By Hassan Sanusi
Veteran actor, Lari Williams, has expressed his sadness at what has become his lot, lamenting the lack of help from any quarter for Nigeria’s aged creative minds. The actor, who is reportedly displaced, also denied rumours that the Federal Government has offered him any type of accommodation.
He said: ‘I have heard people say that the Lagos State or the Federal Government had given me a two-bedroom flat somewhere, it is all lies.’
In a chat with Punch, he added: ‘We served this country and helped to build the entertainment sector that a lot of people are benefiting from today, but there is nothing for people like me to show for it. Most of us are left unsung because of the kind of structure that is being run; we should be having benefits like the civil servants.
‘In other climes, artists live on government subventions and are structured in such a way that they earn from their creative works,’
Lari also said arts has been ‘the unfortunate ministry’ while urging the new government to structure it so as to stop the trend of actors dying poor and wretched.
‘Government needs to have time for the creative sector so that it can have a voice, arts has been the unfortunate ministry. If it is well structured, then we can stop dying poor.
‘Look at Femi Robinson who played the second headmaster-character in the Village Headmaster: a Nigerian television drama, Dan Maraya Jos and others, they all died with nothing.’
