[Mhiz Rebecca]

The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) have
placed a ban on works by three of Nigeria’s top level
music artistes for an alleged violation of its rules and
regulations.
According to PUNCH, the NBC, named Olamide’s "Wo"
and "Wavi Level"; a remix of Davido’s "If" and 9ice’s
"Living Things" as the culprits in a current list of banned
songs and music videos that it released to the public.
The commission however did not give specific reasons
for banning the songs, the decision may have been
influenced by a recent reaction from the Federal Ministry
of Health to the music video of Olamide’s new song.
In a swift reaction, Olamide said that he never intended
to cause harm to music fans with the song. He tweeted,
“No intentions of promoting tobacco to get people killed. I
love my people, I love my country. One love, one Nigeria.”
A message posted on Twitter last Friday, the ministry
kicked against the video of Wo, released some weeks
ago and described the content as contravening the
Tobacco Control Act of 2015.
The Ministry of Health also noted that the video
contained scenes showing youths of different ages
openly smoking substances believed to be either
cigarettes or narcotics and concluded that such scenes
could encourage second-hand smoking among underage
children anywhere in the country.
Also, before the ban on 9ice’s Living Things, the song
had been fingered as the subject of a statement by
fellow rapper Falz, which urged Nigerian musicians in
general to be mindful of the kind of messages that they
passed to the public in their songs.
Falz had appeared to be genuinely concerned about the
impact of such messages on the youth. He pointed out
that artistes who saw nothing wrong about glorifying
Internet fraud, drugs and other anti-social behaviour
were not doing the society any good.