Hannatu Musa-Musawa is the Minister of Arts, Culture and the Creative Economy. In this interview, she speaks passionately on President Bola Tinubu’s vision to harness the pool of resources in Nigeria’s creative industry and the steps she has so far taken to achieve this. Excerpts: Since your appointment as Minister of Arts, Culture and the Creative Economy, what are the things that have happened in that space? A lot! I think one of those things that shows that President Bola Tinubu is an innovator is the fact that he really was committed to diversifying from our normal means of revenue, which is oil.
In that diversification, he created this amazing ministry – Art, Culture, and the Creative Economy – the first of its kind in Nigeria. When I got this job, I decided to approach it from a ground zero point of view because I really felt that not much had been done in the space to create a fortifying sort of industry-specific structure. The basic things that are needed to put a foundation were not there, so we approached it from a ground zero perspective.
In doing that, I came up with an eight-point agenda. That eight-point agenda hammers on making Nigeria a global creativity hub and engaging in skill acquisition for members of the industry and capacity building so that they will be better positioned for job creation. Can you break down this eight-point agenda and its operationalisation? Policy framework is central when you talk about building a foundation.
We decided to lo.
