Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo on Wednesday named Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as foreign minister, but said the former World Bank executive would remain in charge of the country's economic team.
Okonjo-Iweala's deputy Nenadi Usman was promoted to the post of finance minister, while Foreign Minister Oluyemi Adeniji was moved to internal affairs.
"The former finance minister, Ngozi, will remain chairman of the economic team and carry out oversight functions with external financial institutions," Obasanjo said at a swearing-in ceremony in the capital Abuja.
Obasanjo's economic team designed an IMF-backed economic reform programme in 2003 that enabled the oil exporting nation to clinch an $18 billion debt write-off with the Paris Club of sovereign lenders last year. As foreign minister, Okonjo-Iweala will supervise the withdrawal of Nigerian troops from the south-eastern Bakassi Peninsula and the transfer of the disputed territory to Cameroon, expected to take place by August.
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