President Jonathan and Governor Fashola Have Done A Lot for Nollywood

President Goodluck Jonathan of Nigeria.

President Goodluck Jonathan and Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State have done more for Nollywood than other political leaders in Nigeria.

President Goodluck Jonathan is the first Nigerian leader to launch an entertainment intervention fund and his N3billion largesse for Nollywood to boost the Nigerian film industry is unprecedented. Lest we forget, he has played a major role in the sponsorship of the annual Africa Movie Academy Awards (AMAA) in his home state of Bayelsa since May 30, 2005 when the first African Movie Academy Awards were held in Yenagoa, the capital of Bayelsa State in the Niger Delta of Nigeria.

The most outstanding is President Jonathan's US$200,000,000 funds for the entertainment industry he announced at the 30the anniversary of the Silverbird Group of Mr. Ben Murray-Bruce who challenged him to support the entertainment industry that can create thousands of jobs for jobless youths in Nigeria and boost the economy. And then President Jonathan added the whooping N3billion grant exclusively for Nollywood he announced during the presidential dinner with Nollywood stars and stakeholders at State House, Marina Lagos on March 2, 2013.

While Governor Babatunde Fashola has focused more in helping to save the precious lives of notable persons in Nollywood like Ifeanyi Dike of the Board of Trustees (BOT) of the Actors’ Guild of Nigeria (AGN) who received over N2million from Governor Fashola for a kidney operation in India in 2011 and the most recent beneficiary is popular Nollywood actress Ngozi Nwosu who received N4.5m for a successful kidney operation in India.


Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola of Lagos State.

Governor Fashola's administration also sponsored the production of "Champions of Our Times", the most successful multiple awards winning Nollywood movie of Macnuel Productions and made the producers richer. He has also done several favours for other Nollywood stars, but he does not like making noise about it.


Governor Fashola sponsored the production of the multiple awards winning movie, "Champions of Our Times".

Governor Fashola who is Yrouba has done more favours for Igbo Nollywood stars than their own Igbo leaders, because none of the Igbo state governors of these Igbo Nollywood practitioners have done even half of what he has done so far. But ironically most of these Igbo Nollywood stars don't even support or vote for Governor Fashola's political party, the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN). They collect his largesse and then still return to campaign for the ruling party, People's Democratic Party (PDP) of Nigeria in elections, but the magnanimous Governor Fashola continues to help them whenever they Ask for his help and support.

Nigerian entertainers should be glad and grateful for enjoying the generosity of these two political leaders.


~ By Ekenyerengozi Michael Chima

About the Author:
Ekenyerengozi Michael Chima, aka "Orikinla Osinachi", is a prize winning Nigerian writer, most prolific African blogger and author of Children of Heaven, Sleepless Night, Scarlet Tears of London, Bye, Bye Mugabe, In the House of Dogs, Diary of the Memory Keeper, The Prophet Lied, co-author of Naked Beauty and editor of The Language of True Love. He has written many articles, commentaries and news reports published by Technorati, Blogcritics, Huliq, Yahoo Voices, Shvoong, Gather, Huffington Post, Face2Face Africa, Black Film Maker, Nigeria Films and Modern Ghana. Michael Chima is also the Founder/Festival Director of the annual Eko International Film Festival and Founder/CEO of Screen Outdoor Open Air Cinema, member of the Projection Foundation promoting the Screen Naija One Village, One Cinema project in Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa and home of Nollywood, Africa's largest film industry of which he is a major stakeholder in movies and cinemas.

© Orikinla Osinachi. 2013. No reproduction in any format of media without the authorization and permission of the copyright owner and publisher.










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