Come October 1, 2022, Nigerians and lovers of the country across the world will be witnessing LIFE, one of the best curated Independence Day anniversary shows since the celebration started on October 1, 1960. Ezekiel Adamu, CEO, of Balmoral Group, and a co-founder of the LIFE project, a full package entertainment festival, speaks to Obinna Emelike in this interview on the essence of the festival, offerings, partnership, and need for celebration, among others other related issues.
What is LIFE all about?
First, I am Ezekiel Adamu and I am the CEO of The Balmoral Group and a co-founder of the LIFE project.
LIFE, which means Lagos Independence Festival of Excellence, came about when Ogidi Studio just opened and I went to visit the studio, on getting there I discovered that it is one of the best studios in West Africa and should be churning out a lot of talents. We considered how to get the talents to know about the studio apart from marketing and I feel like the best kind of marketing is experiential marketing because people need to come and experience what you have and see what they can do. As an event company, we own the largest network of venues in Lagos and if not in Nigeria and with that strength I started thinking that we can come together and pull up an event where we can be churning out talents from this studio because we have the venues, with which we can do live events, while Ogidi Studio will nurture the talents afterwards.
So, we got talking with Idris, who is the CEO of Temple Company, and we asked how come we don’t have heritage events anymore because before now we used to have Lagos carnival, which was a very heritage event, we used to have Eyo festival, which was also a heritage festival. Nowadays, when people want to do shows, it is mainly comedy and music shows and in another two months after the show, you will forget everything about it because it was not impactful.
Based on the fact that we do a lot of events, we realized that people like South African do the Nickelodeon festival and the kids come out, Sadly, we don’t have family entertainment shows here again, people only go to shows in the evening and that is all.
So, we came together and said Independence Day nothing happens apart from the speech by 7am and after that everybody looks for what to do unlike July 4th in America, which is being celebrated all over the world.
So how come in Nigeria we do not have that and a thought came to me, let us make October 1st memorable again because we do not have any major event marking that day, and where else to do it but in Lagos, the centre of excellence.
So, we started toying on the ideas and we brushed it down and that was when the idea of LIFE was conceived and we thought that for us to do something of this magnitude and with the excellence that Lagos is known for, we needed like a year to organise and plan it, so we started by holding a media parley last year October 1, to start planning for this October. So, it has been in the works for a year now.
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What is LIFE?
It means Lagos Independence Festival of Excellence. We came about different names but LIFE is catchy, enjoy life, explore life, and so on. The acronym made sense and it is a Lagos thing, to show the excellence of Lagos, which is obvious when compared with other states.
LIFE is beyond an event, it is a festival and we intend the festival to outlive us the founders because we want to put the event on the map and on the calendar of events across the world.
It is also going to be a hybrid event so that people all over the world can participate virtually to catch the excitement.
As the years go by, we intend to move it around the world, starting with New York. But for now and for the maiden edition, we are starting with Lagos because it is the city we know.
The event covers all genres and ages; from the children, teenagers, young adults, adults and the old. Everyone is covered and it is a full family entertainment.
For us, this is Lagos excellence, but the story is African and we are celebrating the excellence of Lagos.
It is an entertainment event and we are not just looking at only Lagosian coming to enjoy the event, but many Nigerians from across the country will come and that makes it both an entertainment and tourism event.
Also, that is why we chose Federal Palace Hotel Lagos as the venue; the hotel is historic with our independence, it is a strategic location for us and also central.
As a hotel it means that you and your family can come from Port Harcourt and lodge.
We have daytime and nighttime entertainment during the event. There will be music, comedy and different talents will be discovered because one of our core objectives of the event is to raise talents.
When we discover some talents at LIFE show, we will nurture them for a whole year and by the time it is next year, we will bring these talents and say, do you remember this person, he is now a star.
So, this is a platform that we want to use in our own way to give back to society.
We are working to grow the event to a level that people looking for talents will always look forward to every October 1st to discover talents at the LIFE show.
Many are more mindful of security now than before, so how are you handling it?
For security, a beach would have offered a bigger space but we chose Federal Palace for many reasons including top security. We have put together a lot of facilities in place, even when children come, there is a code given to them, there will be no child missing case. Even in the evenings, there are maids and nannies that the parents can engage for their children, while they enjoy events curated for them. Security has been well-thought of.
Nobody walks in and out of the hotel without going through the security and the hotel has only one way in and out. We are also going to invite other security agencies, it is not a Balmoral and Temple Company event, it is a Lagos, Nigeria and everyone’s event.
What are the details and offerings at the festival?
The events will run for three days and you can decide what time to come for your event. There will be a calendar to show specific events and time, and everybody gets a pie at the event and at their convenient time.
In the evening we have the likes of Tales By Moonlight where the kids can come together, there will be nannies there, while the parents will be having their own entertainment, we have artistes that resonate with children who will come and perform for children during day time and there will be no vulgar language, in the evening we have quality entertainment and for our parents as well. We will bring people like King Sunny Ade. Everybody will have their own area and something to enjoy.
It is a festival with different stages, sports entertainment events amid swimming, artistes performing there, food area, exhibitions, among others.
Why the one year planning?
It is not just an event. If I am planning a musical concert for say Davido, it may take a year. But LIFE is more than a concert, it is a festival, there is food festival, made-in-Nigeria festival, educational events, children’s side of it and more. So, we felt like a year minimum is required for the planning so that we can break the event down into pieces and rebuild it into what it should be.
As well, why are you partnering with Temple Company?
I have known Idris Olorunnimbe, the CEO of Temple Company, for a while now and he is someone I share the same values with and we have been friends since we have been growing up. He is someone that I know that if we are to meet here by 10 am, he will be here by 9:50 or thereabout. He is disciplined and we share those values together. Apart from that he owns one of the biggest studios in West Africa, which is Ogidi Studios. Also Ogidi Studio will be nurturing the talents we will churn out at the festival.
Even if I did not know Temple before now, I will still partner with it because the studio is what we are trying to push. It is too big and equipped to be ignored. Our artistes cannot go global by producing music in ‘boys quarters’, they need world class studios like Ogidi, which has the topnotch facilities and management team to produce for global audiences.
Why celebrate Independence Day when many do not see reasons to do so?
We know that people have complaints here and there, but there is nowhere in the world that does not have issues, though Nigeria’s case is peculiar anyway. If you meet an 18-year-old American for example and he is walking on the road and he meets a Nigerian billionaire on the road and when they get into an argument, he will say listen I am an American and that’s all that matters, all your money means nothing to me. It does not mean that America does not have problems. We need to start changing our narratives and it starts with the media. I am a very spiritual person and I feel like negativity on top of negativity will never produce anything positive. We need to change, there is a lot to celebrate, there is a lot being celebrated and little things can become something major if all of us come together to celebrate.
