ADDIS ABABA– The Ethiopian Music Sectors Association Union said that it has been working to capitalize on the music industry to promote peace, tolerance and coexistence and mobilize the public to national agendas, besides ensuring the music’s artistic values.
Speaking to The Ethiopian Herald, Union President Artist Dawit Yifru stated that the Union encourages member professionals to produce songs that will cherish Ethiopia’s much-acclaimed mutual coexistence and address the society to shun narrow nationalism and sectarianism.
Noting music’s stronger connection with human’s interest and emotion, Dawit indicated that framing musical contents in a way promoting brotherhood and sisterhood would help in sustaining the age-old peace of the country.
He said that both famous and young musicians have been incorporating songs of different ethnic groups in their albums and performing diverse cultures in the video clips that show the huge importance the music industry has for maintaining the long cherished value of mutual existence.
“Unlike the practice of the Military Government, now musicians are free from the obligation to do propaganda songs,” Artist Dawit noted, adding that a significant number of professionals mainly focus on romantic and such other topics and they are tending to commercialization.
The president pointed out discussions are crucial to encourage professionals to give due attention to public interests and make public-centered works in a view to enhancing the role the music industry has played for sustaining peace and reaching national consensuses.
Dawit stressed that the government needs to put in place stricter mechanism to enforce copyright law and bring individuals who took part in breaching the law to justice. “By doing these, the government will enable the artists get appropriate benefits from their labor and address the major problem that enforce many music publishers to abandon the industry.”
Capitalizing music’s iconic role in laying the foundation of peace, tolerance and coexistence needs the active participation of all actors in the industry and the task should not have left to the Union or professionals, he remarked.
The Ethiopian Musicians Association, the predecessor of Ethiopian Music Sectors Association Union was established in 1964 and the latter currently has 2,200 members.
The Ethiopian Herald, August 27/2019
BY BILAL DERSO
