Kunle Afolayan has finally reacted to NOSC’s (Nigerian Official Selection Committee) predominantly nil vote resulting in no Oscars submission for the second year in a row.
The filmmaker, whose latest film Anikulapo emerged one of top contending entries this year, took to his Twitter handle on Monday with his first reaction to the committee’s September verdict.
“I am so pleased and delighted that the whole world have decided to tagged ANIKULAPO film “a masterpiece “ even though the Nigeria Oscar selection committee think it’s not worth submitting for the Oscars Will keep making doing my own thing,” Afolayan wrote.
Last month, NOSC announced that three non-English language emerged tops but all failed to satisfactorily meet the criteria for the Academy’s International Feature Film category. The 15-member committee reached 8-5-1-1 votes with the majority voting for no film.
Since the announcement, at least two members of the committee have announced their resignation. Revered film director Mildred Okwo first took to her social handles last Thursday confirming her resignation while sharing that she hoped to serve the industry in other ways.
“This is my last year working on the @officialnosc Committee. I am proud of those in the Nigerian film space working hard to make films good enough to travel the world & to make it to the @TheAcademy foreign language category competition. We will win this award some day soon,” Okwo tweeted.
Veteran journalist and film critic Shaibu Husseini followed closely with a tweet.
“I have formally notified the Chairperson of the @officialnosc of my resignation as a member of the Nigerian Official Selection Committee For the @TheAcademy awards IFF submission. I wish the other members of the committee well in their quest to serve the film industry well.”
Meanwhile, Afolayan’s epic launched to rave reviews on Netflix on October 1. The Kunle Remi led film is the third Netflix and KAP studios collaboration following Swallow and A Naija Christmas. movies
