Opportunity for young talents, as Lekki TV berths

Following the recent projection that the Nigerian media and entertainment sector would grow to $8bn by 2019, an oil and gas mogul, Dr. John Ayeke, has launched an online TV dubbed Lekki TV, with the hope of joining the league of leading online content platforms such as Netflix, which is currently the world’s 10th-largest internet company by revenue.

The formal launch of the platform, which held recently in Lekki, Lagos, also witnessed the official commissioning the outfit’s photography and video studios with which it aims to boost local content production in the entertainment industry.

According to the Chairman, Lekki TV, Dr John Ayeke, the aim is to create a platform for upcoming generations to grow in the entertainment industry.“Our focus is on the music and movie industries, sourcing out local content and pushing it out to the world. It is mainly an online platform with over 20 shows that are free to air at present,” he said.

Ayeke further informed, “We are giving opportunities to upcoming artistes to showcase their talents and secure international opportunities. The photo studio is for weddings and other high quality pictures, while the motion studio is for our Television shows.”

On the content angle, he explained, “The issue of content has been covered and is being covered. A lot of Nigerians are coming on board with their scripts and with various proposals on what they want to do. For instance, on Thursday, June 29, a half-cast (German father and a Yoruba mother) came with a proposal to do a Mixed Race programme, so we have various interesting contents like that. We are going to explore every area of the country to bring interesting entertainment to the people.”

Some of the programmes coming on the platform include Dance For Me, a dance tutorial and Nude on the beach, which covers activities around the beach and other contents. There’s also Where are they now, a programme on people, who were once in the limelight but are no longer active.

“We are very much of local contents; local content is more of oil and gas term than media term, but we are bringing local content from the oil and gas sector to media. We are going to do it as an addition to what Nollywood is doing, in term of TV shows. It is going to be Infotainment. But beyond that, we are going to have a bit of foreign content, but we want to do more local than foreign,” he said.

The Manager Director, Samuel Oladoye, who called on government to encourage the development of talents, said, Lekki TV is an online platform established to create contents and create awareness about events and social happening within the community.“We focus on being an educative and Infotainment platform; we offer all kinds of entertainment services, we produce skits and the likes. Our focus is to reach the Nigerian populace and the world at large, and we do this by getting as much as local contents we can get from the teeming youths and from both the movie and the music industry,” he said.

He continued: “These past few years have seen online TV taking centre stage in providing entertainment. As we grow, our platform will incorporate more premium services. Currently, our platform is open to everyone to enjoy free content 24 hours. We are pushing out so many contents and in as much as we are doing this, we have contents that are for general consumption, irrespective of age and class, and of course, but as we move on, we will have contents targeted at adults.”

On the obvious competition in the industry, he said, “We know of the competition in the market but online TV business is still young. We understand the competition and we are not afraid of anything provided we are able to engage the audience with lovely contents; social media is a large space, big enough to accommodate everyone,” Oladoye hinted.