertainties in the country