Nigerian filmmaker Kunle Afolayan has revealed that he invested more than N8 billion of his personal funds in his film village. He also appealed to the federal government for support.

The award-winning director spoke during an interview with former finance minister Kemi Adeosun on the Nidacity podcast. The episode aired on Tuesday.

Afolayan laments lack of electricity

Afolayan said the KAP Film Village and Resort in Oyo State has had no electricity since it began operations.

As a result, the resort relies on diesel generators to run its operations. He said the rising cost of diesel has made the situation difficult.

“I believe so much in this country. We haven’t had electricity in KAP Village since the beginning. So we’ve been running on diesel,” he said.

The filmmaker said the high cost of diesel once made him consider shutting down the resort.

“I did a post a few months ago that I cannot be like, we can’t sustain this diesel thing. We’re going to close the resort, but then there is another friend who said I will sell diesel to you on credit and I’m like, it’s still not sustainable.”

N200m invested in green energy

Afolayan said he is now looking at other energy sources to reduce the resort’s reliance on diesel.

He disclosed that about N200 million had already been spent on green energy. However, he said the investment cannot yet power the entire resort.

“So right now we’re talking to a lot of people to try and see how to do green energy. We did one last year, which cost about N200 million, but it’s not enough to power the entire resort,” he said.

The filmmaker also questioned why his project had not received government support despite the scale of his investment.

“And if we’ve managed to do that, I think there should be some sort of support, like from government agencies,” he said.

“I know people are not even doing one quarter of what we’re doing, and they get a lot of grants from government.”

In March, Afolayan revealed that the resort spends about N11 million on diesel every four to five weeks. He said this was despite having some solar power installed.

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