One of Ghana’s finest musicians D-Black says he has never taken any royalties from the Ghana Music Rights Organization (GHAMRO).
D-Black speaking in an interview on TV3’s New Day said he once received a call from a representative of GHAMRO to come for his royalties but he rejected the said amount.
He also said GHAMRO rather indicated to him the disbursement was being made based on how relevant and/or hot a particular artiste is.
He said his decision to reject was because the mode of disbursement made no sense to him.
“Royalty collection has been going on in Ghana for years. Media outlets have been paying royalties to the body that collects these monies but they haven’t been disbursed the manner it should,”
“Never”, his response when asked if he has ever received royalties for the ten years he’s been a musician.
“I have [been called] but it didn’t make any sense to me because I was on a radio station one time discussing a very similar issue and because I was upset or whatever, somebody from there [GHAMRO] texted me that this year, for A List artistes, everybody gets GHC600.
“I receive royalties from all over the world and that’s not how it is disbursed. You’re supposed to show me a statement, the logging, how many times my songs were played…” he noted.
D-Black revelead that he once went to the Finance Ministry with the then MUSIGA President Obour to convince the government to fund the music industry but he has lost patience in the whole system.
“In 2011, it was my first year in the music industry. I met Obour and he asked me and some other artistes to go with him to the Ministry of Finance to convince the government to fund the music industry. I asked him what the money was going to be used for. They told me it was a top priority, we will set up a royalty collection society and system put in place to track and log in the songs that are played from each artiste so that everybody can make money,” he recalled.
“We went for that meet, the budget was read. This was when Atta Mills had passed. They said they had given MUSIGA two million Ghana cedis. It’s been 9 years so when you say I don’t have the patience to wait, I’ve been waiting for 9 years,” D Black added.
