The Executive Secretary/CEO, National Institute For Cultural Orientation (NICO), Ado Mohammed Yahuza, has yesterday disclosed that no nation can develop to its full potentials if culture is not given the right priority in the scheme of things.
Represented by the Director Administration and Human Resources, Ibrahim Hussaini, Yahuza who made the disclosure during the commencement of a 2-day conference on culture, zonal intervention projects and national development for stakeholders in Adamawa state noted that there is an intrinsic relationship between culture and national development.
“No nation can achieve meaningful development where its culture is not accorded priority attention in its development agenda. Experts have rightly observed that development efforts have failed because the cultural dimension was ignored.
” It is important to emphasize that an intrinsic relationship exists between culture and national development. A profound understanding of the place of culture as the bedrock and roadmap to national development is imperative in our quest for meaningful progress and sustainable sociopolitical and economic development of our nation,” he said.
Yahuza said in order to boost development and ensure equitable distribution of projects along Nigeria’s corridors, the zonal intervention fund which is a product of synergy and consensus between the legislative and executive arms was floated.
” The zonal intervention projects (ZIP) is a well thought out development mechanism designed to foster equitable distribution of economic, political and sociocultural development projects in the constituencies of lawmakers by various ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) of government.
“It is gratifying to state that through zonal intervention projects, many communities that were hitherto neglected, have benefitted from this commendable strategy.
” It is also noteworthy that through zonal intervention fund, many MDAs are able to execute several projects and programs in furtherance of their statutory objectives which would have been impossible due to funding challenges from regular budget,” he said.
In his address, the special guest of honour and member representing Demsa/Numan federal constituency, Kwamoti Laori thanked the organizers for convening the program despite the nation’s challenges.
Laori, who was represented by the deputy speaker, Adamawa State house of assembly, Pwamkweno Mackondo said NICO’s role in national development cannot be overemphasized noting that mainstreaming culture can be an indispensable aspect of national development.
“Speaking about zonal intervention projects, otherwise referred to as constituency projects is one of the areas that interest most Nigerians even though its implantation is widely being misunderstood. In the United States it is called ” Pork Barrel” in Zambia it is known as ‘Constituency Development Fund” it goes with many different names in many democracies.
“ZIPs a category of projects that are appropriated for annually by the national assembly and being supervised by the special duties office of the secretary to the government of the federation (SGF),”he said.
