Veteran Ghanaian filmmaker, Socrate Safo, has linked the collapse of Ghana’s movie industry to the decision by producers to flood television stations with films, a move he says has drained revenue and crippled sales.
Speaking on GhanaWeb Entertainment’s X Space on September 12, 2025, Safo argued that the choice to hand over movies to TV stations has been disastrous, leaving producers unable to recover investments or even break even.
“Out of ignorance, we are where we are. What am I going to do with TV? When I go there, it will kill my business. Nobody is listening, and I am tired of talking. Producers are losing money. People go there, produce movies, and cannot break even. It is so frustrating. TV stations have so many films,” he said.
According to Safo, this glut of films has not only discouraged audiences from buying CDs but has also left television channels oversaturated. He recalled that years ago, TV3 even told filmmakers they had more than enough movies and did not need new ones. “Ignorance is what has brought us here. TV stations have killed our business,” he added.
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Apart from television, Safo expressed concerns about how cinema premieres are wrongly treated as part of Ghana’s distribution model. He argued that relying on premieres instead of building strong distribution channels is another mistake the industry has normalized.
“Check the records apart from the night of the premiere, how many films can fill the halls even for three days in Silver Bird. Now, the premier is considered part of the distribution. Premier isn’t part of our main distributions,” Safo explained.
He emphasized that cinema owners had warned of the dangers years ago but were ignored. “Look at the mentality now, it’s become the norm. Ignorance is what has brought us here. When you meet owners of cinema halls, they will tell you, they don’t understand what is happening right now because they warned us when we started giving our movies to TV stations,” Socrate Safo stated.
