BRITAIN’S decision to fund Nigeria’s space programme with a £1.14bn investment has sparked controversy with a member of the UK Independence Party describing it as giving money to Bongo Bongo Land.
Yesterday, the UK announced that it would contribute towards Nigeria’s National Space Research and Development Agency (Nasrda) over the next five years. Godfrey Bloom, the UK Independence Party MEP for Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire, described the funding as unacceptable.
He said: “How we can possibly be giving a billion pounds a month, when we’re in this sort of debt, to Bongo Bongo Land is completely beyond me.”
Backbench Tory MP Philip Davies added that it was totally unjustifiable and unaffordable for Britain to give this money to Nigeria, given the scale of Abuja’s grandiose space programme. Nasrda has built laboratories and plans to launch its own rockets by 2028 after the space programme got off to a disastrous start in 2003 when its first satellite disappeared from orbit after losing power.
Mr Davies said: “We cannot go around the world saying don’t worry, we will feed your public for you while you waste your money on all sorts of other projects. We have got to say to these countries you have got to spend that money on your people where it’s most needed not on some grandiose space programme.
“We are against welfare dependency at home but at the same time we are encouraging welfare dependency abroad. These foreign leaders frit money away on Ray-Ban sunglasses as well as apartments in Paris and Ferraris.”
Nasdra now has three satellites that were built by its own engineers and NigComSat- 1R, NigeriaSat- 2 and NigeriaSat- X are now all in orbit after being launched on Russian rockets. Astronauts will be trained and ready for space travel within two years according to Nasrda director general Professor Seidu Mohammed.
Professor Mohammed: “By our road map we are supposed to have astronauts prepared by 2015. Before the end of the year, the recruitment of astronauts will begin so that we have them handy and as soon as we get the nod we can pick from that number.”
However, Jonathan Isaby from the UK Tax Payers’ Alliance, said: “When budgets are tight both for families and the government alike, people cannot understand why ministers are sending more and more of our hard-earned cash overseas. Taxpayers find it especially unacceptable when their money is sent abroad as aid to developing countries which then somehow find sufficient cash to fund the likes of a space programme.”
However, a spokesman for the UK Department for International Development said: “No UK aid money goes through the Nigerian government as our investment goes into specific health, education and poverty reduction programmes. Nigeria is home to a quarter of the poorest people in Africa, and supporting their development will benefit our own trade and security.”
She added that spending aid money in Nigeria would help cut crime and illegal immigration into Britain. Although miniscule when compared with remittances from the diaspora which totalled $21bn in 2012, British aid to Nigeria will increase by 116% to £305m in 2014/15 from £141m in 2010/11.
*Source: Nigerian Watch