2012 Entertainment was a ‘One step @ Progress’ year

‘GH Entertainment is growing’, a cliché which has a very high tendency of improving this year.

Another year has come and gone and as we say ‘bye-bye’ to 2012 and ‘Akwaaba’ to 2013, it will be right we do an in house recap into how the year has been and how we hope to open a new chapter. 2012 was an election year and unquestionably had most eventful highlights even though the country lost its sitting President, actor Gideon Kotey, Highlife legend, Dr K Gyasi, Nana Ama Mcbrown’s father and Blakk Rasta’s wife among others.

2012 was a big year where so many things (the good, the bad and the ugly) did occur, it was that year when the world got to know that there is more embedded in Ghana than just what they knew from outside. The Azonto dance became almost the world’s official dance step. From the North to the South, East to West, everyone was accredited to twist the right leg and put his or her fist up in the air.

Again we must say that the Personality of the Year in Entertainment should go to the man who is popularly known as the ‘Obidiponbidi’. The industry opened the way for the beauties to unfold: Sarkodie did Ghana proud by winning the BET Awards even if his infamous Irish cream line was blown out of proportion, yet the brother still stood tall. Apart from winning the BET Award for Best African act, he was also the only African act to be featured on the BET Hip Hop Awards Cypher alongside several top American rappers.

He also won and received nominations for several other international awards including MTV EMAs, MOBO Awards, and Channel O Music Video Awards among others. 2012 also saw Sarkodie being crowned Ghana Music Award artist of the year for a second time; he performed with Ludacris on the remix of ‘How Low Can You Go’, and released singles from his joint collaboration album with Jayso. Apart from performing across the globe, he staged the second edition of his ‘Rapperholic Concert’ on Christmas day, pulling a reasonable crowd. He ended the year on a high with his inclusion in Forbe’s list of 13 African stars to watch out for in 2013. Let’s wait and see if it would be third time lucky for the rapper in 2013 as he readies his third album, ‘Sarkology’.

Majid did Ghana proud by winning the AMAA, D-Black won Channel O Awards, Yvonne Nelson, Roseline Ngissah won Papyrus Magazine Screen Actors Awards (PAMSAA) held recently in Abuja, Nigeria, and many others did make the country proud.

2012 was the year new entrants got their ways into the music and movie scenes. It was a calm time when the likes of Kaakie could share the stage with bigger stars in the music industry, a time the likes of Kafui Danku could get the chance to play lead roles alongside bigger stars in the movie industry. Just as new members joined the fraternity, some groups fell apart such as Praye, RnM (who replaced Denice with January), among others.

2012 was that year Ghana sent three representatives to the yearly Big Brother Africa reality show, and without mincing words, the representatives did give their all to be there yet it wasn’t all rosy as Eazzy’s ‘Brazilian hair’ incident added sour to her leaving the house abruptly. Comedian DKB’s slapping of Zainab saw him leave as a villain. An incident he regretted and later apologized by even kissing the Sierra Leone girl’s feet here in Accra. The last of the trio, Keitta did do well to at least stay longer than anyone has done from Ghana. His stay wasn’t without winks as his ‘boxer’ was a topic of discussion.

We may not be able to recount all here on paper, nevertheless the Halloween party put together by Juliet Ibrahim was fun cum funny. That aside, who will ever forget the ‘free show’ of Wanluv Kubolor on Delay’s show? That act kept tongues wagging all months, but who cares if the main man in action never gave a hoot? Fewer attributed scandals could be said of the year 2012, but Raquel who forgot her panties home & showed off her naughty part on stage will be remembered for a long time.

Fashion event weren’t left out of the scheme in 2012 calendar, as we saw Fashion Night Out, Glitz Africa Fashion Week, Ghana Fashion & Design Week, Legon Fashion Week and Citi FM’s Expressions in the City, all take their turns to satisfy the fashion freaks.

Then the Yvonne Nelson, Iyanya, Tonto Dikeh ‘merry-go-round’ love tale. Whoever won the day, from the self imposed romance, to the self declared relationship, to the self imposed break up, all we got itchy about was that it did keep us all in business. Also Mzbel’s pregnancy became topic for discussion, though the sister is stylishly asking all and sundry to mind their business Other matters arising in 2012 which we cannot forget so soon is the way and manner Funny Face got his Range Rover from Tottenham Togolese striker, Emmanuel Sheyi Adebayor. Also we cannot forget the Father-Daughter-Manager triangle which occurred with Kiki Banson, Becca and Mr. Acheampong. Trumpets were blown for days and suddenly it all died down, something hints us that 2013 may see a new twist to the whole issue. With the year almost ending, it saw new beauty queens crowned from Ghana Most Beautiful to Miss Malaika to Miss Ghana 2012, but the latter raised eyebrows when the winner was mentioned. Different camps were built to defend their cases (that’s if there were any). There were different statements which serrated the air and until date so many are yet to be unanswered; statements like ‘sexual bias’, ‘vote rigging’, among others.

In 2012, the events were rolling in back and front and many celebrities made public appearances. One celebrity who made more appearances was Nadia Buari who increased her public appearances but for some reason, she got her styles not complementing her beauty throughout the year. It is either the hair got in her way or she tried something new with dresses which didn’t come out right.

Highlife just didn’t go down well in 2012 unlike the Afro Pop, Hip Life et al which all did positively well. Quality videos must be done this year if we want to truly recognize in the bigger leagues. Fine lines, cute approaches yet the industry must wake up to first hand technologies in dishing great pictures.

In 2012, Back in the Day, 020 Live Concert, Sonnie Badu’s concert, Becca’s Girl Talk, Okyeame Kwame’s Versatile Show, Rapperholic, Malta Guinness’ Top of the World show which saw P Square rock, were shows which brought out the grooves in the hearts of the people. They were great efforts and brilliant coordination which saw their successes. Just as there is best, there is worst, thus, the Radio & Television (RTP) Awards, the fight between Tema and Accra acts at the Nite with the Stars, Lord Kenya’s preaching on stage instead of singing, Ghana Movie Awards all came in handy as some of the worst nights in 2012.

Event organizers have all been guilty in 2012 with bad sound, bad lighting and timing. The Kojo Antwi’s show saw Salif Keita dropped the microphone because of bad sound and walked off the stage because of bad sound. Sonnie Badu witnessed bad sound also.

In all these, we can gladly say that 2012 was that year the Lord had made and we shall be glad and rejoice in it. The lingering itches in the industry hopefully will be patched in 2013.

In 2013, we hope to see more adventurous entertaining industry, more awards, new creative songs and films, bold and daring strides in all fields of organizing events. We hope that no issue will be too small or too big to discuss when our celebrities come in mind. Hopefully we hope to have a scandal free, or let’s say a less scandal free year.

As we always say, in all this, we want to wish you all a beautiful and happy new year. It’s important that during this period, you have fun, party, eat, drink, and sleep. Just responsibly enjoy yourselves without worrying about anything as we ride you smoothly in 2013.