GMW Festival, not the same as Ghana Music Week - MUSIGA

The Musicians Union of Ghana (MUSIGA) has debunked allegation by Mad Time Entertainment that the musicians body has stolen its intellectual property - Ghana Music Week.

MUSIGA has launched the second edition of the event and it is scheduled to take place from March 3 to March 9, 2014 at the National Theatre, Accra Sports Stadium and some selected venues in Accra.

Days after MUSIGA launched the 2014 edition of the event, Fennec Okyere and rapper Kwaw Kese have dared the association's President, Bice 'Obour' Osei Kuffour and MUSIGA to go ahead with the festival if he wants to be slapped with a legal suit.

But reacting to the claims by Mad Time Entertainment in an interview on Airtel Entertainment News on Drive Time on Joy FM Monday, Nana Yaw Osei-Darkwa, Communications Director of GMW Festival said MUSIGA has not launched any event by name Ghana Music Week.

"We've launched GMW Festival 2014 [and], we've not launched Ghana Music Week," he stated.

Nana Yaw Osei-Darkwa denied reports by Fennec Okyere, as published by News-One Monday, that before the 2013 edition of the event, MUSIGA had to beg him before that event could come off.

According to him, "Ghana Music Week then, 2013, was launched in September of 2012 and then we had press briefing here in Accra in January 2013 before the main event went on between the 4th and 10th of March, 2013."

"The questions we want to ask is when did Fennec and his team register Ghana Music Week?" The GMW Festival Communications Director quizzed.

Asked what GMW stands for, Nana Yaw Osei-Darkwa said "GMW is our new brand that we've launched following what we did last year," but fell short of giving the full meaning of the acronym except to say "we will like to hold that to our chest for now."

Below is a full statement issued by MUSIGA Monday on the matter:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ALL MEDIA HOUSES
PRESS STATEMENT
Date: 10th February 2014
HEADING: GMW FESTIVAL ON COURSE : NO FIGHT OVER
GHANA MUSIC WEEK
Our attention has been drawn to news making rounds in some media circles of a story headlined “ Fight Over Ghana Music Week” published today Monday, 10th february2014 edition of the News One Newspaper which has been reviewed by other media houses and carried by several online platforms.

In the said story filed by Nii Ogbamey Tetteh of News One, Fennec Okyere, an artiste manager of rapper Kwaw Kese threatens to take

the Musicians Union of Ghana (MUSIGA) to Court for Launching “GMW FESTIVAL 2014” because according to Fennec Okyere he

owns the franchise “GHANA MUSIC WEEK”
The Musicians Union of Ghana (MUSIGA) wish to state categorically and emphatically clear that content of the said publication is untrue and fabrications by those purporting same to create tension for which we cannot explain.

In the said publication, Fennec Okyere was quoted as saying that as far back as 2013 when MUSIGA launched the Ghana Music week he already had registered the event and therefore had the legal right over the event. The story goes further to state that after broader

consultations he Fennec yielded to pleas for MUSIGA to be allowed to go ahead with the event last year.

The above statements could not be true because Ghana Music week 2013 was officially launched on 11th September, 2012. What even

beats our imagination is that Kow Kese, an artiste managed by Fennec who claims to own the company “Ghana Music Week” was paid to perform on the very event he claimed to own.

Another obvious untruth is where he claims ownership before the event was even launched in 2012 when he indeed registered the

“Ghana Music Week” as a private business in April 2013 after Musiga had already organized the event with partners from March 4-10, 2013, an obvious exercise of bad fate and mischief.

By the above statement of facts, we of the Musicians Union of Ghana want to assure all partners, sponsors and the good music loving fans of our great country Ghana that there is no fight whatsoever regarding the GMW FESTIVAL 2014 and that such calculated and mischievous stories calculated to throw dust in the eyes of the public must be ignored and treated with all the contempt it deserves.

The Musicians Union of Ghana (MUSIGA) is focused and determined to develop the GMW FESTIVAL into a huge international event as part of our nations drive towards tourism development. For the next three years we would be running under the theme: “Promoting Music as the Heartbeat of Tourism”.

We are by this statement also urging our partners in development, the media to cross check facts before putting them out for public consumption.

It is our fervent hope that the stated untruths published may be corrected for the knowledge of the consumption of the general public

and patrons of GMW FESTIVAL 2014.
Nana Yaw Osei-Darkwa
(Communications Director)  Story by Ghana | Myjoyonline.com | Ernest Dela Aglanu (Twitter: @delaXdela / Instagram: citizendela)