LIKE A DOUBLE edged-sword, the new strategy for selling audio tapes and CDs with floats on the principal streets of cities in country, has come as a solution for initiators, and a problem to people who do the same business in shops.

What movie producers started, has now become a norm among music producers. All it takes is to negotiate for a pick-up truck, arrange for a sounds system, get a stand-by generator, gather a few jobless boys or girls, and make the street the market point.

For some months now, this has impacted as a new order and buyers are getting used to obtaining tapes and CDs of their favourite artistes in the streets.

The question is, what impression is this creating?
For Mr. John Agbenu, CEO of Precise Music Production, who is presently selling copies of Princess Efioma’s Dependable God on a float, ‘this has come to help than destroy’.

He does not see anything wrong with selling tapes and CDs from a moving truck fitted with loud speakers.

Mr. Agbenu explained that the world had changed from “when you have to sit and wait for customers”, to a time when “you have to chase the customers with whatever product, in the streets.”

Though John admitted the fact that the trucks made excessive noise, thus disturbing public peace, he emphasized also that this new sales technique had created jobs for a good number of unemployed youth.

Generally, John believed this was a positive change for people like him, who had invested so much into music, but who, due to low patronage, tended to lose, eventually.

“This is better than before, when our products were only sold in shops,” he stressed.

On the contrary, Kwame of Big Ben Music Centre felt this was in no way helping them, as this system reduced the value of their products, as well as destroyed the market of record shops like his.

According to him, because of the floats, people did not even see why they should walk to a record shop when they could easily obtain the tapes and CDs on the streets.

He agreed that the local music industry was not as vibrant as it used to be, but did not think making so much noise and creating traffic in town with cheap CDs and tapes was the remedy.

“In my opinion, this practice must be banned outright, because it is doing more harm than good to us,” stated Kwame, who could not hide his resentment.

Our investigations unveiled that this new practice only required obtaining permit from the police and the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA).

In an interview with Mr. Aryeetey, head of the Metro Health Department of AMA, it was disclosed however that only a handful of those practising this system, came for permits from them.

It is clear also that AMA does not have absolute control over the situation, because, according to Mr. Aryeetey, his office presently did not have any policy or laws to monitor the activities of the truck drivers.

To the boys who ran beside the trucks with the tapes and CDs in traffic, this had become the sole source of employment and they could not see anything wrong with it.

On the other hand, Paa Agyekum, a cassette dealer at Kantamanto in Accra, was crying foul, because he too believed the floats had mobility advantage over people like him, who had to sit in his shop to await customers. “They are destroying our business,” he too complained.

“Nobody wants to come and buy tapes and CDs from us anymore. The Government should place a ban on their operations, because they create excessive noise in the metropolis,” Agyekum stated.

Indeed, the float system has come with its bottlenecks but until AMA comes out with a laid down policy to monitor the activities of these truck drivers and street sellers of music and movies, it shall remain as ‘legalised’ as it seems now.