The Confederation of African Football, CAF has finally commented on dancehall artiste, Shatta Wale not performing at the 2017 edition of its annual awards held at the Accra International Conference Center on Thursday, January 4.
In a statement signed by the president of the football body, Ahmad Ahmad, the organisation blamed headline sponsors, Aiteo Group for the mishap. They further requested for an explanation from the Nigerian energy conglomerate on why the ‘Dancehall King’ hitmaker did not appear on stage as planned.
According to the press statement cited by Zionfelix.net, CAF agreed with the company to book the services of dancehall heavyweight Shatta Wale and Lynx Entertainment artiste Kidi so they were taken aback when Shatta Wale did not mount the stage to entertain patrons at the venue and millions who were watching on TV.
We had agreed with them, in pursuit of continental spread of the performers, to ensure a regional balance and a strong local representation of at least two musicians from the host nation Ghana – Kidi and Shatta Wale. We sincerely apologize and take full responsibility for that.
However, that did not happen and there is the need for an explanation from them on why that was the case in order to make next year’s event more successful.” Ahmad Ahmad said in the statement concerning Wale’s no show.
Shatta Wale however in a phone conversation with Sammy Flex on Zylofon FM in Accra said he was booked for $30,000 but failed to perform at the show because he felt disrespected by the show organisers.
““I don’t have a contract with CAF. Nobody had contacted me. Two days to the event, then someone contacted me that CAF is offering $30,000. I have worked with CAF before and I know they don’t do things like that. Some of us should be very careful in this country. We are killing ourselves. I need to be paid well. This is my home. I have taken the money and nobody can take it from me because I didn’t sign any contract with anybody. I don’t know why somebody can just go and collect $30,000, come and give it to me and tell me to go and perform while I’ve not seen my contract.
When they (CAF) wanted me in Nigeria last year, they wrote emails two months to the event before we were able to seal a deal. We had a schedule. Here in Ghana, two days to the event, someone will call me and say he has $30,000, rush and come meet my manager. As a smart man, I’ll save the $30,000 first and that’s what I did. I then asked them to go and bring the contract to show who agreed that I take such an amount for a show of that nature. So disrespectful!”
This year’s event hosted Hollywood actor of Ghanaian descent, Boris Kudjoe, and wife, Nicole Ari Parker had exciting performances from top African acts like Efya, Kidi, Wizkid, Patoranking, Flavour, Patoranking, Phyno, Tiwa Savage, Olamide, Too Fan and many others.
Mohamed Salah of Egypt and Liverpool won the African player of the year at the 2017 CAF Awards. Mohamed Salah beat Sadio Mane of Senegal and Liverpool, and Gabon’s Pierre Emerick Aubameyang who plays for Dortmund.