By Aluta News
Dec. 20, 2022
Director-General of National Orientation Agency (NOA), Dr Garba Abari, has called on governments at all levels to revive the reading culture through provision of functional libraries across the country.
Abari gave the advice in Abuja on Tuesday at the public presentation and launching of a book entitled: “A Speck of Dust and other Poems”, written by Ba’aba Ibrahim.
Abari, who said that the digital technology had impacted negatively on the peoples’ reading culture, stressed the need to revive reading culture through provision of functional libraries, where Nigerians would have access to newspapers, magazines and books.
“There is the need to revive the reading culture because a society that does not read and capture its history and culture in a literary form is a society that is working toward destruction.
“The internet culture or environment has impacted negatively on our reading culture, but what we can do to re-invent or go back to the olden days to revive our educational system,’’ he said.
According to the director-general, in many advanced societies, there are libraries that are working and bookshops that are well stocked.
“If you go to any town, you will see, at least, a public library where people can go and read newspapers, magazines and books.
“But, hardly can you find functional libraries in most of our big cities. Today, virtually all our printing houses have gone comatose simply because the society is no longer a literary one,’’ he said.
In his remarks, the author of the book, Ibrahim, said that he decided to write the book as a way of expressing concern on how people had been degrading the environment through indiscriminate dumping of plastics and other wastes.
“The universe has always fascinated me, especially when I look back at the environment of my youth with nostalgia; how modernity has changed everything.
“This is in addition to the scourge of poverty, a sure path to misery, diseases and despondency, which is pervasive in our society,’’ he said.
Also, National President of Association of Nigerian Authors, Mr Ahmed Maiwada, urged Nigerians to support the author to ensure that the book was widely circulated.
Maiwada said that although the author was a member of staff of Federal Judicial Service Commission, with the presentation of his book, the association had accepted him as member of its Abuja chapter.
NAN