• Nigeria to turn Abuja stadium into culture, sports innovation hub
• Project includes museum, arenas, markets, and youth creative center
• Gov’t targets $100B GDP boost, 3M jobs from creative industries by 2030

Nigeria's Federal Ministry of Arts, Culture, Tourism, and Creative Economy and the National Sports Commission (NSC) signed a memorandum of understanding on Thursday to transform the Moshood Abiola National Stadium in Abuja into a major innovation hub for arts, culture, sports, and entrepreneurship.

?️ ????????: NSC & Ministry of Arts, Culture, Tourism & Creative Economy Sign Landmark MoU

The National Sports Commission (NSC), led by Chairman Mallam @ShehuDikko On Thursday, 4th September 2025, and the Federal Ministry of Arts, Culture, Tourism & Creative Economy, led… pic.twitter.com/8xaENFXcll

— National Sports Commission (@NatSportsComm) September 5, 2025

The project, which will be developed as a public-private partnership, includes plans for a national museum of arts and culture, an entertainment and performance arena, a gaming arena, a sports heritage pavilion, and a creative center for young people. The plans also call for housing, open-air markets, cultural lounges, and a family recreation park.

Hannatu Musa Musawa, the minister in charge of culture and the creative economy, praised the initiative as a transformative partnership aligned with President Bola Tinubu's vision for youth empowerment and economic diversification. "This partnership has the power to empower the young generation, teach them about our culture, and provide capacity building," she said at the signing ceremony.

Shehu Dikko, chairman of the NSC and a key architect of the project, presented the initiative as a way to reinvent the long underutilized 60,000-seat stadium, despite Nigeria's strong sporting tradition. "We need to invest and revamp our sports facilities to have around 4,000 activities around the clock," Dikko said. "This project will showcase our history, sports, and culture, and we are committed to its success."

In November 2023, Ramin Toloui, then U.S. Assistant Secretary for Economic and Business Affairs, noted that "Nigeria’s creative industries have the potential to become Nigeria’s largest export sector and could create an estimated 2.7 million jobs by 2050 for the country’s growing youth population, and $100 billion to Nigeria’s GDP by 2030."

These forecasts echo the federal government's ambitions, which aim for an annual contribution of $100 billion to GDP and the creation of more than 3 million jobs by 2030. Nigerian authorities hope that the future "cultural and sports city" of Abuja will serve as a model for other states and mark a new stage in the country's economic diversification.

Servan Ahougnon