'Africa Rising' video; a shame to Africa?

At this modern age, some people in the western world still think that Africans live on trees like monkeys, that the African is domiciled in a squalid environment and that the African is synonymous with poverty and disease.

It takes creative artistes like filmmakers, writers and musicians to tell a good story about the good things we have here too. Like philosophy, art is meant to change the world.

Monitor international media and all they write about Africa are war, poverty, sicknesses and corruption. They don't put their spotlights on the good things that we do.

So if the outsiders would continue to paint the bad side of us, why do we not paint the good side when we get the opportunity?

The summary of my piece is that I have watched the video of a song called Africa Rising put together by Multichoice Africa that features 6 African artistes including Sarkodie from Ghana; Davido, Tiwa Savage and Diamond Platnumz all from Nigeria; Bongo Flava from Tanzania, Micasa from South Africa. I puked at seeing it.

“The Africa Rising campaign underscores the Multichoice's passion for Africa's development on the ethos of creating shared value. Thus, the main objective of the Africa Rising campaign is to encourage Africans to stand up and make a positive impact on the continent.” The song is very good.

I love it to bits, but I was not happy when I saw the video. I hear it was shot in Ghana but as to why they chose to shoot it in the slums still beats my mind. They could have shot some of the scenes at some beautiful and tourist sites we have in the country.

The song is titled Africa Rising, but the scenes don't project Africa rising from mediocrity. It should rather have been named Africa Sinking.

So the theme of the song jars with what was portrayed in it and I am very disappointed. Africans must grow. We have challenges as Africans, but we also have our good sides.

Let the world know about the positive stories of Africa, enough of the gloomy pictures!

We must liberate ourselves from the fetters of over – westernization, purge ourselves of inferiority complex and stand for what is good. Shooting that video at dirty places in Ghana is not African.

This is the time to imbue ourselves with a sense of worth, the spirit of cherishing what God has blessed us with as a people and let the world know that we are not 'animals.' Africans are not monkeys. Africans are not dumb.

Africans are human beings like any other species of human beings in the world. If we all want to cause a positive change in the African society, we cannot and should not leave the burden on only the politicians.

In fact, we (in the arts) needn't let the politicians have 100% stake in steering the affairs of the nation. We can use our works to cause change and instigate developmental projects.

We can change our ways of thinking by continually thinking about that which is positive and doing positive stuff in this regard. That is the mandate of the creative artist; the musician shouldn't always be singing about sex; the movie makers shouldn't always be portraying witchcraft; the writer shouldn't always be writing about things that have no bearing on their immediate society.

The change we seek starts in the mind and if the creative artiste doesn't know he is an agent of change in his society, then we would always have videos like that which was shot for the Africa Rising song.

Aside that, I would to rate the song 90%; all the artistes on board delivered immaculately and to those who say Sarkodie's rap should have been in Twi, I beg to differ.

It is difficult for rap music to be enjoyed if the language is either unintelligible or alien to the listener of the song. As I always say, melodies defy this rule, and that is why songs in different languages that used in sending their messages across can be enjoyed without understanding the languages in which they are sung.

My plea to all creative artists is that anytime such opportunities come our way let's not forget about how influential we are in society. Be good ambassadors of Africa.

Watch 'Africa Rising':