AREWA24, the leading Hausa language entertainment and lifestyle channel in
Nigeria, announces a slate of new premium programming for Q4 and Q1 2019, including the launch of the channel’s much-anticipated new original Hausa drama series in January, complementing its current long-running and award-winning series, “Dadin Kowa.” The ambitious new drama series is currently in production, and is expected to set a new standard for originality and quality in Hausa language television production.
AREWA24’s new slate of programs launching in October includes “Amo Daga Arewa.” This primetime music series features live performances and interviews with the incredibly talented musicians from across the North, including traditional music genres, as well as R&B, soul and religious. “Amo Daga Arewa” brings together the more traditional elements of the rich Northern Nigerian music culture, adding to
AREWA24’s already popular Hip Hop programs.
Re-launching in the fourth quarter with a brand new format and hosts, “Matasa@360” is a contemporary, street-wise and relevant youth show, focusing on the talent, innovation, and creativity of Northern Nigerian youth. The show also addresses the very real challenges facing young people in the region and the pressures they experience on a daily basis. The show’s regular featured segments explore how Northern Nigerian youth navigate daily life, relationships, media, entrepreneurship, performing arts, current affairs, campus life, technology and other areas that youth from all over the world can relate to.
AREWA24 has also green-lit a fourth season of “Haske: Matan Arewa,” featuring the dynamic women from Northern Nigeria as they tell their stories intimately and passionately. Breaking social and cultural barriers to becoming leaders, traders, teachers, entrepreneurs, rural activists, filmmakers and more, these amazing women share their successes, their struggles, their disappointments and their triumphs.
Rounding out AREWA24’s new Q4 programming lineup are dozens of Kannywood’s newest and best films from the industry’s top directors, producers and actors. AREWA24 now rivals any channel in the region when it comes to showcasing the most and the best Kannywood films. The channel has also licensed new shows for young viewers who watch its popular morning and afternoon Children’s block.
AREWA24 also announces two major executive programming and production hires at its Kano studio: Kadiri Yusef and Evans Ejiogu, each of whom brings their long experience and stellar track records in the Lagos television and media sector to Kano.
Kadiri Yusef is a veteran executive of the programming and production staff at Silverbird Television, where he worked from 2004 to 2017. Kadiri became Silverbird’s Head of Television Production in 2006 where he directed most of Silverbird’s flagship shows, and all of its live broadcast programs. At AREWA24, Kadiri is in charge of directing all of the channel’s diverse studio-based shows and formats.
Evans Ejiogu has been a successful television content creator, producer, director, writer and video editor.
Along with his programming and production experience across formats and genres, Evans also brings to AREWA24 his extensive commercial skills honed from a decade in the corporate communications and advertising sectors. Evans’ work in theatre, television drama, short films, commercial production, radio and online digital content, helps raise the overall level of expertise and production quality at AREWA24.
Says Jacob Arback, AREWA24’s CEO, “we are very fortunate to have programming executives of such caliber and professional pedigree working at AREWA24. Evans and Kadiri are not only contributing to our already high performing programming staff and raising the channel’s production values, they are also helping to grow and further professionalize Northern Nigeria’s television and media sector.”
ABOUT AREWA24: AREWA24 was launched in 2014 to fill a glaring void of locally-produced Hausa language entertainment and lifestyle programming that reflects pride in Northern Nigerian life, culture, music, film, art, cooking and sports. Today, AREWA24 is available to over 80 million Hausa speakers in Nigeria and West Africa through its Eutelsat satellite free-to-air broadcast, and, in Nigeria, on the StarTimes pay bouquet (channel#138), on the StarTimes DTH satellite platform (channel#538) and on the two Multichoice pay platforms, DStv (channel #261) and GOtv (channel #101). AREWA24’s original productions are also uploaded weekly to youtube.com/AREWA24channel, and the channel benefits from active audience engagement across its digital platforms at AREWA24.com, facebook.com/AREWA24,
Instagram.com/AREWA24channel, and twitter.com/AREWA24channel.
For additional information please contact: info@arewa24.com.
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AREWA24 Launches its “Focus On Mental Health and Wellness Campaign” For The Entire Month of July
27 June 2023 – AREWA24, the leading Hausa language family entertainment and lifestyle television channel and production studio in Nigeria and West Africa, announces the launch of its inaugural Focus on Mental Health and Wellness Month.
Throughout the month of July, AREWA24 will devote major segments of its daily breakfast show, “Gari Ya Waye,” and its women’s show, “Mata A Yau” to a series of in-depth discussions and interviews with some of the top doctors, therapists and other health experts on issues of mental health and wellness in Northern Nigeria. Although experts agree that mental health is an integral part of good health and well-being, it has been neglected in Nigeria and Northern Nigeria.According to the Association of Psychiatrists in Nigeria (APN), more than 60 million Nigerians are suffering from some form of mental illness, but only 10 percent are able to access appropriate care. APN President Taiwo Obindo explains that the gap in treatment is a result of various factors, including a lack of knowledge which leaves people with insufficient information about the causes of mental illness and the ability to identify and seek appropriate treatment.
Despite the prevalence of mental illness in the country, according to the Nigerian Medical Association, there are only 350 psychiatrists currently available to serve a Nigerian population of some 220 million people. It is estimated that at least one out of every four Nigerians are living with some sort or mental illness.
“People do not have an understanding about mental health,” says Nigerian mental health expert, Aisha Bubah. “So mental health gets attributed to so many cultural beliefs, superstitious beliefs, and evil. And the image of mental health people have is always about the most extreme cases.”AREWA24 is working to fill this glaring knowledge gap by first providing basic information and awareness about mental health, mental illness and mental wellness. The goal of the AREWA24 Mental Health and Wellness campaign is to close the information gap by providing credible information and to eliminate the stigmatism surrounding issues of mental health. AREWA24 has brought together a group of psychiatrists, therapists, and subject matter experts who will also discuss how we can all develop ways to nurture positive mental wellness, both individually and with our families. This includes services ranging from assessment, diagnosis, treatment, and counseling – all dedicated to maintaining and restoring the mental well-being of Northern Nigerians.
“At AREWA24, we’re committed to using our broadly distributed, popular and trusted entertainment platform to serve our Northern Nigerian communities with positive campaigns such as our upcoming “Focus on Mental Health and Wellness Month,” said Aisha Lawal, Executive Producer of AREWA24’s Studio Productions. “We believe it’s our corporate and social responsibility to go beyond just entertaining our viewers. That’s why we want to raise awareness around critically important issues in our communities such as mental health. We want to help educate and inform our sons and daughters, help prepare them for a better future, and try to address some of the root causes of poverty to which poor mental health is a major contributor.”
ABOUT AREWA24 (https://arewa24.com/company-overview/): AREWA24 and its production arm, AREWA24 Productions, was launched in 2014 to fill a glaring void of authentic, locally-produced and high-quality Hausa language entertainment and lifestyle programming that reflects pride in Northern Nigerian life, culture, music, film, art, cooking, and sports. Today, AREWA24 reaches 40+ million Hausa speakers in Nigeria and West Africa through its Eutelsat satellite free-to-air broadcast, on the StarTimes payTV bouquet (channel#138) the two Multichoice payTV platforms, DStv (channel #261) and GOtv (channel #136), the payTV and on the Canal+ payTV service (channel #285) in Niger, Chad and Cameroun. AREWA24 benefits from active audience engagement across its digital platforms at AREWA24.com, facebook.com/AREWA24, and Instagram.com/AREWA24channel. AREWA24 also operates a global streaming service, AREWA24 On Demand in partnership with Vimeo.
To subscribe to the global streaming service, AREWA24 ON DEMAND, go to http://tv.arewa24.com or download the app from the IOS App Store, Google Play, Apple TV, Roku Channel Store, and Amazon Fire TV.
For additional information please contact: info@arewa24.com -
AREWA24 Announces The Launch Of Its New Original Drama And Film Division
AREWA24, the leading Hausa language family entertainment and lifestyle television channel and production studio in Nigeria and West Africa, announces the launch of its new Original Drama and Film Division. The new company production division will develop, script and produce a slate of new original drama series and feature films, telling authentic African stories from Northern Nigeria and West Africa in both the Hausa language and in core English.
AREWA24’s production studios already produce and broadcast the two most popular and highest rated Hausa language drama series in Northern Nigeria and West Africa, “Dadin Kowa” which is in it’s 25th season, and the channel’s runaway hit political thriller, “Kwana Casa’in” (“90 Days”), which just concluded production on Season-7. Several new original drama series are currently in development and the company will be debuting its first originally-produced premier feature film in Q4 2022.
“AREWA24” has been developing some of the finest Nigerian writers, producers, directors, editors and actors since the channel launched eight years ago,” says Jacob Arback, AREWA24’s CEO. “We are now positioned to be a major Pan African producer of scripted, authentic African content – – for Nigeria, for Africa and for viewers in the West who are becoming more and more exposed to the unique and compelling stories being told in high-quality dramas and films from the Continent.”
Leading the new Original Drama and Film Division is Evans Ejioju, an experienced and talented industry veteran who has been the executive producer of Kwana Casa’in since its first season. Salisu Balabare, the current director of Kwana Casa’in and longtime director of the Dadin Kowa drama series, will head up creative direction for the new division. Bob Reid, a well-known Emmy-award winning executive producer with Discovery Networks and the former EVP and Programming Executive at The Africa Channel in the U.S., is on board as a production consultant and executive producer of AREWA24’s original drama and film productions.
With the creation of this new Original Drama and Film Division, AREWA24 will leverage its own production resources and expertise, as well as look to partner with top creative talent from throughout the world, and with the major global streaming services, to develop and produce an expanding slate of scripted narrative content.
“Our goal is not just to create ever more popular and successful dramas for our core Hausa-speaking audiences,” says Arback. “Some of what we produce might not air first on AREWA24. Going forward, we plan to create a slate of content that appeals to viewers throughout Africa and the rest of the world. The new production division will enable us to tailor content to suit those broader targeted audiences. To do that, we plan to produce authentic African content in English as well as in Hausa and take on more provocative subject matter across a wide range of program genres.”
ABOUT AREWA24 (https://arewa24.com/company-overview/): AREWA24 and its production arm, AREWA24 Productions, was launched in 2014 to fill a glaring void of authentic, locally-produced and high-quality Hausa language entertainment and lifestyle programming that reflects pride in Northern Nigerian life, culture, music, film, art, cooking and sports. Today, AREWA24 reaches 40+ million Hausa speakers in Nigeria and West Africa through its Eutelsat satellite free-to-air broadcast, on the StarTimes payTV bouquet (channel#138) the two Multichoice payTV platforms, DStv (channel #261) and GOtv (channel #101), the payTV platform TSTV (#361) and on the Canal+ payTV service (channel #285) in Niger, Chad and Cameroun. AREWA24 benefits from active audience engagement across its digital platforms at AREWA24.com, facebook.com/AREWA24, and Instagram.com/AREWA24channel. AREWA24 also operates a global streaming service, AREWA24 On Demand in partnership with Vimeo.
To subscribe to the global streaming service, AREWA24 ON DEMAND, go to http://tv.arewa24.com or download the app from the IOS App Store, Google Play, Apple TV, Roku Channel Store and Amazon Fire TV.
For additional information please contact: info@arewa24.com
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How we wish ’90 Days’ will be a path to followed
The new drama series from AREWA24, ‘Kwana Casa’in’ (90 Days), has come with a new plots and styles that is quite different from the Kannywood movies we watch every day. The story tells about Nigerian politics and what has really been happening in our universities and in our daily lives.
For decades, our Kannywood movies should be pointing out the kind of problems we were faced with; instead, our Hausa movies portray dancing, music and modeling. In the 90 days drama series, there is a very high-quality picture which is different compared to Kennywood movies. This is because high-quality equipment has been used in the film making to give viewers a quality picture.
And the locations used in the drama are quite amazing, places such as hospitals, offices, homes, universities and a radio station. Really, AREWA24 has used a collection of professionals and they deserve a thump up. Looking at the places in the drama, even if someone is living outside Nigeria, they can fully understand what the story is trying to portray. This alone shows that AREWA24 is one of a kind and with professionals. Whenever I am watching ‘Kwana Casa’in,’(90 Days) I feel like am watching a reality drama, because the drama shows the way people in power and the way the poor live. Today, people in power make good use of the poor to subjugate high positions by all means. I believe that, before the end of this drama, many people will learn different lessons in life. When I first saw the faces of some Kannywood actors and actress, I felt weak and fear engulfed my heart – – the fear of sabotaging the drama the way they always did in their movies. But, to my surprise, they appear to be different and serious in this drama without making us bored of watching it. This showed me that, if they can have a good story and equipment, and invite educated people in their productions, I feel that they might be even better in the Kannywood film Industry. The way these artists showed commitment and expertise; it is very impressive. Even those who watch foreign movies will salute them, because developed countries were producing dramatic series about issues facing them in their countries, unlike the trash in the films we’re used to watching. It seems like the 90 days drama will overshadow AREWA24’s drama series, Dadin Kowa, as there is no single drama from the Kannywood [film industry] to rub shoulders with Dadin Kowa so far. It may only be AREWA24 that can be able to shine again with its new and well-produced drama series, 90 days (Kwana Casa’in). During the long time I have been watching Kannywood’s Hausa films, I realised that here is a school for Kannywood to learn more. Gradually AREWA24 will replace Hausa dramas, because they are treating issues that are affecting us in this country, not just singing and dancing on our TV screens. Fadila H Aliyu Kurfi is a writer and analyst on current affairs and an activist.
She can be contacted through email: fadilakurfi@gmail.com, Facebook: Fadila H Aliyu Kurfi.
