A comedian, Bethel Njoku, a.k.a Senator, on Wednesday said Nigerian comedians overseas were plying their trade at discount rates in order to remain relevant to Nigerians in the diaspora.
Njoku said in Lagos that although the comedians were making more money from their performances in Nigeria, they still needed to keep up appearances abroad.
He said that their shows in Nigeria were overpriced, while the entertainment audiences in U.S. and other countries abroad paid much less.
“Our comedians here do that to still be in the eyes of the Nigerians in the Diaspora. So for showbiz, you have to be in their eyes and that is why you see that these our comedians, every year they take these shows to that place to still be in the eyes of Nigerians in the Diaspora. The Nigerian structure in terms of entertainment is not yet solid because over there, there are certain bodies that operate on the contents of entertainment; but, here in Nigeria so many things are uncertain. We pay more for shows here. A VIP here in Nigeria is like N20,000 or N25,000; a VIP in the U.S. is 100 dollars which is like N15,000 to N16,000 approximately. You see the big difference. A table for 10 here or a table for five as the case may be or whatever could be like N1 million here; a table for five or 10 there is like 500 dollars which is not even up to N100,000. So, we pay more in terms of value for show.”