Beyond the Lens: Kemi Adetiba’s King of Boys as A Metaphor for Power and Order in Democratic Nigeria

This study examines the symbolic representations of Nigerian social reality in the movie “King of Boys”. Social reality in this instance is examined from the perspective of official and unofficial political and economic power, influence and coercion. Based on the framework of Ferdinand de Saussure and Charles Sanders Peirce’s semiotics and semiology theory, the study aims to examines the symbolic relationship between characters, scenes, and institutions in the Kemi Adetiba’s “King of Boys” and the realities in the Nigerian political and security sectors. Using the methodological approach of Critical Discourse Analysis, the study found that the movie is a bold attempt at representing the intricate power relations that exists within Nigerian political circles as well as that which exists between the Nigerian political class and organized crime.


INTRODUCTION
Democracy is arguably the dominant paradigm of government in the world.
It is the yardstick for measuring the success or failure of governments. Democracy is widely perceived as a form of government in which every adult member of a society participates in the daily governance of the society either directly or indirectly through elected representatives.
In the practical sense, democracy as practiced in the developing world is far from the ideal concept. The will of the people is rarely evident in the processes and outcomes of the democratic process in the developing world. The ideas and manifestoes of candidates or parties carry little weight in the opinion of the electorates; instead, the amount of money expendable by each candidate or party as well as the control of the official and unofficial tools of coercion as well as the demonstrated ability to put them to "effective" use are more important in the estimation of the electorates and politicians (Samarzija 2020). The democratic experience of Nigeria since the return to democratic rule in 1999 suggests that the will of a few individuals trumps the wishes of the larger populace. For instance, a handful of political and economic elites have seemingly decided the flag bearers of the major parties and by extension, the occupiers of political offices. At the end of his second tenure in 2007, former president Olusegun Obasanjo singlehandedly installed late President Umar Yar'adua as his successor against the desires of other party leaders. At the regional level, former governor of Lagos State, Bola Tinubu has allegedly installed every governor of the state since he completed his second tenure in 2007.
The community is increasingly apparent through social media (Damayanti and Hidayat 2019). The media and the society have a symbiotic relationship. The nature, composition and content of the media is determined by societal dynamics and the media in turn influences social order through their representation of societal happenings. The movie industry is a subsidiary of the media industry and they reflect the social realities prevalent in any given geographical space.
In the submission of Adeleke, literature provides us with windows to life and films constitute an aspect of literary art. Movies therefore provide us windows into the socio-political and economic realities prevalent in the country. The pictures seen through the windows provided by movie producers and directors may be inaccurate due to the limitations imposed by the positions of the filmmakers in relation to the general events happening in the social-cultural and political environment. However, they would always contain elements of the realities obtained in the society (Adeleke 2003).
Movies are representations of the world. Producers and directors draw inspiration from events around them and tell stories about such events from their own perspectives for the entertainment or enlightenment of their viewers. They provide their own interpretation of events in the society through their camera lenses. However, the lens can only see what is placed in front of it. This indicates that the camera lens does not provide a full picture or complete context for the images it presents to the world. Just like the camera lens, the human mind is also subjective and as such can only see and projects segments of reality at a time. The segments provided will depend on the ideological, social and experiential makeup of the person. It is against this background that producers and directors select and project information about the society to their viewers.
The media in every society provide reflections of such society (Mahmood 2016). They are products of the societies in which they operate and they have symbiotic relationship with the societies. A political internet use has been identified as a determinant of democratic attitudes (Stoycheff 2020).
Communication has been identified as the underlying factor for human development whether at the socio-scientific, socio-economic or socio-political levels (Omoera and Obekpa 2019) . Movies are powerful literary genre with the potential to "create profound changes in cultural values, norms, patterns and ideals of a nation and can alter the future of the nation. In fact, this feature makes the film industry today are closely connected with the politics" (Mohamadi 2016 The nature of films as historical documents divides opinion because history itself is inherently divisive as there are usually many accounts to every event and it is difficult for one account to capture every twist and turn in the historical plot (Endong 2019). Therefore, films that are meant to replicate history or mirror the society are likely to divide opinions due to the innate and experiential differences among humans. Notwithstanding the divisive nature of history and historical/critical films, the camera lens remains a convincing means for the preservation of cultural heritage and the interpretation of social-political events.
KemiAdetiba'sKing of Boys fits this frame.
Movies are cultural products often with deeper messages than the words and actions heard and seen in the scenes. They provide room for subtle criticism of government programmes, policies, institutions and officials. The Nigerian senate is presently considering a bill to silence critics of the Nigerian state especially social media critics. With such bills in place, critical movies become more important in our understanding and evaluation of happenings in our society.
Consequently, there is a need for media literacy on the part of everyone. Media messages" (Hanson 2014). People with high media literacy can easily decode the embedded messages in media productions while people with low media literacy can only see what is placed on the surface.
The novelty in this paper, that it is arguable that Nigerian movie viewers largely watch movies for their entertainment and socialization values and they rarely engage in critical analysis of the contents of the movies they watch. We often take media literacy for granted even though the mass media is central to the definition of our lives. It is therefore important that we develop and improve our media literacy skills in order to improve our lives.
The movie King of Boys contains characters and plots which are similar to real persons, institutions and situations in the Nigerian polity. While there have been efforts by film makers, over the years, to represent the political realities in Nigeria, there has been a dearth of attempts by Nigerian scholars to investigate the relationship between Nigerian movies and prevalent political realities. Another peculiarity of this study is that it is the first to attempt to interrogate the relationship between the political class and the criminal world. This study therefore aims at identifying the direct similarities between the components of the movie "King of Boys" and real life characters and situations in the Nigerian political economic space.

METHODS
Theoretical framework work hinges on the theoretical foundation of Some of the themes in the movie are power, corruption, ambition and karma. The major lesson is that "evil will always self-destruct" (Tayo 2018

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The movie is a critical evaluation of Nigerian politics by Kemi Adetiba. Since the creation of the EFCC, it has been headed by northern Nigerians.
The first is NuhuRibadu, he was succeeded by Farida Waziri, who was replaced by Ibrahim Lamorde. The incumbent Ibrahim Magu succeeded Lamorde at the inception of the Buhari presidency. It is important to note that both Ibrahim Lamorde and Ibrahim Magu were pioneer staff of the EFCC under NuhuRibadu.

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In the movie, the NCCC is portrayed as a tool for settling political scores and it is ironically headed by corrupt men who care more about their pockets than the interest of the nation. This is similar to the perception of the EFCC by Nigerians. Over the years, the EFCC has allegedly harassed the opponents of the ruling elites while turning a blind eye to the crimes of the allies of the ruling elite.
The Chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) publicly stated that defectors to his party will be forgiven their sins ( The outcome is that there is pseudo order in the polity as anointed candidates do the bidding of the political godfathers. Sovereignty and loyalty are taken away from the people and handed over to the godfathers. Only those who are willing to follow orders, serve and protect the interests of the godfathers are enthroned and they are changed as soon as they attempt to dislodge the godfathers (Derboven, Roeck, and Verstraete 2012). The case of the immediate past governor of Lagos State, Akinwunmi Ambode aptly fits in here. Although he is widely perceived to have performed well in the estimation of the electorates, he fell out with the godfathers of Lagos politics when he attempted to wean himself off them.
He was promptly discredited in the court of public opinion and he was replaced by another candidate on the prodding of the godfather of Lagos politics, Bola Tinubu.

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A similar case is playing out in Edo State where Governor Godwin Obaseki is having a running battle with his benefactor and predecessor Adams Oshiomole.
Mr Oshiomole who is the current national chairman of the ruling All Progressives

Congress is the immediate past governor of Edo State and he installed Godwin
Obaseki as his successor against the wishes of many stakeholders in the state.
Upon assumption of office, Governor Obaseki has made efforts to rid himself of the shadow of Adams Oshiomole and they have been having running battles since then with many sordid revelations entering the public sphere from both camps.
Nigerian policy has been shaped by such factors as: (1) interest group politics (based more on ethnic and regional than class cleavages), (2) the nation's legacy as a former British colony, (3) the shift in structure from being a colony to an independent nation, (4) the level of economic development, and (5) the structure of the labor force (Williamson and Pampel 1991 Synergy between crime and politics. Areas which were constituted into states have recorded development which may be directly attributed to the factor of their having been constituted into separate political sub-units (Ikporukpo 1986).
The filmmaker established a link between politics and crime in the King of Boys.
Eniola Salami and her likes were expected to provide funds and thugs for electoral victory. They were also expected to make their money from the black market economy without hurting the political elites. There are reports of association between Nigerian government officials and suspected or convicted criminals "many of whom have been re-integrated into society without proper penance for their crimes".
In Nigerian politics, there are links between criminals and politicians too.
Recently, a notorious kidnapper and political thug, Hamisu Bala Wadume was arrested and upon interrogation he to have received six million naira from a sitting governor. He also claimed to have received 13 million naira from the All Nigerian political and economic elite can get away with any crime.
Whenever they are investigated, they are rarely indicted and when they are indicted, they either enter a plea bargain or face unending trials in court. In realities in Nigerian politics, those who are less perceptive may miss the similarities. This buttresses the position of de Saussure and Sanders that the relationship between the audience and the semiotic data is subjective. This means that while some viewers would only perceive the entertainment value of the movie, others would see beyond that and perceive the political, cultural, economic, and historical messages embedded in the movie. While it is arguable that the movie has preserved contemporary Nigerian political culture for future generations. It is important that other film makers tell stories about Nigerian political realities from their own perspectives so that viewers can have a variety of angles from which they could understand the complexities on Nigerian politics.