I led Multimedia’s move to blacklist Sarkodie’s 'Mary' album – Okraku Mantey

President of the Creative Arts Council and Programmes Director for Accra based Hitz FM, Mark Okraku Mantey has revealed he played an instrumental role in a move to blacklist Ghanaian rapper Sarkodie’s fourth album Mary from the Multimedia platforms.

Speaking to Andy Dosty on Hitz FM, Mark explained he was an integral part of the agenda because Sarkodie had disrespected the media outfit some time back.

Monitored by Ghana’s Hub For Pop Culture And Urban Entertainment News – www.nydjlive.com, Mark made this shocking revelation when the issue of artists relationships with media outfits came up. He however stated he later confessed to Sarkodie when things got settled.

“Andy Dosty was the one who felt we had forgotten about it and started playing music from the album…” he said.

On September 14, 2015, Sarkodie in a tweet announced his respect for the media outfit had dropped from “100 to 0” after myjoyonline tweeted an article with headline “I have come of age so I don’t just grant interviews – Sarkodie”.

He felt disappointed the media platform he considered a ‘reliable source’ could ‘turn to tell lies’.

Sarkodie in a later interview apologized to the media outfit.

The rapper, born Michael Owusu Addo in addressing the issue in an interview on the KSM Show, said in spite of the incident, he still loves Joy FM.

“It was a tweet. It was not limited to… Most times, we are not that serious but we check ourselves from time to time. Because I love Joy and I talked about Joy because I love Joy. Just like you, I rarely will go on a show back to back like I do here, but this place feels like home and it’s more genuine.

You bring the best out of people, so they can be themselves. But it’s rare to get that these days because if people need traffic to their websites, they need to create the controversy and negative energy for people to watch.

“Believe it or not, people like bad news more than good news. But the people who choose to go with the good news, if we have two of them and KSM is one, I wouldn’t want to lose you.

So if I lose KSM, I won’t be happy, that was the whole vibe but it was nothing personal. May be the words came out in a bit of disrespectful way but I feel this is a station I love and I don’t want them to go on that path.”

Sarkodie has since maintained a good relationship with the Multimedia outfit and recently honoured an interview on Hitz FM where he spent a considerable amount of time with Andy Dosty on the station’s morning show.

Mark Okraku Mantey took of the opportunity to advise Shatta Wale. He asked him to maintain a better relationship with the media than engage in unnecessary war. He also commended Shatta Wale (who had earlier spoken on the show) for realizing the need to build a better relationship with the media.