The Nigeria Government and the United States of America have taken their cultural relations and cooperation to another level of strength.
The two countries on Friday in Washington DC agreed to sign a bilateral agreement stopping illicit trafficking in cultural property and artifacts.
Nigeria’s Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed revealed this and other contents of his meeting to Voice of Nigeria in Washington DC after a closed door meeting with the US Acting Assistant Secretary of State on Education and Culture, Mr. Mathew Lussenhop.
Alhaji Mohammed said the agreement which would be signed in Nigeria by the two parties soon, will certainly add value to the already existing cultural ties between the two nations. According to Mohammed, the agreement would prevent stolen artifacts in Nigeria from getting in to the US. The agreement will focus on protection of illicit trafficking of cultural goods as well as capacity building for Nigerians.
“We agree on the final draft of the MoU which will be ready after vetting by our Ministry of Justice, and anytime soon, there will be a signing ceremony in Nigeria. The agreement is to prevent artifacts and cultural property that people want to illicitly ship to the US.
In addition to artifact, the agreement also extends to illicit drug trafficking and the FBI is involved. There are few stolen artifacts that Nigeria was expecting mostly from private museums in the US and hopefully this sort of pact will help facilitate.
They have invited us and the National Commission for Museum and Monument in Nigeria is working hard on that. In particular, we already have about two or three private collectors who had voluntarily surrendered the artifacts which they believed were either illegally trafficked or stolen from Nigeria.’’
The Nigerian Government has since begun a campaign with deliberate action to retrieve her stolen cultural artifacts across the globe, especially in Europe and America.
Last month the government went on a trail of thousands of artifacts looted from Benin Kingdom in present South South region of Nigeria during the 1897 British expedition.
Nigeria is the second country in Africa to enter into such a pact after Mali.
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