It’s Time to Wake Up—Otunba Olusegun Runsewe
Speaking at the 1st National Stakeholders Review Conference on the National Festival for Arts and Culture (NAFEST), the Director General of the National Council for Arts and Culture (NCAC) has challenged the creative sector to wake up from its slumber.
“It is time we wake up from our slumber and push the culture and creative sector up the ladder where it deserves to be. There are seven countries in Africa that rely solely on the creative sector. There are many countries around the world whose ministers of culture and tourism are more important than their ministers of finance because that’s where they make their money from.”
The former Director General of the Nigerian Tourism Development Corporation (now Authority), who is presently the President, World Arts and Crafts Council (African Region), challenged stakeholders in the sector to up their game and stop giving the impression that the culture and creative industry is all about dancing and cannot contribute to the economy.”
Speaking further, he explained that the review of NAFEST was long overdue, having been done consecutively in the last 35 years without any attempt at reviewing the existing document. “During this conference, we shall review NAFEST for the purpose of repositioning it, not as a jamboree, but as a major contributor to the GDP of Nigeria.”
Otunba Olusegun Runsewe, who during his tenure as DG postulated the saying “oil is exhaustive but culture/creativity is not exhaustive, argues that if each state lives up to their expectations, creating jobs of a minimum of 200,000, then there’ll be no criminals in our prisons, because most of those that should cause trouble would have been dutifully engaged.
The conference, which is ongoing at the Chida Events Centre, continues until Friday, December 8, after which Nigerians will expect repacked NAFEST in 2024.