Nigeria Content Online

The National
Museum, Onikan, Lagos, will come alive this week with activities
marking International Museum Day. The museum will be joining similar
organisations all over the world in celebrating the day, a major
international event marked annually.

This year’s
celebrations at the National Museum will begin on Friday May 14 with
the Miss Museum Beauty Pageant, which is expected to draw young and old
to the grounds of the museum in Onikan for the glamorous contest. An
Open Day will follow on Monday May 17, with a focus on the theme,
‘Ability in Disability: celebrating the special people’. The events
will culminate in a Public Awareness/Road Show scheduled for Tuesday,
May 18 – International Museum Day proper.

Curator at the
National Museum, Ronke Ashaye, said of the plans, “Thousands of
local/international tourists, stakeholders, government agencies,
corporate organisations, media practitioners and visitors are expected
to throng the museum to savour the joy of this celebration.”

International Museum Day was created by the International Council
of Museums in 1977 to encourage awareness in the role of museums in the
development of society. A theme is chosen each year by the Advisory
Committee, and the 2010 commemoration is anchored on the theme, ‘Museum
For Social Harmony’, underlining the need for museums to be an
effective tool for positive change and social development.