George W. Bush arrived in Abuja late on 11 July 2003 after stops in Senegal, South Africa, Botswana and Uganda. The 12 July programme was concentrated at the State House and at Congress Hall, Abuja, where he addressed business and civic leaders and praised Nigeria's 'regional leadership' in West Africa.
The substantive agenda was the Liberian crisis. Charles Taylor was under indictment by the Special Court for Sierra Leone, Monrovia was under rebel siege, and Obasanjo had offered Taylor asylum in Calabar; Bush publicly endorsed the asylum offer and authorised the deployment of US naval assets to support an ECOMIL Nigerian-led peacekeeping mission. The second pillar was the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), which Bush had signed into law on 27 May 2003 — Nigeria was one of the original fourteen 'PEPFAR focus countries' and would receive over US$8 billion of HIV/AIDS funding from PEPFAR over the next two decades, financing the antiretroviral roll-out, prevention-of-mother-to-child-transmission programmes and the Walter Reed Programme-Nigeria at the 68 Nigerian Army Reference Hospital. The visit also discussed AGOA implementation and the proposed Africa Command (AFRICOM).