Developing Ghana's Tourism - the Role of Entertainers

By Sheila A. Williams

A nation overflowing with amazing talents in different fields of endeavour. Ghana! Our motherland. The black shining star of Africa and the world. Wherever you go, in whatever field you find yourself, there is a Ghanaian excelling there. Talk about sports, industry, commerce and technology.

You will find at least one Ghanaian who is shining so bright. In entertainment, Ghanaians have made a substantial impact with several well-known exceptional talents in music, acting and comedy.

Every industry plays a role in the development of another. When we take a close look at tourism, it is clearly evident that a small push by the group directly related to it can go a long way in boosting this industry.

In this regard, this write-up examines ways in which Ghanaian entertainers can promote tourism.

Using Social Media

Averagely, Ghana's top entertainers have over 100,000 followers on twitter and Instagram with a few hitting the million mark. On facebook too, they average about 50,000 page likes with a few having between 100,000 to one million page likes. What this effectively means is a strong social media following for these entertainers.

Movie actors/actresses, musicians, comedians, fashion icons and TV/radio personalities have so much influence on social media. The impact is so huge that a positive tweet or post by one of such people causes a stir of positivity among the youth. Inversely, a negative post brings about a negative impact. This influence can be used to our advantage in the bid to develop and grow tourism in Ghana.

Anytime these entertainers visit a monument, tourist site or beautiful destination in Ghana, they can post pictures with informative captions and encourage others to visit as well. This little deed will go a long way to motivate and encourage their followers and fans to also patronize tourism and the end results are glaring for all to see.

Using tourist sites as set locations and venues

Movie and music video directors use various set locations for their movies, adverts and music videos. Other TV personalities use hotels and plush locations for their recordings and reality shows. How about shooting a movie at Kakum National Park or The Cape Coast Castle? Or even shooting that honeymoon scene at the Mole National Park with the couple enjoying the safari experience?

Many individuals look up to our entertainers a lot and the little things they do are imitated by many all over the country, especially the youth. Watching a movie of Jackie Appiah and John Dumelo shot at some very beautiful and historic tourist sites can be a very good way to sell those sites.

Imagine a music video of Sarkodie, featuring Shatta Wale at the Buabeng Fiema Monkey Sanctuary or the Volta Lake. Many who have never been to these places or even thought about visiting them would have a first-hand view of it and be motivated to try them out.

Organising tours

When we watch TV, listen to the radio or even read newspapers about a fun tour trip organised by Nana Ama McBrown, Liwin and Bola Ray, we are halfway on that bus. The names alone are attractive, talk less of the fun you begin to imagine you can have with your celebrity crush in the same bus for hours. Recently some entertainment personalities such as Abeiku Santana have organised mini tours to certain tourist sites.

This is a move worth commending and it encourages many people to travel and experience the beauty and history of our motherland, Ghana.

Our entertainers can even liaise with tourism policy makers and stakeholders to organize these fun trips, excursions and tours for students and workers. This helps generate more income for the development of the industry as well as create a platform to promote these places.

There is actually more that our entertainers can do, in our quest to grow and develop the tourism industry in Ghana. We have a lot of responsibility on our hands as citizens, particularly those of us who are role models. More so, entertainers, whom others (young and old) look up to, entertainers have an added responsibility of innovating and coming up with various things that can help develop tourism in this country.

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