Actors Guild tackles sexual harassment of members

The  Actors Guild of Nigeria (AGN) says that it is poised to eradicating all forms of alleged sexual harassment of its members by some alleged producers under the pretext of allocating juicy roles to them in their films.

The newly elected National President of AGN, Emeka Ejezie, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos that it was part of his leadership’s efforts at sanitizing the industry.

Ejezie was recently elected the president of AGN during the just concluded Peace and Reconciliatory Committee’s conference held in Enugu in August.

He said that sexual harassment of ladies in a common phenomenon.

“And such allegations against film producers by actresses may either be true or false, but we are going to raise eyebrows to ensure it does not exist.

“We will restore sanity into the industry by campaigning against sexual harassment of our members and ensure it begins to occupy its pride of place,’’ he said.

He said that the guild would also develop a database that would checkmate the activities of those who come into the guild with other motives rather than acting.

“We are going to expose the bad eggs in the industry if at all they exist by creating a database of actors; this will afford us the opportunity to know the real actors and fish out imposters,’’ he said.

The president also said that the new executive would try to identify producers who were alleged to be extorting monies from young actors with a promise to allocate good roles to them in their films.

“Most times, these amateur artistes may end up not getting such juicy roles often promised after they must have sold their bodies to such dubious producers,” he said.

Ezeji also reacted to the public perception that most styles of story lines were portraying fetish or traditional norms.

He said that it was the business of script writers and producers but not the actors.

“Actors and actresses are like messengers; we follow the directives of film producers who give us scripts, it is what the script says that we act,” he said.

He, however, said that the guild would create an affiliation with the bodies in charge of scripts and producers to fine tune the quality of Nigerian films.

Ezeji said that the guild would also encourage scriptwriters and producers to venture into writing scripts on issues such as Agriculture, Engineering and Information Technology that could enhance national development.

He said that the new executive would ensure that there is cordial relationship between young actors and the veterans for the growth of the industry.

“We shall not disappoint the Peace and Reconciliatory Committee, headed by Chief Remi Ohajianya, that saddled our executive with the task of uniting the various factions into one entity,” he said.

NAN reports that the Peace and Reconciliatory Committee’s conference that led to the election of the new executive ended years of leadership crisis that had rocked the guild.