He is called the Shiekh of the Nigerian movie industry known as Nollywood. He’s the brain behind the longest running soap opera in Nigeria “Ripples” which lasted for 5 years uninterrupted.
Most of the brightest stars the sector can boast of today were discovered by him, Just as he produced most of the films that raised the industry to international recognition.
His name is Zeb Ejiro and his contributions to the movie industry stand him out as a grand master of the make-believe industry.
Over the years, this Mass Communications graduate of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, has held enviable positions, including being president of the Association of Movie Producers (AMP). He is presently the Vice Chairman, Board of Trustees, AMP, Trustee, Directors Guild of Nigeria and a member of a few other organisations.
The road to the movie world started for him after writing a script for NTA titled “But My Ring on My Grave”.He was among the 27 people chosen by NTA out of the about 5,000 people who applied, and was later trained by NTA and BBC in 1985 in script writing, directing / producing.
Though he stayed with NTA for a while, when he left he still wrote scripts for NTA on village Headmaster, Second chance and other programmes. He later created his first soap Opera Ripples .
Later he moved on to Fortunes then changed the name to Mega Fortunes. His quest for more launched him into the movie industry. The first movie he shot as a director was Nneka the Pretty Serpent. Then, Fatal Desire where Hilda Dokubo debuted, Ikoko 2 followed and then Mortal Inheritance among many others.
On why he had lied low in the past few years he says: it gets to a point in one’s life when one gets bored about doing one thing again and again, and you just need something more challenging. I think I have gotten to a stage whereby I need to start impacting knowledge to people because God has blessed me so much. That is why I have been spending my time building a film school in Delta State. It is called Film and Broadcast Academy. We intend to teach script writing, production management, directing and anything that has to do with film making and television broadcasting. This is where I have been channeling my energy.
On how the industry has fared he says “The industry has done well, yes. But, atimes, tears run down my cheeks because this is not the industry we built. It is presently in total comatose. It is down and if care is not taken it will be out. Training is lacking in the industry. People are not trained. Most of the people you see in the industry today came in through apprenticeship. Apprenticeship is good, but it is better to go and get formal training, because you’ll raise your standard.
Also, there is the distribution network problem. I think at this point in time, my take is that there should be a shift. There should be a change of guard. We have a new Minister of Information and I think she should inject new blood into the Censors board and the NFC.
He futher describes the African Movis Award (AMAA) as d only credible award presently in Nigeria and Africa, as it has given movie makers something to look forward to every year.
Zeb Ejiro sees himself as one of the richest and happiest producers/directors in the country today, in the sense that many of the big stars in Nollywood debuted in his movies. In his words he says “Many of them are about the biggest today and they have been working so hard making names for themselves. All of them too accord me that respect from time to time. I got Omotola Jolade-Ekeinde a Hollywood movie with Genevieve Nnaji and we all travelled. She shed tears and told me that I have been instrumental to her success. She said she was going to show her appreciation someday and that what she was going to do, I’ll be surprised. I cried when she said that. Genevieve said the same thing too, because I gave her major break-through. Regina Askia, Liz Benson, RMD, Ngozi Ezeonu, Jennifer Okere, Alex Osifo-Omiagbo, etc.
After an award ceremony one day, Chief Raymond Dokpesi called me and said that more than 80 per cent of people who received awards that day dedicated it to me, meaning I must have done a lot in their lives. I think it is based on this that the federal government commended my contribution by giving me the honour of Officer of the Order of the Niger (OON)”.
On low sales of movies he attributes it to this “I think it’s because Nigerians are tired of what we produce. Storylines are shallow and lack depth. Plots are nothing to write home about. When there is nothing to keep you glued to your set, you switch it off. To change this, we need a change at the top. We need people who can handle the mantle of leadership. We need people who have vision. Training schools should be empowered to train us. We want a governing body.. We need to raise standards, so that we can do more professional jobs so that we will be able to compete internationally.
Presently Zeb says he has a movie he has finished shooting but he won’t release it until there’s a change in the movie distribution network.
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