20101210
africanews

She traversed the length and breath of Nigeria, visited virtually every state, attended every important socio-cultural event, visited every bank, took pictures with big wigs. She was so much into us!

After the former United States Ambassador, Dr. Robin Renee Sanders, presented her credentials to former President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua on December 3, 2007, she enthused that she felt like she was with her family.

In actual fact, her corporeal looks would remind one of a typical Nigerian woman and one may not tell if she had traced her ancestry to this country.

"It is with great pleasure that I arrive here to my second home, as the Ambassador of the United States of America, to the Federal Republic of Nigeria," Sanders had said after she presented her letter of credence to the president.

The career member of the US senior Foreign Service was sworn in as Ambassador to the Federal Republic of Nigeria on November 19, 2007 in the United States and just finished her tenure.

Her simplicity at public forums in Nigeria does not in any way presage her recent stoic way of demanding from our presidency what its line of action are and what it stands for as revealed by WikiLeaks.

On one occasion, for instance, she saidJonathan needed to publicly demonstrate that he was the sole executor of national issues, not being directed or serving a political purpose for Obasanjo or others and the president gave her his words and commenced acting as directed.

Vanguard

President Goodluck Jonathan, who was acting president at the time, with President Barack Obama.

Perhaps the most plausible evidence of her influence here was when she requested that former INEC chairman, Professor Maurice Iwu, be placed on terminal leave and the script was acted out as written.

Nonetheless, it is instructive to note that Sanders had a strong and top military background before she proceeded to become an ambassador in Nigeria.

She served as the International Advisor and Deputy Commandant of the Industrial College of the Armed Forces of the US. She served as the Director for Africa at the National Security Council at the White House under President George H. W. Bush from 1988 to 1989, and President Bill Clinton from 1997 to 1999.

If what the online whistleblower WikiLeaks published of her "summaries" are nothing but the truth, Sanders could be described as a spy who was in love with Nigeria.