I Lost $100,000 on My First Business : Mawuli Gavor || Masterminds Podcast EP76

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He left a stable job at KPMG, moved to Nigeria knowing nobody, slept on a friend's couch for three months, and built one of the most recognised entertainment careers on the continent. Then he put everything he had saved into his first business — and lost over $100,000 to bad partners in one move.

In this episode of the Masterminds Podcast, Richie Mensah sits down with Mawuli Gavor — actor, entrepreneur, and co-founder of Rhythm and Brunch — for one of the most honest, wide-ranging, and provocative conversations the show has ever hosted. Mawuli breaks down the mindset that made him leave KPMG, how Chief Daddy became the first major film on Netflix Africa, what the $100,000 loss taught him about doing business in Ghana, and how Rhythm and Brunch went from a one-time idea to 29 events across 7 countries. He also makes a passionate and unflinching case for why Africa needs to stop blaming everyone else and start taking ownership — and promises to produce the greatest African superhero movie before he leaves this earth.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• Why Mawuli left KPMG and never looked back — and the mindset that made it easy
• How he moved to Nigeria with no connections, no friends, and no support system
• How Chief Daddy became the first major film on Netflix Africa
• Why being delusional is not a weakness — it is the prerequisite for doing anything great
• The full story of how bad business partners cost him over $100,000 on his first venture
• How Rhythm and Brunch grew from one event to 29 events across 7 countries
• Why Africa needs to stop blaming colonialism and start taking ownership of its own future
• Why the richest continent on earth is still the poorest — and what we can do about it

Chapters

00:00 – Intro: The Man Who Does It Anyway
 04:26 – Growing Up Between Ghana and America
 07:03 – Leaving KPMG: Making 700 Cedis a Month and Finding a Way Out
 11:23 – The Martini Ambassador Deal That Changed Everything
 14:00 – You Have to Be Delusional to Do Anything Great
 17:38 – Moving to Nigeria With Nobody and Nothing
 21:45 – Sleeping on a Couch and Moving Up One Apartment at a Time
 23:04 – Chief Daddy and the Netflix Africa Breakthrough
 27:34 – The $100,000 Business Partner Betrayal
 35:26 – Rebuilding Play From Scratch With Nigerian Workers
 42:19 – Why the Club Life Was Not For Him
 59:53 – How Rhythm and Brunch Was Born
 01:08:45 – Ghana, Africa and Why We Need to Stop Playing the Victim
 01:53:05 – The African Superhero Movie He Will Make Before He Dies

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

I used to hate being an N.

SPEAKER_02 0:02

Really?

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Yeah, I used to hate this country. The one thing that I tell people about Nigeria, you can't go and make it in Nigeria by choice. It's not up to you. They need to open the door for you. They need to open the door for you.

SPEAKER_06 0:13

Impact you. You know, did you actually go through any difficulty before the success?

SPEAKER_01 0:18

100 100%. The club.

SPEAKER_06 0:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 0:22

Was probably I think definitely the hardest journey in my life. I've always known that I'm going to be a businessman. I just didn't know what I was going to be doing business in. Yeah. So I started the production company and that was going well. But again, it's not something that you know how it is. You can't produce the films every year, type of thing. So I'm gonna have to produce one of the best superhero movies that Africa has ever seen. Thank you. Thank you. I guarantee you, I guarantee you, before it's all said and done.

SPEAKER_06 0:45

Now let's talk about my favorite thing that you've done.

SPEAKER_01 0:47

Yeah, man.

SPEAKER_05 0:48

Rhythm and Brunch.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

Combination of a bunch of young people who are also maybe delusional. Because we believe that we could do something that number one hadn't been done before. Scaling up a business from one event to 30 events, 29-30 events across seven countries is and everywhere you go, you call it rhythm and brand Ghana. Rhythm and Brunch Ghana, but we know they changed it. Hold on the culture.

SPEAKER_06 1:14

You've gone from not from hating Ghana to repping Ghana. Before we jump into the conversation, I wanted to take this opportunity to thank you for supporting and deciding to watch this episode. But now I have a favor subscribe to the channel. Subscribing to the channel helps me and the entire mastermind team to continue bringing you wonderful conversations and episodes that bring you closer to being the mastermind you deserve to be. So join the community. Welcome back to the Masterminds Podcast. The place where we always have conversations to sharpen your most powerful tool that you were given your mind. My name is Richie Mensa, and I am your charming guide on this exciting journey. Now I call myself charming, but this conversation I'm having, I shouldn't have said that because the man sitting in front of me has charmed the ladies with his good looks, with his intelligence, with his fit body. You know, some of us we look at him and hope that one day we can be like that, but it's not working. He's dazzled people from his acting ability to his how much he knows about finance, business. You know, there are very few people who are able to dabble in different industries and succeed everywhere that they go. You know, when I met him, I just thought this was just a guy who knows how to talk well and host and present. And then I got to understand who he really is, and my respect for him just went through the roof. So I am so honored to be sitting here with the charming Mauli Gava.

SPEAKER_01 2:59

This one day you take pastor's time. You know, when you were talking, I was doing the there's a meme about when an assistant pastor is being introduced. If I just look for the button, yes, praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_06 3:15

Welcome, welcome to Mastermind.

SPEAKER_01 3:17

Thank you for having me. It's been uh long time overdue. No, you know, you should have been my first interview. I did with you, but I'm glad I'm glad we're finally doing it. Your uh your set, you guys, you guys really try. I don't know if I'll give you a say thank you like it'd be you do them. But thank you. I chose her to do it. Okay, Baba does some amazing work. This is this is nice, and what you built with the platform, uh you try. I mean, can you just leave on there? You try, honestly.

SPEAKER_06 3:44

After after getting so much from people, we also need to give back. So fair. Hopefully, by the time Masterminds reaches, let's say five years, we've built a million masterminds out of it.

SPEAKER_01 3:56

Amen. Why not? Yeah, why not? That's for the why not there. It's probably one of my favorite things. Why not?

SPEAKER_06 4:02

Yeah, okay. Let's jump into your mastermind right from the beginning. So, I mean, you grew up in Accra, then you went to Pennsylvania, right? You went to PA, yeah. I went to study business and finance. Yes, you know, how did all that shape you into the person that you are right now?

SPEAKER_01 4:19

It's crazy. I used to hate hate being an end.

SPEAKER_02 4:24

Really?

SPEAKER_01 4:24

Yeah, I used to hate this country. I used to every time we go to things, say, God, why are you not born me for Canada? Why are you not born me for yeah? No, no, no. I'll be honest, especially when we were growing up and we're seeing all the things that were wrong with the country. And then after I left the country, when you finally start to see the world and the fact that the rest of the world is working, you start to resent, why aren't my people doing it? Why can't we do this? Why don't we also have all the roads and all the streetlights in the in the world? But I think eventually I came to understand that it's all for a reason. If you got he got decide, and this is where he saw fit for me to be born. So rather than complain about it, make I just see her mythography help, how I can also be a part of the journey of Ghana. Um, so growing up here, half and half, I thought it was amazing, just in terms of being able to carry some of the values that I truly think are uh Ghanaian to the core. When they say we're hospitable or we're this or we're that, these are things that people just say sometimes and we just throw it out into the air. But it's actually a thing that you can monitor, it's a thing that you can actually use to your advantage. Yeah. So eventually I started to see it as a blessing. I'm the only one in my family with a first airway name. Most family's half fancy, half away. Okay, brother Sebastian, mother's a race, mother's a ray four, but I was the only one with Mao.

SPEAKER_06 5:36

Oh, interesting. So when I go to your family, I'm not going to get more L.

SPEAKER_01 5:39

You know, go to get their G never have the Ojiba sisters, um, not as their first name. And I always used to think, uh, why me? They don't give me the they don't give me the Sebastian, you know, they don't give me the Pierre. Fancy funny. You understand. And then again, I grew up and I realized Baba, I probably couldn't have Hamali means God lives. Yeah. Obviously, and I probably couldn't have gotten a better name because last last God has shown me that above all things He lives. And that's just been my journey. I grew up here, but I went to school in Alphabeta and started all the way in Dancing. Um, and then I went to SOS, and then I was fortunate enough to go to America. Uh, and then I came back for a little bit, and then then Ghana they vexed me still. So when it didn't change anything, so so so I ran again, but eventually I found my way back home. And growing up here was a bit of half and half. I saw the terrible side of Ghana. I saw a time where there was, let's just say, plenty things, no day house like that. Yeah. And then I've also seen the good side of things. So I think it shaped me to be who I am today, for better or worse.

SPEAKER_06 6:43

Nice. And when you came back, when you came back, you were working at KPMG, right?

SPEAKER_01 6:47

It is KPMG matter. I got into oh, I love it. I got into so much trouble the last time that I discussed this KPMG matter because I think a lot of people didn't really understand the point that I was making. Because there was a it was a small clip that everybody watched. So the whole idea was, oh yes, I left KPNG because I made my one year salary in one day, which is true, it's a fact. I'm not gonna lie about that. Next time maybe you'll pay people more in this country, but but I was literally just telling my story, and yes, um, I studied business and finance my whole life. My father did, my older brother did. Um, and it felt like that was all I was destined to be because I wanted to be like my dad so much in every way, shape, or form. He's probably by far the greatest accountant on earth. Um, and that was the path. I thought, let's just go along this path, and then one chance encounter in New York City sort of set me on the to the to the left side. Okay. When I was 19, my brother was in New York, so I went to go visit um just for a brief period. And while I was there, I got recruited by a modeling agency, and it was one of those random whatever. I went for the addition or whatever, and then they took the photos, but I never really went far with the modeling thing when I was there because it was one of those you have to choose between modeling and school. I'm not gonna be running around um going from here to here taking pictures. I can't go home and tell my parents that it would be beats me. So I thought, hey, it's done and it's all set. But then I moved to Ghana, and funny enough, Martini was in the process of looking for an ambassador during that period where I had just gotten here. Okay, and I guess somebody suggested me and they looked online, and you see a few photos. So it gave the impression that I'm actually a model. But I wasn't, I still had my job, I had just come, I had applied, I got into KPMG and everything. So the offer to be Martini's brand ambassador came, and I probably it's probably where the I told you, why not is one of my favorite expressions. So the whole thing was the worst that can happen. The whole thing about Omar, really, really why not? But it was one of the hardest decisions of my life because again, I've trained for one thing my entire life, and all of a sudden I'm going to leave this job to go do that other thing. And leaving wasn't even by choice, it just wasn't something that I could do both sides. I did try. Okay, I tried, I would be at photo shoots and everything, and then I would be like, guys, I have to be at work at 8 a.m. put the foot in the shoe. You know how production is, yeah. And then at 4 a.m. Fam, the shoes sometimes wouldn't even start till 2 p.m. Job where I forget at 8 a.m. They'd wait for me and everything. So it became clear that if I didn't leave KPMG, they would have fired me because again, I was I was becoming late too often. And also, you I was in the audit department, you can't do that kind of work and be doing media and be on billboards and everything. So, regardless, they would have fired me anyway. Um, so I spoke to one of my friends, I spoke to Powers. Funny enough, you know, who made me quit my job, I blame him. But no, but he gave me some good advice. He said, bro, let's be to be honest, it's it's it's a big decision and it might go either way. You can always find another job, number one and number two. If you reach time for them to fire you, if they have reason, they're gonna fire you and they're gonna they're not gonna think twice about it. So if you need to walk away and do something different, just walk away and do it. Um, so I did. I went home and I typed my letter. But let me let me be honest, it was main, it was mainly the money thing because especially at that time, it was ridiculous that people who were earning who were working proper jobs with ties and everything were getting paid what we were paying. And I say this when I said the 770 CDs, people shouted and everything. Well, how much? I said 770 CDs on the previous one. 770.

SPEAKER_06 10:13

770. Yes, 770 CDs.

SPEAKER_01 10:15

Yeah, but that was the net. So there was also about 400 and something CDs, but that was your transportation allowance. So you end up using that to go to the client side. Yeah, so your your net take on when you're done with everything is about 700 and something CDs. Okay, which was ridiculous for me. I was making more money sweeping gutters in my summer breaks in America than than that. So I was very resentful. I thought this doesn't make any sense. I thought, why are people okay with this? Why are people happy with this? Is it just because you get to wear a tie and say I went to I work here, I work at Equibac? Like it, it it wasn't computing for me. Yeah, so regardless, I would have left. Um, a lot of people would have said I should have stayed there and um built my time. You give three years to the company, five years to the company, and then you get to say, Well, I work here, and then you use that to leverage yourself. I personally didn't believe I needed anybody to leverage myself, even with zero, even with zero, I could still leverage myself. So I left, and uh everything sort of just skyrocketed from there. Because I guess if something is supposed to happen, it's it's going to happen. So I took the huge risk. Um, I didn't even tell my parents until like after a week. Challenge, oh, if you thought they'd say I'll leave AVMG of all places to like and they're like, What do you what do you? So after a week, they were like, I thought you were, I told them I was on leave.

SPEAKER_06 11:29

At least you told them after a week. Some people I know would have said after like three months.

SPEAKER_01 11:32

I was staying with them at the time, so I couldn't, I could only dodge for so I told them I was on leave for a week, but after the week ended, because I needed to buy myself some time so for him to tell them. So after the week ended, they were like, Baba, how come? How far? Your week never your your leave never ends, aren't you gonna go? And I'm like, Charlie, yeah, you guys need to sit down, make a tell you something. I beg you that job, I'll leave her out. I'm like, what? And it skyrocketed from there. But again, I think that's where I truly saw the value of having the kind of parents that I have, and maybe I never I took it for granted before. Because no matter what the decision is, as long as you understand it yourself, my parents will leave you to do it. So they felt like I understood what I was doing and I wanted to do it, and I would make chart my own path. I don't have to do exactly what my father did. So they said, listen, if this is what you want to do, you can go. If you fail, it's okay. You can come back home. We're still there for you. But go and see what you can do, and then and then I went.

SPEAKER_06 12:24

That's incredible, especially with your father being in finance. That's incredible that he was okay with you leaving to chart your own. But I need to understand the confidence and the mindset that you had to make that decision because I know a lot of people who have opportunities to jump ship, but they are too afraid to take that risk. So, what was going on in your mind at that moment?

SPEAKER_01 12:47

I'm not a big believer in horoscopes and everything, but um I did end up doing one of those personality tests and those uh some I I'm an Aries. I was born in late, late March. And it turns out one of the things that I didn't understand about myself probably before, possibly could be attributed to that part of it. Aries are naturally, we are confident to the point of almost delusion. Okay, because we believe that we can do it. Like, and I don't know what it is about me. I believe truly that if I put my mind to it, I'll go feed door. And I still believe I believe there's nothing in this world that I can't do, even if to fly to space safe, I'll go fee. Sometimes I have dreams where I'm like flying, I use my hands to flap, and I'll go fee just fly. And in my mind, I'm like, joke, joke, one day if I figure out the air, this and I'll go feel use these two hands, and I will actually fly. So I more just confidence in trying. And if I fail, I fail. You know, go fi beats me, Baba. Like if I fail, I fail. Yeah, you laugh, but yeah, after I finish, remove. After I finish laughing, you will do this and that. And back to the parents, is a monkey, no fine, but Timother like so. No matter what happens, last, last, I'll always have a family who will take me back. I'll always have a family who will love me. Even if I make mistakes, they will correct me, of course, but they're not gonna abandon me. So I went and I felt, Baba, what's the worst that could happen? Yeah, it was it was one of the craziest decisions because imagine training for one thing, and I've never had any acting lessons, I'd never had literally nothing, I'd never hosted a show ever in my life. And I ended up one of my very first shows, I ended up having to host in front of millions of people. That was um MTN Hitmaker.

SPEAKER_04 14:26

That's where we met.

SPEAKER_01 14:27

Which was insane for me. Imagine me on that stage. I never do this kind of thing before. And I was doing MT Hitmaker with Peace Hide, yeah. I'm having to do the national broadcast to everybody and everything. Um I'm like, Charlie, bro, this matter. I don't know how good dog. But after a while, you start to realize that there's I just go back to nobody go if you beats you. Yeah, you get on that stage and then you do it. And if you fail, you fail, and if you succeed, you succeed. And for whatever reason, God decided that this is how my path should go. I did well enough, at least, that it skyrocketed me to a few other things.

SPEAKER_06 14:58

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SPEAKER_01 15:36

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_06 15:37

Because we look at people like Elon Musk, yeah, and he's the most delusional person in the world. Everything that he's achieved, when he said he was going to achieve it, it was such a big delusion. Like when he said, I'm going to go to space or I'm going to make electric cars or you know, everything has always been a delusion until it's like, oh wow, he actually did it.

SPEAKER_01 15:55

And now we're sitting here and he's a trillionaire. Yep. Yeah, I mean, say what you want about his personal life, about his views, or whatever it is, but the audacity and the confidence, you can never, ever, ever take that away from him. But I do believe that you have to have that level of delusion, mainly because do what's inside you. It's impossible for all of us to lead, and that is a simple fact. So not all of us are supposed to leave their jobs. And people used to message me after the KPMG interview, I also want to leave my job. How do I do it? And everything. I'm like, no, listen, just because I did it doesn't necessarily mean that that's your path. I'm not here to sit down and say if you sit in an office and wear a tie, you're somehow not achieving enough.

SPEAKER_06 16:32

Yeah, because that's somebody's path too.

SPEAKER_01 16:34

That'd be you, your path. You might even be there for 10 years and then you end up doing something else crazy. That's that's your path. Yeah. What you're supposed to do was inside of you. And if you feel inside of you that you truly have something more to give, I think you owe it to yourself. At the very least, before I wouldn't say owe it to the world, but you owe it to yourself to at least try. So those of us who feel that extra push to say, hey, listen, this office job is amazing and everything, but it's not enough for me. I wasn't happy when I left. I was at work from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. I wasn't happy, I didn't feel fulfilled. I didn't feel like if I stay here for five years and I get to say I was KVNG for five years, is good for me. For me, for other people, it's absolutely great, and I'm sure they will also find it to propel themselves into greater things, possibly even greater than what I would do. That's there's nothing wrong with that. But I felt like I had more to give. So that was my whole thing. And it brings me back to my main. I told you I I used to hate Ghana. But then when it all came around, my whole thing is this. Yeah, I know I'll be honest. I joined this whole acting thing because I felt like in Ghana, we grew up. The thing that we used to do the most is just point and laugh. Ha ha ha. Look at how bad the Ghanaian film is. Or we go to America, ah, Ghana films, yeah. Yeah, Bombo. You can even see the boom mic coming in. Oh, ha ha, I can see the shadow. Yeah, ha ha ha. Look at how bad this is. That's all we do for our music, for our this, for our point and laugh. Ha ha. Who's supposed to fix it for us? Who's supposed to develop it for us? Who's supposed to come and say, hey, you know what? Maybe he's not the best. But let's go see what we can do. But we love to just do the sit back and laugh part. And I felt, hey, we spent a lot of time pointing at our movies and our film industry for people who were killing themselves to make things happen. That David Dontos and the um Bruce Rivison Jr. and Frederick's and all um Grace O'Malba and all of these people, these guys were giving everything and receiving nothing. And all we could do in return was point and laugh at how subpar the films were. Yeah. So at some point, enough is enough. At some point, even if it means that I can we have enough accountants in this country, even though they didn't need me. AFMG is the biggest brand in the world. They don't need me. They will be fine whether I'm there or not. Yeah. Which is why I say when I left, it had nothing to do with this is above this or anything. If you put it do your own thing for the do all, I don't get a problem. I'm gonna go join a small group of people who are doing something and everybody's been making fun of. And I'm also gonna see how we can all lift up this whole thing together and hopefully come up with something more serious. It's one of the reasons I admire you personally because you started off as one of the hit artists, and of course, making hits is amazing. I'm sure the fame was amazing. I'm sure when you go eh, when you go in it, they don't have I'm not gonna lie, I can know sometimes I look at you guys and I can only imagine like being on a stage and thousands of people are screaming or people are singing your name, it's a hit, man, and all of those things. And then for whatever reason, I wouldn't say you you didn't disappear, but you pulled back almost willingly. You sort of just pulled back, and all of a sudden Richie is not making it's a hit, man. We're not hearing the tracks anymore. Yeah. And then you re-emerged as an industry shaper. And yes, that music fame part of your career might not have been as big, but you now created platforms where the people who you brought under you ended up being bigger than you ever were, ended up making more money than you made in music, ended up having more fans and everything. Yeah. But then would you say that that was uh was you shrinking, or would you say that that was just more you giving giving something giving something back?

SPEAKER_06 19:56

I mean, it's it's like what you said on who's going to change it. Yeah, I remember one of the things that started making me realize I needed to take a step back was I did the music as an artist and I reached the top. And I reached the top, and I was like, is this it? Like, there needs to be something higher than this. And I felt my first thought was the usual thing, the industry needs to be bigger than this. Then I asked the question, but who's the industry? Like, who is going to take people higher than this? So then, okay, then let me step back because I can't do both. Yes. So let me step back and push the industry so that the next generation can actually go higher than this.

SPEAKER_05 20:37

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:38

And as um, when you came back with the links and everything, you saw you for flying and everything. Oh, last yeah, this guy be stuff on guy. Stop on guy. And I saw you people did Tigon and everything, and it it was, I wouldn't say it directly, and I'll make a note how if you saw you at the exact reason that I did all that, but you and a few other people in Ghana who were shaping the industry. I was like, I feel like I want to do what they're doing. I feel like they're charting a past that I feel like I can do very well. I like that, very, very well on. So every time I'll see you do something bigger and bigger, I'm just like, oh my, when you did you guys did the RNA Q and you did all of those things. I'm like, yo, this is uh this is what it's supposed to be.

SPEAKER_06 21:19

So is that is that a kind of energy that helps you to move to Nigeria? Because that was crazy, you know. First of all, it's difficult to make it in your country in entertainment, and then you just up and moved to Nigeria and took Nigeria by storm.

SPEAKER_01 21:35

Yeah, man.

SPEAKER_06 21:35

Like, what gave you once again that confidence to do that? I'm a madman sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 21:41

I guess I guess some small mental problem. I don't know how to see. It's not that I don't feel fear, I feel the fear, but it almost never stops me from doing anything. Um, when I went to Nigeria, I knew literally nobody. I don't know a single person for that. I don't get any friends, I don't get any. Support system and everything, but it still felt like something that I felt I can conquer anywhere. Ghana's just where I was born. Yeah, but the world there before all of us. So I don't mind, I don't mind going. I plan on going to Nigeria for three weeks and I stayed there for five and a half years. So that was a short trip. Yeah, short trip. Quick enough. I told my parents, Mom, I'm just going to imagine how stressed out my parents must be with me by now. They go tire passing. They go this can't kid with this. You come house, you say you did this place, right? Now you say they do act, and now you say you leave Ghana, they go to Nigeria. How?

SPEAKER_06 22:32

I'll be back in three weeks. I'll be back in three weeks. Five years later.

SPEAKER_01 22:36

Five years, five years later. But I didn't move to Nigeria specifically by choice. I moved there initially to be on a one-year project. I was working on DSTV's Hush. It was an Mnet program. It was one of their long soap operas. And we shot about 256 episodes, I believe. Wow, that's right. We shot for 200 and something days in the year. So we're shooting almost Monday to Saturday. And uh by God's grace, the character that I played happened to be one that made an impact. Um, by God's grace, the people who I was working with, the cast, were pretty special. Um, RMD Richard Muffer Damijo was playing my father. Yeah. So that's where my relationship with him got started because we shot together for about a year, so we ended up getting pretty close, and he sort of took me under his wing. And the one thing that I tell people about Nigeria, you can't go and make it in Nigeria by choice, it's not up to you. Nigerians have to allow you to make it, that's just the way they are. They have to decide that this we're going to elevate you because you've seen people who are more talented in the music side, safe, yeah, who you try to break the door, break the door, still emphy, it's not it's not working. They need to open the door for you. They need to open the door for you. There's no you can't break into the Nigerian space, it doesn't work like that. And I was fortunate enough that they allowed me to thrive in their space. And I and that's why I called them my second family. No matter how crazy my time in Lagos was, um, Lagos will always be my second home because the people who owed me nothing, who knew me from nowhere, still found it within them to not just take me in but to nurture me, to help me out. Some of them even housed me. I slept on my friend's couch for about three months before. Yeah, my friend Abounce, uh by far one of the best people that I ever met. Slim with him and one of my other friends, Yvonne, at the time. Slept on their couch when I couldn't find my place and everything. Three months, one of the most beautiful times of my life. But that whole Nigerian experience, I attributed more to Nigeria, just allowed me to be great. I managed to meet the right people. I was working for DSTV. I ended up hosting a show for the 53 extra. Um, so that's what caused the main move why I couldn't simply come back because now I was a full-time worker for Mnet. Yeah, so you couldn't just come back here. I mean, I was flying in and out every week. Back then, prices were cheap, so ran out of holding spa. But that that was more the main reason. But again, it's more I decided to do something that I said if I fail, I fail. And then I went and it sort of just kicked off from there. I always like to give props to Chris Attor for this part of the story because I believe he showed me something that I'm trying to do a bit more what you said you did, rather than compete with each other or see people as threats to people, someone who might be taking your line, like, oh my god, this guy might be bigger than me. It's a lot easier to either collaborate or give them a leg up. Chris was the biggest in Nigeria at the time, the biggest Ghanaian export. Um, and he was the one who went to speak to them and said, Hey, listen, I have this guy, you guys should really try him out. So and so. So you call me one day, he's like, but then tomorrow, can you take a flight to Nigeria? I'm like, bro, what the hell are you saying? He said, Yeah, the people make ready for you. Can you fly and go? Yes. I'm like, bro, what? Like, no, I can't fly and go. I don't I don't have no more. I didn't even have the money at the time. I think I spent my last thousand something CDs to buy my ticket to Nigeria.

SPEAKER_06 25:44

But that was a good time, thousand something CDs.

SPEAKER_01 25:47

Yep, right, but it was it was the fact that somebody who should have seen me as a threat. Oh my god, there's gonna be a new guy who people are gonna say he's also this and that and that. And ideally, a typical, let me not say typical Guinean, but people who aren't like the rest of us would look for ways to rather block me rather than say like closed mindset people, yes, to block me rather than to push me ahead. And what he did was he set a platform for me, he gave me the opportunity, and I went there and I excelled at that opportunity. So I always like to say these people literally did almost everything to create that career for me. I went and I met Moabudu, who is one of the greatest women on this African continent. Say, nobody hard pass Moab, nobody hard passed Anti Moore. Audacity, just drive, just if Anti Mo says she won't do something, she's just gonna do it. Yeah, um, so I worked with her briefly at Ebony Life hosting the TV show Um The Spot. Uh and then I did Chief Daddy with her. And Chief Daddy ended up being the first film that you love that movie. It ended up being the first film that Netflix um put on. I mean, uh Lionheart was first, but Chief Daddy was a first big whatever. So then Netflix blows up, and then next thing you know, you're you're off from there. So for whatever reason, God decided and Nigerians allowed that the the the little things that I did just happen to be big and have an impact. I wouldn't say it happened because I'm so amazing or I'm so talented. The talents yeah, I get all first of all.

SPEAKER_06 27:13

I love the gratitude in your speech. You know, as you are talking, as you are describing your story, I'm not hearing what you did, all I'm hearing is what everybody else did to put you on, and that's amazing. But let's trip that away. Yeah, no, let's talk about what you did. I want to understand because everybody knows that to succeed at a certain level, you need to have traits of excellence, yeah. And excellence comes from those daily things. Yes. So when you had these opportunities, what was your routine like? What were you doing daily to be able to keep performing at that level?

SPEAKER_01 27:49

A lot of people see me and assume that like I'm this outgoing town, like lively person. I mean you run a nightclub, so even the nice club oneself, even though I don't even know how I found myself there. Yes. Um, on on the outside, I am to an extent, but for the most part, I'm only able to I can put on a show. So if I'm outside at a party, whatever, bro, I can be the life of the party, I'll be dancing, I'll be on the listing and everything. But I can only do that for very short periods. After that, I have to retreat back to my regular self, which is a severe introvert. I love spending my time alone. So I ended up doing this thing where myself and my laptop became best friends. Okay. I will put in some music, and this is before Chat GPT and everything, but I would just put in the music and I'll just learn anything, anything that I could. I used to have this notebook as well. So because I spend so much time alone, it becomes easy to develop yourself. Um, I ended up going to the gym. I used to go alone all the time, but it was a great place for me just to be. The whole gym thing for me is about being able to see where you're going. I believe the gym is one of the only places in life where you can actually see in real, in real time, the fact that consistency um produces results. Yeah, it's it it's it's the one thing that teaches you that lesson more than anything. Because when I first started, you're not seeing any difference one week, two weeks, three weeks. And one day I'm walking by a mirror and I thought I was like, hey, hey, I cuts, hey, who this?

SPEAKER_06 29:17

I'm like, yeah, what the hell is this?

SPEAKER_01 29:19

It genuinely took me by surprise. And I'm like, oh wow. So this is what they talk about that sometimes just the daily habits always end up turning you into something more than you ever thought you could become. Yeah, so I just lean more into that. I love to read. I used to read, now I read on my phone, but I used to have like books and everything that I would just actively read and all of those things. So I feel like all those little, little, little things prepared me for whatever opportunity that would come. If that opportunity means working in a bank, so be it. I will excel at that. If that means I have to talk on stage or whatever, I will excel at that as well. Because I love reading, I love learning new words. Yeah, I love reading books about grammar. What is supposed to, when are you supposed to use I before e, or when is this supposed to come before that? So all those little things, just spending a lot of time alone, learning whenever I could learn. It it's it's done more for me than I can ever. It's how I learned how to play the guitar. I learned on YouTube. Yes, you know, COVID hit and there was nothing to do. And I said, Shale, what's I go for? And I always wanted to learn an instrument because I play the drums, yes, but you can't play drums at home, you're gonna make noise for everybody. So that was the only thing I knew how to play properly, and then the recorder, but I don't really know they counts. The God bless our home like gonna know. No, I need to teach you for square. I don't I don't think that counts. But the guitar also taught me the same thing. I just went on, typed YouTube guitar lessons. I saw a guitar on the street, I bought it, and I'll just go home. And the people I was living at the time, you they could tell you'll just be trying one, one, one, one, one. And after three weeks, you realize that, oh my god, I'm I'm playing something. And you you you teach yourself that as long as you can dedicate yourself to doing something enough times, eventually something will come out of it.

SPEAKER_06 30:56

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SPEAKER_01 31:43

One time, you know, truly, truly.

SPEAKER_06 31:45

And and I I find it sad that people don't understand these concepts. You know, they they believe that to make it these things should happen automatically. But they don't get you need to be intentional about it. Like when I let's talk about your physique, for instance. If I, Richie, had decided to be as disciplined with workouts like you are, I could easily look like that. You're not rocket science. So if I'm not looking like that, who else can I blame?

SPEAKER_01 32:13

No, but no rocket science. Yeah, hey, but also one day like you, hide the dog, and I said, bro, this one is not there. So you get time and you wake up in the morning, you do some push-ups. I used to do sit-ups before every shower for about five years, every single day before every shower. Now I'm lazy with it. But then that's how I was able to get like that. This is back when I was still skinny for Fatherhood and everything. But um, then I saw that oh my god, this and that that physique kept me like I didn't do sit-ups for the next maybe 10 years because of the work that I did within those five-year periods. I literally just stopped doing sit-ups for literally almost a decade, and they stayed the same until because of the work you are doing. Until I passed the 30s, and my buddy showed me that life no life no day like that. So now I have to go back to doing that.

SPEAKER_06 32:59

But absolutely, I think that's the biggest lie that we tell ourselves. You know, we keep thinking, oh, there must be a way, there must be something that I don't know. But really, anything we want to achieve, we sort of know the way already. You want to be fit, you work out, you want to be rich, you save, invest, start a business. Like it's actually so simple.

SPEAKER_01 33:22

But we like to complicate it. Oh, easy, yeah. If it'd be easy, everybody could do them. And I don't I actually kind of like the fact that things aren't easy. I like the fact that it separates those of us who are willing to do the work from those who aren't willing to do the work. So if it was easy, everybody could do them. And I like the fact that it's not easy, it gives us a bit of a challenge. So, challenge.

SPEAKER_06 33:41

And I keep reminding people that you see, it's not easy either way. Because, for instance, it's not easy to get fit. No. But it's also not easy to be unfit. No. Because the problems you will face when you are unfit are not easy at all.

SPEAKER_01 33:53

So then you make up your mind.

SPEAKER_06 33:55

It's not easy to eat healthy, huh? But it's not easy to go to the hospital for that bad food you ate either.

SPEAKER_01 34:01

Nobody could tell you. Nobody could tell you. So eventually you start watching your sugars and your this and you're that. And it's not easy because we all want to eat all the you know, I like short bread, I like coctamat.

SPEAKER_06 34:12

At some point, yeah, cutting out sugar was a big one for me.

SPEAKER_01 34:16

Oh, you're so you're off sugar altogether. Of sugar.

SPEAKER_06 34:18

Yeah, I mean, of course, the occasional celebratory thing like Ghana is winning, so I'm drinking Coca-Cola.

SPEAKER_05 34:28

Yeah, yeah. If Ghana wins the next match, bro, forget.

SPEAKER_01 34:32

Forget. I was telling people all I needed for Ghana was just to give us that one win, just one win for us to just let loose those those emotions and everything. And I feel like they did that. So if they come household, we know Vectu. We're fine, yeah. Or if they come house, we know Vectual, we'll forget everything.

SPEAKER_06 34:49

Okay, but back to making that hard decision because honestly, deciding to switch careers, deciding to switch countries, yeah, did it actually impact you? You know, did you actually go through any difficulty before the success?

SPEAKER_01 35:05

100 100%. I difficulty is relative, and that's what I try to remind myself all the time. I think we're the privileged ones. We get to sit in an AC, AC room, and talk on mics and be on TV and everything. So even when we talk about our challenges, it's all in perspective. Yeah. Because compared to somebody who's selling charcoal every day and having to walk up a hill, it probably doesn't match. So I don't run around saying, oh my god, I had such a terrible. It wasn't easy, but I'm not gonna pretend like it was I was sleeping on the streets. But I appreciated my Nigerian journey because I did it all not on my own, because I had people helping me, but in terms of the drive, I saw all of it. So I moved up the ladder all by myself. But that also comes with a lot of loneliness. It comes, I don't have a support system and everything. It comes with a a lot of depression when things don't work out. You can only go back to your own little one bedroom and you cry by yourself and everything. I lived on the mainland for two years, lived in a one bedroom above somebody's office, on a small corner where you just gave me. Um, but it was great. Um gave me my first year and he housed me. Obviously, then I saved up and I got a two-bedroom on the mainland. I saved up again, I got a two-bedroom on the island, saved up again, I got a three-bedroom on the island, saved up for the last time I got a three-bedroom with a swimming pool and a car on the island. So I saw, I saw the whole thing. I saw the I would walk up to the streets, and if I don't have money, I'll take a bus. That'd be the matro, they call it a bus. So I'll take a trail if I have to, and I'll just go up, go see my things, and then I'll come back. Those things I've never, I mean, I don't really vex about. I'm gonna say having to lower yourself because that sounds a bit, you know, I'm lowering myself to the standard of true trail, but um compared to what I was used to, it wasn't supposed to be that way. But I didn't mind because I know it's temporary. If you sit in trautro, probably another day, it doesn't mean you sit in torture your whole life. So even if you have to do it for a little bit, jump up, just do them and everything. So it did impact me in terms of having to not survive on my own, but do all of it by myself. My whole friends and family network, none of them are in the entertainment space, which means I don't actually have proper friends in the entertainment space. Yeah, um, all of my people are either back home or still still in America or still doing different things. So now I'm charting this path on my own. Half my family thinks I'm crazy. Because you know how he did about it. I know. Anjimera, what's going on? We heard Amali left KPN. What's going on? Is everything okay? They're thinking something must have happened. Maybe I became addict to everybody, including my friends, including people who knew me and everything. Somebody would say, We heard you've gone to do acting. Yeah, all the best with that. Yeah, and now they're the ones who call me and say, Hey, I told my friend that I know. I said, Don't tell anybody you know me. No, I'm joking, but still, just the people who and I'm sure you'll be able to relate when you started writing lyrics in your Disney where people were like, Go Richie, go Richie, yeah, like go and do, go and rap, go and sing.

SPEAKER_06 37:59

No, no, no, no, and especially my time, music, especially because you know, being from a chimoto school and everything, that I be children, music at that time was sort of frowned upon. Absolutely. So, me saying I was going to do music in Ghana, I got the uh me to do hip lights.

SPEAKER_01 38:19

Even your friends and everybody sort of looks at you in this um, I want to call it condescending, but they believe that what they're doing is better, which is fine. You're allowed to you're allowed to believe that, but it's just that it's up to me to prove you wrong. And I'm glad that I was able to prove people wrong. I'm sure when you prove it, now people are calling you, hey Richio, child. The tall people say my guy, they know they believe me. You won't talk about it.

SPEAKER_06 38:37

So that I can hear that I'm a loudspeaker when they call. Now do like I'm busy.

SPEAKER_01 38:43

So you already know, you know, when certain people are calling you, you already know why they're calling. You you always know that it's just they're trying to prove to somebody that they know you, but it's a good feeling. It's a good feeling that you believed in yourself enough to show that you can prove your worth and you don't just have to say your worth right now. You see my worth, you yourself, yeah.

SPEAKER_06 39:00

But I'm sure at the beginning, because your brother is um your brother Sebastian, he's the manager and director at Goldman Goldman Sachs.

SPEAKER_01 39:06

That boy they would disgrace me every day. Get our life, it get a life, it'd be some show off and his love.

SPEAKER_06 39:12

Because I can imagine that's in the family, you know, they'll be watching your brother and thinking, you know, Charlie Maui, what are you doing with yourself?

SPEAKER_01 39:18

So, fortunately for me, because my career took off early, it sort of became evident that I'd made the right decision from the very beginning. Okay, because again, I started with Martini, so I was already on billboards and everything, I was already all over the place. I made enough money that I bought my first car with just literally one day of work. So it was sort of evident that, oh, it'd be like say Maui might be onto something. Okay. Um, but my brother, so my father, that's my hierarchy of top dons for the word inside. My father and then my brother felt like they set the standard for me because just the excellence in anything we're gonna do, we're gonna do it to the best of our abilities. My brother was head boy, I was headboy, my little sister was head girl. Um, it's just something that within, I mean, those days, if my mother sees this thing, she goes shout. Those days, if you know chop first for class, they go feel beat you for house. I think someday I was fourth. See, my mommy almost killed me. Hey, for fourth. For being fourth. Yeah, fourth in class, they almost killed me tired for house. Wow. But again, it's more the maybe they knew that we were capable of doing it. If maybe they're not seeing if your kidding head died, you're kidding, head die. There's nothing wrong with that. But maybe if you know that your child can do something, you're not gonna sit back and let him. So we just tried to do everything that we could. And my brother was working for Goldman, he was doing so well over there. And I'm like, Charlie, you people, you already have one son who's doing good things for you. You don't need another one who's gonna do the same thing. Do good stuff. Make I also go do something else and then let him be that one and let me carry the family name in a way that none of you can carry it. Yeah, so now you have things where even if you're been in Jamaica and Dubai and Thailand or whatever, people will either see me or hear my name and be like, oh, or if they hear um my father's name now in other rooms, they now ask him, Is isn't your son Marligavot? Nice. So now you sort of you sort of flip the script. When I first got my big break, my dad went and printed uh um complimentary cards, like his ID cards. He changed, he changed it from everything, and he put my photo at the back with the Martini thing, and in the front he put a father of Mali Gavot. Oh so right now that'd be how he did introduce himself. So he goes out, like he gives it out to people and everything. So my brother doing what he does is great, but then we can all conquer different industries. Yeah, my sister also eventually departed and did her own thing. She's built an amazing school right now in uh the poker society. It's called Prodigy International. Oh, okay. You're focusing on sports and all those other things as opposed to just academics. Okay.

SPEAKER_06 41:33

Um that's the kind of education I like.

SPEAKER_01 41:35

See, forgets. No, no, no. They've if go online and check huge school. Sometimes I do what they jealous the girl said. You young, younger than me, she already has three kids, um, built an amazing school. She went to Harvard and graduated. I'm just like, Charlie, which kind of disgrace would this you could have been for this family, etc. So if maybe like my acting career, no work. Basically, you forecast maybe that. But as God would have it, we're each doing our own thing in a different way. And I think that's that's a great thing. Three different kids. Three different kids dominating in three different ways. Maybe you couldn't get it better than that.

SPEAKER_06 42:08

And then after your acting and presenting success, you just decided that now let me start opening businesses because why not?

SPEAKER_01 42:16

Why not? Baba who go if he beats me. No, so the the club was probably I I think definitely the hardest journey of my life. Oh, please talk to me about it. That one I can be honest, I can be honest about that. It cost me more than I could have ever imagined. Not even monetary-wise, just in general, because starting a business in Ghana, you would be able to know, is probably harder than I wouldn't say anywhere else in the world, but it's not high up on the list of places that are easy. Um but for me, because acting and TV hosting and everything was never my main goal, when I went there and things went well and I was able to dominate and I'm all over the place and everything, it was great for me, yes, but it didn't fulfill me in the way that I wanted to be fulfilled. Um, because simply being on screen wasn't enough for me. Yeah. I wanted to own things, I wanted to be the decision maker. Maybe I'll be too known, guy. Maybe maybe my pride is just too much that I can't work under people. I don't know what it is. But I always wanted to create. So even when I was in Nigeria, I started my production company um my second year of being there. You know, I run a small production studio. Um, but even then, we formed it just usual Takashi. My older brother, some of my other friends, Adrian Powers, um, one of my other older brothers, not by blood, Lawrence. Um, we all went to school together. So we discussed the business idea and it sort of made sense. I made a case for why this could work. I could see that the movie industry was that time Netflix was in Africa or whatever. So there was no reason to think it was gonna take off. But for whatever reason, I was able to foresee that this is where African cinema is going to go. So I said, guys, let's get into it early. And we each contributed money. That's how we use it for startup capital. We produced stuff filmed by ourselves, I hired one of my good friends. Uh Lola D to direct a film for me. It's called Entangled. And we produced it. I had Sikao Say, FIYR, um Inidima. And uh it was an amazing piece, beautiful story written by Gene Edu, one of the best creators. Yeah, Gene is amazing. Best creatives like this this country has to. So I put together a small super team and we did it ourselves and we produced it. I ended up selling it to DSTV and then I sold it to a few airlines. But again, I did all of that from my laptop in my room. Okay all the work. I'll just go home and I'll literally just tell. So we formed a production company. I did that in my second year there. So I always knew it was going to be more than the acting. Um, it's just that I didn't know in what way it was going to shift. But I am first and foremost a businessman before anything, before the acting and everything. I've always known that I'm going to be a businessman. I just didn't know what I was going to be doing business in. Yeah. So I started the production company and that was going well. But again, it's not something that you know how it is. You can't produce the films every year, type of thing. So that was going on, but I was always looking for opportunities to become more. Um, so I met another madman, one of the maddest human beings I know, Charles of Thalike. He goes by the name of Charles of Play. Um, so there's a play that exists in Nigeria. So he owns a number of clubs, I believe six or seven, maybe. Okay. But uh it's formed from a group called the Play Network Group. And what the play network group essentially is, is a combination of brilliant, audacious people. That's literally all it is. Gather as many brilliant and audacious people together and let's see how we can just build businesses all over the world. So there's rice factories, there's movie studios, there's this, there's that, there's this. So I ended up being signed on to play network as a as an actor.

SPEAKER_02 45:38

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 45:39

But you know that we are there, nothing is ever enough for me. So I went from being an actor when me and him met and we synergized. I think we saw that we could do a lot more. So an opportunity came for us to own a part of a business in Ghana, which was um a bar at the time. That was Mojo Bar back in the day. Yes, that's that's what we started it out um as. So we came on as investors um to a company that already had a few people. But I again I came and I saw the location, it's in Usu, directly off the main road. And I'm again thinking forward, if we can own the space for a while, it's gonna be beneficial. So let's invest. And then we invested in uh Charlie, that'd be where everything's scattered. Don't do business with Ghanaians. I'm joking. Please, what went wrong? What went wrong? Don't do don't do business with some Ghanaians. No, so it was an existing structure, and uh they made us do a buy-in. So everybody brought Mick GR no can't chase me, but let's just say we we put together about six figures plus between me and my Nigerian partner in USD. Six figure investment and everything, and the partners who were already there ended up taking that money and using it for themselves. Oh, so we thought that we were getting into a long-term deal. We gave the money that was supposed to be used to pay our rent for a long because we have a long lease on the space. So we wanted to be done with rent for the next five years. We're paying for it, we're done, we're gonna run the space and everything. We gave all the money to be paid for five years, and then the people went and paid one one year and then kept the money for themselves and used it to do all sorts of silly things. Um so that was my first entrance. That's my welcome to business moment. Imagine having over a hundred thousand dollars of um so the money was gone. Uh there's somebody in pockets inside.

SPEAKER_06 47:30

Wow, crazy.

SPEAKER_01 47:31

So imagine that being your first big blow. You know, nobody even had the money like that. Everything that I put in, I I I I saved a ton. You know, I was just getting married at the time, so my wife actually went in with me at that time and we did it like together, but it ended up just going so pear-shaped.

SPEAKER_06 47:51

And there was no way to get that money back.

SPEAKER_01 47:54

Like people do. Uh it's just that way. I'm not I'm not too keen on um putting it out into the public sphere yet. But if they continue misbehaving with me, I probably will. Because the people are in Ghana, um, one of them is actually fairly well known. Uh but I I I took it on the chin. I took the L and having to solve that problem in that point, like I said, cost me more than I would have liked.

SPEAKER_06 48:23

I can imagine.

SPEAKER_01 48:24

But it also turned me into a more resilient person. Yeah. Because imagine you think you paid your rent for five years, and then one day somebody comes knocking and says, Hey, listen, you owe me so. I'm just like, wait, what? How? Like, no, we paid that yeah. Like, no, no, no, I only got so I'm just like, how is this even possible? So now we have to repay that money again. And I'll give you the kicker. When we paid the thing, dollar was one is to five point eight when I paid, when we paid for the first those six figures, yeah. At the time that we found out, dollar was one is to 16.

SPEAKER_06 48:53

Oh so this means your rent had tripled.

SPEAKER_01 48:57

Head knacking, head, head knacking. It was uh it was something, but again, Vim day. So we we braved it. Um, I was able to I had to use pretty much everything I had at that point just to make sure that we don't lose the space to secure it because again, I'm thinking long term. I I picked the space because of the location, so thinking long term because that location was amazing. We managed to we managed to push our way through, managed to repay, managed to secure the space, and now we have it for ourselves. That's complete. But I guess in the process, we're able we're also able to get rid of the bad seeds. So it ended up being that we're able to kick out the other people who had caused the damage. Okay. Um, because the reason I was so vexed was you guys came and said, hey, we've all put in this amount into the company, so you also put yours. And turns out they are not putting that amount into the company, and they were just using our money. So if you're using our money at the very least, why don't you use our money and actually do something good with it? Yeah. You use our money, you haven't put in that's one. You've taken the money too, and you won't even use it for the thing, you're going to use it for something else. So now you've harmed us in two different ways. But it's also just how we are as Africans. I wouldn't just say Ghanaians, but it'd be Ghana one problem. Uh, Shatowali says everybody's taking one, they're taking one. You alone, you want to take two. That's how it is.

SPEAKER_00 50:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:09

We don't know how to just write there's corruption everywhere. Nobody's gonna say nobody is corrupt, but for whatever reason, whatever is in our DNA and within the backs of our minds, we don't know how to just steal a little bit and stop.

SPEAKER_06 50:21

I think it's because most people are short-sighted.

SPEAKER_01 50:23

Maybe, maybe, yeah, and it and it bothers you. It's just short-sighted thinking. They've given you 10 million to build a road, you'll use 9 million for something else, and even at 1 million savings, you still won't finish the road. Like, what madness is that? At least finish the road. And if some small one day, you say, Oh, you won't pocket down, you don't buy something for yourself. Yeah, maybe then people would understand a little, but you're you're not gonna do the job at all. That makes zero sense to me. But it also showed me what it is to do business in Ghana and just how we think and how we're not able to think long term because you've sacrificed, bro. At least pay four years and then keep one year for yourself. How in the world are you gonna do that? How did how in the world does that make sense? But it's calm, they they take chook me. I lost so much.

SPEAKER_06 51:04

So then how did that lead to play then?

SPEAKER_01 51:06

Yeah, lost so much, lost. So that whole thing was gone. The money would do issue, issue with that. But because my partner Charles, again, a madman, we decided we're already in this, let's just go. So we went in and we broke everything down. We broke down the whole mode, we broke every single thing down in that space, and we rebuilt everything from scratch. This time it was just me and him. Okay. So now we use our without without the other people, without the bad season, everything. We're able to build everything from scratch. And even the reason we built it so high and whatnot, because in Ghana, everybody likes small space. My partner was like, no, no, let's do something audacious, let's do something big. We did it, we put the rooftop lounge at the top. That was Lupita at the time. So we started that whole lights thing, the thing that Mad and everything they're doing now. They took all of those designs from us, okay, including the inside of their club that came from us. We were the ones who we opened, I think, a year and a half before they did. Um, to be fair though, we took our design from a place in Lebanon or Spanish. So actually, maybe say, maybe say that'll be how that'll be how life day. But the whole point was to build something audacious, to build something that doesn't exist in Ghana, and that's why we built it in that particular way. And it taught me everything because I had to be there to build it, like carry blocks myself and like be there myself. Because Ghanaians still want people, Charlie.

SPEAKER_06 52:18

Yeah, yeah, you have to be there.

SPEAKER_01 52:20

You have to I tried when I was in Dubai at the time, I used to try to supervise from afar. Again, it went so badly. So I ended up having to come to sites or be on sites day till night. I could just stay there with them, even if it means that we could dig the sand together. Yeah, let's do it. I did something that I wouldn't say I'm proud of, but I believe was necessary. And hopefully it'll show Ghanaians that we need to stop misbehaving and actually get the work done. I fired all my Ghanaian employees and I brought in 12 Nigerian workers on a bus and we had to pay, and then that's how we built the space. Because by 2 p.m., if I reach like an empassing, you shall already say the go house.

SPEAKER_06 52:53

I hate that thing.

SPEAKER_01 52:54

You know 2 p.m. You both already say, Oh, yeah, he's done for the day. And I'm like, what is happening? Like, what is so that the the thing was dragging so much? So in the end, because I've lived in Nigeria and I know how they are, say what you want about them, Baba. But when they decide to do something, they will go all the way and they will do it, they will go direct to the thing. And I brought 12 of them, 12 of them, and then they they lived on the site, and in three and a half weeks, we had finished the whole thing. Finished the whole thing.

SPEAKER_06 53:18

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 53:19

And how I said the story is for inside plenty. But that was essentially how we ended up going through that journey. We rebuilt play eventually. The club life, I know what fits. You know the fits, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 53:32

Oh, yeah, like somebody I know.

SPEAKER_01 53:34

I should have done it, I should have done it in my 20s. It would have been perfect for me. Um, I thought it was something that I could do, but it especially I was already in my 30s and everything. You start to realize that it's not. I can't wake up at 2 a.m. every day and then now go to the club and then be there too. Because I had to be there. I was doing the finances as well, so I'd have to be there till 7, 8 a.m. when they close, wrap up with the thing, check the cash reports and everything. I'm not gonna kind of energy. I thought I did. I thought I did, but it turns out that I I I don't. Number one.

SPEAKER_06 54:04

And then when you are running it too, you need to be there because people are coming there because of you.

SPEAKER_01 54:08

Absolutely. But I I don't have the I don't have the constitution. And number two, club culture worldwide was changing at the time. Okay. We had an amazing first year, it was great, and we're doing all we had the Dave Chappelle show, we did Rima, we did all these huge, huge um shows, and it was and it was great, made made enough money and all of that back then. Um, second year now you have to keep going. But then I started to notice the shifts in the culture. I mean, obviously, FBI 2 didn't help us. They get to take a few of our boys away. They give to take a few of our boys away. So obviously that also damages the thing. But in general, you start to notice that the club culture is not the same. Yeah, people aren't as willing to go and spend three, four times the amount. But by Youssef, I'm not saying you're like channel, I'm not saying you get money, but Youssef, you know, go just enter club, go blow 30k CD at this age and with everything that you're doing.

SPEAKER_06 55:04

I'm sure when you started when I was young and you know, hey, let's but right now then yeah.

SPEAKER_01 55:09

So the reality is, especially in Ghana where things had adapted a little, people aren't willing to spend those amounts anymore because they're spending it mainly for ego, and people realize that they don't need to do it. And like I said, first and foremost, I'm a businessman, not a nightlife enthusiast per se. I do enjoy the nightlife, but I entered into that because I'm a businessman, first of all. So if I see something changing, I will also adapt rather than force it to be a particular way. Because the people who are doing it and doing it on that level, they know where the money is coming from. They know that they're able to gather this money, that money, and they'll spend it. They might not even be making money from the club itself, which is the way it usually works. You might make it from some of your other auxiliary businesses and everything.

SPEAKER_06 55:48

The reputation of the club helps them bring in other revenues.

SPEAKER_01 55:51

So everybody has a reason for why they continue to push their things. Yeah, but I realize that all I'll be doing is just be putting money in so that I look cool. Yeah. So in town, they go, no, I mean, oh yeah, but that guy being on the club and you look cool and everything. But on the back end, are you actually making money? Are you actually moving forward? Are you the time and effort being there 3 a.m. are you actually getting enough that it's worth all of that? And for me, the cost-benefit balance wasn't worth it. So we made the decision to not run the place year-round anymore. Um, initially, we're doing it seasonally. Okay, so when it's seasonal, we can always run it. But now that I don't live in Ghana, I haven't lived here on and off for some time. I don't know how I feel about running such a high-scale thing when I'm not here. My partner is also not in the country. My other partner, Lawrence, lives in the minority.

SPEAKER_06 56:33

And it's hard to trust people to run it.

SPEAKER_01 56:35

So I don't feel comfortable doing that. So we adapted again and then we built a restaurant that's cello. We built a restaurant and a lounge, which is cello in the middle. That was more my speed, at least the age we're at there right now. Now at least by 11 p.m. midnight, I'll go reach house. Yeah. So we again transitioned into that phase of things where we now have a nice little um space and everything there. Again, I enjoyed building it from scratch because everything I could do, I could just try to use my hands. Yeah, so it became the space where we planted a lot of plants and all of those things. I went into the forest myself, got the plants, brought them, planted all of them myself with the help of my boy. Um, grew them myself. So when I see the space now, I don't see the venue. I see just actual hard work. I see my plants that have grown up to like this height and everything. So you feel like you're a part of it. Yes, absolutely. So again, it cost me a lot personally, professionally, just everything. But it also taught me so much about resilience. It taught me so much about the fact that nobody chooses the bad things that happen to them. Nobody sits and says, Oh my god, I feel like being scammed. Nobody says that. But if it happens to you, it happened. Now the question is, Wait, good, what are you going to do now that life has come to slap you and the face?

SPEAKER_06 57:43

Are you going to sit down and mop? Or are you going to do something like that?

SPEAKER_01 57:46

And it slapped me very hard. But fortunately, I didn't fail. Um, again, mainly because I have people around me who lift me up always through thick and thin. So that was the journey. So now we still have it, we still own the space and everything. I still own the space. Yeah, I still run the club. We actually just have an event. I had an event a few days ago. Um, on an event and seasonal basis, the restaurant runs all the time. Okay. But a rooftop lounge, I closed it for now because this is the this is where the audacity sometimes is delusion. I opened three businesses at the same time and wanted to run them at the same time. I wanted all of them to be successful at the same time. But I don't be so did it do I'm now.

SPEAKER_06 58:21

Uh uh You face the challenges.

SPEAKER_01 58:23

And I learned that the hard way. You don't just no, try to focus on one thing at a time, build it, and then when it gets somewhere, then you can expand. You can't just snap your fingers and everything is gonna go well. So I don't try to do that anymore. I don't try to be too much at once. The things that I'm doing, I'll try to focus and then do that the same way.

SPEAKER_06 58:40

But I mean that failure leads to growth. Oh, heavily. You see, you can't sit there and say this confidently if you hadn't tried it.

SPEAKER_01 58:47

I try my way I flop. Exactly. Doesn't say I managed to survive. But I'm grateful for it. All in all, I'm um I'm super grateful for all of it. Number one, the network that it exposed me to, the ability to adapt and learn how to host people, to understand people better, to understand the wants and needs of people, what makes people pay 10,000 CDs for a bottle, what makes people spend 50,000 CDs at a club? How do you get somebody to calm down when they're super upset about something? It teaches it teaches you all of these. How do you manage people? How do you inspire people? So it taught me a lot, and I just take it as it is, it is what it is. It happened, and I'm not gonna regret it. I'm not gonna say, including them even taking the money and wasting it. Um, all of those things. It taught me number one, don't trust people freely. Always try to have enough um ways to protect yourself. And now I think I'm a better businessman for it.

SPEAKER_06 59:34

So make you more vigilant in future business.

SPEAKER_01 59:36

I'll take out it'd be cool, don't worry. They take you me, they take you me, but it'd be cool.

SPEAKER_06 59:40

Okay, now let's talk about my favorite thing that you've done.

SPEAKER_05 59:44

Yeah, man. Rhythm and brunch.

SPEAKER_06 59:47

You know, there are very few events that I can get up and go to, especially in this my old age. Yeah, rhythm and brunch is awesome. How did you come up with that idea?

SPEAKER_01 59:55

Appreciate that. Appreciate that. Um, rhythm and brunch is not like it's not a one-man show, it's not my idea, it's a combination of a bunch of young people who are also maybe delusional. Okay, yeah, because we believe that we could do something that number one hadn't been done before. Before we started doing purely RB parties, nobody was doing that. Yeah, nobody. And now every weekend, RB this, RB that slow jams, this thing that every everybody is doing the same thing. But when we did it, nobody was doing it to that particular level because the music genre had shifted mainly, and my piano was dominating Afrobeats, obviously dominating and hip hop. So that's what usually dominated the airwaves and the nightlife scene. But for us millennials, we were starting to feel like we were being pushed out.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:44

True.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:45

Because when we go out now, we don't know if we're getting something that actually serves us. We don't know if do we actually enjoy this now? If I go out to the club, I actually don't even know what to do with myself anymore. Do I stand? Yeah, it's like I'm looking around. What do I do? I uh like I almost freeze up type of thing. Um so it started with a number of people, Johnny Stone and Yan Fo. Yan Foe runs um one of the biggest social media agencies in the country, social Ghana. Okay. Johnny Stone is one of the biggest, best MCs on the whole continent and everything. So I joined them to expand that dream into something that was sustainable and something that was actually financially feasible. Because it started out as just a one-time thing that we did and we said, oh, maybe we could just do them once. But the demand and the everything from it was so ridiculous that we had to do it again, and then we did it again and we did it again. And now we've done it 29 times in seven different countries.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:40

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:40

From something that was supposed to be just one, but it all came from the listen, guys, we're young people. Um, no one's gonna come give us this money to do it, no one's gonna come create it for us, but we can create something that we can call our own, something that is unique to us, and something that is unique to the current climate. So we call it Rhythm and Branch Ghana because we want people to know that it's a purely Ghanaian event. It's a bunch of Ghanaians who came together, all as a side job because everybody has main jobs. Our other team members, Amoaba is a medical doctor. Um, Joseph does oil and gas, he does engineering, um he does law and all of those other things. Um, Johnny, everybody has a side job, but we all a main job, I say side job, right? A main job. But we all came together, we spent a lot of time and energy just putting it together. So people see the end result and they see the parties and they assume the party, they jump and everything, but they don't see the hours that we spend in the boardroom planning every single bit of it. Everything from the music, which is why we we value our DJs so much, because we put together some of the best DJs in the in the country Temple, Pizarro, Sly, Loft, Handsome Fella. Um, we we we put all these people together and they actually committed to the task. So we would get in a room and we would decide hey, so you're gonna play for one hour, you're gonna do slow jams, you're gonna do pop, you're gonna do this, you're gonna do that. At the pop moment, I think so and so this is how we should do it. We have our production guy, Ashes, who's there. So when this happens, we want the smoke to go up. When that song goes on, we want the fire to come. When this happens, when and then we hours, bro, hours. Sit in the boardroom for hours just well done, and it shows planning all of these things just step by step. And I think the people appreciated the fact that our event was intentional. So when you come, it's not just a party where the DJ is just they play for a while. You can tell that oh no, these guys have actually done their best to plan this whole thing. So that's pretty much just what it was. A bunch of us came together and decided that we can do something a bit more that didn't exist, and then we decided to just be more audacious. That's when we started bringing in the artists, yeah. Um, even that, I wouldn't say we locked out, but Ja Rule was already in Ghana. Okay, so that was our first big uh artist, whatever. And funny enough, he had heard about our things so through his partners and Pablo Ace, who was a huge reason that we were able to even expand in that way because we partnered with him to do Ja Rule. Okay, and we had our first artist hosted by Ja Rule, and even us fam, to this day, I still know if you believe our because I did with Ja Rule, where this guy's not been writing his lyrics for whatever, but it taught us that this is something that we can do. I think if we put our minds to it, we can do it. Don't forget, there's no money, there's no sponsorship, there's no yeah, that's crazy.

SPEAKER_06 1:04:22

So, but you guys are like it's financially rewarding, right? As a businessman, I'm imagining so.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:26

We wouldn't be doing it if it wasn't financially rewarding, but it also takes a lot of our time and it it's a lot of investments, absolutely, because we have to fund 95% of it by ourselves, yeah, including paying for private jets and booking these people and paying deposits and everything. We have to look find from our side and then make all of these things happen. Yeah, so when we when I hear Ganesh, who are you bringing next? But you but you're only bringing this person yourself. You go pay for him, you go pay for you go give you get one million dollars. You guys did the shots, you're not even gonna say, Oh, yeah, thank you for even bringing this because where would where would you have seen him unless you fly somewhere else? He wasn't gonna come otherwise, yeah. But we found a way to get him here. We brought Cisco, we brought Beanie Man, we brought Buster Ryan, we brought Chingy, we brought Bobby Valentino, we brought Wanda Call, we brought the Banch. But by no be small job, it no be small job.

SPEAKER_06 1:05:13

Yeah, and you guys are doing a great job. I mean, I had seen Rhythm and Branch, I've never been to it before. And I mean, these days I'm not really a party person like that, so they never called me to attend. Yeah, but when I came to interview Cisco and I had to pass through the video, just go ahead and check what's going on. I was like, Well, I would like to be at this look. I felt it. I I came there for work and actually paying me that oh, I wish I actually come for the event itself. So that's the moment I saw the next one.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:41

I was like, I have to, I appreciate that. I appreciate that. Um, the Cisco thing is one of the best moments of my life, truly. Number one, because Cisco did a long time.

SPEAKER_06 1:05:52

I mean, Cisco D.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:53

Okay. If I wear the red, then I'll do the no no no. So, but it was just more just a combination of taking. Hard work because it was our first major concert. We brought him ourselves, we set up our own stage, got polo grounds and everything. So to see all of that culminate and the success was huge because it rained that day, I believe. Rappaholic happened in Kumase that same day. I don't know if you remember when they had the heavy rains. So it was supposed to rain and whatnot, but Chalegorgias pity us. But that final moment when he's doing the yeah, and then he he does the crescendo, and then the fireworks are going to the fire is going to see our own craze. I'm just like, oh man. Just that feeling inside me that we actually pulled this off against all odds. Nobody thought we were gonna do it. We sold the most tables that I think anybody has ever sold in this country. We sold about a hundred tables before the event. Nice. Who pre-sells a hundred tables before the event?

SPEAKER_06 1:06:42

But that's because you see your intentionality and your intelligence is playing. Because the funny thing is, the types of artists you are bringing call to people who can afford to buy the tables. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:54

Absolutely. Yeah. And that's what we tried to do. It's an event for millennials. We're not going to be apologetic about that. But it doesn't mean that other people can. We welcome all the time. Because we deserve some party into it. Even if they jam you on our piano every day, we leave you and everything. So this is our little thing. But of course, come and join us if you're a Gen Z. Come and join us and see how we used to do it. Yeah. So we specifically made it for millennials for people who know what it is to press stop and start, or you want to record to use a cassette, or you won't do dig different. You press stop, or you press start, or sometimes your listing will spoil. Yeah. We have those core memories burned into us. And that's what we saw from our very first event. There was a moment where we were playing Westlife. Okay. An empty street, an empty heart. And by the time, oh my life. By the time everybody started singing it together, everybody, bro. People who didn't know each other were like putting their arms in, and everybody is like, you know, together. Just like, what is happening? Just that feeling, bro, was it was electric because it sort of showed us that we might have come from all different parts, but we all grew up the same way. Yeah. When it comes to music.

SPEAKER_06 1:07:55

I mean, I've been at Rhythm and Branch, and I will always love you. And everybody was singing. I was like, oh my God, these are my people.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:01

Because we don't realize that this thing shaped our lives. Most of us, our parents, had the cassette or the CD, and that's how we started listening to Kenny Rogers, and that's how we knew who Whitney Houston and all these people were. So it's a very nostalgic event, and we make it specifically for those who don't go out too often. People who aren't necessarily club goers, but who will come out for an experience that for just that one day, come with your friends, come with your family, challenges let loose. Yes, sing some Whitney Houston, hold the mics, and then have a great time and then go. But that's also been one of the most challenging parts of my career in general. Because scaling up a business from one event to 30 events, 29, 30 events across seven countries is and everywhere you go, you call it rhythm and brunch Ghana. Rhythm and Brunch Ghana, but we know they change it. Holding the culture.

SPEAKER_06 1:08:49

You've gone from not from hating Ghana to repping Ghana. See the whole too.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:53

You see the whole too. So now I even wear because we even wear, you've seen, we wear these iconic um jerseys. Yeah, yeah. The yellow Ghana jerseys, branded rhythm and brunch, because we believe that's one of our iconic things. So every country that we go to, you see all of us wearing the branded Ghana jerseys. We take the Ghana flag when we go, we um give the little flags to the people to wave. So if we're going to Rwanda, we'll give you Rwanda flags and Ghana flags, everybody is waving it and everything. Okay. But it's super important for us to be branded as a Ghanaian event because we are proud of the fact that we came from Ghana. We are proud of the fact that this is something that Ghanaians can expose. We're the cool kids of Africa, some of the cool kids. Not necessarily always the smartest, not necessarily always the most diligent, not necessarily almost the most industrious and hardworking.

SPEAKER_06 1:09:33

But we are the cool kids.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:35

Yeah, you can't take that away from us.

SPEAKER_06 1:09:36

You know, Ghana's disadvantages are our advantages as well.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:39

I believe that. I believe that. You can't deny that, especially our influence that's everything from high life, yeah, which again came and then Afrobeats. Same. They took the influence from here and everything to our the intricacy of our Kente, the the fact that we have this warm, hospitable spirit about us, where when people come, till this day, speed is still talking about Ghana.

SPEAKER_06 1:10:01

Speed is like an unofficial ambassador now.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:03

No, but it's fine, but we should be proud about these things. We should be we should be actively honing them and possibly even commercializing and using it to make money for the country. Yeah. But for whatever reason, we don't focus on that. We don't we don't focus on the focusing on the things that we are good at. We more spend time asking for people to give us, give us freedom, give us this, give us everybody every day, give, give, give. Why are we always talking about giving? Who who should give you? Why don't we create it? Why don't we build it? I just came back from Ethiopia. We did an East African tour, so we did rhythm and brunch in Adisababa and then in Kigali. We've done Kigali three times, but Addis Ababa was our first time. Let's see they do for that Ethiopia there.

SPEAKER_06 1:10:45

Ethiopia dear.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:46

Nah, man. So we consider ourselves the cool kids, and yes, we have their zone tours and the rest, but they have the streetlights.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:52

True.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:53

Tons of streetlights, paved roads, and and I'm not saying they're perfect and everything, but we should give credit where credit is due. Yeah. And I'm thinking these guys aren't even making as much noise as we are on the continent, but quietly, they're actually doing the work, they're actually improving, they're actually going somewhere. Yeah, and I really wish that rather than spend so much time talking here, we would spend time actually doing. And I try to apply that to all the things that do Charlie. We did talk plenty for this country. Too much. Oh, so let's talk about it later. Uh I'll start a meeting with my boss and meetings, see me. This thing, and we formed a committee to look into this. Every day, people they form committee.

SPEAKER_06 1:11:28

We love meetings. You know, we can arrange a meeting to plan a meeting.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:32

Yes, let's have a meeting next week. Let's talk about it. See, we won't talk about them. But either you could do them or you don't go do them. And there's one thing I learned from Nigerians, man. In one weekend, with one conversation, come and see me in the office on Monday. By Monday, you do everything, you didn't want. But we love to just discuss and just discuss, and we and we're doing it again. The the streets are flooding, and we're all on the radio talking about this and talking about that and talk, talk, talk. But there's no nationwide campaign to go around and take out all the trash. One would think that this is the time. Finally, maybe we should stop everything that we're doing. Maybe let's say, hey, you know what? We're not gonna do anything for the next month. See, Baba, forget everything. We're canceling all engagement, we're canceling every single thing. This is a national emergency. Our country cannot continue to flood. We will stop everything, we will all come out, and every single one of us will clean. I was gonna say the shit out of this place, but we'll clean the hell out of this place and actually improve it. But we would, we, we, we, we do the talking and we do the the discussing and whatnot. And it's times that I wish I was in a position of being able to make some sort of policy changes because at the very least, I would say we shouldn't be doing anything else. I was in Barbados, I was fortunate enough to shoot a film there and produce one there, and they do this thing where they have this um sarcasm that washed up on their shores. And I don't know if you've I'm sure you've been to the Caribbean, you've seen how blue their waters are. Yeah, they consider it a national treasure. But when those weeds washed up on their shores, they called it a national emergency. They stopped everything. It was on the news, sargasm washes up on our shores, and everybody was focusing on that because the beaches are our pride and our joy, and they spent all the time in the world to clean it. So now when a visitor goes there, oh my god, look at how clean your beaches are. It's been 60 something years, we're still begging for Labadi Beach to be cleaned. 60 something years, we're still we're still sitting around with do you know how valuable that Labadi stretches? That from end to end.

SPEAKER_06 1:13:25

You know, every time I travel, yeah, I keep thinking, Ghana is such a beautiful place that we are not holding dear.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:33

So beautiful.

SPEAKER_06 1:13:35

Like I like I was in Zanzibar and I was admiring everything in Zanziba and thinking, but wait, Zanziba is Cape Coast.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:42

If it's the same thing, Baba. If it's the same thing, Baba. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So every time I travel, I try to just take the lessons away from what I'm not saying we're supposed to be like other people. So people mention Singapore, Malaysia, all these places. I love what they've done. I'm not saying we're supposed to be the same, but the mindset can be applied anywhere. Yeah, Dubai isn't rich from oil. That's a common misconception. That's it. Dubai found oil, what, 60 something, I believe. Around that, 50s, 60s. They're not rich from right now, oil is about 1% of their GDP. Do you know how insane that is for them to be who they are and for oil to be 1% of their of their GDP, 1% to 2% maybe? They were intentional about tourism. Wonderful. Which means that when they found the oil, not being short-sighted. They didn't say, Oh my god, this is this amazing oil. How can we sell it and make money? They said, How can we make enough money from this oil and invest that money into other things that will sustain us beyond the oil? Because oil is a finite resource, it's not going to be there forever, it might dry up at some point. So they spent all of their time building. I believe the guy built the McTooms built the one of the first ports. Um, and they built it huge, huge, huge, huge. And they did this, which I wish we were doing, Ghana. They built it hundreds of miles away from the city. And everybody thought they were mad. Why would you build a port hundreds of miles away from the city? All of us live here. And they said, no, don't worry. And they expanded that whole thing to become an area on its own. Yeah. And then now that means that you've expanded trade. We're so busy putting up all the skyscrapers in Accra. We're so busy developing Oxford Streets and trying to say, Oh, there's a new high-rise and airport residential area. You can never tire of the residential area for airport.

SPEAKER_06 1:15:16

When if you take a place like Ada, which is so beautiful, you take you take Cape Coast, you take all these places, and if we would concentrate on developing them and connecting. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:28

The matter I know we rock every day, do I'm like, who is going to save us? And then we would now say one thing I hate the most, I find myself hating it more and more. We say the white man, the neocolonialists. That's when they vex me. That's when they vex me past anything, bro. Yeah, I get so annoyed when I hear people saying the white man did why the white man not do anything to you? Forget him. It's done and it's gone. We weren't the only people that were enslaved. A lot of people were enslaved, and yes, ours lasted for 400 years, and yes, ours was unique, and yes, ours had a lot of things that were terrible about it. Yeah, but at some point you cannot be a victim your entire life. That is no way to live that.

SPEAKER_06 1:16:02

You need to come out of it. You know, when I was I was I was doing research, I was watching some history stuff, and I was watching about the barbarians. Then I Googled, wait, who are the barbarians in modern world? And I learned it was the Germans. I was like, wait, what? Like at a point, the Germans were called barbarians. Are they going to sit there and cry about it for the rest of the year?

SPEAKER_01 1:16:23

What are we supposed to do? What about Singapore and those people? But they were also colonized. They had to break away and they also had to. So I'm not saying that we shouldn't acknowledge it. Acknowledging it is one thing, but making it your identity, yes. When you make it your identity, then you define yourself by that victimhood. And I personally don't believe in that. I don't believe we're victims anymore. I don't believe the white man is doing anything to us, including the neocolonialism and everything that you want to say. They are stealing our resources. Who's stealing your resources? You're giving it to them. You're giving it to them. You're talking about somebody's did they come in the dead of the night and sneak in and take the gold and run away? No, you allowed them in. You struck a deal, a few of you made money, and you allowed them to take it. So why do you say they stole it from us? Nobody is stealing from us. We keep saying Africa is the richest continent. There's a there's a channel that I found on YouTube, it's called Project Rethink. I encourage everyone to watch that because um by a gentleman, a Benin guy called Frank Sandu, and he's talking about the fact that we should rethink some of the conclusions that we've been fed as kids. Okay. Because we hear these things and we parrot them without actually understanding what it is. So they told us that the white man took everything from us. So we thought you grow up with resentments for the white man, you do this, you do that to you, or these people did this, or the neocolony, they are raping the country and everything. And then we just don't ask the questions. Number one, if they are doing it, why is it working? If they are able to do that, why did it work? If they were able to come here and colonize us, why did it work? Why weren't we strong enough to be able to do this? Or why would those are the questions that we should be asking? And we just like to say we say things like Africa is the richest. Who tell you who told you that? Has anybody done actual empirical research into the intrinsic value of the minerals on this continent compared to the value to the minerals that other people have? If you do that, you'll be surprised by the results. We're not the only places, the only place with gold and minerals on this earth. Australia also has Russia, has natural gas, people have lithium, um, Canada also has, Venezuela also has, a bunch of people have different things. Yes, you can say we're one of the most diverse, absolutely, because it's a dream. You can have gold, diamonds, there's we have we have all of it at the same time. Absolutely, there's no denying that. But to just sit until we say we are the rich, we love to praise ourselves for things that we didn't do. We say we are the richest continent fam, God put those things over there. So it's not something that you get to claim and own and be throwing gang signs with the richest.

SPEAKER_06 1:18:37

What are you doing about it? What are you doing about it? What's happening in your backyard? But what are you doing about it?

SPEAKER_01 1:18:42

You say that people they extract to something. If they leave you, can you extract it yourself?

SPEAKER_06 1:18:45

That's the question.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:46

When was the last refinery that's like that?

SPEAKER_06 1:18:47

Are you even trying to learn how to extract yourself? Or are you waiting for somebody to now come and teach you how to extract it? Like, what responsibility are we taking? It's it's it's easy enough to say the white man did this to us, this person did this to us. But the truth is, nobody does things to you, they do things for themselves.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:07

Yes, which is which is the unfortunate truth.

SPEAKER_06 1:19:10

Yeah, like the white man didn't come here with an intent to harm the black man. No, that's not that's not why he came. No, yes, they came to benefit themselves. So, why don't you also think about what can I do to benefit myself? And stop talking about what somebody did to you to harm you. No, no, what am I doing?

SPEAKER_01 1:19:27

They took it from you, and then they this and that, and then you are this thing. Um, I love Kamen Krumma, he's by far one of our biggest visionaries and everything. I love Kamen Khruma. In his in his speech, he said something that to this day we've not been able to prove. He said, Finally, the black man will be able to shop people that we can do for ourselves.

SPEAKER_06 1:19:43

We still haven't done for ourselves. But he was doing it for ourselves. And who got rid of Kamen Kruma?

SPEAKER_01 1:19:49

Our own people, Sankara and all those other people, who got rid of them? Yeah, so when you say the CIA did this, how did the CIA did it?

SPEAKER_06 1:19:54

They didn't come here and do it personally.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:56

No, but how did they do it? They did it through all the people. Yeah, so we did it to ourselves, but we want to sit down and we want to complain. So it's something that with everything that I do, I I like to just say, Charlie, same with why I enter the film industry and everything. Sitting back and being a victim your whole life is not going to help you in any way, in any way, shape, or form.

SPEAKER_06 1:20:13

But it's very comfortable.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:14

It is comfortable, but if you make if something is always someone else's fault, yeah, then you never bear any responsibility to fix it. Exactly. Because nobody you do. I'm saying if I didn't cause it, why should I be the one to fix it? So that's why it's easy to complain. They stole the gold, they stole the this, they stole the that. Bro, the gold was here before they came, yes or no? We discovered the gold, yes or no? Someone enlightened me. Who stopped us? Who put a cane and whipped us and said, hey, don't do this? Who stopped us from sitting down and saying, hey, listen, rather than saying who's going to buy this gold? Because that's that's that's what we do over here. We grow, we discover, we sell, and then we repeat. We grow, we cover, we sell, and then repeat. Who stopped us from saying, hey, listen, we're gonna form a research institute. We're gonna say, listen, the five of you guys, if people be the shocks for the village inside, if people stop going to the farm, sit in this room, look at this substance, and just learn about it, figure out what it is, how can we use it, what can we use it for? All of all of these different things. Nobody stopped us from doing any of those things. The white man definitely didn't stop us. This is what I'm talking about before they came. So if they came and they saw the farm, you people get someone to where you don't know what you could do, and then they give you biscuits and mirror, and then you gave it to them. You can't blame them. You should be asking yourself, why wasn't I I don't even know what the word to use, but sharp enough to realize that hey, listen, maybe I probably shouldn't do this. Yeah, we gave it to them and we're still giving it to them. You say, Garam say it's costing us what two billion in revenue a year. That is insane. You know how much money we took from the IMF the other day? We lose two billion every two billion is what divided by three something, that's what five point something million every day. Every day we lose five point something, yeah, like five point four, five point five million.

SPEAKER_06 1:22:00

People are allowing it to happen.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:01

Of course they're allowing it to happen. Nobody is, like I said, they don't come in the dead of the night and sneak and sneak out with it. But to this day, we haven't stopped it because for whatever reason, we're not able to think long term. I do believe it's it's a byproduct of the fact that we're still living in a system that wasn't designed for us. And I truly wish we would decide to just chart our own path. A lot of the time we say the colonialists came and they came and they did this and that. But the reality is when they left, they put a bunch of tribes that didn't like each other, some of us hated each other, they put all of us together and said you guys are now a country. Yeah. Problem no day. That's fine. It explains a lot of the division and everything. After they left, who prevented any of us from going back to say we're going back to our region? Yeah. Nobody stopped you. When Pakistan and the rest were having their thing, they decided that hey, too many religions, it's not gonna work. We we are going to go to our side and have our own religion and have our own language and everything. Nobody stopped us from doing any of those things.

SPEAKER_06 1:22:52

We we've just sat there and complained about the fact that we were great, greatness was tripped from us, and now we are waiting for somebody to come and fix it. Like one country that I love and I watch so much is China.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:04

Heavy. Love them.

SPEAKER_06 1:23:05

Now China was great, China was a superpower. Yes, and then China lost that status of being a superpower. If you go, if you look at China from 1901 all through to the 1950s, China wasn't Japan was even doing better than them. Then China started saying, We're going to like we're going to build up again, we're going to own technology.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:27

Do you remember the research? You know, right now their research is probably what they're best known for in the world.

SPEAKER_06 1:23:31

Thank you. Do you remember a point in time that made in China was something we loved at? Of course. Made in China until it reached the point, wait, now everything is made in China. Now, everything is made. You look at the biggest US company, the biggest US factory, and everything they have is made in China.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:52

You cannot deny greatness. If you're great, Baba, you saw me and just drove in with a Chinese car. Exactly. I'm so happy with this.

SPEAKER_06 1:23:57

And as soon as you you drove in with the Chinese car, we stopped everything we're doing. We're talking about everyone like, look, these Chinese cars are great and this and that.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:04

Baba, forget me and fuel, we're done. I switched. And I'm and I'm and I'm never and a lot of people at first I was skeptical, I'll be honest. Um, but then I eventually I eventually got one. And bro, it's by far one of the best um decisions that I made. Just not having to buy fuel, the efficiency of the current one. And I'm more making it to the fact that China is putting in the work. Putting in the work. That's all we're asking our people to do. No, you don't you don't we don't have to be like China, we don't have to be like Dubai. That's that's not the point.

SPEAKER_06 1:24:29

We all have a let's find our own path, local solutions to our local problems. Easy.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:34

That's it. And again, it's our country, man. I said I was upset that I was Ghanaian, but nobody's gonna come do it for us. Yeah, and above all things, with all the things that I'm doing with the club, with rhythm and brunch, with acting and all of those things, I truly just believe that no one's gonna come and do it for us. Nobody's come and do it. So if we'll improve it ourselves, we'll do it ourselves. Yeah, if we'll build better um establishments and run them better, if we will build new nightlife concepts or we will do new clothing brands or whatever, everything is going to have to work. It's why, for the most part, almost everything I wear is African-made. Almost everything. Nice from head to toe. I don't think there's a single thing. Um, this is my outfit is Lekim. If it's not Lekim, it's gonna have to be Shanet or chocolate or if it's a suit as at or robes from Nigeria or whatever, has to be African-made. Yeah, nobody say I know they buy Zara or whatever and the HM, I buy them.

SPEAKER_06 1:25:25

Yeah, but not you don't prioritize them.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:27

Oh, I probably spent like the first 15 years of my life buying all the buying all the Nikes and the world. I've paid my dues to them. I think I can also pay my dues to my African people. But I love the fact that these people are just doing it for themselves. They went to sit in their corner and then they made something. If I'm wearing a watch, it 100% has to be caveman because that's something we make these in Ghana. Not we're not assemble in China and brought it here. We actually make these. We craft from the metal to the leather, we paint the leather here ourselves to the craftsmanship. The the the stuff that Anthony does at caveman, I won't lie. I left caveman.

SPEAKER_06 1:25:56

Yeah, Anthony's doing a great job.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:57

It's something else, man. And again, caveman says caveman accra. Because we're trying to tell people that it is possible to do these things for ourselves. It is possible. My shoes are from David Wedge, this is from Nigeria, the watch will be this, this, that. It's possible. Yeah, the glasses. I don't know who I'll go take from Vasty's. I'll go take from Vasti's. Maybe that's the that's the my bag will be detailed Africa. We make amazing leather goods and whatnot, but I I don't want to just talk, I would like to actually embody it. So you'll be saying I just say like I said, Genesis talk playing. So I don't want to sit here and just talk, hey, let's do it for ourselves. I want people to see that we're doing for ourselves. So if you ask me about my outfit, I can tell you it's a Ghanaian designer, he makes it so and so. If you ask me about my bag, I can say it's a Nigerian designer, or this and that, and that. I feel like if we can keep doing those things, people are going to realize that we don't actually need anyone to save us. Yeah. So this whole give me, give me, give us this, give us no one's supposed to give you anything.

SPEAKER_06 1:26:53

Everybody in their own corner would serve the country great. The next thing we see, everything will be great.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:00

Yeah, but we don't consider ourselves a country, we consider ourselves just a bunch of groups that are living together, yeah. Which is why an MP would gladly see his roads ridiculously deteriorated and he was still drive on them because he has a Praddo.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:13

And he doesn't really mind. If he truly saw those people as his people, he would never do that. Because he wouldn't let his family, that's why his he'll make sure his family is okay. But if he saw those people as my family as well, as we are Ghanaians, that would never happen. We wouldn't see half of our roads not done, and we'll just leave it like that because Miadi Drive Prado. Because we don't see, he doesn't see the other person as his people. Your struggle is not my struggle. And I get upset when people say, Oh no, but Africa is doing well, Ghana Ghana is doing well. What about their roads that their Dubai circle and everything? And I get so pissed off because we put the the bar over here, and when somebody does this, then you clap. Yeah, you say the government builds a road. Who the hell is supposed to build that road? And my papa, or who's supposed to build? You took the taxes. You goddamn right, you build a road. You built one hospital. Woo-hoo. The hell am I supposed to be clapping for? Baba, you're supposed to build a hospital. Nobody say it, and I put you there to build that hospital. I'm not going to clap for you because you did it. No. You're doing what you're supposed to be doing. So I hate it when we say, Oh, we're making progress. Because we get to say that we're sitting in AC. The people who are standing in the sun, yeah. And then the Galamsey sites, the young boys and everything. Do you think that they have the time to say the nation is developing?

SPEAKER_06 1:28:27

You know, I have I have this friend who's an artist. He was talking to me. He's an amazing artist. And right now he's stopped. He's doing Gallamse. Because things went really low for him. Art in the country is not selling. So he's trying to survive. So he's doing Galamse. I was trying to talk him out of it. But he was like, he was hungry. He told me like he was getting towards the point of suicide.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:51

It's crazy. People don't realize about those of us who are fortunate, then we be, we become government apologists. Yeah. No, but the government is doing. Now don't get me wrong. I'm for neither government. I'm not saying one is better than the other. I do believe that the current one is doing very well. I do believe that they are restoring our belief because our belief was shattered. Very, very, very badly. We went for more to do more, and we ended up doing up seeing Shigy. But that's life. So it's not even about who's better than the other. I believe across board, because Galam State didn't start with this current government. It's been there for a while. The Tamamoto Way is not spot because of it's it's it's been there for a while. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:29:28

So most of our problems have been there throughout different governments. Wonderful.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:33

So yeah, so my thing is not even about oh my god, this government is the business government. All the governments, let's hold them to the same standard. My people, you've taken our taxes, you better do the work. And if you build one road, we're not gonna clap for you because that's not yeah, you built a road, you're supposed to do that.

SPEAKER_06 1:29:47

But you know, I think even that is part of the problem. You see how you're talking about like let's say it's not just tribalism, yeah, just too much division because when you talk about governance, we don't hold the same standard to government. No, you see, when NDC is in power, NPP people expect more and NDC is fine. When NPP is in power, NDC expects more.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:09

So round and round and round we go.

SPEAKER_06 1:30:12

Like there needs to come a point where we say we don't care who's in power, this is what we expect. Yeah, and that's the barest minimum. You need to impress us more than that. But it's hard to do that because of the separation.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:24

Roland said it's in one of his interviews because they asked him about his corrupt again. Say what you want about him, but some of the principles that he was trying to push for, you can't say they're wrong. Yeah, he was saying, um, it doesn't matter if I'm the one in the seat. He said, even if the devil comes and comes to sit in the seat, we need to put in certain procedures that will make sure that even if the devil came to sit on that seat, yeah, he wouldn't be able to just misbehave the way he bro. We have people who stole money and built 23 houses in a yard. What kind of rubbish is this? What are we what are 23 houses? What are we truly doing here? When was the last time anybody went to jail for stealing um big money?

SPEAKER_06 1:31:01

Yeah, when was the last time we saw that somebody um but we always hear about it and they do committees to investigate it and committee and in the end they guess they go dress free? And then some new coconut comes and we all forget about it.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:15

Yeah, we are waiting for who's sex tape has come.

SPEAKER_06 1:31:17

Ghanians were forgiven, though.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:18

Who is this thing as but I believe we can do it. Um, I'm inspired to be Ghanaian. I think that we are doing well enough. I just believe that we should be audacious enough to believe that we can do anything. So let me ask you this.

SPEAKER_06 1:31:31

We're talking about policy making. Will you ever consider being a politician and making policies?

SPEAKER_01 1:31:38

I told you me I will feel anything for this order. President Maui. I like that. Um I will be where I can make the most change possible. Okay. So if that ends up being in a space where I'm supposed to be guiding policy, absolutely I'll do it. Especially if I believe that um I will be able to help the people around me. But if that means I'll do it from the private sector, it doesn't really mean anything to me. And I'll still do it no matter what. I love the fact that I'm able to hire I think I believe I have maybe a 30-something employees within a different something. That's also enough for me. I've been able to provide 30-something jobs. Somebody also will also provide 15, somebody will provide 100. And then together all of us will come to. I don't believe governments build a country, I've never believed that. I believe if you ever go somewhere and the people say, Oh, the president's built this for us, the president's gave this, you know that they're already in trouble. Yeah. Because that's not the way it's supposed to work. We put them there, which means that if they're misbehaving, we're the ones who are supposed to say, Hey guys, Charlie, we're not gonna go take this thing anymore. If you joke, we're gonna camp outside your place, and until you resign, we're not gonna go. They'll be forced to resign. Yeah, but we leave them, like you said, we don't hold them to any high standard, and we just leave it to be to be to be what it is. So at whatever point that I can do, I can make the most change, 100% I'm gonna do them. But I wouldn't be seeking political whatever for the for the sake of it. If you come away and it makes sense, why not? But I'm more just looking to be a doer and not like a talker. Yeah, looking to serve, looking to serve, to do and to have tangible results so that we don't just yave yavvy yavi just all the time. We can actually say, no, we did this within four years. We did this or that. I personally don't believe in the four-year model. Yeah, I believe no great uh civilization has ever been built from democracy.

SPEAKER_06 1:33:24

And I don't think we're at the stage where we can now look at just the four years.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:29

Yeah, because everybody has to have a long-term plan. So we'll do Sagma Me, and then we're I hope that by God's grace they'll do it. Fine. We can't keep building estates and leaving them. Or we said we're doing, was it Hope City somewhere or so and so city, this place, and we have all so many cities, these grand every day, city here, city here, we'll do this city, and then we have all these grand ideas, and nothing ever comes of it because after four years, or let's say even eight years, before you realize there's a new priority and there's a new whatever. But it's up to us as the people to say we're not gonna take it. But as long as we take it, if somebody did cheat on you and you let them continue cheating you, nobody else is gonna do it. So you know, I need to read the book. I need to read the book properly. You have to, I'll give you a couple. Um, but just to bring it back to the stuff that you've been able to do on your side, it's part of why I enjoy for something like this I would come for it and or for what you guys are doing and whatnot. Because I personally feel like if there's enough of us who can say, fam, nobody's coming to save us. Nobody's coming to save us. We go meow on ourselves, we'll just come together by ourselves and we'll figure something out. I feel like if enough of us can do that, there will be actual change. Yeah. Because I'm not gonna just sit by and wait, you know how many people are dying in the maternity wards because we don't have enough beds, or how many kids are dying from malaria and everything. We're the privileged, so we keep saying, oh, but the government is doing well, things are improving. Yeah, but at what rate?

SPEAKER_06 1:34:49

When we when we judge based on our lives, it looks like everything is good, but that's not the standard for everybody.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:55

No, you say the government is doing, you think somebody's no, no, who wants to wait 20 years to get one hospital in their in their neighborhood? So just because of one big hospital was built in a crowd somewhere, it doesn't mean the entire country is benefiting. So every time you want me to applaud because somebody finished so-and-so poquasi, so-and-so highway, it doesn't really make sense to me because I know that I'm privileged, I know that for a fact. I'm not I'm not ever gonna deny that I am grateful for it, but I also see the suffering of all the people around me, and it doesn't benefit me if I'm the only one who's doing well. It feels better when everybody else is doing well, when you're with your guys and everybody has the Charlie Richard, I won't use your Ferrari morrow. I'm gonna feel that I can't pick them up.

SPEAKER_06 1:35:33

Well, they say, let's go on vacation, let's meet here. That's the one right now, meeting Techiman safe.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:39

We don't go feedback, but small, small. I think I think we'll get there as long as we're not afraid to have these discussions and be open and honest about it. Yeah, um, Europe and all those other places developed because they weren't afraid to criticize their societies, the philosophers and all of those things. They weren't praising societies, they weren't praising them. They were deconstructing them, they were saying this and that, and this is why you guys do this, and this is why you do that. But we're afraid to call our behavior bad, we're afraid to call our bad behavior over here. So when somebody builds 23 houses in Oyarefa, we don't shame him enough that it will never happen again.

SPEAKER_06 1:36:12

Yeah, the next person will do it because this guy.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:17

I would probably also do it. Yeah, why not? Yeah. Because I'm not gonna, nothing is gonna happen. When you start to put a death penalty for for owning a Galamse site, let's see how many people will go to the sites and go and do it. Now it sounds ridiculous, but again, no great civilization has been built from democracy. Can it be? It doesn't happen. None of them, all the people who run democracy now, they didn't build it off democracy. No, no, no, they finished building it and then when they were done. Exactly. Now they okay, everybody, everybody stop the authority and is it stop it, stop it, it's democracy, not democracy. But they're already built, they already had their reality.

SPEAKER_06 1:36:49

Well, now their governments are standardized, everything is fixed. There's a there's an entire system, you are just adding on to it, but we don't have the system yet, so we need bold people. Like I'm I'm always so sad about Kwame Krummer because we're six years, yeah. Six years, look what he achieved in six years, six years, and we couldn't even shut up and now listen.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:11

I'm not saying he was perfect, I know for a fact that he made a lot of mistakes. Nobody is perfect, but I in in sometimes I understand his frustration, even when he formed the Prevention Detention Act, did it after two, three years and everything, which and he was jailing his opponents and everything. Think about it from his point of view, right? You people are they try to help you with Jimmy, with Jimmy San. You will not keep quiet and let me finish building the ports and everything for you. People are here doing helter skeleton and everything, and to this day. Now, of course, a lot of it was through British Help. I'm not I'm not saying he was our singular savior, that's not the point I'm making. I'm saying the mindset of let's do it for ourselves and let's try to develop and everything is something that we should have supported a bit more, but we crushed it with our own hands, but they want to come and say it's the CIA that did it. CIA didn't do anything, man. We did it. Us were the ones who are gonna do it.

SPEAKER_06 1:37:59

You know, if you're in your family and then somebody's coming to attack your father, and your children actually take the knife and stab your father, can you really say it's the outsider who did it?

SPEAKER_01 1:38:09

You say, but they were coming to what's yeah, but you're the one who took the knife. I thought they weak me past anything, and I get I the vex pass anything, and I end up in all these arguments with my friends because sometimes they say I'm anti or whatever, which is and it's actually Oh, just so you know, though they're insulting you in the comments right now. Problem not, they may insult me for I know I'm I don't mind, but we're supposed, as Africans, I feel like we should accept each other, we should accept ourselves for who we are rather than who we think we're supposed to be. Yeah, we keep saying Africa is wasting its potential. Which of the potentials have you seen it happen elsewhere? Is there a reference that we can point to and say this is how it was before? And these people came and took us away from that.

SPEAKER_06 1:38:45

This is how it was before. The truth is, before colonialism, before slavery and everything, Africa was great, but the question we have to ask ourselves is how did we lose the greatness? And I feel we lost the greatness. One thing I always say is that Africa has never had to evolve because nature was good to us. Unfortunately, you know, the West had to evolve because nature wasn't good to them, they had to fight the weather, they had to fight the earth, they had to fight the sky, they had to So they were forced to be ingenious when you have to think, you have to innovate.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:23

Switzerland has almost no natural resources, exactly. So they had to figure out how can we leverage other things. People know that Chale winter is coming. So by this particular time, I don't know. If you go fetch water from the river, the lake is gonna be the river is gonna be frozen. So, geez, what are we gonna do? We're gonna die. We don't want to die. So let's try to think of a way. Let's pass water underground, let's pass it through pipes up in the air, let's figure out all of those things. Unfortunately for us, we had all the sunlight and all the mangoes, and there was no need to overly every day we say Ghana Bomb Bomb Ghana Bomb Bomb. We get just the shake all over there. And I don't blame my ancestors sometimes. Yeah, it's just there's there's just abundance, and yes, abundance sometimes is like so.

SPEAKER_06 1:39:59

Even how we let them in, it's not our fault because we were used to giving, that we're used to sharing because it's there's another there's abundance, yeah. Abundance of food, abundance of resources, abundance of people who are used to sharing, whereas they came in and resources are always limited. So when they see resources, like, hey, we have to grab what we can and take it because we are not always going to have this. So you can't blame them because that's who they needed to be to survive.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:40:31

So who do we need to be?

SPEAKER_01 1:40:33

After a particular point, blame is pointless. Okay, it's their fault. Now what? No problem, no problem. They are the most evil, corrupt, devilish people. Okay, oh yeah, no, we gotta accept it.

SPEAKER_06 1:40:43

Like that's one of the things I say in the book. When I say yes, it's your fault. Yes, it's your fault doesn't mean that you may have caused every situation, but you chose how to react to it. 100%. You know, somebody slapped you on the street, you didn't cause that. No, but how did you react to it? When the Trotra driver crossed you while you were late to a meeting, and then you decided to stop and get out and fight for 30 minutes, and you missed that business opportunity.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:08

Was that also the Throsha driver's fault? I mean, yeah, he did his thing, but the reality is we choose, we choose how we react. And too often I don't think we are able to hold ourselves accountable. Yeah. And so one thing I had to learn over the last couple of years, just a bit of accountability, and because I made so many mistakes, just personally, professionally, all of it. But the mistakes are how you learn, yeah, and the mistakes are how you realize that number one, it's okay to forgive yourself, it's okay to realize that it doesn't stop here. So, yes, it might be your fault for now, but it doesn't mean that you're supposed to now go and lie down and faint and whatever. To your point about Africa being great before, I don't doubt that we were great inherently, but we had never captured that greatness because again, we didn't have the need to other places had industrialized out of need, and which is why I say we need to accept ourselves for who we are. Yeah, we're not the most intelligent in the same way that they are intelligent. Please understand the the nuance.

SPEAKER_06 1:41:59

I'm not saying we're not intelligent overall, we have natural intelligence, wonderful. We understand nature, yes, they have artificial intelligence, they are the original AI.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:09

Basically, so but I don't see that to be a bad thing. Yeah, allow them to commercialize what they can commercialize. Why aren't we monetizing the things that we are also fantastic at? Our handiwork is beyond amazing, the things that we can do with our hands is ridiculous. The the spirit that we have inside us of being able to welcome people or being able to sing or dance or do all of those things. These are things that we should be saying. Listen, we're great at these things. Yes, you guys might be great at financial manipulation and all of that. That's great. Let's partner with you. You come and you do this, but it's not what we want to do. We want to say, we'll do it by us. How are you gonna do it by Dubai didn't build it by themselves? The Emiratis didn't build Dubai in the 1960s something, they had to call the um the British people to come and help them dig their canal because it wasn't good enough that the the big ships couldn't come in. So they had to go get the money. The guy tried to get the money from the British government, they said no, and then I believe he went to get Maktoum, got a loan from Kuwait. I believe there was a personal loan between two leaders. He loaned them the money and then they used that to dig their whole canal, and that's how they formed their first ports, about Ali, something, Jay, something. Okay. Uh, and that's what their first port, the first huge port became. But again, they went to find the money, they looked inwards. It's not about how can we export our gold? We always say we are the biggest exporter of cocoa. How is that something to be proud of?

SPEAKER_06 1:43:24

Yeah, that we are taking everything here out.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:26

How is that a thing that you we are the biggest exporter of cocoa and biggest exporter of something? When we say those things, I get so infuriated because how is that something to be proud of? It's like saying that we're the ones who own all the ingredients, but somebody else owns the restaurant.

SPEAKER_04 1:43:40

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:40

Who's making more money? The person who grows the tomatoes or the person who turns it into a um pasta dish and sells it for 300 CDs? No, the reality is that person is gonna make way more. So we shouldn't be saying that we're the biggest exporters of cocoa. It's a very silly thing to be proud of.

SPEAKER_06 1:43:56

How do we start processing it to the level which is being processed in the world? How do we partner with them to do it further?

SPEAKER_01 1:44:03

How do we say, hey, listen, you guys are good? It's why Botswana is a different case study from the rest of Africa. Because unlike Uganda, Zimbabwe, and even South Africa, with the silliness that they're doing over there. Um, now I understand them from the point of frustration, and I'm not gonna lie, some of the illegal immigrants are heavily misbehaving. They're they're creating a bad name for the rest of us. But that's not the way to do it. But my point is this whole everybody else should go, and then we'll do it by ourselves is a very silly way to do it.

SPEAKER_06 1:44:31

Yeah, because we live in a global village now, you know, and and we keep talking about being divided. This whole the white man did this thing to me 400 years ago, so white people are bad, is part of the division. Because are you telling me that that white man right now there, who's opened a perfectly good factory that you can work with, was the one who enslaved you?

SPEAKER_01 1:44:57

Or you're not the victim. They asked the white man Jared Taylor. I ended up listening to he's a race realist, that's what he calls himself. People call him a white supremacist. But I personally I enjoy listening to other views because I find that we like to put ourselves in an echo chamber and we only hear views that agree with us. So you watch YouTube and then you are nodding, yeah. No, algorithm says, Yes, it's it's it's good to hear the arguments from both sides and understand where they're coming from and where we're coming from. And he's making the point that at the end of the day, me, him as a white man, he's like, I didn't do it to you and you didn't suffer it. Yeah, so why are we fighting?

SPEAKER_06 1:45:35

Exactly. Why can't we find a way to work together? Because now we do want to work together.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:40

Well, we should we don't I would say we don't have a choice, but if you want to succeed properly, yes, you do have to work together. But Swana didn't just say, unlike Uganda and Zimbabwe, they made a silly mistake of kicking all the white people out, you kicked them out, and then they gave the farms to the local people. What happened with that? Uganda has enough arable land to feed the entire continent, and everybody just wasted it because we were so busy to kick away the devilish white people and let them go, and then we couldn't run it ourselves.

SPEAKER_06 1:46:08

Because right now, the world's eyes are on Africa. Heavily. The world wants to partner with Africa and we have the chance to do it right this time or to still play into what happened at that time and mess it up again. We need to understand that we have the natural intelligence and they have an understanding of how to commercialize, and there's nothing wrong with that. You know, when we talk about Mansa Musa, Mansa Musa has been pronounced the richest man to have ever lived.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:38

People should do research about that thing properly, man.

SPEAKER_06 1:46:40

I mean, I was watching something somewhere where they they claim that he's still richer than um Elon Musk right now.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:47

We love to say those things just to make ourselves feel better.

SPEAKER_06 1:46:49

But here's my thing about Mansa Musa being the richest man to have ever lived. It was still part of nature. Yes, you know, Elon Musk becoming the richest man in modern history. It's not about the gold he has in his in the ground that he owns, no, it doesn't come from nature, he had to evolve to create that. Mansa Musa was born into riches, our land is rich. So we have to ask ourselves that how do we actually own this properly? Because we've never had to, you know, it's it's like a child who's born into riches. That that small boy, you know, your father was a poor man, he built wealth and became a wealthy man. That that mentality is very different from the man who was born into riches. 100%. And if he doesn't learn, if that boy who was born into riches doesn't learn from the man who built riches, he will grow up and become poor.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:49

And then he'll blame somebody else. Thank you. He'll say they they did it to me, they did that to me, they did this to me. And that's all I want us to do. That's that's that's literally all I want us to do, man. Let's stop blaming everybody else and everybody. It's okay if they're more intelligent in different ways than us. There's nothing wrong with that. It's not in our DNA yet, because we didn't have that need to evolve in that way. So that's not how we think, including how we were even brought up in schools, how we learn. What is a computer? A computer is a device that's something. Rote learning, we can chew and then we can pour. We can memorize pie, but do we actually understand the implications of pie? Why it was even conceived, why are these things? So the why is the question that I like to ask. Not just the what the what?

SPEAKER_06 1:48:33

The what is never important.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:34

I can recite to you what this and this is. But so that's why I don't because when you don't know the why, you can replicate. So when they say we are the richest continent, how are we the rich? A farmer who lives in Cape Coast, who sits on hundred acres of arable land, is not richer than uh despite who is doing, or for example, who is doing this and who's actually making things. That is simply not true. Yeah, because just because you sit on the land, doesn't if you're not using it for anything, how are you rich? Yes, you're rich in terms of you own the property, but if the gold is lying underneath the ground or the pineapples are lying underneath the ground and nothing is coming out of it, yeah. Are you truly gonna say that you're more wealthy than the people who don't have these resources but have built something with nothing? Are you truly richer than them?

SPEAKER_06 1:49:18

Because if that's the case, then golden tree chocolate should be richer than Calbury.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:22

Easy, yeah.

SPEAKER_06 1:49:23

Because the gold, the the chocolate is gonna be a little bit more than a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:26

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I want us to stop. Okay, let me put it like this let's not congratulate ourselves for things that we didn't do or we didn't create. That's what I would like.

SPEAKER_06 1:49:36

But maybe to what we should be doing is changing it completely because I think the worst part about our system now is we've taken the Western system and we're trying to apply to replicate it, it's never gonna work. Yeah, because we need local solutions for our local problems, it's never gonna work.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:54

They can't understand us. We are just a different set of people. We are they say play they want to. I thought for Ghana here. Yeah. But it's a good thing.

SPEAKER_06 1:50:02

It's a good thing. That's what makes this place such a beautiful country.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:05

They say you can't be sad in this Ghana. You see the buildings of it's raining, and somebody comes out, you put some clumbianly put six.

SPEAKER_06 1:50:11

You can't even stand in Ghana. It's a good thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:13

You can be sad for five minutes. You can be sad for five minutes. But somebody will say something in there, you will laugh. Like it's not you, it shows on how we celebrate funerals. Yeah. We've turned death into something that is truly beautiful in that moment. Yeah. Because for that brief period, yes, we are grieving. People ask why do we dance and everything? Well, number one, the person's already gone. And number two, the person did live a life. So we can't spend all the time grieving just the loss without remembering that the person also left a huge legacy. So maybe if that means that we will dance and we will bask in the joy of the fact that that person came and was with us, that's okay. We've been able to turn pain into joy. That is something that is not normal.

SPEAKER_06 1:50:50

It should be applauded.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:51

It's not normal. So we're so busy to try to be as intelligent as we all want to do STEM and we all want to be the this and that. We all want to. Why is the richest man in Africa not known for being the biggest farmer? Why is Dangoten known for making cement? Yeah. Why does that make sense? We should have multiple farming billionaires by now. Billionaires. But that's not what we're doing. We're so eager to replicate what the West has done because we believe mud huts, it's a mud huts are a marvel of wonder. Yeah. The technology behind it, the cooling systems, all of those things, we shouldn't be ashamed of those things. Like even look at the colour.

SPEAKER_06 1:51:32

Like her own medicine is amazing, but we're not concentrating on it.

SPEAKER_01 1:51:35

Yeah, because we've seen that there's parasitamo. So when you see somebody calling which which doctor and this and that. And I just wish that we would we just had this thing in us where we would stop congratulating ourselves for what we didn't create. Africans say we have the best DNA. What the hell is that supposed to be? Okay, no problem. You have the best DNA. What are you doing with it? And you are the poorest continent. What does that say about you? It doesn't say anything good. So maybe that's not a thing that we should be mostly. And no more, we didn't create the DNA, God gave it to us. Yeah. Which is why when I talk, I don't talk about things I like to say, hey, I was given this, I was blessed with this, I was this and that. But that's not what I go and beat my chest about. I'll beat my chest about what I've built, what I've been able to turn whatever I've been given into. So I wish the whole Africa is the richest continent, Africa is the whatever. Stop applauding yourself for things that we did not create and things that are there, but we are not even using. So maybe we should take a break from patting ourselves on the back and actually go and start to use our own things and stop boasting that we are the biggest exporter of things, like it's a thing to be proud of. Find it, bring it up, study it, refine it, create a brand around it because branding is everything. Yeah. Create a brand around it and let that brand ground.

SPEAKER_06 1:52:45

And the brand is just the story that you tell. And Africa is rich with stories. So we should just tell our stories.

SPEAKER_01 1:52:52

I cannot wait for the future of African cinema. Everybody had a waits for you because I tell you if we do something crazy. Oh, we will do it. But just with how you've been able to come, and I know you're doing some stuff in the film and every um uh space and everything, but I truly believe that there's some crazy things that we can do with African cinema. The stories that we haven't haven't even been able to tell. The one of my things I always say this, I'm probably gonna be before I go, before I go, last last, I'm gonna have to produce one of the best superhero movies that Africa has ever seen.

SPEAKER_02 1:53:20

Thank you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:53:21

I guarantee you, I guarantee you, before it's all said and done, I will 100% do that because I truly believe that there's nothing that's gonna be more interesting than a large-scale, large budget, inherently African superhero movie. Hopefully, we can get the kids to start believing not just in Superman, but in whatever African hero that we create, so that now we have our own legends where it's not just Spider-Man and everyone created by Stan Lee that we can create. Yeah. Maybe we can say we also have some local legends that we can also call our own. And I believe these little things can hopefully take us to where we need to be. And that's why I said I'm gonna go do film. If even if people think I'm crazy, that's why with rhythm and brunch and all these things, or with the restaurants, or with whatever it is, we're trying to pass on the message that bro, we will do it. And I keep saying this: there's two outcomes. It's either you fail and people will laugh at you, probably another day, they will laugh, or you will succeed, and you may not necessarily change the world, but you definitely change either the people around you or the community around you. Yeah, for me, those are odds that I can live with. I think I'm okay with that. If I fail, make you laugh. Make you people laugh. It's okay. I'll fail and then you laugh at me. If you normal level, after you laugh and it's then I'll go again. If I fail, then you laugh again until I succeed. Or even if I don't succeed, hopefully my daughter will see that hey, he tried and tried and tried, and these are the things that happened. Yeah, and maybe I will also try and try. I don't want our kids to grow up repeating the same things that we grew up repeating. The white man took this from us, the neocolonialists are doing this. Africa is the richest continent, we are the biggest exporter of something. Yeah, we need to cut all of that rubbish out and just take ownership for the fact that we have not done enough with what we've been given. God gave us a lot of things, but even lucky the war don't really come on a side like that. Famine came but didn't last for too long. We haven't seen the shige that other countries have seen. Yeah, we haven't. So we should just be blessed and say, Oh my, thank you, God, or let's use this time to create something with it because we've been blessed. And that's one of the reasons. For the rest of my life, I'll forever be proud to be getting it.

SPEAKER_06 1:55:23

Well, they do something for me. I just look in that camera. Okay, imagine it could drop a mindset into the person who is watching that will take them closer to being a mastermind.

SPEAKER_01 1:55:35

I don't think there's anything in this world that is impossible for a human to achieve. And I say that because I believe in God, and God endowed us with enough brilliance and strength and everything to make the impossible possible. We've seen it happen over and over and over again. So the least that you can do as a human being, no matter where you're from, is to believe that it is possible. And if you fail, you fail. Let them laugh. You will try again. If you fail again, that's absolutely okay. But eventually, even if not you, somebody from your lineage will succeed, and it will be because you spoke and you believed that anything is possible. So don't make anybody lie, you not see you know, go for do for this audience, or be vim. That's pretty much it.

SPEAKER_06 1:56:25

And like it stayed illusional.

SPEAKER_01 1:56:27

One time, one time.

SPEAKER_06 1:56:30

Thank you, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 1:56:31

I've enjoyed this conversation. Thank you so much. If you give me a chance, I'll go for complain about this thing so much. But it's also because I want the way forward for us. So I appreciate you giving me the space to no way.

SPEAKER_06 1:56:40

I'll bring you back another time and we'll complain some more. By that time, would have solved some of the problems. So they'll see that the complaining is not for nothing.

SPEAKER_01 1:56:47

Yeah, no, but Richard, before I go, see Ghana, you people you they misbehave sometimes. You guys do this all the time. You always wait for the legends to be gone before you acknowledge them for the things that they've done. And the honest truth is what you have done from beginning to now, and I'm not calling it the end, but what you've done from beginning to now, you know, B Beans. Oh, thank you. What you did with your music career, what you did with building industries, and now you have the tech side and everything. It's beyond what you could have ever imagined in terms of inspiring millions of people, including me. That's one of the reasons that I even think the way I think, because I've seen people, I have examples of people who have actually done it, who didn't settle for the status quo and actually pushed beyond the status quo and created a new era, I guess, for whatever industry that they're in. So even nobody say anybody talking about you be so full legend. Full, full, full legend. It means a lot. It's a hit, man. Appreciate you, my guy.

SPEAKER_06 1:57:44

Thank you, thank you so much. I really hope you watching this. We've brought you one step closer to being the mastermind that you deserve to be. Thank you for watching this episode. Now, the mastermind's dream is about building a community of people who have the right mindset and are ready to take their success into their own hands. So do me this wonderful favor, subscribe and share with anybody out there who you believe you want to see have the right mindset to succeed so that together we can all become the masterminds we deserve to be.