Minister of Tourism, Arts and culture, Catherine Afeku
The Ghana Association of Audio and Audio-Visual Distributors (GAAD) has charged the Minister of Tourism, Arts and culture, Madam Catherine Afeku, to get down to work and solve the dwindling fortunes of the creative arts industry.
The Public Relations Officer of GAAD, Yaw Agyapong Britwum famously known as Osunku says the minister's 'diplomatic way' of discharging her duties has not helped the industry in any way.
" The President appoints sector Ministers to seek the welfare of jurisdictions under their control. The likes of the minister of lands and natural resources has done a good job fighting galamsey because he gets down to the ground to get firsthand information but our case is different. " he said this in an interview with graphic showbiz.
According to Yaw Agyapong , the Tourism Minister doesn't come down to the ground to know what is really happening. He added that this is not helping solve the problems of the creative arts industry.
" It's been two years since the new government came to power and interestingly , we are yet to meet the Minister when we are one of the most important branches of the creative arts sector," he added.
GAAD is a major distribution outlet in the country and have contributed immensely to the careers of musicians and film makers via the sale of CDs . Due to advancement in technology , the CD system has been ignored as modern day Musicians and Film makers go the digital way.
He disclosed that the above problems are some of the problems amongst others that they face but the Minister needs better information on so that she can execute solutions to them. He believes that it is only those on the ground that can give the Minister accurate information .
" It is quite interesting to hear people make comments that the sale of CDs is old fashioned . Who determines what is old fashioned? For me, such arguments can't hold because there are people in the hinterlands and other towns who can't get access to effective Internet to buy songs online. So how will they get access to these songs if not for the availability of CDs? he quizzed.
He proceeded by saying that we should not underrate the works of Kantamanto distributors as irrelevant because of new ways of distribution that technology has introduced but the interest of the masses should be considered.
He concluded by saying that radio stations are abusing the works of artistes without any proper remuneration. According to him radio stations use the works of Musicians to play test transmission close to six months and they don't give Musicians a penny for using their songs to find their feet.
