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Gospel musician OJ fumes at Charterhouse

Minister OJ has argued that the gospel music has limited categories out of over twenty-eight and scrapping one is unfair to the gospel fraternity.

Minister OJ

Michael Oware Sakyi, popularly known as Minister OJ is asking Charterhouse, organizers of the annual Ghana Music Awards to ‘take Gospel musicians out’ of the awards if it considers them not important.

His comments came on the back of claims that the Gospel Album of the Year category faces a possible exclusion from this year’s edition.

“The question we must even ask ourselves is, how many categories do we have for gospel on the entire Ghana Music Awards? We have three slots out of over twenty and you want to scrap one… if they don’t want us to be part of the awards, they should take us out,” he said on Hitz FM’s Showbiz This Week with MzGee.

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Public Relations Officer of Charterhouse, George Quaye in an earlier interview on Hitz FM indicated that there have been discussions regarding whether or not to maintain the Gospel Album of the Year category in the 17 edition.

According to him, the argument has been why there should be such a category when the same cannot be said of other genres. George indicated that the Vodafone Ghana Music Awards board will take a decision on that when they sit.

“Some section of the public have opined strongly that if other genres do not have album categories but compete in the general category, why should there be a Gospel Album of the Year category? Why shouldn’t there be Highlife, Reggae/Dancehall Album of the Year categories as well? It is a discussion that has gone on on several platforms and I’m sure it is something that will come up when the board sits,” he told host, KMJ.

Minister OJ, however, opined that he was sure the category will be taken out because there is nobody on the board to speak for gospel musicians.

“Already we don’t have the voice… we don’t have anybody to do that for us on the board. How many gospel musicians are on the board? There’ve been several times that my song has come up for Song Writer of the Year but because I don’t have any voice on the board speaking for the gospel genre, sometimes when it comes to voting, they’ll vote against the gospel people so already we are at a disadvantage,” he noted.

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Gifty Osei won the Gospel Album category in 2012 with her Fefeefe album while Cwesi Oteng’s Mercy Project won in 2013. Nyame Eguama by Joyce Blessing and Evangelist Diana Asamoah’s Pentecost Asoredwom won in 2014 and 2015 respectively. The award is mostly given during the Industry Awards night.

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