The latest guidlines on advertisement released by the Gaming Commission of Ghana to minimise exposure to minors where applicable and to ensure that advertisement by operators are conducted in a responsible manner devoid of promises of any predetermined outcomes have been subjected to public criticisms from celebrities who are asking for an empirical evidence, by statistics, of minors who are exposed to betting following an endorsement by a celebrity.

Ghanaian stand up Comedian, DKB, in a recent discussion with Dr Pounds on Hitz Gallery, has expressed a gross level of displeasure in the commission which is the sole regulatory entity for the gambling industry in Ghana for giving the various betting companies a cautionary advise to stop using celebrities, including musicians, actors, comedians, media personalities with huge social media presence to entice the public to gamble.

According to him, this decision from the Gaming Commission of Ghana practically means, government established institutions don’t seek for the wellfare of celebrities in Ghana. He revealed that, in the creative economy with less or no funding from the government, celebrities arguably make more money from the most lucrative celebrity endorsement deals than they generate from their various sectors, this he explained has become an even more important source of income in the era of COVID-19.

“The government of Ghana hates Ghana celebrities. Their passion is to take daily bread away from celebrities. What wrong did we do by becoming celebrities?

First you banned us from promoting alcohol and the monies were used to sign Nigerian celebrities. Now you banned us from promoting betting, very soon you’ll ban us from using flashy cars and phones.”

DKB stated that, rather than denying celebrities this business opportunities by protecting the interest of punters, customers and stakeholders, the commission should ensure that, advertisement by companies must contain warnings like “Gamble Responsibly”, “Only 18 Years”, “Gambling is Addictive” and any other warnings that may be prescribed by the commission as endorsement by celebrities does not directly suggest the patronization of the game by minors.

Popular Nigerian comedian and content creator, Nastyblaq, has, through his production house, RedCup Cinemas, premiered the first episode of his much anticipated web comic series dubbed “Caravan”. Executively produced by Nasty Blaq and directed by Victor Giwa, the short series casts Seyi Awo, Ebisan Arayi, Fedelis TBoy etc.

It is a beginning of a new journey for Nasty Blaq as his quest to achieve his dream job was almost “marred” after being paired with his social media (Instagram) crush on set in the line of executing his assigned duty. The 9-minutes interesting comedy clip which happens to be the first video into the series tagged “The Introduction”.

Popular Ghanaian comedian, Derrick Kobina Bonney, popularly known as DKB, has made a u-turn on his decision to quit comedy after he took to Twitter page to announce his readiness to retire from comedy due to hatred and disrespect.

DKB explained that his mental well-being was important to him—hence his decision to call it a quit. After his post was widely reported by entertainment websites in the country, DKB has revealed in a new post that his earlier post was just a prank to expose his enemies.

He wrote on Instagram: “Once in a while, you do a prank to expose your enemies. He really thought I was retiring, see the amount of hatred this blogger had harboured for me. I deliberately covered their website so they don’t get free promo.

“Imagine such a fool will call you for an interview and you will waste fuel to honour it, little do you know that he is a dreaded enemy.”

Off his “The Zing Network” production company, Bright Okpocha, a popular Nigeria comedian known as Basketmouth has released a nearly 6-minute trailer, directed by Adasa Cookey, which offers an insight into his ‘Papa Benji’ web comedy series that promises to be an interesting one with characters such as Nedu, Broda Shaggi, Buchi the comedian and Basketmouth himself

With the use of cartoons to depict his characters, the comedy series tells the story of an industrious Igbo man who took a loan to start his pepper soup joint which attends to many other interesting characters who come into the pepper soup joint to discuss pop culture, current affairs and other people’s business. The much anticipated web series is billed to premiere October 31, 2020.