Decades after, Nollywood swims in unfulfilled greatness

The Nigerian film industry (known as Nollywood), rated as the third most valuable film industry in the world, is filled with prospects but has yet to realise its full potential.

In terms of output, Nollywood is the second-biggest in the world, behind Bollywood. At its peak, it produced an average of 50 movies per week, though of lower technical quality.

During Nollywood’s golden age in the first decade of the new Millennium, Nigerian actors enjoyed unrivalled fame on the continent. The likes of RMD, Genevieve, Omotola, Jim Iyke, Aki, Pawpaw, and others were household names across sub-Saharan Africa.

Today, as it was yesterday, Nollywood’s potential is apparent. A recent statistic released by PwC revealed that Nigeria’s entertainment sector will be worth $15 billion in 2025 if properly harnessed.

Similarly, the Chief Executive Officer of First Generation Mortgage Bank (FGMB), Dr. Young-Tobi Ekechi, in a speech titled, “Nollywood: A Rising Pillar in Nigeria’s Socio-economic Development,” at the closing session of the 2022 Nollywood Technology and Security Summit, asserted that the country’s film industry has a financial value of over $6.4 billion, making it one of the fastest-growing film industries in the globe and one of Nigeria’s biggest employers of labour.

Most recently, the Director General of the World Trade Organisation, WTO, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who was the former Minister of Finance, while speaking at the Governors Forum in Abuja on Monday, May 15, 2023, affirmed that “Nollywood is one of the world’s fastest-growing creative industries, worth $6.4 billion in 2021 and growing at 10% per

year.”

Without any doubt, the indices of greatness are evident.

Yet, there is a cause for concern because, on the other hand, Nollywood’s influence seems to be waning, its intensity and aura diminishing.

A number of developments are silently eroding its power and influence, thereby threatening the economics of the film industry.