“Between Washington’s lectures and Beijing’s loans, Nigeria finds itself the newest battleground in a global race for power.”
By Jacob Edi
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The latest diplomatic faceoff between Washington and Abuja over alleged genocide against Christians has thrown open a new vista in global politics, with Nigeria sitting squarely at the crossroads of two giants, China and the United State. As tensions rise, Beijing wasted no time declaring its “unflinching support” for Nigeria’s sovereignty, a move both strategic and self-serving. For those who understand global politics, this was predictable. If the roles were reversed, America would have done exactly the same.
President Donald Trump’s threat to “roll out the tanks” against terrorist leaders in Nigeria was read by many as a veiled threat to Nigeria’s independence. For a country long haunted by foreign interference -pre aand post independence- disguised as humanitarian concern, such language felt invasive. Nigerians may be divided over America’s motives, but they are unanimous that no foreign has the right to dictate terms or deploy threats to Nigerians on Nigeria’s soil.
Then, almost on cue, came China with a calm demeanour, smiling, and offering solidarity.
But charm is not charity.
Beijing’s diplomacy is rarely sentimental. It’s strategic, transactional, and focused on long-term gain. Unlike America’s loud, moralizing posture, China moves quietly like a flowing river, slowly but surely, embedding itself into economies, politics, and infrastructure until disentanglement becomes nearly impossible.
China, like America, is a superpower.
Across Nigeria, evidence of this entrenchment is everywhere. From mining camps deep in forests to construction sites in major cities, Chinese companies have built a silent empire. They are in the crevices of our rocks, in side the muds of our rivers, our gold fields, digging, dredging, extracting gold, lithium, iron ore and several other minerals resource yet known to Nigeria as a result of technological backwardness. Some operate through official joint ventures, others through the shadows, neither licensed nor regulated and oftentimes untaxed.
In many rural communities, Chinese miners have turned once-green landscapes into barren wastelands. Homes near quarry sites are collapsing, and the environmental damage is devastating. Victims are helpless. The Chinese destroy the ecosytem and cart away billions of dollars at the detriment of Chinese, some of whom are prisoners about ending their jail terms. Yet, the system remains complicit, lured by the Yuan and crippled by corruption. Not even our judicial system can be absolved. All the institutions saddled with the responsibilities of environmental protection have fallen prey to what is now dubbed ‘Chinco magic’.
That’s China’s playbook: they don’t colonize; they commercialise. Their projects- roads, railways, ports- come wrapped in loans, cheap labor, and quiet influence. What looks like development is often a debt trap in disguise.
But America is no saint either. Its hands are equally heavy, only its tactics differ. In the Obama era, when Nigeria battled Boko Haram at the height of the insurgency, Washington bloocked Nigeri’s purchase of Tucano fighter jets, citing human rights concerns. Yet those same jets were later approved under Trump when political winds shifted. This wasn’t about morality. It was about leverage. That denial sent a clear message: America helps on its own terms, and strategic compliance is the price.
So, as China extends loans and America extends lectures, Nigeria is caught in the middle of a modern Cold War fought with trade policies, surveillance tech, and arms sales and not bullets. The global arms race and economic war between East and West is now bleeding into Africa, and Nigeria, with its massive population and rich resources, has become the prime pawn.
America’s economic rivalry with China has evolved into a full-blown global contest for influence from microchips to military bases, from AI to oilfields. Sanctions, tariffs, and tech bans are the new weapons. The Eastern bloc, led by China and backed by Russia, is pushing to weaken Western dominance through alternative financial systems and resource diplomacy. The West, in turn, doubles down on sanctions and ideological warfare.
Caught in this vortex, Nigeria, a nation rich in minerals, poor in leadership, and strategically located in a region where global powers crave a foothold remains the world’s biggest prize. The traagedy of Nigeria’s situaation is not that it lacks potential, it’s that it hasn’t learned how to play power politics. America sells ideals; China sells infrastructure. Both sell influence. Yet Nigeria keeps buying into both without a clear national doctrine.
Still, all hope isn’t lost.
Nigeria may not be a producing economy, but it can weaponize what economists call the power of the consumer theory. With over 250 million people and one of the largest youth populations on the planet, Nigeria’s consumer base is a power. If managed strategically through smart trade policies, digital innovation, and regional market leverage, Nigeria can turn its population into bargaining power. The market can become its shield, and its numbers, its negotiation tool.But that requires clarity of vision and not leaders swayed by foreign flattery or easy loans. It requires investing in domestic production, strengthening local industries, and insisting that every deal, whether from Washington, France, UK, Germany or Beijing, aligns with Nigeria’s long-term interests.
If the U.S.-China arms and trade race intensifies – and it sure will – Nigeria must resist being the chessboard. We cannot afford to be America’s project or China’s playground. Both powers come with fine print that usually leaves developing nations indebted, exploited, humiliated or all of these can occur at once.
Our minerals, our policies, our sovereignty should not be up for negotiation. Whether it’s America’s tanks or China’s tractors, both are instruments of dominance. Beijing’s sudden embrace of Nigeria in this diplomatic spat may look like friendship, but it’s strategic opportunism. China sees an opening where America sees a problem and in global politics, opportunity is always a strong factor.
In truth, China is America, and America is China. They wear different colors. One draped in capitalism, the other in socialism but same mission, ultimately … control through dependency.
Nigeria must choose neither. It must choose itself.