Veteran Nollywood director, Tunde Kelani, has divulged that the rate of piracy in the country has grown to an extent that it is now affecting the industry in a negative way.

Recalling the state of the industry way back when his movies like ‘Saworide,’ ‘Agogo Ewo’ and others were released, the director explained that there was no depressed infrastructural setup at that time.

“Of course, previously when we made Saworide, Agogo Ewo and the earlier movies, we didn’t have a depressed infrastructural setup at that time and we didn’t have the menace of piracy, which gave us a false sense of security. But today, piracy has impacted negatively on the industry and it’s destroying lives and businesses. We just manage to stay afloat ourselves, as we’ve lost our investment base. The attack of piracy is getting worse, the attack on Arugba was worse than the attack on Maami and all the other movies that we have produced,” he said.

He further stated that the industry cannot yield profit if the menace of piracy is not flushed out. Adding that this has made funding in the industry a bit slow.

According to him, “The challenge is to recoup the original investment, we can’t even begin to talk of profit, and it’s made us more careful. Unfortunately, it has slowed us down. It’s getting more difficult to get funding to go on, and unless we find solutions, Nollywood will perhaps not get to the peak. There’s still a long way to go and there’s hope for improvement.”