About a month ago, I was interviewed by an Accra based TV station and guess what the topic was; the English premiere league. I have since been concerned about how Ghanaians have developed an appetite for English soccer.
This is an indication of a great inferiority complex of our people. We cannot identify and be proud of what is our own but would rather patronize anything foreign. This even emboldens westerners to believe that they are superior to us.
This phenomenon is also killing our local leagues and even talents.. When there is a local league match to be played and it coincides with a Premiere league match, our stadia are virtually empty and our clubs have complained about this. We must remember that these young men we are going to watch are our own brothers, relatives and friends.
You can’t begin to imagine the amount of money foreigners make off us through tv rights to air their matches.
It is also most saddening when the programme schedules of our TV stations are disrupted to air live a premiership match and we have "experts" who have match discussions and rattle off facts and figures about these teams. How disoriented can we get! Do we think any English TV will air a Ghanaian league match?
Almost everybody in Ghana is either "a Red" or "a gunner" or a "blues". I for one am disgusted when i hear people, some of them the creme of our society, using possesive pronouns when relating to these teams."We 'so so and so' fans" .And we spend money to buy their jerseys to complement this. What an identity crisis! We are not English fans! Everybody knows English fans. We are Ghanaians and let’s support our teams.
George K. Appiah
Ghana Institute of Journalism, Accra.
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