April 23, 2026
FROM MY WINDOW: EDO ICONS
Lancelot Oduwa Imasuen-The Governor of Storytelling
There are many ways to serve a people.
Some build companies.
Some build institutions.
Some build roads and bridges.
And some build something less visible, but no less important, memory.
Lancelot Oduwa Imasuen belongs to that class.
Popularly known as The Governor, Lancelot Oduwa Imasuen has, through film, carved a place for himself not only in Nollywood, but in the wider story of cultural preservation and identity.
In a society where too often we consume stories made elsewhere, told through foreign eyes, he chose a different path. He understood that a people who do not tell their own stories risk being edited out of history.
That insight alone deserves respect.
For decades, he has been one of the industrious hands in Nigeria’s film industry: directing, producing, mentoring, and helping shape one of Africa’s most influential creative sectors. But beyond industry success lies something deeper: his commitment to stories rooted in home.
That is why his iconic film 1897 matters.
To many, it may be a title. To Edo people, it is a wound, a memory, and a marker in time. It recalls the Benin Expedition of 1897 which was the violent disruption of the Benin Kingdom and the looting of priceless heritage.
To bring that chapter to screen was not merely entertainment.
It was remembrance.
It was education and certainly a cultural duty.
At a time when younger generations can recite distant histories yet know too little about their own, works like 1897 become more than cinema. They become classrooms without walls.
That is the power of storytelling!
Lancelot’s contribution also reminds us that success is not confined to politics, oil, contracts, or commerce. There is honour too in the arts. There is influence too in creativity. There is nation-building too in culture.
And Edo people have always understood culture.
From bronze to palace tradition, from language to ceremony, from craft to courage, ours has never been an empty civilisation. It is therefore fitting that one of our sons chose camera and script as tools to continue that legacy.
There is something admirable about men who use their gifts not only to prosper, but to preserve.
Lancelot Oduwa Imasuen has done both.
In celebrating him, we celebrate every Edo son and daughter whose work may not always sit in government offices or corporate boardrooms, but whose labour still uplifts the name of our people.
Because nations are not sustained by economics alone.
They are sustained by memory, identity, pride and by those wise enough to keep the story alive.
…When others imported stories, he told ours!
Chris Osa Nehikhare
From My Window: Edo Icons is a column where I pay tribute to Edo men and women who have distinguished themselves in industry, commerce, academia, culture, and service to not just Edo State, but Nigeria at large.