Runsewe Backs Move To Merge Govt Agencies

Director-general of the National Council for Arts and Culture, Otunba Segun Runsewe, yesterday backed the ongoing move by the House of Representatives to merge and streamline some federal government-owned agencies.

The speaker of the House, Femi Gbajabiamila, had on June 29, 2022,  inaugurated an ad-hoc committee with the mandate to investigate and determine such agencies, and to recommend appropriate action to the larger house.

At the first hearing session of the committee yesterday, Runsewe described the move as one which “will make some of us more effective” in the discharge of responsibilities, answering in the affirmative when the committee asked if in his opinion, five agencies performing related function as his’ that “the five agencies can be merged. I totally agree with you.”

The agencies in focus at the committee’s first hearing were; National Commission for Museums and Monuments, National Council for Arts and Culture, National Gallery of Art, Nigeria Tourism Development Commission, and the National Institute for Hospitality and Tourism.

According to him, culture and tourism cannot be separated, as is the case in Nigeria. “You can’t go to Dubai today and hear all these names (agencies) here. It is just culture and tourism”, he argued, noting that some sister parastatals have been trying to operate parallel functions, with almost all carrying out one festival or another.

But the director-general of the National Institute for Hospitality and Tourism, Nura Kangiwa, insisted that there were no similarities between his organisation and any other, saying that “our own is a training provider.”

He also could not satisfy the committee on which law that gave rise to appointment of a DG for the institute, when he said an amendment to its Act was passed last year, but yet to be signed into law by the President. He was asked to, at a later date, furnish the committee with details of the number of trainees of the agency since inception.

The chairman of the ad-hoc committee, Victor Danzaria, in his remarks said the essence of the engagement was to look into how desirable the agencies were, “so that the government doesn’t waste resources on agencies”.