Governor Amaechi Didn’t Insult Nollywood Stars In Port Harcourt – BON 2014 Awards Organizers

Oct 17, 2014 – Governor Amaechi Didn’t Insult Nollywood Stars In Port Harcourt – BON 2014 Awards Organizers

Best of Nollywood Award held last night in Port Harcourt, the capital city of Rivers State with several movie stars in attendance.

Few hours after the event, a report went viral that the host governor, Rotimi Amaechi allegedly insulted Nollywood stars and called them  ‘products of circumstances because they had failed in other fields.’

The organizers of the event who witnessed everything that happened last night said they were shocked to hear that the governor who was very friendly and down to earth yesterday said such thing, they have since released a PR to debunk the report.

Below is an official report from Best Of Nollywood award organizers:

“At no point did Governor Amaechi insult Nollywood practitioners. Instead, he commended them for growing the industry into a multi billion naira industry without any form of institutional or government support.

Nollywood, he says, now employs hundreds of thousands of Nigerian youths who, despite their qualifications, may have remained jobless because of the unemployment challenge in Nigeria which has led to a situation whereby graduates of medicine, law and other such disciplines end up in Nollywood.

At that point, popular entertainer, Okey Bakassi, interrupted the governor, saying he is an agricultural engineering graduate of the Rivers State University of Science and Technology, which threw the whole hall into laughter.

The Governor then recalled that at the 40th birthday party of Kate Henshaw a while back, Basorge Tariah Jnr reminded her how they used to slap the streets in search of jobs and that it was Nollywood that rescued them.

Governor Amaechi also cited the example of the banking industry which has become a dumping ground of sort for graduates of different disciplines that are not even remotely related to the banking profession.

More so, at no point did the Governor say he gives Kate Henshaw money. He did, however, say that the state has contracted Mrs Joke Jacobs to turn Chinua Achebe’s political satire, A Man of the People, into a movie because of its inherent, timeless social message.

We therefore want discerning Nigerians to discountenance this ill-intentioned report as it is not only the product of warped reasoning and deliberate misinterpretation, it is most uncharitable to Governor Amaechi and demeaning to the Nollywood stars and stakeholders that were at the event.”

Will bring you more photos and full list of winners from the event shortly.