Veteran Ghanaian rapper Kwame Nsiah Appau, Known in showbiz as Okyeame Kwame, fondly called by his fans as Rap Dacta has shared the dark part of his struggles before he attained his present celebrity status wrapped in wealth.
The former member of Akyeame music group spoke at a recent seminar which came off at Weija, Accra on Jan. 23, 2020, designed to inspire the youth and upcoming artists on how to remain relevant in the music industry.
“I grew up in the (big house) ‘efikesem’ type of setting where we had like 150 people in one big house built by some old cocoa farmer that has one toilet and bath. In that house, there is the hustler…, the sister in the house who is trying to go to London…, the gentleman of the house who maybe works at COCOBOD that at the end of the month the water and light bill will be given to…, the house owner who is more than 70years old which is wicked…”
“I always felt that ‘my father is an accountant why do I have to live in a place like this…” he said.
Okyeame Kwame stated that the condition toughened him as he began hustling as a cobbler (corrupted as shoeshine boy in our parlance). He continued:
“…I lived there and sold rubber bag when I was five years old, I made my own shoeshine box and on vacation, I’ll go through the neighborhood and shine shoes for coins. I didn’t know that this thing that I thought was disturbing me, was destroying my swag, was the thing that was going to give me the opportunity to meet a lot of people. Inside that house, I saw many things and all the things I experienced, little did I know was building my library to become an artist.”
