Accra: Renowned movie director and entertainment pundit Socrate Safo has lambasted Charterhouse over what he described as a persistent disrespect for audiences at the Telecel Ghana Music Awards. According to him, this year's edition is the latest example of a pattern that has gone unchallenged for too long.
According to Ghana Web, Safo expressed his frustration during an appearance on Peace FM on May 16, 2026. He noted that the 2026 edition of the awards was advertised to begin at 7pm with the red carpet and the main show at 8pm, but the red carpet did not get underway until 8pm, while the main event only started at 10pm, keeping attendees in their seats until almost 4am.
"If you organise an event and you say it will start at 7pm and you start at 10pm, it means you do not respect your audience. And they were made to sit up till almost 4am. Do you feel you are dealing with robots? To keep them sitting all these hours? How did you plan your production? Was it timed?" Safo questioned.
He contrasted Charterhouse's approach with that of veteran theatre producer Uncle Ebo Whyte, whom he held up as the standard for punctuality and audience respect in Ghana's entertainment industry. "When he says his theatre production is starting at 8, it starts at 8. That is respect," Safo stated.
The veteran filmmaker also criticized audiences who, he said, enabled the behaviour by continuing to attend the event year after year without holding organisers accountable. "Year after year, this is what you do to your audience and they don't care. And maybe the audience does not respect themselves. If they did, they wouldn't have kept going back year after year," he remarked.
Safo called for a change in the way events are managed, urging organisers to start events on time regardless of attendance levels. "If you say a show will start at 7pm, start it whether or not the people are in. Start giving the awards. Next time, they will come early. It is about time we call the organisers out. We don't do that," he concluded.