Award-winning Nigerian media tech entrepreneur, Uche Eze Pedro created BellaNaija.com with the sole intention of projecting a vibrant positivity of Africa.
Founded in July 2006, BellaNaija develops and delivers exciting online content aimed at Nigerian and Pan-African audiences. The idea for establishing BellaNaija came while Pedro studied at a university in Canada.
Her savvy grasp of media trends led to the website becoming the go-to lifestyle, entertainment and fashion portal in Africa. Her impressive website has established a loyal following among the young, cosmopolitan, upwardly mobile millennials in Nigeria, with over a million unique visitors and 9 000 000 page views each month.
Pedro represents a new generation of creative entrepreneurs that Nigeria and the world surely needs. She has catalysed growth in the online media sector in Nigeria while supporting expansion in the wider creative industries. Pedro believes that fashion as a business in Nigeria and across Africa has immense potential.
While it has made great strides over the past decade, technology will play such a huge role in accelerating this progress. Naturally, Pedro has always loved Nigeria, and each time she returned to the country on a university break, she noticed its growth. Nigerian fashion and entertainment were noticeably more vibrant and younger people were becoming increasingly involved in politics and business.
In an attempt to capture the essence of this creative scene, Pedro blogged about fashion and celebrities, which led to the conception of BellaNaija.
“When the portal was initially launched, a lot of our visitors came from around the world, from the diaspora, but Nigeria is now the number one country on the BellaNaija visitor list. It just shows that today, more people have internet access, and people are interested in what is going on around them. “The site has visitors from around the African continent, from South Africa, Ghana and other countries,” she said.
