Health And Fitness
Health And Fitness
Eddie Douglas Okila
When The Workplace Becomes The Wound
This particular column piece focuses on how toxic work culture is quietly taking the lives, health and creativity of Africa’ s cultural and creative workforce and attempts to share snippets on the way out for the most vulnerable in this ecosystem.
There is a dangerous lie we have normalised across Africa: that exhaustion is evidence of ambition, that suffering is the price of success, and that anyone who cannot survive a toxic workplace simply does not want success badly enough.
We celebrate the artist who works through the night, the producer who sleeps in the studio, the journalist who never switches off, the filmmaker who survives impossible deadlines, the advertising executive who answers emails at 2am, the designer who works for three clients simultaneously and the young creative who accepts unpaid work because someone has promised that“ exposure” will eventually become opportunity.
We call it hustle. Sometimes, it is exploitation. And increasingly, it is costing us something far more precious than productivity: human life.
The Cultural and Creative Industries( CCIs)- spanning film, television, music,
94 MAL74 / 26 ISSUE fashion, advertising, publishing, design,- photography, performing arts, digital content, heritage, gaming and much more- have become one of Africa’ s most important engines of employment, identity and economic possibility. UNESCO describes Africa’ s creative economy as having enormous potential for employment and entrepreneurship, particularly among young people and women. Its film and audiovisual industries alone already employ millions, with the potential for substantially greater job creation and revenue.
But behind the glamour of the creative economy is another story. A story of insecurity. A story of unpaid invoices. A story of bullying disguised as leadership. A story of sexual harassment disguised as opportunity. A story of impossible deadlines disguised as excellence. A story of people smiling for the camera while privately falling apart.
The African Creative Paradox
The irony is profound. We have built industries around creativity while often creating workplaces that destroy the very conditions creativity requires.
Creativity needs psychological safety. It needs curiosity. It needs rest. It needs disagreement without humiliation. It needs experimentation without fear. It needs leaders who understand that people are not machines.
Yet in many creative environments, the loudest person in the room becomes the boss, the most connected person becomesthe gatekeeper and the person willing to tolerate the most abuse becomes the person who gets the next opportunity.
The International Labour Organization ' s 2026 global report on psychosocial working environments estimates that psychosocial risks are associated with more than 840,000 deaths annually, nearly 45 million disability-adjusted life years and economic losses equivalent to 1.37 % of global GDP. The risks include long working hours, job insecurity, excessive demands, low control and workplace bullying and harassment.
This is not simply about being“ stressed at work”. It is about how work is designed, managed and experienced. The ILO identifies excessive workload, poor communication, authoritarian supervision, bullying, discrimination, job insecurity, limited control and poor work-life balance among the psychosocial hazards that can damage workers ' health.