The 2024 National Festival of Arts and Culture [NAFAC] has been launched in Accra on Tuesday, August 6.
The event attracted numerous high-profile attendees, including the Deputy Minister for Tourism, Arts, and Culture, Hon. Mark Okraku Mantey, Bono East Regional Minister, Hon. Kwasi Adu Gyan, and the Executive Director of the National Commission on Culture, Nana Otuo Owoahene Acheampong, among others.
While performing at the launch, a former Mentor contestant, Nene Narh claimed to have been rejected by Okraku-Mantey during one of the Mentor auditions.
Known for his strict and no-nonsense demeanour as a judge, Okraku-Mantey was a core member of the show’s judging panel when it was incepted in 2006.
The Deputy Creative Arts Minister, in response to Narh’s claims, candidly indicated while addressing the gathering that being a judge of the music reality show has become a problem for him.
According to him, “The challenge is that each episode of Mentor recorded over 2500 people so for 6 seasons we are sure of over 12 thousand and it’s difficult to remember them”.
He continued, “And it has become a problem for me now because some of them are true some of them are not true but how am I going to tell the difference because, I don’t remember them but this very one I do …Yes, I do”.
Mark Okraku-Mantey, in an unusual manner, praised Nene Narh by stressing,” I am happy he has become a better person and I am proud of him”,
The National Festival of Arts and Culture (NAFAC) is scheduled to take place from October 25 to 31 in Techiman, Bono East Region.
Watch the video below
