Ghanaian highlife musician Dada Hafco believes that the culture and creative industries hold greater fortunes for the country than sports.
Dada Hafco, worried about the nation’s lackadaisical attitude towards the arts, told Kwame Dadzie on Joy FM’s Showbiz A-Z that if more resources were pumped into the arts, Ghana would make bigger gains.
According to him, the investment made into football has not yielded the desired results.
“Look at how much money we’ve been pumping into the Black Stars. I am an avid football lover. I would love to watch football every time. But since 1982 if we haven’t won any football trophy why do we keep doing it when in recent times Ghana has become a hub for entertainment every Christmas?” he asked.
“Why are we not channelling enough energy [into the arts] because entertainment is actually putting Ghana on the map more than even football so why are we not putting more energy into that?” Hafco added.
The highlife musician also bemoaned lack of a collective agenda to promote Ghanaian music as one of the nemeses of the music industry in Ghana.
According to him, if the Broadcasting Law is passed to give assent to playing more local songs than foreign songs on Ghanaian radio, a lot of songs that have been consigned to the back by some DJs will make their way into their playlists.
He also noted that though he believes every artiste in Ghana should be free to venture into music genres of their choice, highlife should be projected to be the face of Ghana’s music.
Dada Hafco, is one half of the defunct highlife duo Mframa known for songs such as ‘Fiili Gadoochi’, ‘Ghana Lady’, ‘Meboso’, among others.
Since he went solo, he has released songs like ‘Yebewu Nti’, ‘Obarima’, ‘Our Story’, ‘Bedianko’ and ‘Friends’.
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