Film Industry Expresses Joy

Finally, film actors and producers have heaved a sigh of relief as the National Assembly, after going through some troubling moments, has passed the copyright bill.

Yesterday, your exciting Chronicle entertainment train had the privilege of having an exclusive chat with Mr. Ashangbor Akwetey-Kanwi, the P.R.O of the Ghana Film Producers Association.

Expressing his gratitude to the President for signing the bill, he acknowledged that he was grateful to all the film producers for their efforts at making the bill a reality.

The P R O, who doubles as a producer and has to his credit, over 13 movies, including exciting and audience-attracting ones such as Dangerous Games and Babina, was filled with joy and praises towards the government and all stakeholders for implementing the bill.

He said the law would affect the works of both the film producers and film artistes in a positive way, adding that initially, there was nothing like censorship for locally produced movies but with the law now in place, locally produced movies would be censored.

According to him, the importance of the law was felt when those in the movie industry realized that it had the potential of helping to check the influx of foreign movies, which had for sometime now, been a bane on the local film industry.

"No law was adhered to by film producers and film artistes, hence a whole lot of confusion in the industry," he stated.

He emphasized that in Ghana, anyone from abroad could come and shoot a movie without paying any taxes but abroad, Ghanaians are required to go through the relevant processes before a movie could be filmed. This, he said, was also a reason for the copyright law.

Denouncing the claims by actresses and actors that refusal of film producers to invest in Ghanaian movies was the cause of the low quality of local movies, he said the attitude of the local movie artistes was such that, they always wanted to impress foreign directors, hence they tend to co-operate fully with them than their local directors.

"No wonder the latest movies directed by the Nigerian director, Ifeanyi Onyanibor, (D.G.N) is doing better than the others; this is the nature of Ghanaian film artists," he said.

Mr. Ashangbor said, lack of cooperation on the part of some stakeholders was the cause of some lapses in the movies, especially in terms of location, where many refuse to use their properties for movies for fear of armed robbers.