Cameron due home to deal with phone-hack crisis
The Prime Minister is to fly home early from his visit to Africa to make a statement to MPs on Wednesday on the escalating scandal over phone hacking.
David Cameron decided on Monday to cut short his visit to Nigeria by around seven hours, returning this afternoon rather than overnight.
His trip to Africa, billed as a high-profile trade mission, has been overshadowed by the phone-hacking scandal and the resignation of two senior officers at Scotland Yard.
During a stopover in South Africa, Mr Cameron faced repeated questions about his hiring of former News of the World editor Andy Coulson, after Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson and Assistant Commissioner John Yates both quit over their links with Coulson’s former deputy Neil Wallis.
And it was a similar repeat scenario when Mr Cameron held a joint press conference with Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan, as he faced several questions about the phone hacking scandal, more than 3000 miles away from London.
“I just would want to give this reassurance to people that back at home…this does consist of big problems, but we are a big country and we’re going to sort them out,” he said.
“At the same time we’re not going to take our eye off the ball on getting our economy to grow, getting jobs for our people, making sure we’ve got..immigration and welfare policies and doing all the things that frankly the British people are crying out for their government to get on with.”
The PM is will make a statement on the affair to the House of Commons on Wednesday, after announcing that he was extending the parliamentary session by a day to allow him to address MPs.
His announcement followed criticism from Labour leader Ed Miliband that the Prime Minister had left the country with the intention of staying away until MPs had quit Westminster for their summer break.
Read more: How are the police, press and politicians connected to phone hacking?
Mr Cameron had already trimmed what was originally intended to be a five-day tour of four African countries ending on Friday.
He dropped Rwanda and South Sudan from his itinerary in order to be able to return to London to deal with the aftermath of today’s appearance before the Commons Culture Committee of media tycoon Rupert Murdoch, his son James and former News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks.
After flying into Nigeria from South Africa, Mr Cameron used a speech in Lagos to urge Africans to use aid, trade and political reform to make the coming years “Africa’s moment”.
Mr Cameron said that the conditions are falling into place to transform Africa, lifting millions of people out of poverty and ending dependence on aid.
And he warned that, unless Britain and its businesses take advantage of this moment, they risk “missing out on one of the greatest economic opportunities on the planet”.
Africa has seen the number of its democracies increase nearly eight-fold over the past two decades, and the continent is now home to six of the 10 fastest-growing economies in the world. Africa is predicted to have the world’s highest average GDP growth over the next 40 years.