Mr. Li Xuda, the Director, China Cultural Centre, Abuja, has pledged China’s willingness to support Nigeria to promote and develop its museums and monuments.

This is in a bid to further the cultural relations between both countries.

Li made this known during the commemoration of the 2022 International Museum Day and International Day for Monuments and Sites in Abuja on Thursday.

According to Li, Nigeria has a lot of monuments and beautiful sites, blessed with a rich cultural heritage that when adequately preserved and developed will make the country the cradle of African development.

“Nigeria has a lot of beautiful sites and monuments and museums."

“Three years ago, I visited a museum in Kano with a lot of artistic works in there and I was impressed."

“I think we can work together to preserve and to develop the museum and make more people know Nigeria and make Nigeria the cradle for African civilization."

“We can jointly organize general events, we can work with the National Commission for Museums and Monuments and such institutes in Nigeria to work together.’’

According to him, this will help to celebrate the great days like the International Museum Days.

“Secondly, I think we can promote the artists, museum experts, and workers to visit each other’s countries to promote the People to People exchange and we can strengthen the capacity building."

“Organise Nigerian people to go to China. Both countries can work together to set up mechanisms to promote the development of our traditions."

“And of course, we can really promote the rich culture and tradition of our countries."

“Now we have a China cultural center in Nigeria, you have a cultural center in Beijing and I think we can really push forward to build a Nigeria village in China,” Li said.

Prof. Abba Tijani, the Director-General, National Commission for Museums, Monuments and Sites (NCMM), said that the commission had mechanisms put in place to ensure Nigeria’s monuments and artifacts were duly preserved.

Tijani said that the commission had successfully repatriated stolen artifacts with negotiations ongoing to return more.

“The NCMM has been achieving great success in its repatriation pursuit."

“It was recently in the news how Nigeria successfully argued and won her case and brought back a 600-year-old Ife Terracotta from the Netherlands."

“In October 2021, the Universities of Aberdeen and Jesus College Cambridge after a year-long discussion returned two important Benin Bronze back to Nigeria."

“A decade of negotiations and diligent pursuit under the Benin Dialogue Group to which NCMM belongs is bringing much-anticipated reward with the support of relevant stakeholders planning to set up museums,’’ he said.

Tijani said that the museums would house the antiquities on their return to their original base.

He also noted that as the world now is a global village, the NCMM was utilizing the benefits of technology to aid the dissemination of museum activities.