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The Director General,
National Council for Arts and Culture, Otunba
Olusegun Runsewe,
presenting a Memorandum of Understanding between the
Council and the Bank of
Industry to the Minister of Information and
Culture, Alhaji Lai
Mohammed, in Abuja on Friday
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The Minister said this in Abuja
over the weekend, when the Director General of the Council, Otunba Olusegun
Runsewe, presented to him the MoU, which was signed earlier last Friday.
"I have been reliably informed
that top on the list of the benefits
that will accrue from this landmark
MoU is that it will create over
200,000 jobs for the sector. This
is epochal, and it is in line with
one of the cardinal programmes of
this administration, which is job
creation and empowerment.
''The MoU will also act as a
catalyst for the development of the
country's craft industries, create
a financing window and make
available loanable funds to be
accessed by all NCAC stakeholders, as
well as assist the stakeholders in
capacity building," he said.
Alhaji Mohammed said the MoU will
equally enhance the capacity of
producers of cultural products and
services to work towards attaining
the standard of modern practice in
the packaging of their cultural
products, to enable them compete
favourably at the global markets and earn the nation's Artists a decent
living.
The Minister commended Otunba
Runsewe for putting together ''this
momentous event'' just a few days
after assuming office as the NCAC DG, and also thanked the Acting MD of
BoI, Mr Waheed Olagunju, for his support for the Creative Industry.
"As you may all be aware, one
of the factors militating against the
promotion of the Nigerian creative
industries has been lack of access
to funding for the Artists to
develop their creative works as well as
weak access to international
markets, due to poor packaging and
standard. I am therefore happy to
say that with the signing of this
MoU, Nigerian Artists can heave a
sigh of relief," he said.
In his remarks, Otunba Runsewe
described the MOU as a milestone in the creative sector, being the first
time in history that the sector will
access funds from a financial
institution with a single digit interest
rate.
"Today, we have come to make a
history-making presentation to the
Honourable Minister. Today happens
to be a day that will create a
change and we are going to tell our
story the way it should have been
told some few years ago," he
said.
The NCAC DG acknowledged the
leadership role of the Minister,
particularly in leveraging on the
unique potential of the Creative
Industry to drive the
diversification of the economy away from oil.
The Minister used the occasion to
decorate some journalists with a
special pin with the inscription:
"Our Culture, Our Pride", as part of
a conscious strategy to mobilise
the media to promote the nation's
Creative Industry.
