Thousands turn up for Independence dinner

The beat of last Saturday’s Ghana as One Gala is still drumming on hours after the event. Guinness in collaboration with Areeba put together a night of dinner, music and fashion at the Golden Village (a.k.a the Independence Square) with The Whispers, Howard Hewitt, and some local acts, who did their best to entertain the massive audience of 2,500. The Independence Square became one huge fun planet on the night with traditional dances – adowa, damba, abgadza etc at the entrance. The open area had been decorated beautifully to seat and feed as many as 2500 people. There was a projector mounted to relay whatever was happening on stage to those who were seated further off. It does not matter what you may say, feeding this large number of people in an orderly fashion with no long queues is not an easy task. But the organizers did a great job at it. Each set of seats had waiters and caterers assigned so it made it easy to access whatever your heart desired.
KKD emceed the show with Jerusalem-born, Anita Erskine showing off their verbal dexterity with French phrases here and there. KKD’s jokes offended some people and he was kind enough to apologise… but then he told more offensive jokes.

The night started with Ola Williams and Kwasi Gyasi’s doing the usual gospel routine, giving programme a spiritual start. The fashion show was very banal and it drowned many in. Many people got up to leave when it got too boring and dreary. Probably because they were unable to really see what they were doing and more because the audience was expecting more music. Some wondered if the long speeches from the sponsors were necessary. But Howard Hewett from the group Shamalar lifted up the spirit of the place with Shamalar’s magic tracks I Can Make You Feel Good, Friends, A Night to Remember and The Second Time Around. There were dedicated dance areas so people could get down and boogie as did many people.
Before the Whispers rocked the audience steady, Jewel Ackah, Gyedu Blay Ambulay, and Paapa Yankson held the fort as best as they could. They handed the mic over to Samini, whose act is becoming too ‘one way’. In between, there were freebies being distributed all over: GTP calendars, Areeba giveaways and some Maggi Nkrakra powder. The organizers made sure that everyone who attended the show had something to take home to remember the night by.
The Whispers took over the stage with a big bang, sliding from side to side with their skillful and brilliant old school dance moves. And the Beat Goes On and Rock Steady were among the tracks they performed that night.
Finally, Mr. Music Man, Kojo Antwi moved through a compilation of his hits and held the audience spellbound till 4:30am on Sunday. Some went to the extent of shining his shoes on stage. The Maestro’s performance was rated by many as one of the best act of the night. Adez and Vic (from Mentor II) made it clear that there was no replacing Nana Yaa’s voice on any Kojo Antwi number.