There has been many factors that have affected music in the Post-Covid-19 era around the world.
Nigerian fast rising artiste, Ajoge Job Okatewun, with the stage name Hypa Cee, has reacted to how the Afrobeat industry has been affected by the pandemic.
During the Covid-19 era there were live shows. Online and Tv shows attracted little buzz. Many musicians could not achieve much. Most recorded indoors. Many were in gloom as to the future of entertainment industry, Hypa Cee recalls.
Now in the post-CoVid 19 era much work has been on deck. There has been many album releases, many shows, gigs, music concerts, song and dance shows, and many trending music. Hypa Cee claims that while there has been several artists releasing new songs and albums, the purchasing power of music lovers has seriously dwindled.
The Nigerian born artiste, Hypa Cee, is of the view that the pandemic affected the music industry negatively. There should be a way for the audience to enjoy music in the event of another pandemic. Tools such as Metaverse can come handy. The reason for the post Covid-19 effects on music was that many people are still trying to find their foot after the pandemic. Social life is returning gradually.
Nigeria and South Africa have the largest music industries in Africa. The post Covid-19 economy has changed the way they do music. The inflation rate in Nigeria and the high cost of living make it hard to really buy music as it were.
According to Hypa Cee the COVID-19 pandemic brought unprecedented disruptions to Nigeria—reducing earnings and increasing poverty and food insecurity as well as leading the region into its first recession in 25 years.
While the global economic effects of the pandemic have started to recede as Western and Asian countries recover, 2022 is still turning out to be a difficult year for Nigeria.
Hypa Cee suggested that the region will face even riskier external and internal environments in the future if the right strategies and policies are not put in place to improve the economy.
From the issue of terrorism threats to flood, to hyper inflation and now collapse of the currency against the US dollar, Nigeria’s post Covid-19 era has been replete with economic challenges which are affecting the music industry negatively.
Hypa Cee recommends resilience measures within the economic and political frameworks. A resiliency that will gravitate towards economic prosperity and productivity. A prosperity-focused resilience.
Resiliency—a country’s capability to recover from shocks and adapt flexibly to stressors—not only protects economic and social gains, but also facilitates economic transformation and sustainable employment in a capricious post-Covid-19 environment. In a “resilient” country, fewer assets are lost when a shock occurs, so more sustained improvements in economic welfare occur for the same amount of investment. Post-COVID-19 Nigeria’s economic development policy needs, therefore, to be centered around both improving resiliency and accelerating transformation to realize sustained economic welfare gains. Strategies for resiliency should build on the COVID-19 experience, helping households, communities, and countries to strengthen coping measures that reduce losses thus allowing for a faster recovery, and investing to adapt to and mitigate the effects of future shocks. Adapting to a “new normal” can help resilient countries to grow and transform at a faster rate.
There should be cuts from salaries of politicians.
There should be increase in the remuneration of civil servants and private sector workers.
Hypa Cee suggests that there should be investment in healthcare and education so as to reduce the brain drain.
Hypa Cee suggests that the government must reduce its expenses on recurrent expenses. More capital expenses must be focused on as Nigeria needs infrastructure such as tubes, state run bus system, trains and good road.
The artiste cum technocrat, Hypa Cee suggests that Nigeria should deregulate the growth of large firms since the entrance and growth of large firms increase a country’s resilient economic transformation. Large firms, with more assets, are inherently more resilient and are better equipped to endure economic storms— therefore Nigeria’s policymakers should prioritize policies that facilitate the entrance and growth of such firms, through domestic deregulation and encouraging foreign direct investment (FDI). This will ease the pressure in the economy and as well positively affect the entertainment and music industry in the long-run.
