Movie Industry Plans to Recruit 2000 Youths in Nonth Central Zone

The Nigerian Movie Industry said that it planned to employ 2,000 youths in the North Central Zone of the country.

Mr Ralph Ogbaje and Msughter Demekpe, of the Nollywood fame, told the News Agency (NAN) on Saturday in Makurdi that the zone was endowed with raw talents which the industry intended to utilise.

They said that this would be done through their talent hunt programme tagged: ``Fish out all the untapped talents’’.

According to them, the gesture is to engage the youths in the movie industry to reduce the unemployment situation in the country.

The Nollywood stars said that they would partner with the state government to ensure that the youths were employed in line with President Goodluck Jonathan Transformation Agenda.

They pointed out that many employment opportunities abound in the movie industry, adding that Nollywood had diversified areas.



``Some could be trained and employed in acting, directing, producing, location management, costumes, make-up arts and so on.''

Demekpe said that the North central also had untold stories about its rich cultural heritage which needed to be told in their movies.

They said that they were interested in the economic and human development of Nigeria, adding. ``that is why we decided to set up a production house called `Real World Production' in Benue State.’’

They said that this would help to bring the talented youths to limelight.

They noted that they were inspired to come to the state after seeing the low quality movies produced by some people in Tiv and Idoma languages which portrayed lack of technical know-how.

``If these people are trained and empowered financially on the job, they would do a lot better and could compete with their counterparts in the eastern part of the country.

``They are in dire need of improvement which requires finance, you cannot produce a movie with the sum of N300, 000 and get it right.

``The technical aspect of the movie alone consumes more than N300, 000 before you talk of your casts,” Ogbaje explained.

However, the entertainers regretted that government and private investors were still unwilling to invest freely in the movie industry which they insisted was full of employment opportunities.

They lamented that inadequate funds, piracy and lack of awareness were some of the problems militating against the growth of the industry in the country.

They noted that youths were the future leaders of tomorrow and called on the government and relevant stakeholders to partner with them in taking them out of the streets.