Entertainment
By Kennedy Nnamani
THE Entertainment industry played key roles in shaping the year 2022 in Nigeria. The industry helped so many people across the world to come out of depression and stay sane and happy, while contributing greatly to the world’s economy.
According to a report, over 80 million international travelers were influenced by films worldwide in 2022 and this translates to acculturation, economic growth and inter racial marriages.
The report by Business Day quoted Femi Gbajabiamila, Speaker, House of Representatives, as saying that Pricewaterhouse Coopers’ 2016 report employed about a million workers and accounted for about 2.3 percent ($600 million) of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) with over 2500 movies produced annually.
According to Ope Ajayi, National President of the Cinema Exhibitors Association of Nigeria, CEAN, said that CEAN realized N495m from ticket sales across cinemas in the country in September 2022 alone, surpassing N334m recorded in September, 2021.
Lai Mohammed, the minister of information and culture, said at the opening of expert workshop of the United Nations World Tourism Organisation, UNWTO’s maiden Global Conference on Linking Tourism, Culture and the Creative Industry, that tourism, culture and the creative industries presented huge potential to mitigate economic challenges confronting Nigeria and the world.
Aside from the economic relevance that this sector drives to the nation’s GDP, there is also an undeniably striking fact about nation building and national unity which accompany this industry.
Zurab Pololikashvilli, the UNWTO Secretary General, supported the minister, saying that there is no better place to start the legacies than Nigeria in order to promote the culture of Africa from Nigeria.
Gov. Godwin Obaseki of Edo state also recognised the importance of this sector to national unity at the 2022 Nollywood Actors Summit, when he sought to collaborate with the Actors Guild of Nigeria, AGN, to build a world class film village in Edo state.
In 2022, the entertainment industry witnessed vibes from the music, sports, movie, social media sectors. There were also some sad events that hit the industry like the deaths of Osinachi Nwachukwu; the gospel “Ekwueme” singer, Ifeany Adeleke; a three-year-old first son of Davido, popular pop singer, Sammie Okposo; a 51 year old popular gospel singer, Patrick Fakoya, A.K.A Rico Swavey, Big Brother Naija reality star, Coolio; a rapper and singer of “Gangster’s Paradise” among others.
However, the year 2022 left a lot of nostalgic memories in the hearts of Nigerians and the world at large with Nigerians unarguably taking the lead.
The aura that Nigerian artists generated at the just concluded Qatar FIFA World Cup cannot go unnoticed as Nigerian singers as well as other recognised performers left the audience of over 50,000 mesmerized by their hit tracks.
For example Kiss Daniel; the “Buga” crooner took the stage at Doha’s Al Bidda Park to dazzle the audience. Also was Patoranki, who threw his audience into another atmosphere of happiness with his popular hit “No kissing baby”.
The fire of social media was lightened when the viral video from the stadium of the World Cup infiltrated the media space with spectators happily singing along to “Calm down”, an award winning hit track of Rhema, an upcoming Nigerian artist.
In addition, the closing ceremony of the round leather game also dropped another sense of glamour on the faces of both football lovers, music lovers and passive enthusiasts of the entertainment industry.
Speaking of the performance from Davido, one of Nigeria’s finest multiple award winning artists, Davido, alongside Aisha and Trinidad’s Cardona performed “Hayya Hayya (Better Together),” which was the 2022 Qatar World Cup anthem, thereby becoming the first Nigerian artist and one of the few Africans to mark such an achievement.
Also in the list of “Nigerians to the world” through entertainment, were various hit tracks that got the nation more recognition in the international community and brought the artists several local and international awards.
There were light ups on social media following the announcement made by LIVE Hub Entertainment that Grammy award-winning superstar Wizkid would be returning to Ghana for his first show in Africa in 2022 to perform at Accra Sports Stadium of 40,000-capacity on December 10.
Also, a few months after the release of ‘Buga’ in May by Kiss Daniel, the hit song fetched him over 100 million views on YouTube, making him hit his first 100 million views on the platform.
Habeeb Okikiola, known by his stage name ‘Portable’ the street-hop singer, was not left behind as he also released a 2-minute, 28 second hit single, ‘Azaman’; the highly anticipated cover of Asake’s hit single, ‘Organise.’
There were also mixed reactions where David Adeleke (Davido) rewarded all 23 members of his 30BG crew with multi-million Diamond studded pendants and Cartier glasses.
The Entertainment industry cannot be complete without talking about the prestigious awards in the music and movie sectors.
Several Nigerian singers and producers were nominated for various award categories and the winners included Burna Boy, who was crowned the “Best African Act” at the 2022 MTV Europe Music Awards (MTV EMAs) and at the Grammy and also bagged two MOBO Awards.
BNXN was also decorated with the Next Rated award winner at the Headies award, beating other nominees like Portable.
The others who won various awards included Wizkid, Patoranking, Tem, Oxlade, Adekunle Gold, Oma Lay, Flavour, Fire Boy, D’banj.
Other notable happenings were P-Square’s Reunion, Burna Boy and Wizkid Sold Out the Madison Square Garden, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever Soundtrack, where 6 Nigerian music acts adequately represented the country.
However, there was an uproar following Headies ban on the controversial street artist (Portable) for his inappropriate conduct after threatening to kill co-nominees for the street artiste award category. In a viral on Instagram, Portable was heard saying he is bigger than the organisers of the award and berating the artiste, who won the category he was nominated for.
Similarly, he was heard in a video saying that he was the leader of the notorious gang “one million boys” known for stealing during the pandemic.
Politicians were not left behind as Sen. Ademola Jackson-Adeleke, Osun state Governor and David Adedeji Adeleke his nephew, popularly known as Davido alongside Tajudeen Amoo-Adeleke, Legendary African Drummer were honoured at the Afro Award in Los Angeles, California.
Grammy award winning singer Burna Boy also made waves on Spotify, an online streaming platform, as one of the 10 most streamed male artiste among Asake, Wizkid, BNXN, Davido, Drake, Fireboy DML, Omah Lay, Rema and Kizz Daniel.
Meanwhile, there were reactions on the internet when the news of the arrest of Panshak Henry Zamani known as Ice Prince, Hip Hop star, rocked the wave for allegedly “abducting, assaulting and threatening a police officer”.
Similarly, the arrest of D’Banj, the ‘Koko master’, by the ICPC over alleged diversion of funds for the N-Power Programme, also trended on the entertainment space in 2022.
There were uproars in May when Stephanie Otobo, popularly known as Stephanie D’Ocean, a Canada-based Nigerian singer accused the famous Apostle Johnson Suleman, the General Overseer of Omega Power Ministries of infidelity and abuse. Although she backed her claims with a track which Suleiman dedicated to her as well as what she claimed to be the pastor’s “genitals”, Apostle Suleiman denied the allegation.
There were similar reactions in July after the same ‘man of God’ denied the accusation laid on him with evidence (list of names) by a controversial blogger who goes by the name Gistlover of having over 30 mistresses.
In the same way, there was another allegation from a controversial 37-year-old Halima Abubakar, an award winning actress, in a series of posts she shared on her Instagram page admitting to having had a romantic relationship with the same Apostle Suleman.
Kizz Daniel, the ‘BUGA’ master also got his own turn of arrest by Tanzanian police during his Afroclassic Tour after he did not show up for a show which he had been paid for.
Hardly had the media space cooled off from the heat of Kizz Daniel’s arrest, Big Brother Naija, BBN Season 7, a reality TV show, took over the media waves.
The show, which was tagged “Level Up” ended with a 25-year old Josephina Otabor, known as Phyna, emerging winner, beating 27 other housemates and bagging N50 million cash prize, a Dubai trip for two, a new SUV motor, new Techno phone-Camon 19, a year supply of Pepsi, and supply of home appliances among other prizes.
Surprisingly, the contentious reality show contributed massively to the nation’s GDP. John Ugbe, Chief Executive Officer of Multichoice Nigeria disclosed that the 2022 version of the show gulped over N4.7 billion.
Meanwhile, MultiChoice Nigeria, recently announced a special Big Brother edition which it tagged: ‘Big Brother Titans’ (BBTitans) to begin on Jan. 15, 2023.
The show, which is expected to run for 72 days, will reward the winner with a cash prize of 100,000 dollars.
The movie industry also contributed to the national integration as well as the economic development of the country in 2022.
Recently, Nollywood has been making waves with new movies released to promote the culture and heritage of the Nigerian populace. Some of these theatral pieces included Battle of Buka Street, The Blood Covenant, Anikulapo, King of Thieves, among others.
A NAN report stated that Netflix, a world streaming service, through Shola Sanni, its Director of Public Policy for Sub-Saharan Africa recently disclosed that it had invested N9 billion in the Nigerian film industry from the year 2016 to 2022.
Also, from Nigeria to the world, Emeka Rollas, the National President of the Actors Guild of Nigeria, AGN, disclosed that the guild was willing to partner with Destiny Network Africa, DNA, and the Satellite Broadband and Broadcast Company, SBBC, for the distribution of Nigerian film contents.
According to the report from NAN, projecting Nigeria to the world through fashion, the entertainment industry also witnessed a record breaking 17-year old Delta state born Stephanie Alfred, student of Babcock University, who won the first edition of ”Face of 9ja” Beauty model competition in Badagry, Lagos, beating 19 other contestants and bagging a cash prize of N200,000 and other consolations prizes.
The entertainment industry was in 2022 crowned with the Calabar Carnival, which saw fun seekers from across the globe appear to witness the always glamouring rich cultural display of the Calabar people.
Although this year’s carnival was marred by unstable power supply, which has sadly become a Nigerian phenomenon, especially along the procession track, the event still remains second to none, which will continue to attract art and culture enthusiasts from across the world.
Consequently, Thamsanqa Dennis Mseleku, South Africa High Commissioner to Nigeria enjoined the Nigerian government to make its tourism sector attractive and viable to boost its economy.
Another event that could not slip off the eyes of the public in 2022 was the mixed reactions on social media following the viral video of some women suspected to be Reverend Sisters spotted dancing to Kizz Daniel’s Buga featuring Tekno.
One cannot conclude talking about the entertainment industry and its activities that made headlines in 2022 without referring to content creators and their craftsmanship in their areas of specialisation.
This sector, which has not seen a decade of its popularity, gained huge traction such that Spotify invested 100,000 dollars into the new Africa Podcast fund initiative to support careers of up-and-coming podcasters across the continent.
In a nutshell, the entertainment industry in 2022 witnessed both its pleasant and ugly sides. However, the contributions it has made to the general good of the country’s unity, peace and economic growth have no doubt outweighed the distractions and hiccups in the industry in 2022.
There is therefore the need for the federal and state governments to invest more in the entertainment industry since it has proven to be a major unifier of every tribe, tongue and race.
KN
Tags: Davido Kennedy Nnamani
