A nation is more than its borders and governance. It is the sum of its stories, the melody of its anthems, the rhythm of its cultural heartbeat. Where politics flounders and policies fail, the arts endure, casting in ink, film, and sound, the indomitable essence of a people.
The soul of every nation is thus enshrined in its stories, the verses of its poets, the visions of its filmmakers, and melodies of its musicians. The arts manifest as both a mirror and map, reflecting our wounds and charting our path to redemption.
What shouldn’t we do for an evergreen story? What shouldn’t we give? If progressively spun, stories yield fresh insights through the imagination of the artist, who milks history and recalibrates reality to espouse a positive national lyric.
What is the Nigerian lyric? What is our reality? For decades, our storytellers have oscillated between two extremes: glorifying foreign ideals or perpetuating narratives of hopelessness. The former divorces us from the peculiarities of our existence, while the latter traps us in a cycle of self-loathing. The result? A people whose reflections in literature and cinema are often distorted caricatures, exaggerated traumas, and borrowed cultural paradigms.
Patriotism does not grow in the sterile halls of government houses, nor does it thrive in the acrid fumes of political speeches. It flourishes in culture—songs hummed by market women, fables whispered in moonlit courtyards, and cinematic retellings of our struggles and triumphs. Yet, Nigeria, rather than cultivating her fertile artistic landscape, has become an unwitting accomplice in her cultural erosion.
For instance, Nollywood churns out too many rabidly wrought revenge fantasies in which the Nigerian female perpetually scores retribution over her treacherous male; lest we forget the increasingly tiresome fiction plots that incite audiences to nurse toxic sexuality, ethnic intolerance, religious bigotry, virulent feminism, and sexist rage. In search of the proverbial elixir, we have drunk water from a pestilent stream and filled our bellies with toxins.
The superiority of Western democracy is one of the supreme constructions of imperialism and the poisonous elixir of Nigeria and her neighbours on the African continent. Nigerians elevate it with obsessive love. It is the magic pill to the nation’s ceaseless headaches.
But the West must never be blamed for our collective ignorance – the United States in particular. The latter’s democratic enterprise is one of its most profitable constructions in its bid to make America great again, at any cost. It is both music and philosophy, a sensory stream of thought feeding generations of writers, political activists, filmmakers, politicians, gender rights activists, academia, and so on.
We must understand, however, that Western democracy and foreign policy, while deliberately presented as two tines on the same fork, are sustained by oft-deceptive ideals and contradictory precepts of influence, crudely wedged into the nuclear powers’ global dominance stratagem. It is imperial politics without heart: ideologically deficit, dangerously manipulative, and Janus-faced.
A few good minds with an intuitive grasp of the hard-edged imperialist designs of the Western agenda are spuriously labelled as conspiracy theorists.
Those who love glorifying toxic foreign doctrines must understand that there is no way this could be achieved without horror, given the marked differences in culture, temperament, and histories defining different nations of the world.
It’s about time we identified values complementary to our precepts of humane governance and development. We cannot dwell, for instance, like Americans or Brits in Nigeria. We can only assimilate aspects of their culture complimentary of ours.
Every great civilization understands the power of storytelling. Hollywood does not merely produce films—it manufactures America’s mythology, refining its political narrative with every frame. Between 1911 and 2017, more than 800 feature films received support from the US Government’s Department of Defence (DoD). These included blockbuster franchises such as Iron Man, Transformers, and The Terminator. On television, over 1,100 titles received Pentagon backing – 900 of them since 2005, from Flight 93, Homeland, 24, NCIS, Ice Road Truckers to Army Wives. The Pentagon funds blockbusters that glorify its military might; the CIA collaborates on scripts that reinforce American exceptionalism. For over a century, the U.S. government has actively sponsored thousands of films and television shows to ensure that America is always the hero of its own story. Thus, Hollywood, despite its veneer of creative freedom, has long been a propagator of American ideals.
South Korea’s investment in K-dramas and K-pop was not accidental either; it was a deliberate strategy to export its culture and reinforce its national identity. China’s film industry is heavily regulated to ensure that its narratives align with its national ethos.
Nigeria must reclaim its creative space. Our filmmakers must tell stories of resilience, not just ruin. Our writers must craft narratives that inspire national pride, not just despair. Our musicians must sing of hope, not just hedonism.
Of course, different aspects of foreign governance cultures are worthy of emulation but only after we sieve and winnow them to extract their preferred aspects amenable to our sociocultural institutions. We must always remember that the Libyans, Afghans to mention a few, wildly embraced a dandy dream of ‘American-NATO-styled freedom, but instead, got trapped in a sinister nightmare. To date, they are paying dearly for it.
Nigeria’s creative economy stands at an inflection point. With projections estimating a leap from $5 billion in 2022 to $25 billion by 2025, there is an undeniable hunger for indigenous storytelling. Yet, economic prosperity must not overshadow ideological direction. What stories will we tell? What culture will we export? Will our arts heal a fractured nation, or will they deepen her wounds?
There is an urgent need for strategic investment in arts and literature. Grants and fellowships must be established, not merely to fund artists but to cultivate a sense of purpose in their creations. Our films must not only entertain but edify. Our literature must not only critique but reconstruct. Our music must not only excite but enlighten.
The government must partner with creatives, not as silent spectators but as active collaborators in shaping a national narrative that inspires rather than disillusions. The American government funds Hollywood. The Chinese government invests in its cultural exports. The Nigerian government must do the same for Nollywood, for literature, for music, and for theatre.
A nation’s heart beats in its stories. A country without a thriving literary and artistic identity is a body without a soul. Nigeria must reclaim her creative consciousness, not as an afterthought but as a deliberate policy of national development. Our filmmakers must move beyond the monotonous tropes of gender wars and vendetta-laden plots. Our novelists must cease writing solely for Western pity. Our reality shows must no longer be the custodians of our values.
It’s about time the government partnered with the arts sector to reinvent the Nigerian story while channelling humane governance and patriotism. It is time to make art the bedrock of our nation-building. For in the imagination of the artist, the poet, the filmmaker, and the musician thrives the history and future of Nigeria. A future yet to be written, yet to be sung, yet to be seen. But a future, nonetheless, that belongs to us to create.
Shall we script a new national narrative? One that does not lament Nigeria but reimagines her. One that does not beg for Western approval but commands global reverence.
It’s about time we refined the maladies that make the Nigerian dream the fantasy of thieves, slatterns, and blinkered murderers.
