Film  

Discordant tunes trail proposed Kano film village

By Shaibu Husseini and Florence Utor

31 July 2016   |   2:05 am

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There is intense lobby going on to get the Federal Government to rescind the decision to cancel plans to build the proposed Muhammadu Buhari Film Village in Kofa, Kano State.

Site of the proposed Kano film village

There is intense lobby going on to get the Federal Government to rescind the decision to cancel plans to build the proposed Muhammadu Buhari Film Village in Kofa, Kano State. Those championing the lobby members of Arewa Film and Culture Society say they want the Presidency to consider citing the project in another area in the North “preferably in Kaduna, Niger, Abuja, where there would be less religious inhibitions” instead of what they said was the “hasty decision to cancel a beneficial project like the film village just because some clerics opposed it”.

The Federal Government had during the week cancelled plans to build the film village, which was to be located at Kofa Local Government Area of Kano State. The government had earmarked N3bn for the project that will house state of the art facilities for the production of movies from script to screen and had according to a source even ‘cash backed’ the project to the tune of N1bn.

While announcing government intention at an interactive session held last week in Kano, Managing Director of the National Film Corporation (NFC) Dr. Danjuma Dadu explained that the proposed film village would house a 400 capacity auditorium, a sound stage, hostels, hotels, shopping mall and a clinic among other facilities. Dadu also explained that Kano was chosen as site for the project because Kano State has been the nerve centre of movie productions in northern Nigeria.

Also at the interactive session, a member of the House of Representatives, Abdulmumin Jibrin, had told Kannywood filmmakers who were at the interactive session that the proposed 20-hectare centre, which is modeled after similar facilities in India and China, would be equipped with state-of-the-art facilities and equipment for filmmaking. According to him, the film village will house a cinematography centre, 400-capacity auditorium for training.

However, the news of government’s intention to sink funds into the building of a film village, which is hoped to facilitate wealth and job creation, and promote cultural activities, had hardly gone round, when some residents of Kofa town and some Muslim clerics led by Sheik Abdallah Usman Gadan Kanya vehemently opposed the decision to site the project in Kofa. The clerics say they don’t want the project in Kofa and in Kano because such a project would promote immorality.

Some residents say they will prefer that the government invest the money on infrastructural development, including reviving their dams for agricultural development. The discussion continued on social media and there were submissions for and against the project. But it appears those who want the project cancelled are in the minority. Most commentators who are in favour say they wonder why government will hastily cancel a project, which as most of them alluded will triple income and employment in Kano. They were also of the opinion that the President would have consulted widely before taking the decision to cancel the project.

A Kano-based commentator, Fatuhu Mustapha said those opposed to the Kannywood film industry and the idea of the film village “are doing it out of narrow understanding of Islam and based on extremist tendencies and ignorance”. He lamented that the state was the biggest loser in terms of revenue, businesses and jobs, a reason he appealed to the state governor and the Emir of Kano to prevail on the President to rescind the decision stating, “Kano and the Kannywood practitioners can produce films without hurting Islam or its tradition and culture’. He also said: ‘’it can be used to promote its religion, traditional institutions and material culture”.

As things stand, the project will remain cancelled, except members of the Arewa Film and Culture Society succeed in convincing the Presidency to either rescind its decision or take the project to another area in the north, where there will be less religious and cultural inhibitions. Kannywood is the name that is used to describe the Kano based multi billion-naira motion picture industry. Although Kano has been home to the industry from inception, productions have moved to other cities in northern Nigeria, like Katsina, Kaduna and Bauchi.

The industry is believed to have taken off largely after Ibrahim Mandawari made a success of his 1990 hit Turmin Danya (The Dawn). The movie is easily cited as the first commercial Hausa home movie. It was released in March 1990, two years before the phenomenal Nollywood movie Living in Bondage was produced and it reportedly sold in excess of 100,000 copies.

This was the pioneering effort and efforts of some practitioners of Northern extraction, who already had background in television production and who before the home movie industry developed, would record short drama skits in VHS format and sell them for home consumption. These set of professionals later got some wealthy individuals interested in the production and marketing of home videos.Soon, an industry that has thrown up a lot of talented actors and technicians and which has provided employment for a large crowd of unemployed youths was born.