Music artiste turned writer, Etcetera known for tackling trending issues have come out to blast celebrities who beg their fans to vote for them anytime they are nominated for an award. According to him, if they know they worth being given an award, then why beg for votes.
“I’ll love to appeal to Nigerian entertainers to stop the habit of going about cap in hand begging for votes each time they are nominated for awards. If your materials are good enough and the award process is transparent, I see no reason why you should go about embarrassingly soliciting for votes like a politician. No award should be given based on public opinion. There should be a “competent” panel of judges selected to review the nominated materials and advise the organisers who the winners should be. It calls to question the motives of award organisers.
Etcetera also hammered on the fact that telecommunications extract money from Nigerians all in the name of voting for a talent in a talent hunt competition. “Same goes for the numerous music talent shows in Nigeria today. Have you ever wondered why all telecoms companies in Nigeria have a talent hunt show attached to their names? It is very simple. Television is the biggest means of communication in the country today. It reaches millions of people residing in cities, towns and villages (those who are lucky enough to have electricity). You can find a wide variety of entertainment on TV daily. From soap operas for (jobless) housewives, news for the working class to catch up on the happenings across the country after a hard day’s work, cartoons for kids and of course the talent shows for the gullible enthusiast who has been tricked to thinking he or she decides the participant’s future via the organiser’s voting system.”
“A lot of Nigerians may never realize how much money they spend voting on these talents shows because they don’t get a monthly giant-sized telephone bill. The telecom companies have washed the public clean with detergent because it doesn’t look like the voting is going to stop anytime soon. With the amount of talents claimed to be harvested yearly, one would think that by now Nigeria should be the world’s leading exporter of talent.”
“Every day on TV, we see a bunch of unknown individuals locked up in a house together, begging for our votes. I do agree that voting makes the masses feel like a part of any competition and it also gives them a sense of importance. But the question is; why do they bother asking us to vote when they have already employed judges to decide the winners? Isn’t it criminal requesting people to spend their hard earned money voting when it’s obvious those votes don’t determine eventual winners? And seriously, does it occur to the telecoms companies that a great percentage of the masses don’t have the required qualification for judging what a real talent is? Won’t their votes be influenced by factors such as regionalism and tribalism?”
“And what do they have judges on the show for? They are invited and asked to judge the contestant and you still ask the public to vote for the most deserving? So these experienced, eminent personalities are defined by the public’s opinions? Why invite judges to the show when you are going to put your money making tactics to use anyway?” he said.
Do you think he has a point?