The Public Affairs Counsellor, Embassy of the United States of America, Adnan Siddiqui, has urged youth in Nigeria to come up with skilled progrmmes to promote the rich culture of the country.
Siddiqui stated this in an interview in Abuja on the sideline of the launch of music equipment and studio by a civil rights organization, Accountability Lab Nigeria.
TheFact Nigeria notes that at Siddiqui said such ideas would enable them be self reliant and would be supported to achieve their goals.
The promoters of the program said the gesture would provide opportunities for artists for music recording and production and also hold a series of songwriting courses, including access to a recording studio for free.
Siddiqui said that music could be used as a medium to douse the challenges facing any nation such as democracy,insecurity good governance and accountability.
“Music as a platform can be used to engage in mutual understanding and common grounds. “Music can be used to share ideas,preserve values,bridge many different bridges and achieve goals and the music art industries can be promoted economically.
“Peotry reflects the society and the world and also how we feel in our lives.
“Youths can develop songwriting as a means of freedom of expression, for the future of Nigeria interns of good governance and accountability.
“We are ready to partner with u on this the US cultural section will engage with you to build the partnership.”
The US Public Affairs Counsellor said his country had always been interested in music as a means to communication with other countries, because music diplomacy has a long history in American foreign policy ever since the 1940s and 1950s.
“We have had many music exchange programmes with Nigeria, since her independence.
“Before the COVID came, we were actually sponsoring American musicians to come and perform at various venues in Nigeria and we are waiting for COVID to end to be able to bring American artists safely to Nigeria to perform .
“We hope to have an American pianists come in March to perform in Lagos and in Abuja.
“I believe that good music and good song writing involves consciousness raising on a variety of social and cultural, political and economic issues.
“And so a lot of young people in Nigeria are very much impacted by what is going on in the country.
“They want to speak out and we encourage freedom of expression in the United States and throughout the world.
“I think this is an opportunity for Nigerian musicians, song writers and singers to be able to have the material means to produce their songs.
“That is why were interested in investing in equipment to donate to this group,”he said.
He also commended the Federal Government for the return of Tweeter to Nigeria, describing it as “a very positive step forward and we welcomed that.”
“US welcomes tweeter return, Nigeria has strong democratic future,
twitter came back in Nigeria and that was a very positive step forward and we welcome that.
“We are always for more freedom of expression,”he said.
The Country Director of Accountability Lab, Odeh Odeh, said it is a platform for youths to upgrade their skills in music.
“I decided to embark on this journey because we have young music artist who are out there trying to make music and don’t have access to studios, because of funding.
“So this project is suppose to be a support ,on one side provide the necessary skills and on the other side provide the access to recording studio and equipment.
He said, “Accessibility is one thing which we have done; so, on our part, we are going to make the necessary awareness for them to see that this is available to them .
“I will advise them to take this opportunity and improve themselves.”
The studio equipment launched were: Microphones,headphones, studio monitors, and sound cards. Also digital audio workstation(Daw), midi keyboard and controller and studio headphones.
Others are microphone preamp,headphone amplifier and studio monitor speakers.
