Why Many Nigerians Hate Big Brother Naija
The just-concluded Big Brother Nigeria is arguably the most popular show on Nigerian television.
To understand what the show is all about, it is important to understand what it isn’t.
It is not a talent show; which means contestants do not engage in singing competitions, tell jokes, dance, and stuffs like that.
It is not a game show; there are no physical or mental contests.
Rather it is marketed as a reality show which follows a group of people as they live in isolation from the world under constant surveillance from Big Brother.
Millions of viewers watch the housemates do everyday activities like cook, clean the house, comment on each other’s behaviors, party, and lots of on-screen sex.
This is why in the middle of the fifth season of the show, Nigeria’s minister of information and culture orders that Big Brother Nigeria be suspended.
Big Brother is a Dutch reality television franchise which was first broadcast in the Netherlands in 1999 since then there have been over 448 seasons of the show in 54 franchise countries and regions.
The Nigerian version, Big Brother Naija is no doubt the most successful version on the African continent and one of the last surviving versions of the show in the world.
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The show has a massive following on television, reaching up to 40 million viewers across Africa.
Since the premiere of Big Brother Naija season five on July 19, 2020, data from social media monitoring tools estimate that every day, Big Brother Naija related conversations reach a 370 million audience, and within the first five days, 760,000 people around the world have posted something about the show online.
The show’s popularity is fueled by millions of fans who vote to keep their favorite housemates in the house.
The housemate with the least votes is continually evicted until there is a single winner.
The winner stands to gain a lot, a #30 million cash prize, a top of the range SUV, trips around the world to Dublin and Dubai, and a special trip to watch the UEFA Champions League final among other prizes.
But not everyone is happy with the show’s success, critics often condemn and point out the many erotic scenes on the show which they claim is contributing to moral decadence in the society.
Others, just don’t find the idea of people doing a mundane everyday activity on TV entertaining, they believe shows like these make the youths mentally lazy.
