How the CEC is redefining entertainment in Nigeria’s tourism capital

Three kilometres away from where the sculpture of the Scottish missionary Mary Slessor was erected, hundreds of young men and women in baggy jeans and skintight dresses gathered under the bright glow of stage wash lights at the main auditorium of the Cultural Centre Complex in Calabar. Across the grassy field outside, dozens more danced to groovy Afrobeats, posed for photographs on the red carpet and played table tennis. The vibrant scene of funky fashion and loud music resembled an elaborate outdoor party—only that it was more. 

Since 2017, the Calabar Entertainment Conference (CEC) has continued to celebrate creativity and innovation in the city of Calabar, an ancient harbour city in southern Nigeria. With an ambient climate and rich cultural history, Calabar is recognised as Nigeria’s tourism capital. Its annual week-long carnival hosted in December is billed as the largest street party in Africa. Yet for all its tourist attractions, Calabar is often seen as lagging behind cities like Lagos and Port Harcourt in terms of commerce and lifestyle.

Hit FM, Calabar’s first independent radio station, launched in 2016 with an aim to provide more than just audio entertainment to its listeners—a deeper sense of entertainment. One such way to bring about this visceral feeling was an event that would rejig the city’s sense of entertainment and drive widespread attention to local talents. “We started the Calabar Entertainment Conference basically as a roundtable conversation around entertainment,” said Duke Emmanuel, the Head of Programmes and Operations at Hit FM. “One thing that we suffer in Nigeria is that the commercial space is very thin. Everything just happens in one state.”

Although exact figures are not known, tons of ambitious young Nigerians flock to Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial hub, year after year with dreams of landing a lucrative gig or winning the good graces of industry promoters. Only a lucky few ultimately break into the fast-growing entertainment  industry, which is projected to generate around $14 billion in revenue by 2025. In 2017, Hit FM introduced the Calabar Entertainment Conference (CEC) to reverse this trend by creating opportunities for local crafts. “We’d bring people from Lagos and Port Harcourt at the time to tell us how they grew the entertainment sector in those places,” Duke explained.

Now in its eighth edition, the CEC has drawn an eclectic array of entertainers from across the world, including Botswana’s Lorraine Lionheart, foremost Afrobeats DJ Jimmy Jatts and media personality Denrele Edun. 

The conference’s high-profile guest list is a clever strategy to spotlight Calabar’s untapped creative potential. “We’re intentional about the guests that we bring in,” Duke explained. “We want them to know that there’s an industry brewing in Calabar.”

But the CEC is not purely glitz and glamour. Alongside the celebrity appearances, the conference features executives from entertainment titans like Multichoice and Boomplay, who engage in panel discussions on topics such as developing a career in content creation and navigating music contracts. Occasionally the star celebrities draw on personal experiences that resonate deeply with the audience.

For its typically young audience, the CEC can be a place to forge high-level professional connections that could foster career opportunities. Fortune, who had considered returning to Lagos for better prospects, attended his first CEC in 2021. “I came really early and sat in the front row,” he recalled. “I watched and really took in all of the nuggets that the panelists dropped.” Although Fortune hadn’t really considered a career in radio, the stimulating conversations on stage that day sparked an urge in him to try out radio. “I felt like now was the right time to take that dive and damn the consequences,” he said.

Days later, he applied for an internship at the radio station. Fortune’s quick foray has since blossomed into a flourishing career in radio, resulting in his role as a moderator on the CEC stage two years later. “I’d say it’s like someone who is in the audience looking at an artist that they revere to being the person on the stage,” he said of the feeling. “It was pretty much like that.”

Where the CEC has recreated Calabar’s creative landscape, it has also grappled with logistical issues such as flight cancellations. “Flight tickets take a chunk of the production costs,” Duke noted, explaining that arranging flights and visas for international speakers is often costly and frustrating. 

“Most times the flights are either cancelled or rescheduled,” he added. Such disruptions can scramble the schedule of events, leaving the audience dismayed in the case of a popular guest.  One veteran Nigerian comedian missed his speaking engagement at the CEC following multiple flight cancellations. “First one got cancelled. We booked another flight, and it got cancelled,” Duke lamented.  

These challenges have not dented Hit FM’s commitment to recreate Calabar’s entertainment landscape, however. This year, the event expanded into the Calabar Entertainment Conference and Festival, a three-day celebration that featured food stalls and game hubs. According to Duke, this is part of a broader vision to redefine entertainment across the Niger Delta and beyond. “We want to spread the message around that quality is quality everywhere,” he said. 

The CEC has earned an ardent following from most of Calabar’s youth. Since 2019, Eucharia Joseph, 25, has attended the conference without fail. “It’s something I look forward to every year,” she said.

As Eucharia strutted along the red carpet at the festival where the Nigerian rapper Magnito was set to perform in a few hours, she stopped at a large whiteboard covered with untidy writing CEC attendees. At the top of the board was an inscription that read: “Today I am Grateful For.” Picking up a marker, she added her contribution:  “Life and entertainment.”