The high-rise of sex in Nigerian Entertainment

– Reports of sexual exploitation in the local showbiz industry continue to make news every other day

– As a result, the Nigerian entertainment industry needs more professionalism despite current growths in some areas

– Perhaps if the government was involved in this sector, a lot of things would have been better off today

– Whatever the case, industry players need to do better in their own ways

The spate of corruption and indecency in the Nigerian movie industry has been a topic of debate for a while now and there are new indications that the speculations might be real after all.
Nollywood actress Queen Nwokoye whose interview was published by Punch on Sunday, August 14, 2016 has come out to state that she never spoke to the publication at all.
According to Punch, Nwokoye spoke on her journey to the top amid speculations she had at various points been in romantic affairs with several star actors in a bid to hit stardom.
She also reportedly spoke on talks of actresses having to sleep their way to the top in the keenly competitive Nigerian movie industory.

Queen Nwokoye and Highlife star Flavour. 

An excerpt of the interview reads:

“If it is true that actresses have to sleep with producers to get roles, I’m happy I didn’t have to do so. Sometimes, it is people’s way of trying to explain away their failure. I didn’t pass through it.

“From my experience, nobody ever asked to sleep with me. If you present yourself as someone that can sleep around to get roles, people will treat you that way. But the truth is how many people do you want to sleep with before you become famous?”

As all of this is being denied by the actress who has gone as far as calling out Punch for such wrong act, there are two major complaints against the backdrop of this.
First, Nwokoye claimed she never granted Punch any interview given their history with misrepresenting her statements just to garner large views from the readers.

Then she stated that she didn’t make all such claims as was reported. Nwokoye added that she spoke on her journey to the top, highlighting her personal struggles in the industry as a newbie with the hope that she would get others inspired.

But all of that was misquoted to attract cheap views, she claims, all of which has given her cause to rant on social media today, August 15, 2016 and the actress is clearly furious.

Here’s an excerpt of what she wrote on Instagram in the early hours of August 15:
“I am honestly disappointed in the punch newspaper. You guys are too big for what you did. Leave twisting of words and tacky unintelligent captions for gossip magazines. First of all, I did not grant an interview to you guys. I wouldn’t have, because the last time I did, you twisted my words as usual and gave it one of your stupid captions. Because of that I stayed away from granting interviews for a very long time.

“I granted an interview to Samuel Olatunji. The interview was aimed at highlighting my personal struggles in the industry as an upcomer to encourage the new ones.. I talked about a lot of things. I talked about how I looked for ways to upgrade myself when I found out I was being stereotyped to a particular role. I talked about looking up to and watching movies of other talented actresses to make myself better.
“I talked about how movie critics also helped by bashing some of my movies and how instead of feeling offended, it made me sit up and it made me work harder. Then I was asked ‘but we heard you have to sleep with someone before you make it big in Nollywood’ and in our defense I told him it didn’t happen to me.
“When d interview came out, I was shocked at what I saw. Everything was removed and the ones they left were twisted to suit the stupid caption they feel will bring traffic to them. Things I did not say were added and the aim of the interview was defeated.

“It is only in Nigeria a journalist will still be asking about sex for roles in 2016. I hardly read about such when i see interviews from other countries. There are other positive things happening in Nollywood.

“Focus on the positives. Write things that will sell the industry instead of always dwelling on the perceived negatives.”

Queen Nwokoye, Bovi and Kanayo O. Kanayo.

As an entertainment industry observer and critic, one realizes without trying hard that corruption and indecency are huge in this part of the world.
There are several reports of models, actresses and aspiring female musicians subjected to different illegal acts as they struggle to climb up the ladder of fame and then fortune.

In Nigeria, fame comes before fortune. In fact, fame comes in many cases and the fortune never quite becomes part of entertainers’ lives.
It is terrible and touching, among other things but it perhaps explains the desperation. However, one finds it unprofessional that people have to resort to sexual gratifications to allow others the opportunity to chase their dreams.
The indecency in the industry isn’t inspiring. But I suppose it makes sense given the economic realities of today.
READ ALSO: Sexy actress slams haters, says their opinions don’t matter
It clearly makes sense if you consider that everyone is grappling for survival and the guys at the upper echelons do not want any of the goodies spreading to the other parts of society – from those in government to various other spheres of our existence as a nation.

Many years back, it was more about talent and improving ones craft. But corporate funding and increased revenue stream into the industry ensures that the competitiveness today is stiffer, not necessarily because it is about increased talent but as a result of the ultimate need to survive.

Today, it is not so much about talent or moral lessons or weighty themes in movies. Directors are about garbage in, garbage out. Do a hasty job, recycle weak stories and shift materials into the marketers’ stables. Easy! No real growth or improvements whatsoever.
And can they be blamed? What roles have the government agencies played in improving an industry that could well be rated as our fastest developing in the last decade or more?
The problems are tripartite. First, there are obvious shortcomings from movie players who have lost all forms of professionalism in many cases.
Then there are greedy, thieving marketers who will stop at nothing to pirate people’s intellectual properties, ensuring the actual investors run at major losses at the end of the day. This discourages real investments.
Thirdly, there are obvious lapses on the part of the government as they have failed over and over in their role as supervisory bodies. But of course it is understandable, this isn’t the oil and gas sector so it isn’t worth monitoring. No use clamping down on pirates in the entertainment sector, to what end really? Why clamp down on them when we can remain a mono-product economy and rely solely on oil?

It’s a major challenge down here. The issues are unending. It’s now about ruthless competitiveness, this is the pervasive mindset in the land.
There is so much wrong with Nollywood as it is, and stories of actresses sleeping their ways to the top will continue to make the news because it is what it is.
One has been privy to some information from insiders in the entertainment industry and talks of models, female musicians and actresses being sexually exploited aren’t far from the truth. These ladies go through all of these in a bid to attain super stardom.
So when newspapers ‘misrepresent’ Queen Nwokoye and others out there today, we understand that there probably have been other deep-seated reasons.

This is not to justify Punch or any other media outfit as we have no concrete proofs to the effect that Nwokoye did grant the interview as was published.
But we know that there’s actually no smoke without fire as the Nigerian entertainment industry is nascent, largely unprofessional and indecent more often than not.