Tinubu Urges Fair Mineral Trade, Ethical AI, and Financial Reform at G20

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has called on world leaders to ensure that the wealth of Africa’s critical minerals translates into shared prosperity, while advocating for ethical governance of artificial intelligence (AI) and reforms in the global financial system.

Delivering his statement through Vice President Kashim Shettima at the Third Session of the 2025 Group of 20 (G20) Leaders’ Summit, held at the Johannesburg Expo Centre, Tinubu stressed that Africa’s natural resources must serve as catalysts for industrial transformation rather than mere raw material exports. The summit was themed “A Fair and Just Future for All: Critical Minerals, Decent Work, Artificial Intelligence.”

“Nigeria calls for a global framework that promotes value addition at the source, supports local beneficiation, and ensures that communities hosting these resources are not left behind,” Tinubu said. He underscored that possession of resources alone does not guarantee prosperity, noting that fairness, transparency, and accountability in extraction and trade are essential to deliver tangible benefits to local communities.

Highlighting the broader social implications, the Nigerian President emphasized that responsible resource governance must ensure that industrial progress uplifts people, not just economies. “The issue before us reaches far beyond the narrow arithmetic of economics and speaks to the moral character of the world we aspire to build,” he said.

Tinubu also stressed the importance of decent work as a cornerstone of inclusive economic development. He said that Nigeria, through its Renewed Hope Agenda, is investing in future-ready skills by empowering youths via digital literacy, vocational training, and entrepreneurship.

On the theme of artificial intelligence, the President called for global ethical standards to ensure AI remains a tool for empowerment rather than exclusion. “Nigeria supports the creation of global ethical standards for AI that uphold safety, transparency, and equity,” he stated, urging partnerships between developed and developing nations to harness AI’s potential for job creation and inclusive growth.

According to Tinubu, addressing systemic bias in AI, ensuring equitable benefit-sharing, and fostering sustained multilateral dialogue are essential steps to make technology serve humanity rather than displace it.

The Nigerian leader further linked responsible mineral governance, AI, and decent work to a broader vision of inclusive development. “Critical minerals, decent work, and artificial intelligence are bound by a single calling: to shape an economy that uplifts rather than excludes; an economy that measures its strength not only by growth but by the dignity it affords every human being,” he said.

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Tinubu also called for urgent reforms in the international financial system to ensure fair handling of global financial flows and meaningful solutions to recurring debt crises. He noted that current multilateral frameworks, designed decades ago, no longer address the complexities confronting developing nations.

“For trade to be truly inclusive, the G20 must take bold and deliberate steps towards reforming the international financial architecture and the global institutions that sustain it,” Tinubu said, stressing that only an equitable system can meet the needs of nations in the Global South, which have historically been marginalized in global economic decision-making.

The President highlighted Africa’s pressing development challenges, including rising debt burdens and the need for sustainable financing to implement national priorities effectively. “Rising debt burdens have continued to drag economies back into cycles of fragility, transforming local difficulties into global vulnerabilities,” he said. Tinubu urged the G20 to prioritise debt sustainability and responsible utilisation of critical minerals in shaping inclusive development agendas.

Through his address, Tinubu presented a clear message that Africa seeks to move beyond being a supplier of raw materials toward becoming a hub of value creation, innovation, and dignity in work. He emphasized that global cooperation, ethical governance of technology, and financial reform are critical to achieving a future where growth is both sustainable and equitable.

“Only with a collective resolve of the G20 can Africa realise a positive paradigm shift in its development trajectory,” Tinubu concluded, advocating policies that drive sustainable growth, promote financial inclusion, and confront emerging global risks.

The President’s intervention at the summit reinforces Nigeria’s strategic focus on leveraging critical minerals, AI, and inclusive finance to catalyze national and continental development, while calling on global leaders to adopt frameworks that prioritize people over mere profit.