Hakeem Condotti Reigniting The Dream To Be A Millionaire

Chief Executive Officer of BLK HUT Media, Hakeem Condotti, earlier this year brought back the popular TV show ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire’ to the screens after a five-year hiatus. In this interview with Vanessa Obioha, he discusses the relevance of the show at a time when the country is experiencing emigration of highly trained and qualified people

Hakeem Condotti cannot explain why his children think he is the Best Dad in the world. A decorative piece with the inscription “World’s Best Dad” occupies a conspicuous spot on his desk in his office. On one of the notes stuck on his wall was a list of all the characteristics his children found him worthy of. The list, beautifully scribbled in juvenile handwriting, includes towering traits of him -smart and grateful-among a few. “They did that the last time they were here and warned me not to clean it,” he told me in a recent chat in his office nestled in one of the posh areas of Lekki. He was decked in a pristine white attire and strikes the picture of one who is always in control, not in an aggressive manner though. He exuded a gentle and unassuming mien that turned evocative when marshalling his thoughts.

For instance, when we compared the modern father with the traditional father, he meticulously argued that the dad of today spends more quality time with their children and as a result enjoys great bonding compared to the traditional dad.

“For them, it was all about providing for the family,” he noted.

Condotti comes from Ijebu in Ogun State. His surname is the shortened form of his great grandfather’s name which is referred to as Oriki. In Yorubaland, Oriki is a praise poem, prophetic name of one’s destiny. It encodes the ancestral identity of a lineage, and what the members of that lineage share in common. In simpler terms, it means what people know you for or what they want you to become. The full interpretation of his surname is one that rejects the filthy.

This year, Condotti is busier than ever. It is the first time he is crossing into content creation with the current season of the popular TV show ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (WWTBAM),’ the license of which he bought from Sony. Most of his career has been spent helping creatives monetise their content, although he started at Metropolitan Bank during and after the mandatory National Youth Corps Service (NYSC). After his stint at the bank, he upgraded his BSc in Economics and Statistics with an MSc in International Business Economics from Westminster Business School. When he returned in 2005, it was the boom of the Global System for Communication (GSM) in Nigeria which was launched in 2001 under the administration of former president Olusegun Obasanjo. Telecommunications companies such as MTN, Airtel and Glo were looking for ways to dominate the growing market with innovative services. Condotti found himself veering into that field, providing solutions for telecommunications companies.

“We provided value-added services where we served as the interface between what the telcos sell and what they don’t do by themselves. Creative services such as SMS contents, ringtones, ringback tones and things like that. We started creating avenues for creatives like musicians to make money, using ringtones at the initial stages, from the monophonic and polyphonic ringtones. This became another source of revenue for the industry that they were not used to at the time,” he said.

Through content monetisation, Condotti became more exposed to that part of the creative economy. It was only a matter of time before he started interfacing tech with the business side of the entertainment industry, organising concerts for super music stars like Asa, Adekunle Gold, Simi and Burna Boy. He did these concerts under Bavent Street Integrated Services, which he founded in 2016.

At some point, Condotti and his team began receiving requests for video content, including acquiring mobile rights for major sporting events such as the World Cup and Premier League. This somehow prepared him to acquire the rights for WWTBAM from Sony when the opportunity arrived.

“This was taking a step back into creating content, not just monetizing content. Since we had the capacity to monetize content, now developing a capacity to create it was going to be a challenge and I was interested in knowing where to take off.”

The buzz for the new season of WWTBAM started last year. The show was one of the most loved TV shows before it stopped airing five years ago. Resurrecting the show to meet today’s high-tech demand was a challenge that Condotti and his team embraced. One thing was certain though, it has to be a good show and future-proof.

“It has to look good in such a way that people will see and regard it, and it can also be sold anywhere in the world,” he said.

His team was bent on churning out a production that was up to UK standards. A new set was built in Nigeria, the right skill set was also brought in. Tapping from his experience in tech, he was able to come up with payment solutions that help people to be more financially included in the economy while playing the game. A different weekly game is posted on the show’s social media pages where winners play to win.

 “About 10 people win N30,000 each every week via the weekly game. The ultimate winning prize for the main game is N20 million,” he disclosed.

No one has achieved that feat yet. The highest money won is N4 million. Given that the season will run for a year, a lucky winner may soon become N20 million richer.

The feedback, he said, since the show officially premiered with Frank Edoho has been so impressive that the licensing company Sony was in awe.

“The initial reaction was funny because you have to match the promise of money giving with the insecurity in the country. In the early stages when we first started and were recruiting people to come and play — a lot of people show interest in participating in the game but when we call them to confirm that they really want to come and play because they answered the questions correctly, they become suspicious. Some felt it was a scam, some were worried about kidnappers. We have had at least two potential contestants who expressed such concerns. One was from Kaduna; we’ve bought the flight ticket and everything and at the last minute, he said his friends told him that we were unreal. This was just before we officially went on air.”

The fears however dissipated by the time the show premiered. Through the comments on the show’s social media pages, Condotti could see a lot of hope, hardwork and fear in most Nigerians. The economic hardship is biting according to him but has not killed the Nigerian spirit. Reviving that Nigerian spirit was one of the reasons he bought the license of WWTBAM.

“One of the reasons why we decided to go for this asset is because it rewards people based on their intelligence and encourages you to read. I can tell from the comments on the YouTube videos. This is one project I’ve worked on where the comments are always positive. People are happy that they can win things by their intelligence. People are happy that they can be entertained and learn at the same time. People challenge some questions sometimes. People are happy about that. And so it’s something that makes people sit down, encourages reading, study more and we’ve had very encouraging contestants.

“We’ve had a contestant that was a doctor and is a teacher and also looking at taking project management and IT training. We have had a trader that came in from Enugu, I can’t forget him, as the main contestant and, you know, he kept talking about how he gives back. He kept talking about how he’s learning more to improve himself and what he does, looking for side businesses. He was saying that with respect to the Nigerian spirit, that is, you can’t stick to one thing, you have to do multiple things.

“So I like that positivity that it brings to people and it’s very encouraging for me when you see other Nigerians that are striving to do something apart from their daily bread, they are also trying to do other things to improve. You see a lot of these in their banter with Frank Edoho. They tell him what they like to do and their hobbies. So from the feedback, I can deduce the average Nigerian has an encouraging mindset.”

 This mindset, he argued, defeats the notion that there is no hope in Nigeria. “A lot of people say the hope is not there, but for you to pick up the phone and want to participate and answer questions and be a part of this, it shows that there’s a certain level of hope you have to be able to win and confidence within yourself. We had a particular interest in a banking and finance graduate who was a Bolt driver. He talked about hoping to win some money to put him back into his education so he can improve himself and maybe, you know, start a business on the side and getting a better job. So we’ve had interesting people like that,” he narrated.

In his view, the attitude of the young man cannot be found in the Nigeria of yesteryears where graduates go hunting for white collar jobs. Young people are today becoming productive in their own way while still looking for ways to improve.

 “That is the reality of Nigeria,” he said emphatically while reacting to the concept of people leaving the country in search of greener pastures abroad, a concept now popularly known as Japa.

For Condotti, it is not a new phenomenon. It has always happened in Nigeria. He cited his uncles who often told him that back then in the 70s, that a class of 15 will have only two people left in Nigeria because of the economic downturn. However, such brain drain has some benefits for Nigeria because it allows them to represent the country in lofty positions abroad.

While he would not say emphatically if it is good or bad to have such repeated cycles, he puts his thoughts this way.

“I will say it’s a thing, whether it’s good or bad. Let’s look at it this way. There is no civilization, no economy, no country developed by being domestic only. Every country developed with an influx and help from abroad. Whether it’s through colonisation that the British did, or the Europeans that went to colonise the world and bring back things in, or the Israelites who were scattered all over the world and came back to develop their own country, or Malaysia or Singapore where the revolution that they had was from a man who went to study and came back to develop the country.

“And so Africa’s development is going to be based on the interaction between the diaspora and the locals. And that is ultimately going to help us. Like right now, our remittances are more than the income that the country makes. It’s just that the remittances so far are only coming into consumption. By the time it interacts with investment, then you see lots of different investments. The investments that the government needs to chase are not FDI from ‘Oyibo people,’ but FDI from the diaspora, that’s the money that will stay. FDI from foreigners will come and go. But the ones from the diaspora will stay here and will develop here. And that’s what we need to structurally create.”

 He already started doing that with his company BLK HUT Media where he is creating a value chain for people to invest in the entertainment sector and make money and keep the money here. He has already built relationships with streaming platforms production houses and is working on a distribution and aggregation platform.

WWTBAM may have put Condotti in the space of creating content but he prefers creating value for people particularly in helping them monetise their content. More so, he is incurably Nigerian whose hopes and dreams are for the country.