Nigeria Content Online

The Committee for
Relevant Art (CORA) will be holding a one-day conference in response to
the ‘Bring Back The Book’ campaign championed by President Goodluck
Jonathan.

According to a
press release, the conference, themed ‘When the President wants to
bring back the book: So what’s to be done now?’ will hold at the
Banquet Hall of Eko Hotel and Suites, Lagos, on January 17.

The release further
states that the conference is intended to fashion out an implementable
document that could guide the president and his team in the quest to
encourage reading culture, as well as place literacy and the book at
the centre of the country’s national development agenda.

Participants are to
be drawn from the entire value chain of the book industry including
business, creative, educational, promotional, NGOs, and CSOs,
government, and corporate donors.

According to CORA,
the conference aims to gain the insight of stakeholders in the book
industry on the current practical challenges of conceptualisation,
production, distribution, and consumption of books in Nigeria and its
impact on the reading culture.

It also seeks to
obtain suggestions on what steps may be taken to address the said
challenges, with a view to reversing the waning reading culture.

It further said the
launch of the ‘Bring Back The Book’ campaign in Lagos on December 20 by
the president is unprecedented in three senses. Firstly, that a
president has publicly adopted the book industry’s campaign to revive
the reading culture as his personal pet project.

“It is the first
time in the last few decades that a Nigerian president has given a
public uncontroverted support to the campaign to return the book and
the cultivation of its reading to a pride of place,” the release
states.

Secondly, that a
president has officially connected the book and literacy to the
national development agenda and lastly, that the president chooses to
present the campaign as a citizen’s project, not just a government
programme.

With regard to all
these, the conference is, therefore, intended to ensure that the dream
behind the project is kept alive, even as the country gradually gets
into the mood of electioneering, when people tend to forget every other
critical aspects of national life.

The release further
states that “while CORA realises the value of the media event of
December 20, 2010 in demonstrating the full faith and weight of the
president in the campaign, we take the view that the real task of
building the critical citizen’s framework for its sustenance has just
begun.”

Deliberations and suggestions at the conference will be presented to
government. It should also provide a reference point for a pan-industry
advocacy for the revival of the reading culture and the revitalisation
of the book industry.