Carlos Sakyi is power drunk…GHAMRO must work for musicians

Getting drunk or intoxicated in any kind or form is not a good thing and that’s what I believe is happening to Carlos Sakyi. Like I’ve always said royalties is the back bone of every musician that’s why some of us had to sacrifice two years of our time fighting Alhaji Sidiku Buari and COSGA just because we knew they were doing the wrong things.

After the successful overthrow of Sidiku and his followers, GHAMRO was setup in haste and was given at most 2 year to put up the relevant structures in place so as to alleviate composers and publishers from the abject poverty we were facing at that time.

The whole idea after taking over was to bring on board experts in the field of collective management organization whiles we supervise their activities since you and I know that Carlos and co have no formal training in that field but were just copyright advocates.

Three years down the lane and nothing we planned happened in fact worse things than the previous administration are happening.

Dictatorship: Soon after Carlos became chairman he became a dictator as well. It is in the constitution that an AGM be held yearly. It’s been three years and not even one meeting has been held and is that not throwing away the constitution he himself wrote?

Accountability: During the struggle, one of the key issues we raised was accountability. It’s been three years and not even a single Audited account to show; in fact no one knows the accounts from the transition period i.e. from COSGA to GHAMRO till date.

Transparency: GHAMRO is shrouded in secrecy and if a board member who speaks his mind, the person is victimized and I believe that’s why Rex Omar and Charles Amoah resigned from the board knowing how vocal they are. Recently quiet Kojo Antwi also came out with some allegations and also threatened to resign.

Funnily enough Carlos threatened to take him to court, I was shocked and was waiting for that showdown even though I knew it would never come on like some bouts I know off because I personally know the role Kojo Antwi and Amakye Dede played when we were fighting for our freedom so for Carlos to turn around to threaten him with court action now then he must be really power drunk.

Amakye Dede in recent times had also had course to complain about transparency in GHAMRO but Carlos again didn’t give a hoot. In fact, he didn’t give a rat’s behind what any of them cares.

Just recently when GAPI with Francis Twum called for the long overdue elections, what happened? Some stories of Francis Twum embezzle some internet monies erupted from know where which lead to his arrest and detention for three days behind bars.

I’m not saying Carlos caused his arrest since I don’t have any evidence to prove that, but my point is why this issue now, is it because he, Francis was raising legitimate concerns about the industry we all belong to?

One thing I know is that unlike GHAMRO when you are dealing with downloads on the internet, accountability is key and they can give you and in fact detailed report as to who, when and where your songs were downloaded and payments they made to you, so for someone to make that an issue I really smelt desperation.

Until now I had some misgivings about Obour’s loyalty since he was been portrayed in a certain way. It was alleged that he suggested that Carlos and co be paid even more than the 3,000ghc they are been paid now and recently when John Mensah was speaking on the reason why the elections was been delayed he again fingered Obour, so when I turned on my laptop to read the letter from Obour to Carlos Sakyi, I knew I owed him one and I expect all his fellow musicians to rally behind him before GHAMRO tries to victimize him even though I know it’s be too late for GHAMRO to try anything silly but hey you never know.

My major concern is not to do with the holding of an elections because we can go and elect some balled headed greedy bandits who will come and siphon our copyrights monies but it’s with putting the right systems and structures in place so that no matter who we elect, he or she would not be able to manipulate the system but work for the good of our industry.

My advice to my good friend Carlos is that when you are drunk you seem to think that you are the only wise person on earth but in reality you could be wrong and that no amount of media gimmicks and antics can save him and his followers. He should take a cue from Muammar Gaddafi and Sadam Hussien.