By Luminous Jannamike, Abuja

In a bid to address the issue of youth participation in governance and development, film-making company, Raw Impact Africa, has announced the 6th edition of the ‘Unleash Ur Creativity’ reality TV show that would also build a bridge between job seekers and potential employers in the movie industry.

The show, which was developed with millions of unemployed Nigerian youths in mind, will create a platform for youths to gain insights as well as meaningful career jobs on movie making, television production and broadcasting.

The Project Director of the show, Eyaba Emmanuel, stated that the show would benefit skilled and talented people who may not know how to put together a perfect story for the screen that could have societal impact and help them build legendary careers in the movie world.

He said, “Unleash your creativity also called UUC is fashioned to capture, nurture, equip and empower industrious and creative African youths with the sole objective of cutting down drastically the rising unemployment rate in Nigeria and Africa at large.

“The show uniquely incorporates, youth empowerment, tourism development and cultural orientation through filmmaking.

“The Program has contributed immensely to the national economic development, job creation and youth empowerment of our country as most of our youths who took part in the program today are all doing well in their different skill sets script to screen.

“Most of them came into the program without really understanding what to do but today what they garnered at the program has catapulted them into choosing a career path that will help enhance their creative abilities.”

According to him, the theme for this year’s edition of the reality TV show is ‘Youth Participation in Governance and Development’ because of its relevance to the forthcoming 2023 general elections.

Also speaking, the Country Director, African Union Economic, Social and Cultural Council (AU-ECOSOCC), Mr John Oba, commended the film company’s effort to reduce unemployment to the barest minimum.

“We have a mandate to promote Nigerian culture and values that is why we are partnering with relevant stakeholders to ensure that tourism in the country is promoted and use it as a means of youth empowerment, employment and income generation,” he explained.

On her part, the Cuban Ambassador to Nigeria, Clara Pullido Escandell, said the Caribbean country was supporting the reality TV show based on its potentials to deepen the its cultural interaction with Nigeria while building the capacity of the youths to address societal challenges through film and tourism.

She said, “The Cuban culture has an important root in Nigeria, and it is one of the reasons we are supporting the project.

“There’s no way you can write the history of Cuba without the tremendous impact of African culture, particularly that of Nigeria.

“We believe in education and training in the area of culture and skills development.”

For 14 days, starting from 1st of December, young Filmmakers with varied interest in film making will be camped and trained, mentored, challenged with activities and film making related tasks with special sessions and mentorship from the Nigeria film industry heavy-weights of the directors and actors guild extractions of Nollywood.

The participating filmmakers will be grouped into three, with each team having the challenge of making a film project around balloted themes fashioned around pressing social development change and communication.

This year’s edition of the reality TV show will be hosted by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism Cross Rivers State as part of activities for the Calabar Carnival 2022.
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Participation is through online registration at www.rawimpactafricatv.com. There will be online auditions and selected participants will be contacted for the grand finale holding in the ancient city of Calabar from the 1st to the 14th of December, 2022.

The grand finale will be at the main bowl of the cultural centre in Calabar.