We’ll not marginalize marketers – Emeka Mba
By SOLA BALOGUN
Friday, April 20, 2007

Against the growing fear by movie marketers that the just inaugurated distribution framework by the Nigerian Film and Video Censors Board (NFVCB) would wipe them off the market, Mr. Emeka Mba, Director General of the board, has said that the scheme was not meant to witch-hunt anybody but to set standards in the sector.

Mba, who spoke with Daily Sun during the just concluded National seminar on Culture and Economic Impacts of the Movie Industry held in Jos, Plateau State hinted that the new set of guidelines requires that practitioners and all stakeholders in the motion picture industry embrace professionalism; and that in all segments of the industry, Plateau State hinted that the new set of guidelines requires that practitioners and all stakeholders in the motion picture industry embrace professionalism; and that in all segments of the industry, "some levels of standard have to be enforced."

Said the DG: "The guidelines are not meant to frustrate the marketers or any practitioners in the industry. It is only meant to boost our regulatory capacity in the area of quality and standardization. We need to do things to ensure that the industry moves forward."

But asked whether the opposition from a section of movie marketers would dampen the NFVCB spirit on the new guidelines, Mba said: "That won’t kill the spirit of the board, rather it would ginger us into action. We confront the high level of opposition. But this would even spur us into getting the best for all stakeholders. The guidelines are not ill motivated. Rather, we want to promote the Nigerian movie sector- it remains a unique industry which must be prevented from disintegration through lack of profession."

Explaining the operations of the new Distribution Framework, Mba noted further that the NFVCB was not trying to invent the will, but to license everyone engaged in the distribution of film in Nigeria. "Our aim is to license the distribution and the environmental (premises) where the movies are being distributed. There is also the need for insurance against fire and other natural disasters. All we want to do is to ensure standardization and give a sense of representation to the marketers. I am totally convinced in the workability of a framework."

Asked if the guidelines would not be discriminatory, Mba quickly said, "as long as you’re licensed by the board, you can submit your film for distribution. This is why we divided the country into six zones. All a marketer needs to do is to become a film distributor under each of the zones and he or she would begin to network accordingly.

And if you don’t have enough money, we have advised the marketers to take an insurance bond to the equivalence of N50 million and get the intellectual property full protected."

Accordingly to Mba, the framework took the NFVCB two years to consolidate, and the marketers themselves had ample opportunity to study its operations. Also, Mba disclosed that the NFVCB is empowered by law to license marketers and that marketers should be tolerant and take the new distribution network in good faith.