By Collins Nweke
It was an interview clip just under three minutes. Its title was not only inviting, but it also spoke volumes: Culture creates instant people-to-people connection in a way that no other action can. As I heard his words and thought along with him, I thought of The Jollof Wars project that an associate of mine initiated in South Africa. He never managed to get his Embassy to take the project seriously. This was at a time diplomacy could not solve xenophobia nation-wide and anti-foreigner sentiment was at its peak. And here was a soft power project meant to use culinary culture to bridge divides and create understanding, yet his Embassy was dismissive.
As I watched I was at the same time reminded that hard power is reaching its limits and transactional diplomacy is showing diminishing returns. Influence will increasingly be secured through credibility, culture, people-to-people engagement, and long-term relationship-building.
The clip was revealing about the interviewee. Belonging to a rare tradition of diplomats, Pieter Leenknegt understands that influence is not exercised only through treaties, communiqués, or negotiating tables. Influence is also and often more enduringly, through culture, connection, and credibility. His diplomacy is not loud. It is deliberate. Not transactional, but transformational. It is rooted in the conviction that people, stories, and shared human experiences can move relations further than protocol alone.
Across his diplomatic engagements, particularly in Nigeria and the wider Africa–Europe space, Ambassador Leenknegt has demonstrated an intuitive and strategic appreciation of soft power as statecraft.
He recognises that while history, language, and geopolitics may frame relationships, it is culture that sustains them. In this sense, his embrace of Nigeria’s creative industries is not incidental, but purposeful. It is film, music, fashion, literature, and visual arts. He understands that creative expression is one of Nigeria’s most potent exports, shaping perceptions far beyond formal diplomatic channels.
Film, in particular, has emerged as a subtle but powerful diplomatic language in his engagement with Nigeria.
Nigeria’s cinematic storytelling, especially through Nollywood’s global reach, offers Europe an authentic window into Nigerian society, its aspirations, humour, tensions, resilience, and relentless creativity. By valuing this cultural dynamism, Ambassador Leenknegt affirms Nigeria not as a subject of engagement, but as a co-author of shared narratives between Europe and Africa. Film festivals, cultural showcases, creative collaborations, and informal encounters between artists and audiences become, in this approach, instruments of diplomacy as consequential as official visits.
What makes Pieter Leenknegt particularly compelling, however, is his versatility; his ability to strike a rare and effective balance between soft power and hard economic interests. His deep affection for cultural diplomacy has never displaced his commitment to economic diplomacy; rather, it has strengthened it.
Few initiatives illustrate this better than the Nigeria Belgium Luxembourg Business Forum, which has not known a more consistent, principled, and insightful friend since its inception. His support for such platforms reflects a firm belief that economic diplomacy works best when anchored in trust, cultural understanding, and long-term partnership. Drawing on an intimate understanding of both the Belgian and Nigerian economies, and their complementarities, he approaches trade promotion not as a zero-sum contest, but as a mutual enterprise, moderated by the conviction that shared prosperity is more enduring than quick wins.
This philosophy is evident in his engagement with a broad ecosystem of trade and investment promotion efforts between Belgium and Nigeria: encouraging Belgian companies to look beyond headlines and stereotypes, supporting Nigerian entrepreneurs seeking market access in Europe, and consistently advocating value-addition, local capacity, and technology transfer. Whether the focus is logistics, port infrastructure, pharmaceuticals, agribusiness, or the creative economy, his interventions are marked by realism, patience, and respect for local context. He understands that sustainable commerce is built not merely on contracts, but on confidence.
Equally noteworthy is how naturally his diplomatic practice aligns with diaspora soft power. Ambassador Leenknegt instinctively grasps that diasporas are not peripheral actors, but living bridges, carriers of memory, capital, innovation, and trust. This conviction resonates deeply with the core thesis of Economic Diplomacy of the Diaspora, a work to which he graciously contributed the prologue. His words there are not ceremonial; they reflect lived experience. They mirror a diplomatic practice that recognises the diaspora as an asset capable of de-risking investment, humanising policy, and translating ambition into action.
Beyond Nigeria, this balanced approach of combining cultural sensitivity with economic clarity, has shaped his broader diplomatic posture. Whether engaging European partners, African stakeholders, or multilateral platforms, Ambassador Leenknegt consistently demonstrates that soft power does not weaken state interests; it refines them. Culture opens doors; economics sustains what follows. Mutuality replaces extraction. Endurance replaces spectacle.
As a Belgian-Nigerian who has spent over two decades navigating the intersection of diplomacy, trade, media, and diaspora engagement, I recognise in Pieter Leenknegt a kindred spirit. He practices diplomacy with listening as a skill, empathy as a tool, and culture as capital. He understands that soft power is not weak power; it is durable power. It is power that outlives postings, survives political cycles, and leaves relationships stronger than it found them.
In an era where diplomacy is increasingly pressured to be immediate, coercive, and results-obsessed, Ambassador Pieter Leenknegt offers a timely and instructive case study. Students of diplomacy and international relations, new entrants into the Foreign Service, and seasoned officers alike, especially those still hesitant about the centrality of soft power, would do well to understudy the Leenknegts of this world. The lesson is neither abstract nor optional.
The diplomacy of tomorrow will require more, not less, soft power: deeper cultural literacy, greater emotional intelligence, and an instinctive capacity to build trust across societies, not merely between governments. Effective diplomats of the next generation will therefore be those who can integrate empathy with economics, narrative with negotiation, and culture with commerce. In this evolving landscape, soft power is no longer a supporting instrument of diplomacy; it is fast becoming its core professional competence.
This is soft power diplomacy at its best.
