Minister for Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts, Abla Dzifa Gomashie, has called for stronger opportunities to enable Ghanaian creatives to access international audiences and markets.
She said Ghana had no shortage of creative talent but needed stronger partnerships, platforms and opportunities to ensure that the country’s filmmakers and other creative practitioners could take their work beyond the domestic market.
The Minister made the call at the opening of the European Film Festival Ghana 2026, which is being held under the theme “Peace, Tolerance and Inclusion.” The third edition of the festival is bringing Ghanaian and European filmmakers, industry practitioners and audiences together through film screenings, industry engagements and cultural exchange.
Ms Gomashie said cooperation between Ghana and the European Union could create opportunities for co-productions, capacity building, knowledge exchange and wider circulation of Ghanaian creative works in international markets.
She also highlighted the importance of Ghana’s revised cultural policy, describing it as an important framework for strengthening the cultural sector and placing culture and creativity more firmly within the country’s national development agenda.
According to her, the policy would only have the desired impact if stakeholders understood its vision, objectives and opportunities and took ownership of its implementation.
She disclosed that the European Union, through the Sankofa II project, had committed support towards the national sensitisation and dissemination of the revised cultural policy.
“I showed off because if the two of us were able to pull this off,” Ms Gomashie said, referring to the collaboration and support that had contributed to advancing the initiative.
She said she wanted stakeholders across the country to have access to the policy document so they could understand the direction in which the government intended to take Ghana’s cultural sector and support its implementation.
“My desire will be for everyone to have a copy, to understand where I think we should be going, so that I can buy your support, buy into your support, and you buy into my vision,” she said.
Ms Gomashie stressed that a policy becomes meaningful when its vision, objectives and opportunities are understood and embraced by the people expected to implement it and those who stand to benefit from it.
She therefore expressed the government’s readiness to work with the European Union and other development partners to take the revised cultural policy to stakeholders across the country.
Turning her attention to Ghanaian filmmakers and creatives, the Minister urged them to tell the country’s stories boldly and authentically while ensuring that their works reflect Ghanaian realities and connect with audiences across Africa, the diaspora and the wider world.
She said Ghanaian creatives had an opportunity to shape how the country and its people were represented internationally by taking greater ownership of their narratives.
Ms Gomashie urged filmmakers and storytellers to remember the adage that “Until the lion tells its own story, the tale of the hunt will always glorify the hunter,” stressing the importance of Ghanaians telling their own stories from their own perspectives.
She assured creative industry practitioners that government would continue engaging them and other stakeholders to identify barriers limiting growth and explore practical interventions to unlock opportunities within the sector.
The European Film Festival Ghana 2026 marks the return of the festival after a five-year break and provides a platform for Ghanaian and European filmmakers to exchange ideas, develop professional networks and explore new opportunities through cinema.
Source: Newspyramid.com
