Nollywood was founded by Yorubas and they own the industry, according to actress Aisha Lawal.

Yoruba performers and directors "own" Nollywood, according to Nollywood actress Aisha Lawal, because "they started it."

The director stated in a Tribune interview;

We own the industry. Go back to research. The industry belongs to the Yoruba people. If you go back to research, you will hear from people like Hubert Ogunde and Ade Love. I don’t want to go into details. But, if you go and research very well, you will discover that Yorubas own this industry, we started this industry. We messed up at some point, but we are not playing catch-up. We are there already. Now, everybody wants to shoot a Yoruba movie.