I Used To Be A DJ, says Asiwaju Tinubu

Music mogul Akon with Tinubu

Not many would imagine former Lagos governor, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu wearing big earphones and standing over some stereo. In fact, not many know that the diminutive politician used to be a disc jockey (DJ).

Known as one of the most prominent politicians in Nigeria, Tinubu had other interests that were pretty unheard of and mixing tapes happens to be one of them.

“I was interested in music. I enjoy music, from the days of James Brown. I told you I followed Roy Chicago to Ado-Ekiti, without knowing. I was just lucky. God just made me a professional because I could have ended up with the late Dr. Sikiru Ayinde Barrister!,” he said in interview with TheNEWS magazine during his 60th birthday celebration.

He added that: “We used to follow him (Ayinde Barrister) about for during the Ramadan, to the extent that I would be locked out. Whenever there was competition around Lagos Island or anywhere, we were always there. There was always the possibility of violence because of the competition,” he stressed.

Of his DJ skills, he said: “But then I was an in-house DJ, not a commercial DJ. Teddy Pendergrass was my favourite and I kept myself updated on the music scene in America.

“You don’t have music now. You now have O foka sibe, O gbona feli feli. I love listening to jazz a lot,” he said of modern music.

Solidstar Forces Davido To 'Wait' For His New Song

Solidstar & Davido

Joshua Iniyezo, Achievas Entertainment star artiste popularly known as Solidstar has released a new feel-good music titled 'Wait'.

The new song features Nigeria's Sony Music Recording artiste, Davido. It is a dancehall funk that is sure to get music fans grooving from start to finish.

This is coming after the earlier leak of the song, which created hysteria and anticipation among fans of the two of Nigeria's top music stars.

In a release by Solidstar's PR Team, the song is about the readiness of a man to wait patiently for his woman until she is ready to take the plunge with him.

To add value to the song, the video, shot and directed by Avalon Okpe, has also been released. 

In the visual was a message from Solidstar to everyone at the end of the video, which says “No Sex Before Marriage, Wait Without Regrets”.

Solidstar has been on a run of musical form lately. He has released massive tracks such as Baby Jollof, which featured Mavin's first lady, Tiwa Savage, Good Woman and another track, My Body featuring Timaya. 

Gbenro, Osas Ajibade Appear As Guest Judges On BET Top Actor Africa

Gbenro & Osas Ajibade with Show host

Celebrity couple Gbenro and Osas Ajibade made a surprise appearance on BET Top Actor Africa Wednesday as they flew in from Nigeria to be guest judges.

The acting couple, who got married some months ago, were judges in an episode of the reality show which featured two of the most tasking challenges so far on this season’s show.

In one of the tasks, contestants were thrown head first into the rural village setting of some of South Africa’s biggest indigenous ethnic groups. They then had the unenviable task of performing iconic Shakespeare monologues to a distracted and often disinterested poolside audience.

After the tasks, Lorraine Gakuo from Kenya became the latest contestant to be shown the door as the competition for the prize of Top Actor Africa hots up.

Lorraine was the fourth contestant to be evicted from the house after Osas, Gbenro and the other judges made their decision following the challenges.

BET Top Actor Africa Season 2 Episode two airs every Tuesday on BET.

Yewande Sadiku: Nollywood's Risk Taker

Yewande Sadiku

Yewande Sadiku, investment banker, takes huge risk committing her life savings and others’ to raise $10 million to produce Nigeria’s international movie, Half of A Yellow Sun

FUNSHO AROGUNDADE

Three times, Yewande Sadiku broke down in tears inside Hall 2 of Ozone Cinemas, Yaba, Lagos. Sadiku, chief executive officer of Stanbic-IBTC Capital Limited, was neither bereaved nor assaulted. But this investment banker of repute, in between sobs, was recalling how she battled hard to overcome what would have injured her reputation as a fund raiser.

Yewande & Chimamanda

With an initial budget of $8 million (N1.3 billion), Sadiku, as the head honcho of a respected financial institution, trusted her savvy to get the cash from some investors by just working the phone. But she was disappointed.In the not-too-distant-past, Sadiku had hauled in over $1 billion for some Nigerian investors in a telecommunication company. Months after that, she got a proposal from a friend to raise fund for the production of the movie, Half of A Yellow Sun. After weighing the prospects of the film project, Sadiku acceded to the role of executive producer and source for fund to shoot the movie.

“I never believed it could take me about six years to raise that kind of money. I am an investment banker by profession and part of my specialty is raising money for people. I have headed a team that raised $1 billion for some investors, but never believed that raising money for a personal project would take this long,” Sadiku said.

As she wiped tears rolling down her cheeks, she continued: “I thought it would be very easy to raise $12m (N2 billion) to shoot Half of a Yellow Sun. But I was wrong. Some people that I approached did not believe it could be done as well as did not believe in Nigeria movie industry. It was a hard sell for most of them because they did not believe they could make their money back because film investment does not look attractive. There were many times I broke down with tears in my car, especially when someone had promised to make a commitment and all of a sudden you can’t reach the person anymore or the person stops picking your calls or replying text messages.”

After she was turned down by some investors, the investment banker became very sad and unhappy for Nollywood. But she was not deterred as she believed in the vast potentials inherent in Nollywood, most importantly, the Half of A Yellow Sun film project she had in her hand. Despite the challenges of day-to-day running a financial company, Sadiku devoted her evenings and weekends to meeting with different investors. In 2010, she took a seven-week study leave and travelled to the United States on Eisenhower Fellowship to get trained in the art of film financing.

While there, Sadiku studied the role of the financial sector in supporting the development and growth of the media and entertainment industry in the U.S. Buoyed by her experience in the U.S., Sadiku, on arrival back home and with the support of her husband, took all the risk by selling everything they had and got two other people to put down part of the money. They also borrowed money from bankers and eventually the fund was raised. With the required fund in the kitty and allies in fellow producers like Andre Calderwood, Sandra Obiago and Mukhtar Bakare, the cast and crew stormed Calabar, Cross River State, in May 2012 to shoot and months after, the production was ready.

“If anybody had told me during the fund raising effort that we would get to this point of watching the movie play out on the big screen, I would say it is a lie. But our faith in God and belief in the project was what saw us through,’’ Sadiku told this magazine.

Half of A Yellow Sun is one of the first theatrical flicks that will have a mix of A-list Hollywood actors and some Nollywood greats. Oscar-nominated players Chiewetel Ejifor and Thandie Newton, joined Joseph Mawle, Hakeem Kae-Kazim and Anita Noni Rose to star in the epic love-story alongside Nigeria’s Onyeka Onwenu, Tina Mba, Genevieve Nnaji, Zach Orji and OC Ukeje.

Half of A Yellow Sun is a sweeping romantic drama weaving together the lives of four people swept up in the turbulence of war. It focuses on a journey through the war of the glamorous sisters and twins from a wealthy Nigerian family, Olanna (Newton) and Kainene (Noni Rose), and their lovers, Odenigbo (Chiwetel) and Richard (Mawle).

Chiwetal in action in the movie

Returning to a privileged city life in newly independent 1960s Nigeria after their expensive education in England, the two women make very different choices. Olanna shocks her family by going to live with her lover, the revolutionary professor, Odenigbo, and his devoted houseboy, Ugwu (John Boyega), in the dusty university town of Nsukka; Kainene turns out to be a fiercely successful businesswoman when she takes over the family business, as well as falls in love with Richard, an English journalist who is about to take up a teaching job at Nsukka.

However, they become caught up in the events of the Nigerian civil war in which the Igbo people fought an impassioned struggle to establish Biafra as an independent republic, ending in chilling violence which shocked the entire country and the world.

The movie, which has already been screened in Canada and the United Kingdom, had its Lagos premiere on 12 April with many of the leading actors, including Chiwetel, in attendance.

“We must understand that Half of A Yellow Sun isn’t just a story about Nigeria. It has its implications and its relevancies across the world. It is also an international story,” said Chiwetel on the importance of the movie during a media chat in Lagos recently.

The actor, who earned an Oscar nomination for his role as Solomon Northup in the movie 12 Years A Slave, said it has become important to start to tell African stories in a geopolitical context and not just in an abstract context.

“There has been an extraordinary amount of progress in Africa, and people in the west need to recognise that. It hasn’t been recognised,” Chiwetel said.

Biyi Bandele, who screenplayed and directed the movie, said the movie is essentially about people falling in love and the sacrifices you have to make sometimes when you are in a relationship.

He revealed that the movie was shot in just 33 days at Tinapa, Calabar and other locations in Nigeria with actors from more than 12 different countries.

With a budget of over $10 million (N1.7 billion), Half of a Yellow Sun arguably becomes the biggest Nigerian production yet. But why did Yewande Sadiku take such risk, committing such amount of money to shoot a Nigerian-oriented movie project? Sadiku believes the cinematic interpretation of Nigeria’s Chimamanda Adichie’s 2006 award-winning novel of the same title, was worth all the trouble. She sees the film as a bridge between Nigerian cinema and the international film community.

“Most of the local crew members, who make up roughly 60 per cent of the production, are getting their first chance to work on a film with a high level of technical detail, acquiring skills that will help the local industry moving forward,” she explained.

One major fear expressed by critics is the success of the movie at the box office so that Sadiku can recoup her nearly N2 billion investment and help others in raising funds for other ambitious film projects. Sadiku also believes that the success of the film will improve the comfort of Nigerian investors with film investment and allow Nigerian film makers to raise formal financing in the future beyond their circle of family and friends. “I want us to see this project as our own. If it succeeds, we all take the credit. I mean for the first time in our history as a nation, a Nigerian story that was funded wholly from here was screened at the Toronto International Film Festival. That for me is very huge,” Sadiku summed.

And it is also very huge for some critics who have commended the courage of Sadiku as well as lauded the technical quality of the film.

“This is a very courageous move and it demonstrates that it is possible to make a high quality production in Nigeria with the appropriate budget and technical input,” said Steve Ayorinde, former managing director, National Mirror and film aficionado.

“Half of a Yellow Sun has been a huge success in different parts of the world and it’s time to take hold of our very own as it comes home. At this point, this movie has proven that we can have good picture, sound, originality and professionalism in Nollywood,” said Shaibu Hussein, movie journalist with The Guardian.

For Toni Kan, Half of A Yellow Sun is a must watch for every Nigerian. “People must go and watch it because it is a valuable piece of Nigeria’s cinema history. It will teach you and touch you in many ways and with 2015 approaching and rabble-rousers banging on the drums of war, this love story set in the time of war will give you perspective. War is evil but love conquers all,” Kan told TheNEWS.

The movie opens at various cinemas across Nigeria on 25 April.

This story was first published in the 28 April 2014 edition of TheNEWS magazine.

http://thenewsnigeria.com.ng/2014/04/yewande-sadiku-nollywoods-risk-taker/

Blast Champ Excites With New Afro-pop single Nwayor

Fast rising Afro-pop sensation, Blast Champ has released a new single Nwayor.

The new song, dropped recently and already enjoying rotation on some urban radio stations, is a fusion of Afro and Hip-hop.

Nwayor, the second single of Blast Champ, is expected to stamp the singer’s feet in the sand of time and made him compete favourably with others in the Afro-pop genre of the Nigerian music industry.

A release from Blast Champ’s PR reps stated that the singer, rapper and songwriter is working with a couple of music producers to bring out the best music to his fans.

Interestingly, like Psquare, Blast Champ also has a twin brother with him in his music sojourn. But unlike the Okoye brothers, Blast Champ sings while his twin brother produces most of his songs under the name Nedz Beats.

At the heat of the fight in the Psquare music empire, BC once said he knew the fight was not going to last because the brothers are twins.

He said he believed that the brothers will soon come to terms because they shared the same womb as twins. Just like he had predicted, the Psquare twins apologised to their fans and came back together as a group.

BC as Blast Champ is fondly called by his fans, was born Anigala Chuka on 30 May 1991 in Delta State. He always had passion for music because of the background in which he was brought up and then he discovered his talent in music at a tender age. Having graduated from the University of Benin in 2013 with a degree in Economics, BC abandoned his degree and focused on music.

BC played the flute in primary school and was a member of his secondary choir. He performed at various school events as a student of University of Benin, Edo state.

With few years in the industry, the talented act has been able to blend the Igbo flavor of highlife with the contemporary hip hop music. His first single Boo Boo Me was released in 2014 and was produced by his twin brother, Nedz Beats.

The singer and song writer is signed to Meshtro Entertainment. He is already working on a new single that will help launch him into the big league of artistes in Nigeria and Africa as a whole.

MoneyGram Celebrates Two Decades of Growth in Nigeria

MoneyGram, a NASDAQ MGI brand, is celebrating more than 20 years of successful growth with some of the company’s key agents in Lagos.

At a ceremony held Wednesday at the InterContinental Hotel, Victoria Island, Lagos, Alex Holmes, MoneyGram’s Chief Executive Officer hosted senior executives of some of the company’s key agents including CEOs of Skye Bank, UBA and Fidelity Bank. 

"We’re grateful for your longstanding commitment to MoneyGram, and for working with us to address a serious and relevant need that has faced Nigerians, which is transferring money to loved ones across the world, quickly, securely and conveniently. Our combined efforts have enabled us to not only expand alongside our customers’ increasing needs, but also have contributed to the growth of MoneyGram,” said Holmes as he handed out milestone marker awards to each agent to honor the hard work, growth and success that has been achieved in Nigeria.

MoneyGram currently operates in Nigeria through 16 Banks of the 22 Banks on the Central Bank of Nigeria  register. This translates to over 4500 locations in Nigeria, where customers can send and receive money transfers. 

In addition and as an indicator of its focus on sub-saharanAfrica, MoneyGram is the only money transfer operator to have a regional office in Lagos. In 2015 alone, $21 billion in remittances were received in Nigeria.

The World Bank estimates that nearly $34 billion in remittances will flow into Sub-Saharan Africa in 2016. Nigeria is a critical part of MoneyGram’s business. 

Mo Abudu's 'Fifty' grosses record-breaking N400m

The Fifty Ladies: Iretiola Doyle, Nse Etim-Ikpe,
Omoni Oboli & Dakore Akade

As 'Fifty', the hit film by EbonyLife Films, closes its remarkable four-month cinema run in Nigeria this week, reports have it that the flick has grossed a record over ₦400m.

The much-talked about story of a pivotal week in the lives of four successful African Women in 21^st century Lagos has redefined return on investment metrics in the African Film Industry. 

It is estimated that through various revenue generating streams, the film grossed such huge figures. 

The breakdown revealed that the producers of the film in partnership with Film One Distribution, maxed out nearly ₦100m through Box Office takings alone. 

Amongst the other revenue streams through which over N300m came in are premiere sponsorship/ partnerships; private screenings; a first-of-its-kind deal with internet streaming provider, Netflix; in-flight entertainment deals and Video-on-Demand (VOD).
 

Speaking on the film's cinema run, Mo Abudu,  Executive Producer of the film said they started the run in early December 2015 and four months later the film continues to resonate with moviegoers across thr country.

"We are extremely proud and it is testament that Nigerians do support their own," Abudu said.

It was gathered that the movie’s revenue intake leverages on a unique business model not previously explored in the Nigerian film industry.

"This model serves as proof to various stakeholders – producers, directors and investors – an unorthodox promotional mix combined with high quality production yields measurable results," Abudu added. 

Mo Abudu

Fifty has enjoyed rave reviews and international acclaim since it was first screened at The BFI London Film Festival 2015.

Top media outfits including BBC, CNN, Vogue, and Essence and other national online and print titles gave the film generous mentions.

The movie also enjoyed tremendous support from the Lagos State Government, Federal Government of Nigeria, Corporate and Social Nigeria.

Industry captains including Alhaji Aliko Dangote, Tony Elumelu, Herbert Wigwe amongst many attended the premiere; while music stars Banky W & Waje surprised fans with Cinema ‘Meet & Greet’ in malls across the country.

A ‘Win Big with FIFTY’ promo was run nationwide with audiences walking away with weekly prizes including Wakanow holidays, SPAR vouchers, Flat screen TVs courtesy of KONGA and more.

The Grand Prize of a Brand new Mercedes Benz B-class courtesy Skymit Motors will be presented to a winner in April 2016.

The success of the film has already spawned a television series, as the movie executives announced that they will extend the movie’s success onto the small screen.

The Season one of "Fifty: The TV Series" is set for production in fourth quarter of 2016.

Writing of the screenplay has already commenced. But details of whether the lead characters will reprise their film roles will be revealed in due course.

EbonyLife Films will also  release its second feature film title ‘The Wedding Party” in December 2016.