One question on my mind as Mobo 2014 came to an end last night, where was Africa?? As I sat wondering what MOBO actually meant, my phone started the pings, the texts and the phone calls, what happened at the MOBOs? Why was there a 'blatant' disregard for Africa.
After sitting through 2 whole hours waiting excitedly to see who would bring the award home for Africa, they had the audacity not to televise it.
Is it that we are a voiceless continent? Or a people of no Value? Is this MOBO the same one that Kanya King (Half Ghanaian) started off and sold to the community as an awards that would celebrate the Black community (Music of Black Origin)?
I paused, where was the Reggae, Gospel, where was the 'Afrobeats', where is therespect?? After the great year and impact that Afrobeats has had, one would expect this to be a year it would get its deserved recognition. Afterall, would I be wrong in saying Afrobeats is somewhat closest to the 'Origin' that MOBO celebrates? (Correct me if I am wrong).
So some of the excuses that I saw tweeted around was due to the fact that it was aired on ITV2 and because of the advertisement breaks, there were the time constraints to take into consideration. I am not going to buy that for one bit. I and I'm sure I speak for many of us, would expect the producers to ensure that theKEY genre categories in the year are represented favorably and no one can argue about the impact of Afrobeats from charts to playgrounds nationwide over the last 12 months.
I was sent a YouTube link to witness Fuse ODGaccepting his award. Totally unacceptable. The fact that Afrikan Boy and Mista Silva fans dominated my twitter timeline for days urging people to vote obviously did not count for anything as they were not even called upon to even grace the MOBO stage with a performance.
If there were time constraints, surely the MOBO's is an awards ceremony so shouldn't the awards have been the most important part?? Cut down some of the performances and televise what people want to see!!!
Is it time to really gather together and put on a real awards show and boycott the likes of the MOBO's that use our community and sell us out?
One thing that is sure is its time for change and we have to learn lessons from how Kanya King has decided to treat her roots!
In closing, if you were to ask me 'Did the MOBO's snub Africa?? My answer would be a BIG 'YES'. What I will say is 'Congratulations' to all those who did win and were televised.
Africa is the origin of all black people and black music, MOBO I was told and read means Music of Black origin, how do you celebrate music and ignore the origin except you use the origin to create a concept and diversify it for self interest commercial purposes . So in summary Africa was recognised but not televised , why? maybe because "Africa" is not relevant. Which means a real solution must come from Africans.
Or why else would you play Afrobeats in your adverts before the event, on the evening show your hosts , entertainment and multiple non black award winners and not have enough time to show the African Act category?
Do I see a 'Afrobeats Music Awards' in the horizon??? WATCH THIS SPACE.
Please drop your comments below and let's hear what you think.
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