Actor Kanayo O. Kanayo has stated that he's a senior to Peter Edochie in the Nollywood movie industry; actor Yemi Solade recently made the same statement.

MyNigeria reported that Solade appeared on Tope Olowoniyan TV, where he revealed how Yoruba people started the movie industry.

According to him, the first home video produced was not Living in Bondage as widely believed, just as he pointed out that he started acting as far back as 1977.

He said, "Living in Bondage was not the first movie." For those who might say the industry started from Living in Bondage, he said, "It was not from there. But because they romanced the media while my people were just doing the do. Most of them weren't schooled. They were just doing their art for art's sake. They were enjoying themselves.

"Bayo Salami is alive; that's Femi Adebayo's father. He will tell you deeper stories than I'm telling you. He's older than me. Jide Kosoko is alive, and we all worked together. It is only in the Yoruba setting that you will find practitioners who will tell you they've been around 60 years. Iya Rainbow is like 84, she's still going on set. I'm senior to Pete Edochie. I started acting before him, but he's older than me. I was 17 in 1977 when I represented Nigeria at Festac 77 as the youngest actor. I've done 48 years and I'm still standing."

While many social media users were still questioning his facts, a video surfaced showing Kanayo also making a similar claim.

Kanayo said, "You can't take it away from the fact that Things Fall Apart, which Pete Edochie took part in, was not a home video; it was cinema. So, if you write a story now and say Pete Edochie is older than me in Nollywood, I'll contest it because he came four years after. It's not a matter of biological age.

"So, in Nollywood, I'm his senior. But when you bring cinema into the picture, then you start going back to Baba Hubert Ogunde in the 1940s or 50s. This is history. History has no romance."

ASA