Abuja Hosts International Children Creative and Culture Festival as Young Nigerians Prepare to Put Heritage on Stage

By Simpson Global Media News Desk

Abuja is preparing to host the third edition of the International Children Creative and Culture Festival (ICCCF 3.0) from September 24 to 26, bringing together children, schools, educators, artists and cultural practitioners for three days of competitions, workshops and performances centred on creativity, cultural identity and learning.

The 2026 festival, themed “One World in a Child’s Colours,” is designed for children between the ages of seven and 15 and will combine visual art, cultural performance, indigenous fashion, mother-language activities and a spelling competition focused on Nigerian landmarks.

The programme will take place at two Abuja venues. Workshops and competitions are scheduled for the NCAC Arts and Craft Village in the Central Business District on September 24 and 25, while the awards and closing programme will hold at the Nigerian Tulip International Colleges (NTIC) Conference Hall in Wuse 2 on September 26.

Organised by artist and art historian Dr. Ngozi Akande, the festival is intended to create a space where Nigerian children can engage directly with the country's cultural traditions while developing artistic and communication skills.

The organisers describe the festival's central ideas as imagination, identity and opportunity, placing creative participation alongside cultural education rather than treating the event solely as a competition.

With five competitive categories and additional hands-on workshops in areas including Adire making and gypsum eco craft, the 2026 edition expands on a programme that began with earlier children's art initiatives and developed into the annual ICCCF platform.

Three Days of Culture and Creativity

The festival opens on September 24 with participant arrival, registration and art workshops at the NCAC Arts and Craft Village.

September 25 is scheduled for the formal opening ceremony and the beginning of the five competitions.

The final day, September 26, will move to the NTIC Conference Hall for awards and the closing ceremony.

The programme is structured to expose children to different forms of creative expression.

Cultural performances will allow school groups to present dance, music and drama under the theme “Unity in Diversity.”

The drawing and painting competition carries the theme “Seeds of Peace, One World Many Colours,” while the indigenous fashion show uses “Show Your SWAG” as its theme.

The mother-language competition is titled “Know Your Language,” and the spelling bee focuses on “Know Your National Landmarks.”

The five categories provide different entry points into culture.

A child who is comfortable on stage can participate in performance.

Another who prefers visual expression can work through painting.

A child interested in clothing and textiles can explore indigenous fashion.

Those with an interest in language can participate through mother-tongue activities, while children with strong general knowledge can compete in the spelling bee.

That structure is intended to recognise that cultural participation does not take one single form.

Bringing Heritage Into Children's Spaces

For the organisers, cultural preservation begins with participation.

Traditional knowledge can be documented in museums, archives and books, but it also needs people who can speak the languages, understand the stories, recognise the symbols, practise the crafts and perform the music.

The festival's mother-language category therefore occupies an important place in the programme.

Children will be encouraged to speak, recite and perform in their mother tongues under the “Know Your Language” theme.

In a country with hundreds of languages and numerous cultural traditions, such activities provide a direct way for children to connect language with identity.

The organisers are not presenting language simply as an academic subject.

The programme connects it with performance, storytelling and cultural expression.

That can make language learning part of an experience rather than an isolated classroom exercise.

The same principle applies to indigenous fashion.

The fashion competition asks children to present traditional fabrics, beads and colours, turning clothing into an avenue for learning about cultural identity.

Rather than separating fashion from heritage, the programme places them together.

Five Competitions, Different Forms of Expression

The five competitive categories form the core of ICCCF 3.0.

Cultural Performances

The cultural-performance category is open to children aged seven to 15 through schools.

Its theme, “Unity in Diversity,” invites participants to use dance, music and drama to communicate the idea of cultural coexistence.

The format gives schools the opportunity to present cultural material through choreography, costumes, music and stage performance.

For young participants, preparation itself can involve research.

Children may need to learn songs, movements, stories, traditional clothing and performance practices before arriving at the festival.

That process can turn the preparation period into a form of cultural education.

Drawing and Painting

The visual-arts category is based around “Seeds of Peace, One World Many Colours.”

It is open to both schools and individual participants, making it the festival's most accessible competition for children who may not be entering through a school.

The organisers say finished works will be displayed as part of the festival's children's art gallery.

The gallery builds on the festival's previous editions, which produced collections of children's artwork and recognised young painters.

The organisers also maintain an archive of works from earlier festivals.

Indigenous Fashion

The indigenous fashion competition, themed “Show Your SWAG,” gives children an opportunity to model cultural fabrics, colours and accessories.

The organisers describe the category as a runway where traditional fabric, beads and colour are used to represent the cultures from which participants come.

For a country whose fashion industry increasingly draws on indigenous textiles and design, exposing children to those traditions can also create an early connection between heritage and creative enterprise.

Mother Language

The mother-language competition gives children an opportunity to speak and perform in their indigenous languages.

Its theme, “Know Your Language,” reflects the festival's emphasis on carrying heritage forward through younger generations.

Language is one of the most direct ways cultural knowledge moves between generations.

Folktales, proverbs, songs and oral histories are often embedded within language.

When children learn to express themselves in their mother tongues, they are also gaining access to cultural material that can be difficult to reproduce fully through translation.

Spelling Bee

The fifth category, the spelling bee, takes a different route to cultural education.

Under “Know Your National Landmarks,” children will spell their way through names associated with Nigeria's landmarks.

The competition combines language, memory and national knowledge.

It also expands the festival's concept of culture beyond traditional performance and visual art.

Knowledge of places, monuments and landmarks forms part of a country's cultural geography.

Workshops Beyond Competition

ICCCF 3.0 is not built entirely around prizes.

The organisers have also scheduled practical workshops designed to allow participants to make things with their own hands.

Among the activities are gypsum eco craft and Adire making, alongside storytelling, music, folktales, spoken word, poetry and book reading.

The practical nature of the workshops is significant.

Children are not simply expected to observe artists.

They are given opportunities to work with materials and participate in creative processes.

Adire, for example, connects children to one of Nigeria's best-known indigenous textile traditions.

The technique involves resist-dyeing processes associated particularly with Yoruba textile culture.

Teaching young participants about the craft can provide an introduction to pattern, colour, design and the history of textile production.

It can also demonstrate how cultural practices can become creative skills and potential economic activities.

The gypsum eco-craft workshop similarly introduces children to a hands-on process involving materials and design.

The combination of workshops means that participants can experience different creative disciplines within a single festival.

Building on the 2025 Edition

The third edition follows the second International Children Creative and Culture Festival, which was held in Abuja from September 25 to 27, 2025.

The 2025 programme featured painting, ceramics, cultural dance and awards, with the Female Artists Association of Nigeria and UFUK Dialogue Foundation involved in staging the event.

The organisers reported more than 70 registered participants, 80 painters in competition, 10 works selected for further recognition and about 200 guests at the finale.

The painting competition was won by Gosifenna Okoro, then 13, a student of NTIC in Abuja.

Her winning work was produced around the theme “My Favorite Sport.”

The previous edition also included cultural performances, spoken word and fashion activities.

The organisers have described the 2025 festival as providing a foundation for the expanded 2026 edition.

The progression from the second edition to ICCCF 3.0 shows an attempt to build continuity rather than stage a one-off children's cultural event.

From Art Olympiad to a Broader Festival

The organisers trace part of the festival's development to earlier children's art programmes.

The ICCCF archive records a Nigerian Art Olympiad held in Abuja in June 2019, during a Children's Creativity Fair marking the Day of the African Child.

That programme involved 80 entries, 10 finalists and one Nigerian winner.

The evolution into ICCCF has broadened the programme from visual art to a wider range of cultural activities.

That change reflects the organisers' effort to treat children as participants in multiple creative disciplines.

The festival now brings together visual art, performance, fashion, language, storytelling and music.

The broader format also creates opportunities for children with different abilities and interests.

A child who does not consider themselves a painter can participate in dance.

A child who is uncomfortable performing can work in visual art.

Another may find an outlet in language or fashion.

The organisers' approach therefore places variety at the centre of the festival.

Nigeria on the International Children's Arts Stage

The 2026 festival also follows a significant international experience for its organisers and participating Nigerian young artists.

In July, Nigeria participated in the 7th World Children's Festival at the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

The Nigerian delegation was coordinated through ICCCF and included Nigerian Art Olympiad winner Adaeze Favour Onwubiko.

Dr. Ngozi Akande also participated in the international programme, where she facilitated children's art workshops.

The workshop themes covered health and environment, creativity and imagination, and peace and leadership.

Akande later described the experience as an opportunity to work with children from different countries and use art as a means of cultural exchange.

Her participation placed the Nigerian children's arts initiative within a broader international network of youth creativity and cultural engagement.

The connection between the Washington experience and ICCCF 3.0 is particularly relevant because the Abuja festival provides a local platform through which more Nigerian children can participate in the same broader creative ecosystem.

A Platform for Cultural Diplomacy

Children's cultural festivals can also function as informal platforms for cultural diplomacy.

When young Nigerians travel abroad to participate in art and cultural programmes, they carry aspects of Nigerian culture into international spaces.

Conversely, when international cultural ideas enter Nigerian children's programmes, participants are exposed to different ways of understanding creativity and identity.

The World Children's Festival experience demonstrated this exchange.

The event brought children, educators, artists and cultural leaders together around creative activities.

Nigeria's participation provided a platform for young Nigerian artists to work alongside participants from other countries.

ICCCF 3.0 brings that concept back to Abuja.

The festival's title, “One World in a Child's Colours,” places the idea of global connection within a Nigerian cultural setting.

The concept allows children to celebrate their own traditions while recognising that other cultures also have their own creative languages.

Culture as Education

One of the important features of the festival is the integration of cultural learning into practical education.

Children participating in cultural performances have to learn performance skills.

Those making art develop visual skills.

Those taking part in indigenous fashion learn about fabrics and design.

Mother-language participants work on communication.

The spelling bee requires knowledge and recall.

Workshops add practical skills.

This combination creates a learning environment outside the conventional classroom.

The approach also places culture within the broader development of children.

Creativity can encourage observation and experimentation.

Performance can develop confidence and teamwork.

Art can teach children to communicate ideas visually.

Craft activities can develop patience and hand skills.

Language activities can reinforce communication and cultural knowledge.

The festival therefore operates at the intersection of culture and education.

Schools as Cultural Gateways

Schools play a central role in the 2026 edition.

Four of the five competitions are entered through schools, while drawing and painting is also open to individual participants who book the relevant workshop place.

The school-based model gives teachers and school administrators an important role in identifying and preparing participants.

It also allows children from different parts of Nigeria to participate through organised groups.

According to the festival's participation structure, each organisation or school can enter up to 10 students.

Registered schools receive access to all five competitive events without an additional competition-entry charge.

That structure creates an incentive for schools to expose more children to cultural activities rather than limiting participation to a single specialist.

It also makes the festival a potential meeting point for schools with different educational and cultural backgrounds.

Supporting Young Creative Talent

The festival is also positioned as a talent-development platform.

Young artists need opportunities to display their work if they are to build confidence and develop professional ambitions.

Competitions can provide early experience in presenting work to judges and audiences.

Workshops can provide access to techniques that children may not encounter in ordinary school programmes.

Exhibitions can demonstrate that children's artwork is worthy of public attention.

For the organisers, this is part of a longer-term effort to create opportunities for young Nigerians in the creative sector.

The record of earlier editions suggests that the programme is designed to identify promising young artists and provide recognition.

The organisers highlight Adaeze Onwubiko's progression from a Nigerian Art Olympiad winner to participation on an international children's arts platform as an example of how early opportunities can lead to wider exposure.

The Creative Economy Connection

Although ICCCF is primarily a cultural and educational event, its activities also connect to Nigeria's wider creative economy.

The country's fashion, film, music, visual arts, design, crafts and cultural tourism industries employ large numbers of creative practitioners and generate domestic and international interest.

Introducing children to creative skills at an early age can help build familiarity with those industries.

Adire making, for example, is both a cultural practice and a textile tradition that can be incorporated into contemporary fashion.

Visual art can lead into illustration, animation, graphic design, architecture or fine art.

Performance can lead into theatre, dance, music, film or television.

Storytelling can connect to literature, publishing, film and digital content.

The festival does not claim that every participant will become a professional creative.

Rather, it creates a setting in which children can discover interests and develop skills.

Preserving Cultural Knowledge

The festival's focus on mother languages, indigenous fashion, storytelling and traditional performance also addresses the broader question of cultural transmission.

Cultural practices survive when they are practised.

A traditional dance is not preserved only because it is photographed.

It survives when people continue to perform it.

A language is not preserved only through dictionaries.

It remains alive when children speak it.

A textile tradition is not maintained only in museum collections.

It survives when artisans continue to make the fabric and younger people learn the techniques.

That is why programmes involving children can have a long-term cultural significance.

They introduce cultural practices at a stage when habits, interests and identities are still developing.

The Role of Parents and Educators

Parents and teachers are important to the success of children's cultural programmes.

Children often require adult support to discover creative interests, obtain materials, practise performances and attend events.

The festival's organisers have therefore opened participation to schools, states, parents and children's organisations.

The event's workshop model also requires adults to recognise the value of practical arts education.

The organisers' call for support says donations can help provide art materials, workshop places and assistance for children who might otherwise be unable to participate.

That support structure reflects one of the practical challenges of children's arts programmes.

Talent alone does not guarantee participation.

Travel, materials, registration, accommodation and workshop costs can affect which children are able to attend.

The organisers' support programme is intended to widen access.

Partnerships Behind the Festival

ICCCF 3.0 is supported by a network of cultural, educational and creative organisations.

The festival lists the Female Artists Association of Nigeria, Nigerian Tulip International Colleges, Nike Art Gallery, International Child Art Foundation, Cedarcrest Hospital, Ngozi Akande Art Gallery, UFUK Dialogue Foundation and ART2 Foundation among its partners.

The partnership structure reflects the range of disciplines represented by the festival.

Art organisations contribute creative expertise.

Schools provide educational links.

Cultural institutions provide heritage connections.

International partners provide opportunities for global exchange.

The combination creates a broader ecosystem around the children's programme.

Abuja as a Cultural Meeting Point

Abuja provides a practical setting for a national children's cultural festival because of its role as Nigeria's federal capital and its concentration of schools, institutions, diplomatic missions and cultural organisations.

The festival's use of the NCAC Arts and Craft Village also places the event within a dedicated cultural environment.

The village will host workshops and competitions on the first two days.

The final awards programme will move to NTIC Conference Hall in Wuse 2.

The two venues give the programme separate spaces for hands-on activities and the final recognition ceremony.

They also provide participants with exposure to different types of cultural and educational environments within Abuja.

Looking Beyond the Three-Day Event

The long-term value of ICCCF will not necessarily be measured only by attendance during the three festival days.

The more enduring question is what happens to the children after the event.

Do they continue painting?

Do schools establish art clubs?

Do participants continue speaking their mother languages?

Do young people develop interest in indigenous textiles?

Do children who discover an interest in performance receive further opportunities?

Do the winning artworks remain accessible to the public?

Those outcomes can determine whether a festival becomes a recurring event on the cultural calendar or develops into a sustained youth-arts programme.

The organisers' archive of previous editions suggests an effort to document that progression.

The 2025 edition has been preserved through photographs, artwork and festival records, while the organisers describe ICCCF 3.0 as the next chapter in a longer story of children's creativity.

From Competition to Community

A children's festival can also create relationships beyond the stage.

Participants meet children from other schools.

Teachers meet other educators.

Artists interact with young people.

Parents encounter cultural activities they may not have experienced themselves.

Those connections can continue after the event.

A child may discover a friend with a similar interest in painting.

A teacher may develop a new cultural activity for a school.

An artist may identify a young person who needs mentorship.

A cultural organisation may discover a school interested in future collaboration.

In that sense, the festival's network can become as important as its individual competitions.

A Broader View of Nigerian Identity

The programme's structure also reflects the complexity of Nigerian identity.

Nigeria's cultural identity cannot be represented by one language, one costume, one dance or one artistic style.

The country contains numerous ethnic communities, languages, traditions, belief systems, foods, textiles, musical forms and storytelling practices.

A national children's festival therefore has to make room for difference.

The theme “Unity in Diversity” for cultural performance provides one framework for that.

The indigenous fashion category provides another.

Mother-language activities create space for linguistic diversity.

The festival's overall theme connects those different identities to a wider concept of global citizenship.

The result is a cultural programme that asks children to understand where they come from while engaging with the idea that other children come from different cultural backgrounds.

The Next Generation of Cultural Custodians

Nigeria's cultural institutions face a long-term question: who will preserve and develop the country's heritage as older generations pass on?

Festivals such as ICCCF address that question at the level of childhood.

By teaching children to create, perform, speak and make, the programme gives them practical contact with cultural traditions.

The children are not being positioned merely as audiences.

They are performers, artists, designers, speakers and competitors.

That distinction matters because cultural continuity depends on participation.

The festival's focus on children between seven and 15 also gives participants several years in which to continue developing interests discovered through the programme.

A child who begins with a school performance at age eight could later develop an interest in theatre.

A participant introduced to Adire at age 10 could eventually study textile design.

A young painter could progress into illustration or animation.

The festival cannot determine those outcomes, but it can provide an early point of contact.

What Happens From September 24

The immediate programme begins with workshops and participant activities on September 24 at the NCAC Arts and Craft Village.

The following day brings the formal opening and competitions.

On September 26, attention moves to awards and the closing ceremony at NTIC Conference Hall.

Winners of the five competitive categories are scheduled to be announced on the final day.

Beyond the prizes, participants will leave with experience in performance, visual art, cultural presentation, language, public speaking and practical craft.

The festival will also provide an opportunity for parents, teachers and cultural practitioners to observe the work being produced by young Nigerians.

A Continuing Cultural Conversation

ICCCF 3.0 arrives at a time when Nigerian cultural institutions and creative practitioners are increasingly examining how heritage can be preserved while remaining relevant to younger generations.

The challenge is not simply to repeat traditions exactly as they were practised in the past.

Young people are also creating new forms of Nigerian cultural expression through fashion, visual art, music, film and digital media.

A contemporary cultural programme therefore has to create space for both heritage and innovation.

The children's festival attempts this through a combination of indigenous practices and contemporary creative formats.

Traditional textiles can appear on a modern runway.

Mother languages can be used in contemporary performance.

Folktales can be connected to storytelling and book reading.

Visual art can explore global themes while being produced by Nigerian children.

The result is a model of culture that is both rooted and evolving.

Conclusion

The International Children Creative and Culture Festival 2026 will bring young Nigerians together in Abuja from September 24 to 26 for a three-day programme built around art, performance, language, fashion, heritage and practical creative education.

Under the theme “One World in a Child's Colours,” ICCCF 3.0 will feature five competitive categories: cultural performances, drawing and painting, indigenous fashion, mother language and a spelling bee focused on Nigerian landmarks.

The festival will also offer workshops in areas including Adire making and gypsum eco craft, alongside storytelling, music, folktales, spoken word, poetry and book reading.

Its first two days will be held at the NCAC Arts and Craft Village in Abuja, with the final awards and closing programme scheduled for NTIC Conference Hall in Wuse 2.

The event builds on the second edition held in 2025, which recorded more than 70 participants, 80 painters in competition and about 200 guests at its finale.

It also follows a year in which the festival's organisers connected Nigerian children's art with international cultural exchange through Nigeria's participation in the World Children's Festival in Washington, D.C.

For the children taking part, the three-day programme will provide opportunities to compete, create, perform and learn.

For schools and parents, it offers a platform for introducing children to creative disciplines and cultural traditions.

For Nigeria's wider cultural sector, it provides another avenue for building the next generation of artists, cultural practitioners and custodians of heritage.

The festival's significance ultimately lies beyond the trophies presented on September 26.

Its longer-term contribution will be seen in whether children continue to paint, perform, speak their languages, make traditional crafts, explore Nigerian history and carry those interests into their education and future creative lives.

In that sense, ICCCF 3.0 is structured not only as a festival for children, but as an investment in the cultural knowledge and creative possibilities they may carry into the next generation.