NPP, NDC right to deal with comedians who make Bad jokes - DJ Premier

Radio presenter supports political parties over comedians

NPP, NDC right to deal with comedians who make Bad jokes - DJ Premier
DJ Premier

Ghanaian radio presenter, DJ Premier has backed threats that political parties have laid down for comedians who plan to make bad jokes about them in the upcoming election.

According to him, it doesn't matter if the threats infringe on the fundamental right to freedom of expression because the so-called comedians are also secretly involved in partisan politics. He explained that if the major political parties intimidate the comedians into silence, the angle of using comedy to campaign will be eliminated.

In his words, most of the comedians are signed to one party or the other, and there is no such thing as neutral jokes because a comedian knows what he or she is doing when they make jokes about specific things. His rationale was that some comedians will deliberately make harmful jokes against an opposition party under the disguise of entertainment while in truth they have been paid to harm the chances of the specific party.

 

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He advised comedians to be balanced with their approach towards political jokes because they are not a necessary form of comedy. DJ Premier pointed out that making partisan jokes may bring about attacks from party sympathizers and will ultimately hurt their careers.

“It is good as a comedian as part of the act to create some of these jokes, but where people will not accept some of these ideas is when it has to be about one political party."

"Because if you can create jokes about John Mahama in his era, you should be able to create similar jokes in Nana Addo’s era,” he told Andy Dosty, host of Daybreak Hitz on Hitz FM on the 7th of August, 2020.

He used KSM’s piece ‘Afia Serebuor’ as an example, as he said that no political party was mentioned in it even though it was a political satire.

“I remember KSM’s Afia Serebuor which included Kufuor and Jerry Rawlings… But that moment it is focused all the time on a particular party it may appear the comedian has some affiliations with other parties,” he said.