Francis Mensah-Twum, General Secretary of GAPI, told the Ghana News Agency in Accra on Thursday that the cultural policy was “dormant” and virtual silent on the music, in spite of the huge contributions that the industry could make to wealth and job creations, poverty reduction and national development as a whole. The 35-page National Cultural Policy only captures music in one paragraph which reads: “The practice, creation and promotion of all forms of Ghanaians music shall be encouraged by the state.
Production of musical instruments shall be encouraged, so that all schools and communities can own their own instruments.” Mr. Mensah-Twum said the policy failed to define any direction to promote music locally and internationally and that created an unfavourable business climates, as it gave no hope to the music industry.
He noted that even though music and culture were captured under the GPRSII, there had not been any practical steps by the state to help the industry to realize its full potential.
“The objective of the GAPI/BUSAC advocacy action is therefore to seek a review of the policy to ensure that it prioritizes and promotes Ghanaian music and musicians on both the local and international scenes and also firmly links the music industry to other areas of national priority.” He said.
He said the effort was also intended to make it a matter a national policy for the state to ensure that resources and facilities for both the production and appreciation of industry players and to the general public.
Mr. Mensah-Twum said as part of the efforts, BUSAC which had previously funded capacity-building in the music industry had also agreed to find a study visit by members of GAPI to South Africa to learn from their experience and the best practices to inform the proposed review of Ghana’s cultural policy.
He noted that though pragmatic steps at promoting music as a major national development commodity, South Africa now ranked among the leading earners from the music industry, rubbing shoulders with developed countries like the United Kingdom, where the value of cultural goods contributed about 100 billion pounds sterling to their gross domestic product (GDP).
He said the advocacy effort would also include activities such as press conferences, publications of articles and discussed programme in the media, which would also be funded BUSAC to pool ideas from wider sources to inform a more friendly policy.
“We strongly believe that with maximum cooperation from the Ministry of Chieftaincy and Culture through a public private partnership (PPP) approach the cultural industry with music as the anchor will play a major role in the country’s development agenda within a decide,” he said.
Source: Ghanaian Times, Saturday February 7 2009
