By Gabriel Ani
Abuja, Nigeria — Nigeria has hired a United States lobbying firm with links to conservative political networks in a $9 million contract, a sum that appears to be the largest ever paid by an African country for lobbying in Washington, as former U.S. President Donald Trump warns of possible additional military strikes linked to Nigeria’s security crisis.
The six month agreement, filed under the U.S. Foreign Agents Registration Act, was signed in December by Nigeria’s National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu. It engages Washington based DCI Group, a firm with longstanding ties to Republican Party politics and conservative advocacy groups, at a monthly fee of 750,000 dollars.
Under the contract, Nigeria is seeking to influence U.S. policymakers, lawmakers and opinion leaders on security cooperation, counterterrorism efforts and narratives surrounding violence in the country, particularly claims by some U.S. politicians and activists that Christians are being systematically targeted.
A senior Nigerian official familiar with the filing said the engagement was intended to ensure that Nigeria’s position is clearly understood in Washington and that policy decisions are informed by facts rather than political rhetoric.
The hiring comes amid heightened rhetoric from Trump, who in a recent interview warned that the United States could carry out more strikes if violence persists in Nigeria, echoing claims of religiously motivated killings, assertions the Nigerian government has repeatedly rejected.
The 9 million dollar fee is widely seen by analysts as unprecedented for African lobbying in the U.S. capital and reflects Abuja’s concern about growing influence from U.S. conservative circles on Nigeria related policy debates.
A long history of election season lobbying
Nigeria’s latest move fits into a broader pattern of political actors, both governments and opposition parties, turning to powerful Western lobbyists during periods of political tension and elections.
It will be recalled that in 2018, ahead of Nigeria’s 2019 general elections, the country’s main opposition party at the time, the People’s Democratic Party, signed a $1.1 million per year lobbying contract with Ballard Partners, a Florida based firm founded by prominent lobbyist Brian Ballard, a close ally of Donald Trump.
Ballard had chaired the Trump Victory campaign organization in Florida, a key swing state, and had lobbied on behalf of the Trump Organization for more than a decade.
According to filings, Ballard Partners was tasked with advising the PDP on U.S. Nigeria relations and with a special focus on ensuring political and security conditions that would allow for what it described as the success and fairness of Nigeria’s 2019 presidential election.
At the time, the PDP’s presidential candidate was Atiku Abubakar, Nigeria’s vice president from 1999 to 2007 and a former ally turned rival of then President Muhammadu Buhari.
Ballard Partners’ client list has included the governments of Qatar, Turkey, the Maldives, the Dominican Republic and Mali, as well as major U.S. corporations such as Amazon, Sprint and Uber.
Government counter moves and rival lobbying
In May 2019, about a month after Atiku Abubakar hired Washington lobbying firm Fein and DelValle PLLC to challenge the outcome of the presidential election in U.S. political circles, the Buhari administration also moved to counter the effort.
Documents later obtained from the FARA registry showed that the Nigerian government, through the Office of the Solicitor General, hired Pagefield Global, a public affairs and lobbying firm with offices in London and Washington, to conduct outreach and relationship building with U.S. stakeholders and media.
The firm was to be paid about $21,600 pounds per month, under a non written contract, according to its U.S. registration filing. Pagefield said it would deal directly with Nigeria’s Solicitor General, Dayo Apata, though Apata later denied knowledge of the contract.
Earlier, in April 2014, less than a year before the 2015 elections, the then PDP led government hired Washington based firm Levick for 1.2 million dollars to help manage Nigeria’s international image amid criticism over its handling of the Boko Haram insurgency. The contract sparked backlash from Nigerian activists online.
The opposition All Progressives Congress also retained U.S. political consultants ahead of the 2015 vote, signing up AKPD, a Chicago based firm founded by David Axelrod, a former senior adviser to then U.S. President Barack Obama.
Ethical concerns over foreign political consultants
The growing role of American and European political firms in African elections has attracted sustained scrutiny.
In 2015, controversial British data firm Cambridge Analytica was reported to have worked in Nigeria after being hired by a wealthy Nigerian client for 2.8 million dollars to run a covert campaign against then candidate Muhammadu Buhari. The firm later admitted to deploying hacked materials in political campaigns and also worked in Kenya’s 2013 and 2017 elections.
Another UK firm, Bell Pottinger, collapsed after revelations that it ran a racially divisive campaign in South Africa, prompting clients and international partners to sever ties.
Analysts say Nigeria’s latest 9 million dollar lobbying deal underscores the extent to which battles over narrative, perception and policy in Washington have become central to the country’s domestic politics and international standing.
“This is no longer just about diplomacy,” said a former U.S. official familiar with Africa policy.
“It is about who shapes the story and who gets heard in Washington.”
