The World Wrestling Entertainment has announced a continent-wide talent competition to uncover Africa's next WWE Superstar in collaboration with its Sub-Saharan Africa broadcast partner, SuperSport.
The tryout will take place in Lagos, Nigeria, over the course of several days in February 2023.
Nigerians and residents of other African nations are now eligible to participate in "The Search for Africa's Next WWE Superstar."
The deadline for submissions is December 18, 2022.
Candidates who are interested must submit a video showcasing their potential as a WWE Superstar.
Those that are selected will be given the opportunity to try out in Lagos in February 2023.
A select number of tryout participants will then be awarded an all-expenses-paid experience to continue their tryout journey alongside current and prospective WWE Superstars ahead of WrestleMania 39 in Los Angeles, United States of America in April 2023.
A full-time WWE developmental contract may be offered to the top-performing participants, who will then begin their new career at the world-class WWE Performance Center in Orlando, Florida, USA.
“Africa is a focal point of our renewed global talent recruitment strategy and this initiative in Lagos will launch what we envision becoming a year-round, multi-country effort to cultivate relationships and identify talent that will resonate with our passionate and loyal African fanbase,” said James Kimball, WWE Head of Talent Operations and Strategy. “The region has incredible potential to serve as a meaningful talent development hub for WWE and we look forward to working with our tremendous partners at SuperSport to uncover the next generation of Superstars through this programme.”
“The continent abounds with athletes and Africa has had several WWE Superstars, so this is the perfect opportunity to showcase fresh new talent,” said Marc Jury, Chief Executive of SuperSport. “As there is a massive appetite among African audiences for WWE action and entertainment, we expect this initiative to be very popular with aspirants. SuperSport looks forward to telling this exciting story in the weeks and months to come.”
WWE and MultiChoice recently announced a major broadcast partnership that will see Showmax, the leading streaming service available in the region, become the new home of WWE Network in Africa.
The partnership incorporates all WWE Premium Live Events, including WrestleMania, as well as WWE Network’s vast library of original and archived programming available to stream on-demand by more people in Africa from early 2023 on Showmax, Africa’s most loved streaming service.
SuperSport, the sport broadcasting subsidiary of video entertainment platform MultiChoice, will continue to broadcast live weekly episodes of Raw, SmackDown and NXT as well as all of WWE’s Premium Live Events in a multi-year extension.