Rubio Snubs Nigerian Delegation in Washington Over Fiscal Transparency Concerns

United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio has declined to personally receive a high-level Nigerian delegation in Washington, a diplomatic snub coming days after the US Department of State accused Nigeria of failing to meet minimum fiscal transparency requirements for the second consecutive year.

The Nigerian delegation, led by National Security Adviser Nuhu Ribadu and Minister of Foreign Affairs Bianca Odumegwu-Ojukwu, was in Washington for high-level discussions on security and bilateral cooperation through the US-Nigeria joint working group.

Despite the presence of Nigeria’s Foreign Minister, Rubio was absent from the meeting. The delegation was instead received by US Under-Secretary of State Allison Hooker, a departure from established diplomatic protocol which ordinarily provides for the Secretary of State to host such engagements.

The snub came shortly after the US Department of State released its 2026 Fiscal Transparency Report, which placed Nigeria among 67 governments that failed to meet minimum fiscal transparency requirements and made no significant progress in addressing deficiencies in public financial management.

The report said Nigeria’s budget documents failed to provide a substantially complete picture of government revenues and expenditures, while actual revenues and expenditures did not reasonably correspond with figures in the enacted budget.

The US also raised concerns over the independence of Nigeria’s supreme audit institution, saying it did not meet international standards for independence or for publishing substantive audit reports within a reasonable period. The report also criticised the lack of accessible information on public procurement contracts.

Washington-based lobbying firm Von Batten-Montague-York, which reported the diplomatic slight, described the low-level engagement as a deliberate signal regarding the Trump administration’s posture toward the current Nigerian leadership.

The firm noted that while the United States maintains bilateral cooperation with Nigeria on shared regional interests, the Trump administration will not throw political backing behind President Bola Tinubu, citing decades-old allegations and court records involving US Department of Justice forfeiture proceedings.

The delegation had arrived in Washington for the second meeting of the joint working group, established following President Donald Trump’s decision to redesignate Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern,” with security cooperation and counterterrorism measures featuring prominently on the agenda.

To improve fiscal transparency, the US Government recommended that Nigeria make its executive budget proposal widely and easily accessible to the public, including online, provide detailed breakdowns of revenues and expenditures, and strengthen the independence of the Auditor-General’s office.

Neither the Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Office of the National Security Adviser, nor the Presidency had issued an official statement responding to the reports of the diplomatic snub at the time of publication.