Entertainment

Here Is Why Africans Artists Receive Their BET Awards Backstage And The Way Forward

By Joseph Lubandi

Posted on June 30, 2015

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In 2013 we were all very happy when Radio and Weasel got nominated in the BET awards for Best International Act (Africa), Ice Prince won the award though.

That year Ice Prince plus our own Radio and Weasel appeared on stage to accept the award making Ice Prince the first African act to receive his award on stage after years of complaints from the African audience about BET treating our homegrown acts with disrespect.

The world later found out that not only did Ice Prince collect his award offstage. His acceptance speech did not air in the US and even more painful for the African audience. Ice Prince later confirmed in an interview with Huffington Post Live, that he was given his award on stage just before the live broadcast of the show kicked off.

In 2014 Davido and Tiwa Savage were nominated in the Best International Act category and guess what, they also got the same treatment.

In 2015 EddyKenzo is bringing us the international viewers choice BET award and however he also recieved his award not on the main stage.
Africa is asking WHY?…….

According to KKD who is one of the African Adjudicators for BET’s International Acts – Africa, and he explained why BET organizers usually give African acts their awards off stage, read his statement below.

1) First, BET is a huge American
brand so their audience is Americans or people living in America. They have a responsibility to their audience, to generate income, pay taxes to the government of America, create employment, promote artistes or performers with their culture, and to be competitive in their market.

2) Because of all these, they won’t lose what we call ‘the battle for the eye ball.’ So BET is doing us good by giving us (Africans) nominations or awards in their award scheme. BET may create opportunities for Africans by giving us nomination or award, recognize us for our culture or learn from them, but they do not see us as superior over theirs! They give recognition and praise to their best thinkers, creators, manufacturers, etc. Already, we Africans don’t see our artistes or musicians as big! We see artistes in UK or America as bigger than our own, so the point is, in as much as we don’t see the greatness in our own; we shouldn’t expect others to see them as such!

3) Besides, not all awards are given on stage in this world. It happens at the OSCARS. I’m not justifying BET’s actions anyway. I’ve raised concerns on this issue before at BET’s jury meetings many times. I hope the status quo may change someday. All great cultures, appreciates their own! Let’s start believing and celebrating our own African artists and others will follow suit.

ADVICE TO THOSE AFRICAN ARTISTS
NOMINATED IN BET
a) Does it benefit to boycott these awards????
b) Does it benefit to diss these awards????
c) What is the use anyway of getting nominated in the BET????

Once you get an international nomination like BET, book a flight, book a hotel and fly all the way to America. It may not necessarily be about the award, but the artiste can use the privilege to build link, network, or collaborate with producers, artistes, media outfits, distribution and marketing outfits, etc.

So there you have it people! Americans take pride in their own!

Let our African acts attending the awards use the opportunity to Network! Network!! Network!!! Our African music has already gone farther than anyone could imagine, one day they will not be able to ignore us!

Credit: Douglas Lwanga