BUJUMBURA August 27th (ABP) – The Minister of East African Community Affairs, Youth, Sports and Culture, Mr. Ezéchiel Nibigira, opened Thursday, August 26, in Bujumbura, the work of the 10th ordinary session of the board of directors of the International Center for Research and Documentation on African Traditions and Languages (CERDOTOLA).
Minister Nibigira indicated in his speech that brotherhood constitutes an important cultural potential of the tradition of African peoples. He affirmed that Burundi is committed to contributing to the smooth running of CERDOTOLA of which it has been a founding member since its creation in 1977.
While Burundi has placed the promotion and protection of national cultural heritage among the priority axes of the 2018-2027 national development program, it is clear that it can only support CERDOTOLA activities, whose main mission is the preservation, dissemination and enhancement of African cultural heritage, through research activities mainly on African traditions and languages. That is evidenced by the opening of the country office in Bujumbura and the hearings granted to the executive secretary of CERDOTOLA by the highest authorities of the country during his working visit to Burundi in 2014 and which resulted in the conclusion of a signed cooperation agreement. in July 2016.
The Minister responsible for Culture said that Burundi welcomes the achievements made in the implementation of that agreement and remains open to other projects and programs agreed, in particular the opening of a regional office of the said center. for East Africa and Southern Africa in Burundi. He also stressed that it is the duty of African peoples in general and intellectuals in particular to know the heritage knowledge of our continent, and to preserve our untapped natural and traditional resources which can contribute to the development of emerging industrialization. He called on prestigious intellectuals and experts across the African continent to be torchbearers in leveraging Africa’s human, cultural and socio-economic capital. He congratulated CERDOTOLA which understood that the development of Africa goes through its history.
The executive secretary of CERDOTOLA, Mr. Charles Binam Bikoi, for his part, appreciated the prevailing situation in Burundi. On this occasion, he pointed out that CERDOTOLA is a pre-eminent Pan-African institution in the defense of African sovereignty resolutely dedicated to renovating and producing a new African thought of development.
Mr. Bikoi thus invites the government of Burundi to put CERDOTOLA back in the generous hearts of Burundians and put Burundi back in the heart of CEDOTOLA. Culture is the new name for development, according to the executive secretary of CERDOTOLA, who clarified that there is no culture without a man of culture, without a creator of culture, without a distributor of culture and without an ideologue of culture. Therefore, there will be no culture of development and integration of Africa in the absence of an African scientific institution, competitive, uninhibited and endowed with substantial and significant resources, he pointed out.