CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION
- Background of the Study
The relationship between Nigeria and China has been cooperative and cordial, especially between 1999 and 2009. At independence, Nigeria adopted a broadly pro- western policy and did little to establish diplomatic relations with China. Formal diplomatic ties between the two countries came into being in 1971, barely a year after the end of the Nigerian Civil War (1967-1970). However, following China‟s economic growth in the 1980s, Nigerian leaders began to look forward to a more serious economic engagement with China.
During the military regime of General Sani Abacha, Nigeria turned to China for military assistance and training of the Nigeria Army; perhaps to help the government suppress the domestic opposition to autocratic rule in Nigeria. By the time of 1999, when Nigeria experienced political transition from military rule to democratic administration, there has been renewed content and context in Nigeria-China relations. The details of such expanded relationship are the contents of chapter four
(4) of this study. Overall, after a lull in Nigeria‟s relations with it‟s outside world; as a result of the hostility and paranoid (Fawole, 1999 cited in Ojo, 2005) that characterized the country‟s foreign affairs, the 1999 political change over marked the beginning of a renewed relationship with other nations of the world. It is within this context that the Nigeria-China relation is considered in the study.