When the Museum of West African Art (MOWAA) was first announced for Benin City, the numbers told a seductive story: a $25 million cultural investment, 30,000 projected jobs, and $80 million in annual revenue from a new creative ecosystem. For a country desperate to diversify beyond oil, here was a glittering prize — a Sir David Adjaye–designed institution that would transform Nigeria’s creative economy and position Benin City as a global cultural destination. Instead, MOWAA has become a case study in how political machinations can incinerate economic value, turning a catalytic project into a cautionary tale of institutional dysfunction.