Joke Silva dares Sanusi

Joke Silva’s commitment to the growth of
Nollywood is well known. On the day
Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN),
Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi ,sneaked into
town to unwind, the versatile actress
deemed it fit to confront the embattled CBN
boss in respect of the indiscrminate lending
rates offered to her Nollywood counterparts
by the various commercial banks in the
country.
The event was the World premiere of Chinasa
Onyechere ’s flick, “Dry Waters”, held at the
National Arts Theatre, Iganmu, last Sunday.
Joke Silva
The CBN boss had just finished making his
speech, tasking Nollywood producers to
learn to use their films to portray the good
image of the country, when Joke Silva
suddenly mounted the podium to give her
own remark.
Joke, furious with the way and manner the
banking operators inflate their lending rates
indiscriminately, especially to movie
producers in quest of loans to finance their
productions, dared the apex bank governor
by asking him to implore the banks in the
country to reduce their lending rates to zero
level.
“The lending rates are very high, and as a
growing industry, Nollywood practitioners
cannot continue to afford to borrow loans
from these banks at a very high interest rate.
The interest rate at the moment is between
20 and 25 per cent.
We are appealing to you, sir, to come to our
rescue by formulating a policy that will
implore these banks to reduce their lending
rates, ” the screen goddess muted.
She believed that Nollywood desired to enjoy
the same zero interest rates as Education and
Agriculture, adding that, “Nollywood has
contributed immensely to the nation’s
economic growth.”
Fortunately, Joke’s momentous appeal to the
CBN governor was not in vain, as there were
many bank executives that graced the
gathering, including the Executive Director of
the First Bank Plc, Mr Alex Otim and many
others, who, many believed, would surely
pass the message to