Reports reaching Beatwaves indicate that some individuals in the
National Democratic Congress (NDC) are putting more pressure on Sidney
Barima Ofori, one of Ghana’s young hiplife artistes, to release his
latest song “Africa Money” to the party to use as its campaign song for
the 2008 elections.

Ever since the song was released two months ago it has attracted the attention of Ghanaian as well as African politicians, who see it as one of the best songs composed against corruption.

“Africa Money” talks about how some of our politicians amass wealth at the expense of the poor tax-payer.

The reports revealed that the ‘agents’ tasked to negotiate with Sidney had thousands of US dollars and British pounds sterling in briefcases to influence Sidney to release the song to them at all costs.

Rumours making the rounds indicate that apart from the NDC, another political party had shown interest in the song and some personalities in that party were also trying hard to persuade the artiste to sell the song to them.

Although many see “Africa Money” as a political song, Sidney insists it is a social song meant for everyone to enjoy and would not allow it to be used by any political party to tease its opponents.

At the moment, Sidney, who is in a very tight corner, is holding series of meetings with his management team on the issue. He told Beatwaves in a chat: “I am not going to release my song to any political party to use as its campaign song during this year’s elections. I do not want my song to be politicized and there is nothing to discuss with any political party about the song”.

The hiplife artiste, who considers himself as someone who believes in Ghana first, was of the view that he did not want his song to be associated with any political party, and that he wanted everybody to just enjoy the song.