Breaking all barriers in indigenous movie production

The African movie industry has over the years received world recognition for its growth and development. With its arrays of stars ranging from producers, directors to actors, actress, screen writers and other elements that complete the production process, many people now see prospect in the African movie industry.

Today, African movies now serve as a means of entertainment and relaxation, as it contributes in no small measure to the alleviation of the stress and strain of our everyday life through its comic movies. Apart from entertainment and relaxation, African movies contribute significantly to other areas of human endeavour.

However, it is sad to note that the contribution of African movies to the economic, social and most importantly, national stability in Africa, is unfortunately bedevilled by several challenges. These challenges have hampered the success of the creative ingenuity of the production process, ranging from producers, directors, actors/actresses, script writers and editors, among others.

Piracy has been seen as a major bane facing the industry. Many people through piracy feed on the creative sweat of film makers without having any form of empathy. When a producer/director puts out a self-funded, directing, professional recording and everything needed to get it to the point of release, many people feel no remorse for illegally pirating this creative content. The effort to stop piracy has been a constant battle in this part of the continent. Even though the general public may think of piracy as a victimless crime, this form of copyright infringement damages the creative professional's ability to earn a living from his work and discourage productivity.

South Africa, like other countries in Africa, faces many challenges in the areas of copyright protection and enforcement, especially in combating movie piracy. According to the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA), South Africa fails to reach the mandated levels of copyright protection under the Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) of the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), especially regarding enforcement. Many organisations have tried as much as they can in fighting against piracy, including the Nigerian Copyrights Commission and the Copyright Society of Nigerian (COSON).

In other to fight against piracy and encourage film makers reap the reward for their creative sweat, leading ICT and telecommunications company in Africa, MTN Nigeria, came up with a digital initiative called MTN Afrinolly. The MTN Afrinolly is an online platform where film makers can make available their movies, thrillers and short film and get royalties for their creative sweat. Since its launch, MTN Afrinolly has been able to appreciate African film makers and has constantly given them their royalties, thus, eliminating piracy. http://afrinollyshortfilmcompetition.com/

Interestingly, many film producers and directors are now using this genuine avenue to curb piracy, distribution problems and other related issues, in order get their deserved royalty from their creative sweat. Today, they now rely on MTN Afrinolly as means of avoiding their content being pirated and getting royalty for their creative content. This is because MTN Afrinolly has grown to become one of the safest and largest distribution platforms, for movie content in Africa.

A key strategic focus for MTN is to connect Africans with their passion for movies, and the organisation constantly demonstrates this via innovative marketing initiatives. Of worthy note, is also the fact that MTN is particularly committed to promoting the consumption of African content which is evident in its heavy and frequent Marketing campaigns which is aimed at driving the creativity in the ecosystem, Larry Annetts, chief marketing officer, MTN Nigeria, stated. Apart from encouraging film makers, MTN Nigeria is also using the platform in unearthing budding film makers across the region, coming up with a digital competition tagged: MTN Afrinolly short film competition.

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