Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, will travel to Nigeria in May for meetings about the Invictus Games, the sporting event for military personnel wounded in action that Harry founded 10 years ago.
A Sunday statement from Brig. Gen. Tukur Gusau, a spokesperson for Nigeria’s military, confirmed the upcoming visit and said Harry and Meghan would meet service members and participate in a variety of cultural activities. The statement did not say exactly when the couple were expected to arrive in the African nation.
Harry has long said Africa is close to his heart. He and his brother William, the Prince of Wales, have visited regularly since first being taken as children by their father, now King Charles III, and their late mother Princess Diana.
Martin Meissner/AP
The couple’s trip is likely to come not long before or after Harry returns to London for a May 8 thanksgiving service to mark the 10th anniversary of the Invictus Games Foundation. It will be his first trip to the U.K. since he paid a fleeting visit to see his father in February after the king’s cancer diagnosis was revealed. Harry will attend the event in London without the duchess, as she and the couple’s children will not join him in the U.K. for this visit.
Modeled after the U.S. military’s Warrior Games, Harry founded the Invictus Games in 2014 to offer wounded veterans, specifically, a new sports challenge.
The couple’s trip to Nigeria, which participated in last year’s games, will “consolidate Nigeria’s stronghold at the games and the possibility of hosting the event in later years,” Gusau said.