The difficulties that women encounter in the entertainment industry have been revealed by Ghanaian actress Akofa Edjeani.
While acknowledging that sexual harassment occurs in all walks of life, she claimed on Showbiz A-Z on Joy FM that the entertainment sector is a common place for this behavior.
She said that she turned down a sexual relationship with a film director, which cost her a role in a movie.
“I remember we were shooting somewhere after Kumasi, I think. Unfortunately, the producer was a Nigerian. We were going to shoot two movies back to back. So based on that, the executive producer had begged me to bring my rates down, that because we were doing two movies he would pay a certain amount, which reluctantly I agreed to.
Now here is the director who asked me to come to his room. I said ‘come to your room and do what?’. He said ‘to watch a movie’. I said ‘watch what movie? I mean come on, whatever you want to tell me, I don’t need to come to your room’. Apparently, he wanted something else. I said ‘like seriously?’ Are you serious?”, she told the host Kwame Dadzie.
Akofa clarified that she was passed over for the second film because she refused to comply with the director’s advances.
“I didn’t go to his room and guess what, that caused me the next movie. And when I asked the executive producer he said it was the director who was casting but I said ‘you were paying me this amount because we agreed on shooting two movies’. And he said there was nothing he could do about it because it was the director that did the casting,” Akofa stated.
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She claimed that she has never catered to sexual demands for movie roles since she has always believed in her abilities.
Therefore, Akofa counseled young ladies who aspire to work in the creative business to have confidence in their skills and avoid falling for such men’s deceit.
Comedian Jacinta Ocansey, event planner Whitney Boakye-Mensah, and musician Mimi Andani were among the other women featured on the show.
On Saturdays from 2 to 6 p.m., Joy 99.7 FM broadcasts Showbiz A-Z.
