Ghanaian actress and film producer Selassie Ibrahim has criticised local television channels, squarely blaming them for the collapse of Ghana’s vibrant film industry, often dubbed “Ghallywood”.
Speaking passionately during an interview on Daybreak Hitz on Hitz FM, Ibrahim asserted that the channels prioritise cheap foreign content over high-quality local productions, rendering the business model for Ghanaian filmmakers unsustainable.
The Unprofitable Local Content Dilemma
Selassie Ibrahim, a key figure in the industry for decades, criticized the lack of support and the low acquisition fees offered to Ghanaian producers, contrasting it sharply with the readily accepted influx of foreign movies.
“Look, the TV channels are not helping us. I’ll say it again. I don’t care what they think. I don’t care what they say. I’ve said it before and they bashed me. But you know what? I will still keep saying it until they help us.”
She highlighted the massive disparity between production costs and acquisition fees, arguing that local channels actively force producers into debt:
“You shoot content and send it to TV channels; they look into your eyes and tell you a thousand Ghana cedis [GH₵1,000] when I spent over $20,000 to $30,000.”
This inadequate pricing structure, she argues, makes it impossible for producers to recoup their investment, leading to the current state of industry inactivity.
Prioritising Cheap Foreign Films
The producer pointed out the irony that local channels often prioritise old, amortised foreign content over brand-new Ghanaian productions.
“Yet they go and buy movies that are 10 years old that had made their money out of cinema and everything.”
She questioned the economic logic of this practice and accused the channels of wilfully destroying the indigenous creative economy:
“You want us to sell it to you the same? Do you want to collapse [our businesses]? You’ve done it. You see the problem? When people say that, ‘oh, Ghanaian film is dead,’ my heart bleeds, but how many people can you explain to that it started from the TV channels because they killed our industry?”
The Failure to Celebrate Our Own
Ibrahim also touched on a deeper cultural issue: the perceived Ghanaian bias against local content, which she believes is reinforced by television programming choices.
“Because when you go to Nigeria, you don’t find them watching any Ghanaian movie. But in Ghana, anything foreign is fine; everything Ghanaian is bad. They will criticise. They will not go and watch. I can’t figure it out. I don’t get it? We don’t know how to celebrate our own… and that is what has killed Ghana movie till today.”
Ghana’s film industry, which thrived in the early 2000s, has seen a sharp decline in production volumes since 2015.
Analysts often cite the combination of low TV licensing fees, the proliferation of cheap satellite channels, and a lack of government regulatory quotas (unlike in countries like Nigeria and South Africa) that mandate a minimum percentage of local content as the primary factors driving the economic collapse.
Ibrahim’s public stance places the responsibility for the industry’s recovery directly on the regulatory bodies and the television channel owners to implement fair pricing and a supportive programming strategy.