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Veteran Nollywood actor Nkem Owoh, popularly referred to as Osuofia, has clarified that Yoruba filmmakers pioneered Nigeria’s home-video trade however didn’t begin Nollywood.
Owoh made the clarification throughout an look on Curiosity Made Me Ask, a present hosted by comic and content material creator Adebayo Abidemi, popularly referred to as Bae U.
The actor was responding to questions on his earlier feedback on the contributions of Yoruba and Igbo filmmakers to the event of Nollywood.
He dismissed claims that he had stated Yoruba folks based Nollywood, explaining that the title didn’t exist when he and different filmmakers started producing films.
He stated the title Nollywood was adopted later after trade stakeholders met to debate concepts on methods to develop and model the Nigerian movie trade.
“First of all, you have given me this wrong accusation that I said, Yoruba started Nollywood. No. When we started the thing, there was no Nollywood as a name,” he stated.
However, Owoh credited Yoruba filmmakers, significantly veteran filmmaker Hubert Ogunde and Adebayo Salami, popularly referred to as Oga Bello, for pioneering and popularising home-video productions in Nigeria.
He maintained that Yoruba filmmakers performed a big role in the early improvement of home-video leisure.
“The Yoruba did not start Nollywood. They started home video,” he added.
His clarification comes amid renewed debate over the contributions of Yoruba and Igbo filmmakers to the Nigerian movie trade.
In August 2026, late Nollywood actor Francis Duru had argued that Igbo entrepreneurs performed a serious role in constructing trendy Nollywood by way of the home-video increase of the Nineties and early 2000s.
The 1992 movie Living in Bondage, produced by Kenneth Nnebue, is broadly credited with serving to popularise the industrial home-video market that turned the inspiration of trendy Nollywood.
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