Ex-Envoy Wants Separate Ministry Of Culture To Promote Arts, Crafts

Former Ambassador of Nigeria to Morocco, Baba Garba, has said for Nigeria’s arts, craft and culture industry to thrive, culture should cease to be under the ministry of information.

He said if it must be affiliated to the ministry of information, there should be a clear dichotomy of functions between the two departments.

Garba spoke at the ongoing maiden edition of the Nigeria Morocco Crafts Exhibition and Morocco Traditional Wedding Festival at the Chida Hotel and Events Centre in Abuja.

At the exhibition, showcasing arts and crafts of Morocco alongside that of Sokoto State, the Moroccan crafts are luxurious, refined and intricately designed: from ceramic crockeries to trinkets, clothing, wooden works, leatherwork accessories to raffia products. They all scream high-end (also expensive) but highly finished, compared to the Nigerian crafts which are definitely unique in their own design but lack the refinement of their counterpart.

This is strange considering that the redskin leather used by Morocco since the 1830s (and much valued in Europe) were initially sourced from Sokoto and via Kano transported by caravans to Fez, Morocco and then to Europe.

Today, Morocco’s Chamber of Arts and Crafts in partnership with the Sokoto State Chamber of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture to ensure the success of this exhibition, holding from October 24 to 29th.

For the Nigerian Arts and Culture Industry to thrive, Garba said the country must view the industry not as a civil service job where bureaucracies prevail, but one where people take ownership and responsibility of cultural projects, just as Morocco has with its Arts and Crafts Chamber of Commerce which shows the country’s recognition and investment in the sector as an income generator.