Nigeria’s creative economy cannot reach its full potential on talent alone and urgently needs stronger institutional structures, access to finance, skills development and robust intellectual property protection, stakeholders declared at the second QEDNG Creative Powerhouse Summit held in Lagos.
Convened by Mighty Media Plus Network Limited, publishers of QEDNG, the summit took place on Tuesday at the Radisson Blu Hotel, Ikeja GRA, under the theme “Creativity, Culture and Nigeria’s Next Chapter.” It drew filmmakers, music executives, content creators, journalists, business leaders and government officials to interrogate the frameworks required to build a globally competitive creative sector.
‘Talent Without Structure Is Just A Hustle’
Delivering his welcome address, QEDNG publisher and summit convener Olumide Iyanda said the institutional gaps confronting Nigerian creatives remained the sector’s biggest drag.
“This conversation is actually very personal for me. I have been around this industry long enough to see talent sprout. I’ve also regrettably seen some of them wither before they could bloom — not because they didn’t want to fly, but because the institutional and structural backbone they need is just not there,” Iyanda said. “For every Burna Boy, every Kiekie, every Chimamanda, every Kunle Afolayan, there are thousands who wish they could be like them.”
He called for stronger Nigerian-owned platforms capable of distributing local creative works and ensuring the stories Nigeria tells about itself shape the wider national conversation.
Representing summit chairman Demola Aladekomo, SmartCity Plc managing director Gabriel Ukachukwu argued that Nigeria must build a full ecosystem around the creative economy rather than depend on individual brilliance.
“A creative economy requires infrastructure. It requires capital. It requires intellectual protection. It requires skills. It requires distribution. It requires technology. It requires serious business models,” he said, citing United Nations Trade and Investment estimates that global exports of creative services reached $1.7 trillion in 2024.
Ukachukwu framed the sector’s future around three questions: how to move talent into enterprise, how to finance creativity, and how to protect and monetise intellectual property. “Talent without structure is just a hustle,” he said.
Storytelling As Strategic Asset
In the keynote, Ife Adebayo, national coordinator of the Investment in Digital and Creative Enterprises (iDICE) programme, said Nigeria’s creative wealth remained under-monetised because the country had not built the systems to convert cultural influence into economic value.
Adebayo pointed to the 1986 film Top Gun, which he said triggered a reported surge in United States Navy applications, as evidence of storytelling’s strategic power.
“The most powerful military on earth, with the largest budget in human history, confessed that its most effective recruiter was not a weapon, was not a general, was not a budget line. It was a story. It was culture,” he said.
He lamented that important Nigerian stories remained untold, recalling the death of a military officer he described as a godfather, S.K. Umaru, killed by an improvised explosive device while fighting insurgents in 2014. “What stays with me most is that this story has never been told. And he is one of thousands of men and women who have fought and who are fighting for this country.”
Adebayo said Nigeria’s creative economy currently contributes about 1.2 per cent of GDP, compared with roughly 3 per cent in South Africa, adding that Seoul’s deliberate cultural export strategy had similarly transformed Korean music, film and television into a global force.
“The difference is that they count it, they structure it, they finance it. We have the louder voice; they build the microphone.”
Financing The Next Chapter
Adebayo identified skills gaps in cinematography, product management and animation, as well as the high cost of professional equipment, as chronic constraints. “A great script in this country does not die because it is bad; it dies because it is broke,” he said.
He disclosed that iDICE had set up a $45 million debt fund and a $65 million Islamic finance facility, alongside equity instruments designed to attract private and international capital into the technology and creative sectors.
He urged banks and investors to treat creative businesses as an asset class: “We should stop treating film like a personal loan and start treating it like the asset class that it has become everywhere else on earth.” Corporate Nigeria, he said, must also move beyond one-off sponsorships. “Do not just sponsor the summit; fund the sector.”
Adebayo added that government had a duty to strengthen intellectual property protection and design policies that respond swiftly to the sector’s realities. “The next chapter of Nigeria will not be written by the government alone, nor will it be written by the private sector alone. It will be co-written by the creator, the financier, the policymaker, the entrepreneur.”
Panels And Voices
The summit featured two panel discussions.
The first, “Building Tomorrow’s Creative Economy Today,” brought together Steve Babaeko, chief executive officer of X3M Ideas; Dr Olamide Okulaja, technical adviser at the Lagos State Ministry of Commerce, Cooperatives, Trade and Investment; Anwuli Ojogwu, co-founder and chief executive officer of Narrative Landscape Press; and Yibo Koko, director general of the Rivers State Tourism Development Agency. It was moderated by former Lagos State commissioner for tourism, arts and culture Steve Ayorinde.
The second panel, “What Creatives Need for Nigeria,” featured veteran actress Joke Silva, president of Women in Film and TV Nigeria; Efe Omorogbe, founder of Buckwyld Media Network; Oluwabukunmi Adeaga-Ilori (Kiekie); and technology and finance content creator Fisayo Fosudo. It was moderated by Funke Treasure.
The event was hosted by comedian Gbenga Adeyinka, with a musical performance by saxophonist Temilayo Abodunrin. Plaques were presented to resource persons.
The summit was supported by FirstBank, NLNG, Zenith Bank, Fidelity Bank, The Africa Soft Power Group, Lagos State Internal Revenue Service and Polaris Bank.
The inaugural QEDNG Creative Powerhouse Summit was held on August 12, 2025, with the theme “Financing as Catalyst for a Thriving Creative Economy.”
