Awal’s appointment as Tourism minister is disappointing – Ola Michael

Entertainment Pundit, Ola Michael has expressed his disappointment in the appointment of Dr Mohammed Awal as the Minister-designate for the Tourism, Creative Arts and Culture Ministry.

He said the former Minister of the now-defunct Business Development Initiative is not the right person to head this ministry because he is not somebody who can build the structures that are needed in the industry.

Ola Michael told sit-in host of the Simply Showbiz, Miriam Osei-Agyemang on TV3 Saturday, January 30 that the Ministry needs somebody who will be able to build the structures and then in the future, pave way for a person of Mr Awal’s caliber to come in to market the structures.

The former Managing Director of the Graphic Group of Communications has been appointed as Minister-Designate for Tourism, Creative Arts and Culture by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo in his second administration, pending approval by Parliament.

But Ola Michael said on the show that “It is disappointing. I think he is somebody who probably is not really in terms with what to do with the ministry especially when it has become an amalgam of Tourism, Arts and Culture.

“This government, then in opposition, were like we have the men. That was the mantra we used to hear from them so, I was asking where the men are. We want to see something. But you bring somebody in, two years the person is kicked out, another person comes in two years we still see nothing and then a third person. So it is more like every time you are trying new people on us.

“Can we get to the point where we say this person has got an experience already so we should bring her back, let her continue what she started doing and then ask somebody to also learn or probably add up to it. Mr Awal, the only think I know about him related to our Creative and Culture Industry has to do with the media part.”

He further called for the return of the former sector minister, Catherine Afekju, to the ministry because he believes she is the right person to help in building the structures that the sector needs.

“If we are looking for somebody like the industry people were calling for who is an out and out industry player then he is not fit for it, he is not that type. He is more of the technocrat kind of people or the business people but before we go into the business we need to build the structure and I am not seeing him as the person that is going to help us build the structure.

“I am seeing as the person that is supposed to have come in when we had built the structure and we need somebody to market us, we need somebody to position us at that stage of business and money-making.

“If they didn’t have anybody in mind then they could have brought Catherine Afeku back because obviously, they have realized that they don’t have anybody, as for Barbara returning, it is no. Not that she is a bad performer but she didn’t fit in.”