The year 2025 will hardly be remembered for a single shock. It was the year the global operating system came under open contest. The United States lost some of the confidence it once had as the world’s leading power. China moved to bend the rules in its favour. And artificial intelligence, long the subject of cautious speculation, began to imbibe itself into the contours of economic and political power.
Nigeria found itself on a multi-vector stage courted by competing powers, challenged by regional responsibilities, and striving to turn diplomatic engagement into leverage. These opportunities, and sometimes limits, manifested in trade outputs, diplomatic alliances, and strained ties. Regardless, the country’s efforts demonstrated its ability to recalibrate and reposition with ambition, posture, and a few concessions.
Here are some defining moments in Nigeria’s external relations in 2025.
HIGHEST TRADE SURPLUS IN SIX YEARS — OWED TO EUROPE AND ASIA
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With a total trade value of N113.00 trillion and a balance of N19.34 trillion, Nigeria recorded its highest trade surplus in six years in 2025 — and it only took nine months to achieve.
With about 91 percent of total exports, much of the successes were owed to oil and natural gas, with markets dominating Europe and Asia. Europe accounted for 43 percent of total sales and 34 percent of total imports, while Asia represented 29 percent of total shipments and 43 percent of total purchases.
The figures contributed to favourable terms of trade (TOT) for the country. TOT measures a country’s export prices relative to its import prices. A TOT above 100 signals improvement, meaning exports buy more imports, while below 100 indicates deterioration. In March, Nigeria’s TOT increased to 101.37 points, Trading Economics’ most recent data showed.
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With N2.26 trillion, India was the most favoured export destination this year’s Q3. Countries such as Spain (N1.83 trillion), France (N1.66 trillion), the Netherlands (N1.54 trillion), and Italy (N1.46 trillion) were also major European markets.
Europe and Asia also dominated markets for other export materials from Nigeria, such as agricultural goods. In Q3 of 2025, Europe purchased goods worth N444.22 billion while Asia imported N246.24 billion worth of exports from Nigeria, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
The top goods in the same period were cocoa beans, cocoa butter, cashew nuts in shell, sesamum seeds, flowers, flours and meals of soya beans, other frozen shrimps and prawns, and crude palm kernel oil.
Earlier this month, Gautier Mignot, European Union envoy to Nigeria and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), said Nigeria recorded a $10 billion trade surplus with the EU alone in 2025.
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Mignot said the figures constituted one-third of Nigeria’s foreign direct investments (FDI) stock.
With a current 3.98 percent of GDP annual growth rate, Trading Economics predicts a climb to 5 percent in 2026.
SECURITY, TRADE — AND FRICTION: NIGERIA’S ROLLERCOASTER AFFAIR WITH THE US
Nigeria’s relations with the US in 2025 were shaped by three main pillars: security cooperation, trade access, and migration politics. For years, Washington has remained a key security partner, particularly in counterterrorism capacity-building and maritime security. Yet this cooperation coexisted uneasily with growing Nigerian frustration over visa restrictions and shifting US immigration policies that disproportionately affected African nationals.
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In July, the US embassy announced a reduction in the validity period and entry allowance for “most” non-immigrant and non-diplomatic visas issued to Nigerians, effectively limiting the legality of their stay in the US to three months with a single entry.
An alleged imbalance in visa reciprocity from Nigeria was cited as the reason for the unprecedented hard-hitting penalty. However, diplomatic sources told TheCable that Nigeria’s refusal to accept Venezuelan migrants and asylum seekers from the US was partly responsible for the visa restrictions.
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TheCable learnt that the US also pushed for the option of allowing its citizens to electronically apply for Nigeria’s five-year visa without visiting an embassy, alongside access to the country’s criminal database so that Nigerians with previous criminal records who are now living in America can be identified for deportation.
Complications worsened after allegations of a Christian genocide began to gain momentum in President Donald Trump’s closest circles. The persisting talks informed Trump’s decision to officially re-designate Nigeria a ‘country of particular concern’ (CPC).
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Amid the row, the US announced new visa restrictions earlier this month targeting Nigerians accused of undermining religious freedom. Marco Rubio, secretary of state, said the restrictions will affect those who “knowingly direct, authorise, fund, support, or carry out violations of religious freedom”.
Weeks after the selective restrictions, the entire country was placed on a list of countries facing a partial travel ban. The decision was made even as Riley Moore, US congressman, said Nigeria and the US were close to reaching an agreement on a “strategic security framework” aimed at tackling terrorism in the West African nation.
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On trade, Nigeria was hit with a 14 percent tariff on imports after Trump announced sweeping global taxes in April. However, the country continued to benefit from preferential access under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), though questions lingered about how much Nigerian exporters have truly leveraged it beyond oil and gas derivatives.
This year’s Q3, the US was ranked the ninth export destination from Nigeria with a trade value of N743.63bn. It is unclear how much of this was facilitated by AGOA, which expired September 30.
Earlier this month, the US Congress advanced a bill to revive AGOA for a three-year renewal period until December 31, 2028.
BRICS AND THE SEARCH FOR NEW ECONOMIC PARTNERS
As 2025 kicked off, Brazil formally announced Nigeria’s admission as a partner country in the BRICS alliance.
Originally comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, the alliance began to expand after more countries began seeking to join the group of leading emerging economies.
Nigeria’s admission into the bloc made it the ninth partner country, joining Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Thailand, Uganda, and Uzbekistan. The nations collectively account for over 40 percent of the world’s economy.
At the 2025 Doha Forum, Yusuf Tuggar, minister of foreign affairs, emphasised that the country’s admittance into the alliance was part of Nigeria’s ambition to seek new economic partners so as to cater for its bulging population.
“We cannot do that simply by sticking to ideological alignments. We need to relate with as many countries as possible in the world,” Tuggar said.
Currently at over 230 million people — most of them young — Nigeria is projected to reach approximately 401 million by 2050, making it the world’s third-most populous country behind India and China.
“We have a lot also to learn from many of the countries that constitute the BRICS,” Tuggar said, but also flagged the G20 as an aspiring bloc to make an entry into.
Independence is a key pillar in Nigeria’s foreign policy. The country has long embraced a policy of non-alignment and strategic autonomy, allowing it to engage with a wide range of partners without blind allegiance to any global power, regardless of ideological, religious, or other persuasions that could colour relationship choices.
This flexibility is why the country can partner with BRICS while simultaneously seeking to join the G20—pursuing relationships across divides in service of its national interest.
INTRA-CONTINENTAL TRADE SPIKE
Last month, Bashir Adeniyi, the comptroller-general of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), said Nigerian trade with other African nations grew 14 percent in the first half of the year, after the government strengthened regional ties.
Adeniyi said trade with the continent increased by N600 billion ($415 million) to N4.82 trillion in the six months through June.
Jumoke Oduwole, industry, trade, and investment minister, attributed much of the progress to Nigeria’s “concrete” steps toward implementing the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCTA) agreement.
Oduwole said Nigeria introduced tariff concessions and opened a dedicated air cargo corridor to East Africa, cutting export costs by about 75 percent.
In West Africa, the Ivory Coast market was most favourable, recording an export worth N1.44 trillion in the year’s Q3. Ivory Coast was also among the top 10 global markets for Nigeria.
Regionally, Ghana came second with N714.03 billion, Togo with N531.06 billion, Senegal with N418.64 billion, and Niger with N40.85 billion.
Benin trailed in sixth place with an export value of N26.15 billion, Burkina Faso with N22.53 billion, Mali with N4.83 billion, Sierra Leone with N1.46 billion, and Guinea in last place with a value of N1.26 billion.
MISSTEPS WITH JAPAN AND BURKINA FASO
Nigeria’s diplomacy was active but not without friction.
An awkwardness with Japan began when delegates held the fort at Nigeria’s booth during the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) in August — pending the arrival of government officials.
The situation quickly drew criticism from Nigerians online, who lamented the country’s poor representation at such a high-profile gathering.
But the ministry of foreign affairs dismissed the concerns, noting that the booth was scheduled to be “inaugurated” while Bayo Onanuga, presidential spokesman, said the narrative of an “empty” booth did not tell the complete story of Nigeria’s activities at TICAD and described it as “sensational”.
The aftermath of the conference would later complicate matters.
Abiodun Oladunjoye, director of information at Nigeria’s State House, issued a statement saying the Japanese government would create “a special visa category for highly skilled, innovative, and talented young Nigerians who want to move to Kisarazu to live and work”.
The arrangement, under the ‘JICA Africa Hometown’ initiative, was said to be geared towards strengthening exchanges between African countries and Japanese local governments.
But Japanese officials said the scheme was misinterpreted, and that the foreign ministry had first raised concerns privately with Nigeria, urging a withdrawal of the special visa claim.
A public denial followed only after the information remained uncorrected.
Japan later scrapped the initiative after the development sparked discontent in Japanese cities, with citizens voicing concerns over public safety, the burden on resources, and the fear of immigrants overstaying their visas, turning a manageable issue into a diplomatic embarrassment.
Regionally, Nigeria also experienced some diplomatic tension with Burkina Faso.
Personnel of the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) were detained for nearly two weeks in the Sahelian country after their aircraft made a forced landing in Bobo Dioulasso, following an “emergency situation in flight”.
NAF said the landing was in accordance with standard safety procedures and international aviation protocol.
But the Confederation of Sahel States (AES) described the landing as an “unfriendly act carried out in defiance of international law”.
The AES said it was authorised to neutralise any aircraft that would violate the confederal space.
The soldiers were later released after President Bola Tinubu sent a delegation led by Yusuf Tuggar, minister of foreign affairs, to meet with Ibrahim Traoré, Burkina Faso’s junta leader.
THE BIG PICTURE
Overall, Nigeria’s international engagements in 2025 sustained existing patterns rather than driving core change. The country remained globally relevant and economically courted, but structurally constrained. Alliances delivered goodwill and occasional investment, yet rarely translated into systemic transformation at home.
That gap between engagement and execution was evident in governance reforms. An EU election follow-up mission, invited by Nigeria, issued 23 recommendations in 2023 to strengthen electoral integrity. By October 2025, only one had been fully implemented, two had been partially implemented, eight were ongoing, three were too early to assess, and nine had not been implemented at all, according to Barry Andrews, the mission’s chief.
The lag was compounded by Nigeria’s delayed ambassadorial appointments.
For two years, several key missions operated without substantive ambassadors. Though it is not unusual for embassies to operate without ambassadors, diplomatic officials told TheCable their absence contributed to a weakening follow-through in host countries and diplomatic continuity.
New nominations were eventually made in November, but the delay had already blunted momentum in some bilateral engagements.
However, until domestic reforms — power supply, manufacturing capacity, regulatory stability — translate into competitiveness, foreign diplomacy will continue to manage decline rather than drive sustained growth.
Arguments could interrogate the intercontinental trade spike and the high trade surplus with global partners in comparison with real growth. However, much of the surplus remained heavily concentrated in energy, depended on external price movements, currency depreciation, making exports cheaper, and could reverse quickly with oil price drops or import recovery.
A competitive economy that is able to sustain export growth across sectors and absorb shocks without collapse is critical to reshaping its economic future, domestically and internationally.
