Saturday's Mentor II Grand Final, Its Prince Or Joe

The fear of eviction and the stress thereof when it becomes a reality; the uncertainty of listening to one?s destiny as pronounced by four judges and the tension associated with emerging from back stage to face an unpredictable audience are no experiences to feel comfortable about.

But these have been the lot of, first, 12 youngmen and ladies and now four gentlemen over a 15-week period during which the Mentor II reality show sunk deep into the collective psyche of Ghanaian music fans and television viewers.

Over the period, some of the contestants have sang their way into the hearts of the audiences to the extent that the eight evictions so far have stirred their own varied reactions and caused many to voice out their reservations about the programme.

That notwithstanding, four finalists will compete for the ultimate prize at the National Theatre in Accra but the winning crown seems to be hanging over the heads of Prince and Joe though Kofi and Dee look determined to beat them by sheer confidence, poise and creativity on stage.

Joe has been tagged as the ?Humble Lion? by the public because though he is very creative and confident in his performances, he appears to be the quiet and reserved type. Apart from having a good voice, his dancing skills are unbeatable.

Prince was a good performer and hence, his eviction shocked most people including some of the judges. His voting back into the house surprisingly proved that a sad experience had transformed him into a giant since his marks topped the others in almost every show according to the voting polls.

Kofi had gathered a lot of public fans from the very beginning of the show due to his versatility and comic stagecraft. He is not only good at tuning his voice to perfectly suit those of the musicians whose songs he sings but he is well versed at imitating their stage performances as well.

?Big Daddy? Dee has created his own constituency with his own blend of power and and energy on stage and keeps surprising many fans week in and week out.

To many fans this far, Mentor 1 was more exciting than Mentor 2 but most of them could not clearly point out the main cause of the sharp contrast, in terms of excitement, between the two shows.

While some fans claim that the contestants in Mentor 1 were more interesting to watch than those in Mentor 2, others blamed the lack of excitement in the second show on the short time between the two programmes.
To the latter group, following a show of such nature with a second one in the same year could create fatigue within the audiences and viewers and also take the appeal for it out of the public.

Showbiz gathered from a section of the crowd that they used to be great fans of Mentor 1 but have lost interest in the second show for no apparent reason and hence, do not watch it at all.

A large section of the public still feel nostalgic about Mentor 1 and its controversies and still question the where-abouts of the winners of that edition namely Prince, Andy, Ruth and Maya.
As part of their prizes, the four were promised a trip to London to enhance their talent in a music school there but organisers till date have kept the public wondering whether they have fulfilled that part of the promise or not.

Despite the fact that Mentor had unearthed the talents hidden in the young folks and are still helping them pursue their music careers by promoting the music video clips of those who have brought out albums on TV3, most viewers feel the organisers should have ensured that all the four winners received every prize they deserved before introducing Mentor 2 on the screen.

Another thing people found fault with during the running of Mentor 2 on the screens was the ?wrongful? eviction of some ?good? contestants who did not deserve it and majority attributed this to the voting system where the public has 70% of the votes with the judges taking 30%.

Mr. Emmanuel Amoako, Production Editor of Daily Graphic and a regular viewer of both Mentor 1 and 2, expressed his indignation at the evictions of three of the Mentor 2 contestants whom he believed had the qualities to make it to Sunday?s final. His prefered talents are found in Prince, Sandy (Obolo) and Vic.

To him, the three were good performers who did not deserve to be evicted. ?The voting out of these three clearly shows that there is something wrong with the voting pattern and this needs to be reviewed by organisers or else, any other future Mentor show would greatly lose public appeal.?

To him those three evictions seriously undermined the high standard previously associated with the show and robbed it of some of its mass following.

He said the 70%-30% ratio in favour of the public should be changed to something like 60% for the public and 40% for the judges because the existing system dubiously afforded the public the chance to organise groups which would text their votes multiple times for one particular contestant, thereby blocking other people?s chances of voting objectively.

?I am told some groups have been organised and funded by some organisations to buy units and text for a particular contestant; by this arragement such a person will remain in contention whether he performs well or not.?

Pamela Brown, another fan of Mentor suggested that the voting ratio should be 50/50 for both judges and the public because the existing system caused the eviction of undeserving contestants.
She also complained that the idea of voting back an evictee into the house was a waste of time and did not make the show a serious one. ? In Mentor 1, only Martin was voted back in but Mentor 2 has had two people voted back which is not fair to the other evictees who would never get the chance to improve on their past flaws.?

Kwabena Asamoah, a journalist, said that since the show?s main objective was to tap and nurture musical talents in the youth, the major decision of who deserved to stay or be evicted should not be left in the hands of the public who only vote based on their personal favourites and not on the talent of the contestants.

? Apart from the fact that the voting system gives room for suspicion of bias, Mentor might be at the losing end since other competitive talent hunt reality shows like MNet?s West African Idol are coming up? he said.

He was of the opinion that Mentor should be designed to groom contestants for the international stage and that the idea of voting back evictees should be totally erased in order to make the programme look more serious.

Despite its popularity, both Mentor 1 and 2 had been tagged by a section of the public as shows not committed to fully developing music talents in the youth.

While some observed that the contestants were not allowed to sing songs they themselves had composed but rather sang the songs of already established musicians, others said that the contestants were not taught how to play musical instruments or read music and that the concentration was more on producing singers than musicians.