US Awards Nigeria $125,000 Grant To Preserve 4,000-Year-Old Site

The United States has awarded a $125,000 grant to the Centre for Memories in Enugu to support the preservation and digital documentation of the historic Lejja Iron-Smelting Site in Enugu State.

The grant, provided through the U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation, will fund the conservation, three-dimensional digital documentation and physical preservation of the site, which dates to approximately 2000 BC.

The United States Embassy and Consulate in Nigeria announced the grant on Monday, saying the project would help preserve evidence of Nigeria’s long history of technological innovation and ingenuity.

Speaking at the launch of the project in Lagos, U.S. Consul General Brandon Hudspeth described the Lejja site as a 4,000-year-old record of ingenuity, innovation and technological sophistication.

Hudspeth said the grant builds on the longstanding partnership between the United States and Nigeria to protect the country’s cultural heritage.

“The United States has invested approximately $1.2 million in cultural heritage preservation projects in Nigeria over the past five years, primarily through the Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation,” he said.

“This is not aid — this is a strategic economic intervention that advances the interests of Americans, Nigerians, and the global community.”

The project, titled “Nchekwaba: Lejja Iron-Smelting,” will also document the living knowledge, oral histories, traditions and community practices associated with the site.

Executive Director of the Centre for Memories, Iheanyi Igboko, said the initiative was not about discovering Lejja but bringing together existing community knowledge and research to establish a framework for its preservation and global recognition.

The launch was attended by Enugu State Deputy Governor Ifeanyi Ossai, officials of the Federal Ministry of Arts, Culture, Tourism and the Creative Economy, the National Commission for Museums and Monuments, ICOMOS Nigeria, the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African Art and other stakeholders.

The project is also linked to the Cultural Heritage Forward programme, funded by the U.S. Department of State in partnership with the Smithsonian Institution, which connects Nigerian museum professionals and community-based heritage practitioners with Smithsonian experts.

The development comes as the United States and Nigeria continue cooperation under a 2022 Cultural Property Agreement aimed at restricting the importation of certain Nigerian archaeological and ethnological materials into the United States and combating the looting and trafficking of cultural property.

The U.S. Mission said it had recently begun discussions with Nigerian officials on extending the agreement for another five years.