Executive Secretary of the Creative Arts Council (CAA), Gyankroma Akufo-Addo, has urged Ghana’s music industry players to dispel negative misconceptions about the PlayGhana initiative.
Months ago, there was a backlash against the PlayGhana initiative, which was promoted as a way to stop the declining popularity of Ghanaian music on the radio. The initiative was criticized by industry players when the council held a stakeholder engagement in December 2023 to gather inputs from creatives and key players in the creative industry to promote the PlayGhana initiative.
The goal of reducing the level of promotion of Nigerian music, on the Ghanaian airwaves was one of the main points of criticism. According to the critics, this action can actually hurt the development of Ghanaian musicians.
Speaking at the DJs and Bloggers Forum-PlayGhana Initiative recently, Gyankroma was taken aback by the reception of #PlayGhana, declaring that it was merely a patriotic idea.
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“It’s unfortunate that we started PlayGhana with controversy and misconstrued information with the core goal of the initiative being ignored. However, I want to give an assurance that the initiative is a patriotic approach. It is never to ban any other music, or to make Ghanaian musicians compete with other artistes. Far from that. What we are trying to do is just to push our artistes to the forefront, which will have a ripple effect on our industry,” she said.
She went on to seek solutions on how DJs can promote Ghanaian music on the airwaves as well as bloggers.
“How do we make sure that the nightclub owners are playing our music, DJs are playing our music on the airwaves and this is why stakeholder engagement with DJs and bloggers are relevant,” she said.
