Mofe-Damijo Calls For Funding For Entertainment Industry
Nigerian actor and former commissioner for Culture and Tourism in Delta State, Richard Mofe Damijo has called on the private sector to invest in show business in the country so as to help grow the business part of the entertainment industry.
Speaking on the Fidelity SME Forum in Lagos, Mofe-Damijo said there has not been any major investment from the private sector, particularly the banks in the Nigerian entertainment industry. He noted that the industry has over the years transformed but is still lacking the required funding to achieve the blockbuster success it is aimed at.
Citing the recent success of The Wedding Party, he said, “in a country where there is less than 50 cinemas, a movie goes ahead to make N460 million, just imagine 100 cinemas alone in Lagos at N2 million per cinema. If the private sector can look at show business as a business and begin to get people to look at what models can be used, they will go a long way in transforming the industry.
“Once there is complete collaboration between the entertainment sector and the private sector, if the private sector can put in as much as it does for agriculture and technology, you will be surprised at how much the entertainment industry can do. Some of us laugh at the figures that are quote when there was a rebasement but those are official figures.”
Mofe-Damijo noted that the entertainment industry in Nigeria has grown to an extent that it accommodates more than just actors. “There is a confluence where all kinds of people come together, we have people today who are architects working in the entertainment industry, people who read electronic engineering doing sound designs and all of that there are people who are historians that are doing documentary because part of the change in the narrative today is making sure we are able to document all kinds of things.
“Today in the film making business, everybody is working, what we lack is the fact that the private sector is not looking at the business which is the other side of it, we have taken care of the show side of it, but the private sector has to look at the business critically.”
Stating that there was a time when there was concentration on just the show side of the entertainment industry, he said “the show cannot go on without the business. That is where we are hoping with the entry of banks the entertainment industry will get the support that it should get.”
The Managing Director and Chief Executive of Fidelity Bank, Nnamdi Okonkwo, on his part assured of the support of the bank adding that he bank plans to hold a seminar where we will have people to speak and share knowledge and talk about personal financial management, entertainment industry value chain at the end of the Fidelity SME Forum series.
