The maiden edition of the Enjoy Nigeria Expo (ENEX 2021) ended in Abuja on Friday with a colorful fashion show and award ceremony.
Zamfara State emerged the best state contingent to the week-long expo. The state carted away three awards: The Best State Contingent Award, Governor of the Year for Culture and Tourism for Gov. Bello Matawalle, as well as Best ENEX Performer Award was handed to Dan Maraya Zamfara. Zamfara State Commissioner for Culture and Tourism, Mohammed Umar led his team to receive the awards. Maimuna Bulama of September Designs was selected as Creative Director of the Year in the fashion category, while Ayo Arogundade received an award for his film, ‘Black State’ for the film category.
Friday’s event dubbed ENEX Show which was a combination of the Sounds of Nigeria, Experience Nigeria, Colors of Nigeria was heralded by Wednesday’s Taste of Nigeria event chaired by Eze Felix Enene Otuwarikpo, Upata III of Upata Kingdom, Ahoada East Local Government Area of Rivers State.
The monarch described ENEX 2021 as timely, even as he opined that the Nigeria is abundantly blessed with the resources to grow its economy and create opportunities for its large population. “We need to look inward to rebuild our economy. The Singaporeans looked inward to build their economy, especially using MSMEs. So, I encourage us as a people to build on this expo and go back to our states to empower young people to be able to build and grow businesses in the creative industry and non-oil sector as suggested by the organizers of this expo. We have done it in my domain, so I know it is possible to do this at different level”, he said.
Speaking to the media on the sideline of Friday’s show, President of Welcome2Nigeria and initiator of ENEX 2021, Mr. Isa Sago, said the expo had achieved its goals.
“These five days of heightened activities captured the essence of hosting ENEX 2021. For the first two days, we had the business and investment forums, stakeholders participated and we had papers presented with robust discussions on the kind of support MSMEs in the creative industry actually need.
“The last five days embodied all that Enjoy Nigeria Expo set out to achieve. We had the Taste of Nigeria event which was five hours of participants savoring food and drinks from different parts of the country. We had the Images of Nigeria event where we had icons like Prof Yusuf Grillo being awarded posthumously. Today we had four events combined into one. You saw the dresses, the performances and all. So yes, all that we have done communicated the essence of the package that is Experience Nigeria Expo”, Sago stated.
Also speaking at the finale of ENEX 2021, Commissioner for Culture and Tourism, Zamafara State, Mohammed Umar said the expo has potentials of creating millionaires in the creative industry. “From we have seen in the last few days, you will definitely agree that Nigeria in endowed with rich cultures. As I said earlier, if this expo is properly harnessed many homes will smile”, he said.
On her part, Ngozi John –Uya of the National Gallery of Art stressed that platforms such as the Enjoy Nigerian Expo should be sustained and fully embraced for Nigeria to survive the post oil era.
“Culture is the totality of the way of the life of a people. However, culture is usually relegated to the background, but culture is actually a veritable source of growing our GDP, especially at a time when oil and gas is going obsolete. Tourism is the vehicle of growing our economy, but culture is actually the engine of the vehicle.
“So, when you have an event that seeks to help MSMEs that are struggling on their own in the culture and tourism sector…. by the time you have a platform that brings them together to showcase what they have to sell, you can say the ENEX 2021 has achieved it goals”, she opined.
Earlier in his welcome address, National President of the Nigerian Artists Guild, Mohammed Suleiman, said the Enjoy Nigeria Expo has the blessings of the creative industry, saying, “Beautiful things happened here tonight. I want to encourage us to have this in mind that we will be attending this event next year and the years to come”.
The Enjoy Niger Expo (ENEX 2021) which held at the Abuja Trade and Convention Centre was organized by Welcome2Nigeria in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment and the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture. ENEX 2021 had as its theme: “A Future Assured Through Cultural Creativity”.
