Cigarette companies lobby filmmakers to include smoking in movies —NFVCB boss, Thomas

The National Film and Video Censors Board has commenced engagement with practitioners and stakeholders in the movie and entertainment industry to enforce the law banning smoking in movies, the News Agency of Nigeria reports.

The Executive Director of the board, Adedayo Thomas, stated this on Saturday (December 11, 2021) while presenting a communique at the end of an entertainment industry stakeholders’ roundtable in Lagos.

The roundtable focused on the National Tobacco Control Act 2015 and the National Tobacco Control Regulations 2019 in Lagos, as they relate to the entertainment industry generally.

Thomas said the engagement was geared towards ensuring that practitioners in the movie industry adhered to no-smoking laws and other relevant laws of the country in Nigerian movies, among.

The NFVCB boss noted that the board and the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture were worried about the growing evidence linking the entertainment industry with increasing tobacco use and its impact on public health.

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He added that NFVCB prioritised classification of movies with smoking scenes and tobacco depiction, and would ensure they were fully enforced.

He also advised the National Assembly, Ministry of Health and other relevant authorities to involve movie industry players in their engagement, so as to be on the same page on the implementation of the legislation.

He said, “Stakeholders observed that smoking in movies and the entertainment sector is a pathway to young people embracing smoking.

“The tobacco industry uses sophisticated marketing mix to promote smoking on set and in the entertainment sector.

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“Entertainment stakeholders are deliberately targeted by the tobacco industry either through financial inducement, misinformation and other subtle approaches to further the glamorisation of smoking in the movies and entertainment sector.

“Awareness on the dangers of smoking in movies and the entertainment sector in the digital media space is still low.”

Punch