Akwasi Agyemang, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Tourism Authority (GTA) has clarified that his company does not provide any form of financial support to event organizers.
According to him, the conception out there in the minds of Ghanaians that the firm gives financial support to organizers of major events is not true. He asserted that the authority cannot fund every event since it is not their mandate to do so.
Akwasi Agyeman made this revelation during an exclusive interview with Andy Dosty on Daybreak Hitz, emphasizing that the GTA only believes in providing some sort of support to event organizers who want to work with them to be a part of the December in GH initiative.
Agyemang to a greater extent disclosed that the logo of the authority is a confirmation that the state endorses these events they associate with.
“We are not a funding agency for events. What we do is give the people some confidence that this event will happen. For it to become an official December in GH event, we put our logo on it. You cannot just put our logo on your event.
“We can not say we will pay for every event. That is not how public money is used. It’s on a case-by-case basis. Generally, the letter that you will get states that we have given you permission to organise the event and use our logo. That one is clear. We are not a funding agency for events,” he explained.
He further stated that there are some instances where they support with some resources to help certain events that come to them with last-minute emergencies. He then cited an instance where some event organizers came to the GTA to pull out of the December in GH initiative because they had challenges with their sound.