The National Film and Video Censors Board (NFVCB) and Federal Government of Nigeria censors say parts of the movie Half of a Yellow Sun could undermine national security. They want cuts to allow the film - which stars Chiwetel Ejiofor [pictured] and Thandie Newton and is partly set during Nigeria's 1960s civil war - to be shown in its home country.
The section that the Censors Board wants cut off relates to Biafra. The Republic of Biafra is the name Eastern Nigeria dominated by the Igbos mainly christians adopted during the 3 year civil war from 1967 to 1970. About three million Igbos died during the conflagration mainly through hunger and kwashiokor.
The movie world has pilloried Nigeria for such blatant censorship.
A statement said the board has not received a response from the exhibitors to a May 27 letter "requiring the distributor to expunge/edit some clearly stated objectionable aspects."
There was no immediate response from the British-Nigerian producers of the movie which made its debut in Britain in April and in the United States in May.
It comes as Nigeria is threatened by an Islamic uprising in the northeast, jeopardising unity between the mainly Muslim north and predominantly Christian south.
The film is based on an award-winning novel by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
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