Saidi Balogun, a Nollywood actor, filmmaker and director, is angry. At the moment, his biggest headache is the activities of pirates who seem to be making it impossible for him to literally enjoy the fruit of his labour. In this interview with DUPE AYINLA-OLASUNKANMI, Balogun, the producer of You or I, ventilates his anger, while talking about some other issues.
FOR some time now, there has been so much buzz about your new movie, You or I; so, when will it released?
The movie is out and it is doing well. But the only sad thing about the work is that, it has been pirated and the sponsors are on my neck now. Right now, I need to pay back those who invested in the movie, individually. But given what the pirates are doing with the movie now, it is difficult to get back the money.
The movie was released two weeks ago. But three days after its release, we started seeing the pirated copies. However, because the movie is coded, they could only get 50 minutes out of it. So, the pirates claimed the rest of the movie would be in the sequel – that is, part II. Consequently, people will be wondering what I am doing. They even had the gut to write parts I &II on the pack of the movie. They cannot get the whole movie. But our greatest challenge is people who buy these pirated copies. They know they are pirated copies, but they still go ahead to buy them; and then they end up saying trash about our production. The pirates are really killing me. We have to pay the banks. Thank God for the sponsors; otherwise, I would have been dead by now.
So, what do you intend to do, given that you have to pay back those who invested in the production?
The government should pass a law. A few weeks to the ongoing national conference, the president came out to say that we (movie producers) are contributing much to the GPR of this country. But the same government formed the constitutional conference that has nothing to do with entertainment; so, I am still in the dark. But you can’t blame them; I watch the news and read the newspapers every day, and I see our counterparts in the English home movie sector going to dance palongo at the Presidential Villa. Till date, none of them has been able to raise the issue.
But they are happy, claiming they know the president and saying they have gone to premiere their movies. What they don’t know, however, is that they are going to premiere gbese. I am close to one of the state governors, but the governors do not have the power to make this law; it is only the federal government that can do that. The question is: Who are the members of the National Assembly in charge of entertainment? What are they doing there? It is time for us to ask them. If the people in Osun State could say this is who they want, we should also ask these people what they are doing.
But some of your colleagues still go out there to campaign for these people. So, are you saying they are not affected too?
What we are saying is, if you know the people in the National Assembly in charge of entertainment, write their names down, so that when next they want to contest, we will be able to say you have been elected for a position before in a committee and you did not do anything. You find out that we have more than 20 associations in the movie industry. For instance, I am the president of The Golden Movie Association of Nigeria, which is for rebuilding and rebranding. You will see me screaming every day, but you won’t see the other presidents doing the same.
Why have you not been able to curb this menace of piracy, if you have as many as that number of associations? Or is it that piracy thrives because the association is not standing as one body?
How can we? The federal government even gave money to form a MOPICOM. The late Amaka Igwe and the likes of Jide Kosoko made some rules to bring together the associations as one, but they threw everything underneath. The Censors Board et al don’t have enough power because they are just parastatals. After oil, it is entertainment, but you wonder why they made such bodies only as parasatals? What do you want us to do? I’ve been the only one shouting over the piracy thing and I thank God I am still alive. What they do is to go about doing competition.
What will make me not to beg for money when I am sick, as a producer who has done a two-cast movie, an all-Ankara movie and a movie with an all-white cast and only me as the black in it? What else do you what? You are killing the person and it is not encouraging. Everything we say and do is all about the government. Leadership starts from the home. Those who see pirated copies and buy, if we make them our leaders, they will sell us and make us look cheap.
Will I be right to say that people buy these pirated copies because they are cheaper?
Thank you. Let me tell you what is in You or I. I kept the premiere of the movie and put it in the movie. And instead of making it into two parts, it is just in one. Everything is in bulk, including the making of the movie; yet, I sell it for N350. Is that not too cheap? If it was another producer, he would split the movie into two, sell it for N150 each and still sell the premiere for N150. Now, they are saying I am on my own and they expect me to do another movie next time. A lot of producers split movies into two and it is the same masses who forced them to do so. It is now a question of if you cannot beat them, you join them.
But there was a time actors were going about to fight the pirates…
Do you know the worst thing now? If you go to the next street to the Yoruba marketers who have shops in Oshodi, you will see those selling the pirated copies of the same movie released that same day. If care is not taken, the government and the pirates will lead us to committing mutiny. You will see a producer, who has just been released from prison, walk up to a pirate shop to machete the owner and even stay there after committing the act. Maybe when that starts happening, the government will pay a listening ear. Nothing good comes easy. Ebola is here now and everybody is running helter-skelter looking for the solution. It is the same approach we have employed to the Chibok girls issue; nothing was done. That is the kind of country we are in. If they do not see death, they won’t listen – and maybe God will use me as that example because I am looking for ways to pay my debt now. Anybody I catch… maybe when they are sleeping, you wake them up through the death oven!
How do you pay back your debt?
It is like you have a law that says stealing is free. Everyone is tired. You know the pirate land is the Alaba Market; so, you have to search for the mafia. And that is the question I keep asking: Are we in a country where people are allowed to do whatever they want and go scot-free?
But isn’t there anyway you can protect your work from being pirated?
There is no way, except that law is passed. There should be a strict law that says when you are caught with a pirated work, you will pay millions of naira or go to 15 or 20 years imprisonment. It will work, if the law is passed and made to be strong.
Why do you think people don’t kill? They know it is the same thing that will be done to them. They sell illegal things in illegal places. Go to under the bridges, you will see them there; and when you challenge them, they will even beat you, knowing that if they go to the police station and offer the policemen peanuts, they will be released. Yet the same government came out to say it is making money through this sector.
Now, imagine what they will be making if they pass the law. I can’t even believe it that my president does not know that there is no law guarding entertainment. He will welcome all of us, as if we are doing children’s party. It is not as if they don’t know, but they just enjoy us coming and giving us peanuts. When the government declared that it is making money from the sector, is the money from the pirates? Are they the ones behind them? So, possibly, we are telling the thieves to catch the rogues. If not, let them pass the law.
Why haven’t your other colleagues who have access to the presidency made use of the opportunity?
There is no president in Nigeria who has ever received the entertainers the way President Goodluck Jonathan has done. He will say the government has given us lands and you see our people in the newspapers smiling. Now, I am looking for a president that will teach me how to catch fish and not the one who will be giving me fish every time. Me, Saidi Balogun, now that piracy has eaten deep into my works, I am not looking for a president who will be giving me fish anymore.
Every week, you will see us premiering our movies in Aso Rock. When the government gives lands, which money do you want me to use to guard the land? In this same country, somebody will steal billions of naira and join a group the next day; and before you know it, the issue is dead. But I’ve said it that when we start ‘Ebolarising’ the pirates, they will now know there is a law.
Is it right for a producer to hold a private screening in the presidential villa?
Yes, it is done everywhere in the world. Since the movie has been pirated, the only way to pay my debt now is to go and pay Mr. President a visit. Assuming it is the governors who can pass the law, those whom I have campaigned for like Governors Abdulfatah Ahmed of Kwara State and Segun Mimiko of Ondo State will stand up and fight for me. But it is not their right; it is a federal law. Governor Babatunde Fashola has tried in Lagos; we supported him and he supported me in this movie. There was even a time a law was passed in Lagos, where anyone caught was expected to pay N30, 000. But the government later realised that the money was peanut because the people who were caught were in possession of works worth millions of naira. We are the giant of Africa and this has to stop.
Maybe I will run away too. These people are a bunch of history killers, creativity killers, and talent killers. I am not the only talented one, but others who don’t want to run into debts have, therefore, run away. Don’t blame them; no creative producer has been celebrated in this country, except you are a noisemaker.
Why did you use an all-white cast in your new movie?
I wanted to tell the world that we Africans are intelligent. We speak English a lot, but it is not our mother language. A lot of the white cast spoke Yoruba in the movie, telling us the beauty in our language.
How did you get them to speak our local dialect?
It is research; the movie was shot in four countries. I travelled to get people who love my culture, language and dream. So, I fetch them out and the Lord Almighty blew it out. One thing I always tell Father Lord is that, I am not doing a movie for today; rather, I am producing a movie that, if you still slot it in eight years from now, you will still have one thing to learn.
Nothing good comes easy; it takes time and research. You or I is about how you keep your home and the people you move with. Don’t get me wrong; it has nothing to do with me. I’m a prophet by birth due to my profession. I look into people’s future and present and put it into the movie. So, if you watch the movie, and you want to build your home, you will put aside the spirit of jealousy. What is the difference between a white and black girl? If you have never travelled and you have a mind of marrying a white girl, I have to prophesy through my movie that this is who they are. What makes marriage lasts and crashes? This, we have to find out in the movie.
Are you sure it is not all about your own story?
I don’t care what people think after seeing the movie. The point is: do they have one thing to learn from it, after spending their hard-earned money on it? If you say the storyline is mine, bisimillahi. If you go to churches now, you will see people rushing out when they call out for singles and wedding anniversaries. But that you are celebrating your first wedding anniversary does not mean you will last 15 years in the marriage. If they say I am speaking from my point of view, then, I am the best prophet to say it. So, learn from me. And that is why I say I see their today and prophesy into their future.
Now that the original is on the shelves, how is the reception like?
One of the people who bought the pirated copies saw me and said: “Sir, the movie did not end” and I cursed him. Those who have bought the original copy have been calling and blessing me though prayers and money. Somebody called and I came down to meet him in the office on Sunday. He gave me N15, 000 and prayed for me. When I called the line to thank him, he said: “I got the SIM for you; I don’t want you to call me again. But you saved my marriage.” So, it means I have been able to touch lives. I am not talking about any family issues, please. It is a bridge that I have crossed over the past 30 years.
