Deputy Minister of Tourism, Arts and Culture, Mark Okraku-Mantey says that Black Sherif might be new in the industry as compared to Piesie Esther, but he deserved the most coveted award, Artist of the Year.

Speaking on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show, he said that the Gospel singer has done massively well for herself over the years, however, twenty-one year old Blacko has worked extremely hard within a very short time making him more qualified for that award.

“Black Sherif is relatively new, Piesie has been around for so many years, some of us know the Piesie story, and so if you’re to look at that then you’ll say, she’s worked for long and she deserves it.”

“But this young man, that’s how God works, nobody knows how that happened, he just came up. I’ve been a follower of Black Sherif when I was on Hitz FM, they used to play his song without mentioning his name.”

“He was so low a brand that people wouldn’t even mention his name whenever they played his song,” he said.

The Minister also reiterated the fact that, the “Waye me yie” hit maker only had a popular song to thrive on looking at the year in retrospect. On the contrary, Black Sherif had many other popular songs to celebrate which has evidently crossed borders.

“And Piesie’s strength was only a particular song. Black Sherif has more than a song which he performed on the night. He did more than three, some of them I had never heard but the whole hall was singing.”

“And so for me, the data could tell that the young man has the numbers to the extent that an international record label showed an interest in him so looking at all these variables, if you put them together, it explains everything,” he indicated.

Mr. Mantey nevertheless acknowledged the awards won by Piesie Esther saying that they are equally huge considering her journey.