After five years, Ghanaian music and cultural festival Afrochella will not return, its organisers have said.<\/p>\n
The \u2018shock\u2019 announcement was made at the very end of the two-day festival, in the early hours of Friday morning.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the last Afrochella,\u201d said co-founder Abdul Abdullah to the thousands of people still in the El-Wak stadium in the capital, Accra.<\/p>\n
He did not give any reason.<\/p>\n
However, in October California-based music festival Coachella sued the organisers for trademark infringement.<\/p>\n
Mr Abdullah made the announcement just after headline act Burna Boy had closed his set, wowing the crowd with hits such as Last Last, Angelina and Dangote.<\/p>\n
Although the stadium was still packed with thousands of people, the news that it was the final Afrochella escaped the attention of some, especially given that it was almost 03:00.<\/p>\n
One African American woman I spoke to had missed the announcement as she was trying to beat the rush to get home.<\/p>\n
Those who did notice were very upset.<\/p>\n
\u201cI couldn\u2019t believe it when they said Afrochella is over,\u201d said one woman.<\/p>\n Afrochella is heavily promoted to African Americans and many of those in the crowd had travelled from the US or UK to celebrate the new year in the continent of their origin.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m shocked \u2013 this is what a lot of us in the diaspora look forward to at the end of the year,\u201d said one African American man.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was something special about Afrochella that meant so much to African Americans like me \u2013 I think it\u2019s gonna be hard to fill the void that they\u2019ll leave,\u201d said another.<\/p>\n And this year\u2019s festival was certainly a huge success.<\/p>\n Stonebwoy, Asake and Gyakie thrilled fans with amazing performances.<\/p>\n Although it wasn\u2019t smooth for everyone.<\/p>\n Nigerian artiste Oyinkansola Sarah Aderibigbe, also known as Ayra Starr, fell on stage while performing her hit song.<\/p>\n She blamed the organisers for the incident. \u201cAfrochella next time y\u2019all should clean your stage after every artist\u2019s performance, that fall was very unnecessary and painful,\u201d she posted.<\/p>\n The event also saw performances from other talented musicians.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was amazing, so good to play for my people, making sure that everyone is getting a good time. Everyone has fun,\u201d Jules, a young singer from the Netherlands, told the BBC.<\/p>\n Singer Aerostar was excited about her performance: \u201cThe energy was amazing, the crowd was amazing too and the band did so well,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n While the end of Afrochella will certainly leave a gap in the jam-packed calendar of events in Ghana, known as \u201cDetty December\u201d, tourists and visitors alike will still be able to enjoy a wide range of programmes.<\/p>\n For example, the Afro Nation festival wraps up on Friday night with performances by British-Nigerian artist, Skepta, Franco-Congolese singer Dadju and Ghana\u2019s rising star Black Sherif, to name just a few.<\/p>\n And the BHIM concert, Tropical Fiesta, Mozama Disco, Lamajo fest will all be back next year.<\/p>\n But Afrochella will be sorely missed.<\/p>\n It was among events that authorities in Ghana hoped would continue attracting tourists, especially from the African diaspora, to the country as part of its \u201cBeyond Return\u201d initiative.<\/p>\n This is a follow-up to the \u201cYear of Return\u201d launched in 2019 to mark 400 years since the first enslaved Africans arrived in America.<\/p>\n DISCLAIMER: <\/strong>The Views, Comments, Opinions, Contributions and Statements made by Readers and Contributors on this platform do not necessarily represent the views or policy of Multimedia Group Limited.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" After five years, Ghanaian music and cultural festival Afrochella will not return, its organisers have said. The \u2018shock\u2019 announcement was made at the very end of the two-day festival, in the early hours of Friday morning. \u201cThis is the last Afrochella,\u201d said co-founder Abdul Abdullah to the thousands of people still in the El-Wak stadium […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1272007,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[13770,7114,85,1484,1962],"class_list":["post-1272006","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-afrochella","tag-festival","tag-ghana","tag-music","tag-shock"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272006","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1272006"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1272006\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1272006"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1272006"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1272006"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Musician\"](\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/_128162665_afro1.png\" "\\"Afrochella:")
![\"Reveller\"](\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/_128163612_africa4.png\" "\\"Afrochella:")