In furtherance of his avowed desire to enhance the working condition and improve the welfare of staff of the National Institute for Cultural Orientation, the Executive Secretary, Dr. Barclays Foubiri Ayakoroma, has steadfastly kept faith with his promise.
Dr. Ayakoroma has recorded another achievement in the area of boosting staff moral by purchasing and distributing laptop to staff in the Institute for effective and efficient service delivery. It is to help achieve set goals towards attaining the overall development of the Institute and the culture sector in general. 
It would be recalled that on assumption of office in November 2009, Dr. Ayakoroma listed some areas where his administration will give priority attention, which include staff welfare as well as improved working conditions.
At the last count, NICO’s Executive Secretary has not only fulfilled his promises but has surpassed general expectations in bringing about a monumental development in the Institute, taking it to a height unimaginable in her recent past.
Some of these areas of development include re-orientation workshops for all level of staff both in the headquarters and zonal offices; conducive working condition brought about by the provision of office furniture; the provision of a functional mini-library stocked with various books, publications and magazines; introducing NICO’s Inaugural Public Lecture; initiating the National Media National Workshop for Arts Writers and Editors; Promoting Nigerian Dress Culture programme; repackaging of Nico Newsletter; various Radio and Television programmes on culture all aimed at orienting and re-orienting Nigerians to the appreciation of our indigenous culture and its unique values.
Other areas of improved development by the present administration are international workshops being attended by NICO’s management statff, which are avenues of projecting Nigeria’s culture to the international community; the UNESCO Convention on Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH), which has brought about a stakeholders training workshop to Nigeria, a workshop aimed at impacting the necessary knowledge and skills required for identifying, defining and drawing up of inventories as well as preparing nomination files for inscription of our living heritages on the Intangible Cultural Heritage list.
These achievements by the present administration in NICO and many more being contemplated are undoubtedly placing the Institute and its activities on the right path towards achieving its mandate of harnessing the country’s culture for national development as well as projecting its unique cultural values, nationally and internationally.
Jonathan Nicodemus
Corporate Affairs.