Shuga is an eight episode, scripted TV drama series. After two seasons set among the bars, hangouts, and clubs of Nairobi, Kenya, featuring Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o (12 Years A Slave), the third season sees the action move to Lagos, Nigeria. Celebrated Nigerian film-maker Biyi Bandele, writer-director of the feature film of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s “Half of a Yellow Sun”, has directed the new season. Nigerian actor and musician Ikubese Emmanuel Ifeanyichukwu, aka 9con, reprises his role as smooth-talking bad boy Femi and is joined by an array of well-known faces and exciting newcomers including singer-songwriter Tiwa Savage, BeatFM DJ Maria Okanrende, and Oliva Tweest Star Dorcas Shola Fapson.

Fusing sexual health messaging with gripping storylines, Shuga is part of a powerful mass-media behaviour-change campaign designed to raise awareness about HIV prevention and teen pregnancy in Nigeria. Key themes covered by the series include: living with HIV; disclosing your HIV status; getting tested; condom use; gender-based violence; gender equality; women’s empowerment; family planning; teen pregnancy; transactional sex; multiple concurrent partners; stigma and discrimination of people living with HIV; and parent–child relationships and communication.