Weekly Trust (Kaduna)
Mohammed S. Shehu
15 October 2006
Jos — In a bid to provide an intellectual platform for ventilation of ideas on specific cultural topics, the National Institute for Cultural Orientation (NICO) recently held a roundtable conference in Jos to review the significance of tolerance in promoting cultural orientation.
Participants in the two-day conference on 'Culture, Tolerance and Nation Building' have identified lack of dialogue and proper education as some of the leading factors responsible for the culture of intolerance in Nigeria.
In a communiqué issued at the end of the conference, the conferees also noted the need for rule of law to help appreciate the tolerance of alternative views.
The conference which is the 3rd in the series of the orientation conferences took place in Jos, capital of Plateau state. It attracted participants from different parts of the country who came to deliberate on the five commissioned papers presented with five discussants from the academia.
This year's edition of the conference came at a time when the country is facing serious political crisis and other high incidence of violence brought about by lack of tolerance.
In his remark the Minister of Culture and Tourism, Chief Femi Fani Kayode said the institute in consonance with it mandate of providing value orientation initiated the forum to enable it provide an intellectual platform for discussions and debates.
Represented by Alhaji Alkali, a director in the ministry, Chief Kayode said the theme of the forum was timely sequel to the recent spate of violence and mindless assassination of political aspirants.
He challenged the participants to analyse the relationship between culture and tolerance.
Declaring the meeting open, the Executive Director of the institute, John Bernard Yusuf said the conference was conceived by the institute in 2004 as a forum where cultural administrators, academics and relevant non-governmental organisation would converge to deliberate on topical issues bothering on cultural orientation in Nigeria with the aim of articulating strategies for dealing with the problem.
Yusuf said the theme of this year's conference was carefully selected to address the high incidence of violence usually witnessed periods before, during and after general elections most of which he said were due to political intolerance. "Unfortunately this has already started manifesting with the spate of high profile assassinations witnessed recently in some parts of the country," he said.
He added: "We have also noted the crisis in the Niger Delta and pockets of violence and inter-ethnic conflicts arising from exclusion, xenophobia and indigene-settler controversies."
Five papers were presented by resource persons with each dwelling on various aspects of the theme.
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