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Maduekwe, Kannywood interact for better performance of film sector

By Florence Utor
14 May 2017   |   3:48 am
According to Maduekwe, “The impact of this is huge particularly, on youth unemployment as the training is specifically designed to ensure that the participants are not only self-employed but also...

Maduekwe (left), receiving a gift from the Director Administration, Kano State Video Censors Board, Hamisu Garko

The newly appointed Director-General and Chief Executive Officer of Nigerian Film Corporation, Dr. Chidia Maduekwe, recently made a stopover in Kano, where he also interacted with filmmakers in the ancient city after an earlier session with practitioners in Lagos. He is aggregating stakeholders’ inputs towards a comprehensive strategy that would be submitted to government towardspolicy formulation for the Nigerian film industry.

The forum also acquainted stakeholders with the vision of the new helmsman on how the Nigerian film industry can contribute at least 10 per cent to the GDP of the federation within the next four years and impact positively on job-creation.

Kano helmsman for filmmaking, Abdullahi Maikano, enumerated areas he believed Nigerian Film Corporation could play a role to include the fight against piracy, challenge of film funding and issues of professionalism and ethics, as well as training and manpower development.

In his response, Maduekwe assured that NFC would sustain its support for the all-round development of Kannywood to ensure that it contributes in the development of the industry. He also commended Kano State Government for realising the importance of training and capacity building through partnership with the corporation to train 450 youths from the 44 local government areas of the state.

According to Maduekwe, “The impact of this is huge particularly, on youth unemployment as the training is specifically designed to ensure that the participants are not only self-employed but also become employers of labour. This will fit neatly to the vision of the present administration’s approach to reducing youth unemployment.”

Maduekwe also identified key challenges of the industry as ineffective Nigerian Film Corporation law, poor content and production quality, lack of adequate and reliable data for decision making, lack of cohesion and professionalism leading to industry fragmentation as well as intellectual property protection and piracy. He also listed lack of film infrastructures such as studios, film villages and theatres, poor funding mechanism and lack of professionalism/ethics as some of the challenges. He urged the practitioners to focus on funding, professionalism/ethics and the problem of distribution, marketing and exhibition networks. Maikano, in turn promised to study the problems and send a detailed input towards developing a roadmap and solutions within two weeks.

Maduekwe disclosed that the Nigerian Film Corporation, through its training arm the National Film Institute and Media Arts Studies (NAFIMAS), has developed a to market the Special Film Training Programme to other states of the federation, which would reduce youth unemployment across the country in keeping with the vision of job-creation and diversification of the economy by exploiting the potentials of the non-oil sector of the economy.

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