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…say N200m too small to fund sector
By
Emman Ovuakporie
The House of Representatives has called for increased funding for the Culture and Tourism sector or scrap it if it is not ready to invest in its full economic potentials.
Chairman of the House Committee On Culture and Tourism, Ogbeide Ihama, gave the admonition during the 2019-2020 budget defence by the Minister of Informational and Culture Lai Mohammed at the National Assembly on Tuesday.
The Chairman of the committee said, if the president is indeed serious of diversifying the economy as he has often said, then the culture and tourism sector should be well funded as it has the capacity to generate revenue and create job opportunities for the nation’s teeming unemployed youths.
He said culture and tourism is big business and the government must stop paying lip service to the sector with the paltry sum of N200million year in year out.
The Minister while adopting the submission of the chairman decry the inability of the ministry to pay dues as a member of the international association it belongs to due to low budgetary allocation to the ministry.
According to Lai Mohammed about N385 million was released of the 2019 appropriation with a balance of N495 million yet to be released.
Lawmakers were all in support of adequate funding for culture and tourism if it must harness its full potentials as it is capable of turning around the futunes of the country if properly funded.
A road map for the revamping of the sector was agreed on with the committee promising to collaborate with the ministry to drive the revolution in the tourism and culture sector.
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