In July 2016, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) announced that Nigeria was heading towards an economic recession.
By August 31, 2016, the Federal Government officially announced that the country had slipped into a recession. Let’s forget all about the economic terms and jargons and break down what an economic recession is.
An economic recession occurs when the economy of a country has stopped growing over a period of time- usually eight months. This is where Nigeria is now. Our economy has stopped growing and with it, people are buying less.
Let’s not forget the naira-dollar rate. Things are very precarious for Nigerians including celebrities. In previous years, we have witnessed Nigerian singers and actors make a killing from their profession. In the times we are in we shouldn’t expect that anymore.
For celebrities in Nollywood (actors and actresses), there will be less money to be thrown around in terms of movie productions. Let me paint this scenario. If an investor gave N50m to a movie producer to shoot a certain amount of movies, this year that amount would be considerably less due to the recession. When the number of movies being produced reduces that means actors and actresses won’t have as many jobs they had last year. And with fewer jobs comes less money.
So what this means is that actors and actresses won’t be on many movie sets for as long as this recession lasts. With fewer movies shot expect fewer premieres also. We might not get to see our favourite actors on the red carpet a lot during these trying times.
In the music industry, it’s a whole lot worse because of the lopsided stream of revenue Nigerian artistes have been surviving on for years. The Nigerian artiste lives off shows i.e paid performances and it has been working for a while with many acts charging astronomical fees for average performances.
Now with the recession, there aren’t many show promoters out there willing to drop a tonne of cash. The numbers of shows have drastically reduced this year. Not a lot of artistes are cashing out like they did in previous years.
To make situations worse Nigerian artistes do not sell their songs, they give it out online for free. What should have been a source of revenue now it’s not. Nigerian singers and rappers will feel the recession the most because their major stream of income has been hit badly. Unfortunately, they do not organize their own tours. Years of laziness in the music industry has finally caught up with them.
In general, the parties, the fancy events and occasions will drastically reduce because the people behind the financing of such lavish projects would take stock and tighten their belts during this recession.
At the end of the day, our stars will have less money to ball during this period.
