Ramadan: Culture Minister Advocates Tolerance for Prosperity

On Mar 13, 2025

The Minister of Art, Culture, Tourism, and Creative Economy, has urged Nigerians to foster religious and ethnic tolerance to promote national peace and economic prosperity.

Musawa made this appeal during a Ramadan Iftar (Breaking of Fast) she hosted on Wednesday evening in Abuja for stakeholders, ministry officials, and the media.

Emphasizing the importance of tolerance and understanding in a culturally diverse nation like Nigeria, the minister stated that unity and development can only thrive when these values are upheld. She highlighted Nigeria’s rich cultural diversity as an asset that should be cherished by encouraging mutual respect, acceptance, and inclusion, ensuring that every individual feels valued, regardless of their background.

She, therefore, enjoined adherents of Islam and Christianity to imbibe the spirit of harmony and tolerance to strengthen the bond of unity for the nation’s common good.

“As a Nigerian and being a woman of faith, this season is very special for me as both Muslim and Christian faithful are having a time of spirituality.

“We are celebrating Ramadan and our Christian brothers and sisters are also fasting and celebrating Lent. So, it is a time to emphasise the importance of unity and pray for it.

“We all belong to Almighty God, so, it is really about unity of our country.

“I really want to use this industry to look at the different diversity that we have and use it in a way that will strengthen us as one great people and one great nation.

“We are one people, we are Nigerians, and we have a very beautiful rainbow of different cultures and languages that is used to show our differences.

“That culture is a national asset and we need to open up that asset and use it as an initiative that will give us the economic expansion that we are hoping to have,” she said.

Musawa said that the ministry, under her watch, was working toward ensuring that Nigeria leverages its rich cultural and creative space to create wealth for citizens, especially its teeming youths.

She further said that besides its economic relevance, the culture and creative sector was a veritable tool for building national cohesion and stability.

She, therefore, urged industry stakeholders to embark on initiatives that foster positive relationships and unity among Nigerians with different cultures, religions, and lifestyles. “There is good times ahead as President Bola Tinubu has been very keen in ensuring that we put up a structure that will really add a lot of value and worth to Nigerians.

“He is so interested in building something different, special, innovative and dynamic for the future generation, and it is not about this government or the next government.”

“He wants us to build something very strong and fortified to give the growing population, especially the younger demography, a hope for the future.

“He has ensured in his diversification efforts that the creative industry, the cultural industry, hold a lot of worth in terms of what we can bequeath to this generation.

“So, what we have done in the last couple of months is really to put up that strong institutional framework, that infrastructure that will really allow us to tap into the bigger potential in the industry.”

“We are at the beginning season, but in the next couple of months you are going to see us roll out and activate different programmes and implement them.”

“The youths of Nigeria will have assurance in terms of job creation and capacity building to use our creative industry to turn Nigeria into a creative and cultural hub of Africa”, she said

NAN/ Oluchi