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Sterling Bank Plc, Nigeria’s leading financial institution, has said it is committed to supporting the annual Ake Books and Arts Festival because it sees Nigeria as part of a larger world and believes that Nigeria’s ultimate competitiveness lies in its energy.
Executive Director at Sterling, Yemi
Odubiyi, who disclosed this over the weekend in a goodwill message at the
opening of the 10th edition of the Ake Books and Arts Festival said Nigeria can
become a leader in the world and its creative people as part of its
competitiveness.
Odubiyi continued by saying that “Nigeria
enjoys a comparative advantage in the arts and culture domain, and Sterling,
being focused on promoting the development of human capital and improving
national competitiveness, is thrilled to have been a part of the festival for
the past six years and plans to continue to do so.”
Also speaking, Founder and Director
of Ake Books and Arts Festival, Lola Shoneyin said, “I’m often amused when
people say they can’t believe how long we’ve been doing this. I believe it has
been 10 years. It has been 10 years of bringing brainwaves to life, 10 years of
learning, 10 years of celebrating the incredible work that so many of you have
done and are still doing and 10 years of making lifelong friends.”
She said ‘Homecoming’ was chosen as
the theme of this year’s festival because, “We were going back to Abeokuta
where it all began, and it was time to reconnect with our ancestral roots. The
main reason ‘Homecoming’ was so perfect is that we couldn’t wait to have you
back at Ake after the COVID-19 pandemic”.
She said, after two years of
lockdown and online festivals, the festival is back again as participants can
mingle, catch up on news and strengthen their friendships. Adding that this
moment, this feeling, is what has kept them going.
The Founder said the priority has
always been to ensure that guests feel at home since the very first edition of
the Ake Festival. Consequently, during this year’s edition of Ake Review,
guests were asked to express what home means to them, and the common responses
were: A place of love; friendship and a sense of belonging, she said.
Shoneyin thanked the winner of the
2021 Nobel Prize for Literature, Professor Abdulrazaq Gurnah and his wife,
Professor Denise Gurnah for honoring the invitation to attend the festival in
person. She also thanked the headliner of this year’s festival, Professor
Veronique Tadjo, for finding time to be a part of the festival.
Other highlights of this year’s
festival include the hosting of Directors of the Global Association of Literary
Festivals while many of the panel sessions explored different aspects of the
theme.
Some of the sessions focused on why
home exerts a pull on us, stirs our creative impulses, influences our creative
expressions, evokes profound sentiments, and shapes our perception of the
outside world.
Others explored the impact of
conflict, capitalism, and climate disasters as well as what it means to be
displaced, to live away from home and, of course, to return. The festival also
featured book discussions on the idea of a home and how for some people, the
home might not be a place of safety, but a place of violence, among others.
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