By Muhammad Mamman
President Bola Tinubu has approved a new high-level Nigerian delegation to drive the US–Nigeria Joint Working Group on Security, a fresh bilateral platform designed to confront Nigeria’s escalating security challenges through deeper strategic cooperation with Washington.
The move follows last week’s high-profile engagement in Washington, DC, where National Security Adviser (NSA) Nuhu Ribadu led a Nigerian delegation for talks that produced the agreement to establish the joint group.
Ribadu will chair the Nigerian side, backed by a multi-agency lineup of senior officials drawn from defence, intelligence, diplomacy, policing and humanitarian sectors.
The delegation includes:
- Yusuf Maitama Tuggar – Minister of Foreign Affairs
- Mohammed Badaru Abubakar – Minister of Defence
- Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo – Minister of Interior
- Bernard M. Doro – Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation
- General Olufemi Oluyede – Chief of Defence Staff
- Ambassador Mohammed Mohammed – Director-General, National Intelligence Agency
- Kayode Egbetokun – Inspector-General of Police
Serving as the group’s secretariat are Ms. Idayat Hassan of the Office of the National Security Adviser and Mr. Paul Alabi of the Nigerian Embassy in Washington.
Tinubu has instructed the team to work “closely and diligently” with their US counterparts to ensure swift, coordinated implementation of all programmes agreed under the new security framework — a partnership expected to shape Nigeria’s counterterrorism, intelligence sharing and defence modernisation efforts in the months ahead.
