Be bold enough to declare me winner of 2019 VGMA Artiste of the Year- Stonebwoy to Charterhouse

Dancehall artiste Stonebwoy has called on Charterhouse, organisers of the Vodafone Ghana Music Awards (VGMA), now TGMA to declare him the winner of the 2019 Artiste of the Year award.

Despite the award being annulled due to a fracas that erupted between Stonebwoy and Shatta Wale's fans, Stonebwoy says he is convinced that he won the award.

Speaking after winning the 2024 Artiste of the Year award, Stonebwoy expressed his gratitude to his fans and team but also took the opportunity to address the 2019 incident.

He said: “I’ve been very consistent and I’ve been working very hard throughout the years. Ever since I won the Artiste of the Year in 2015, I won it again in 2019 but we all see what happened. I want to plead with Charter House that as honourable as they are they should make sure they announce the winner that I am confident that it was Stonebwoy for 2019 and then 2024.

I couldn’t do this without you guys. We all saw what went on in the news. A lot of things went on in the news because of how hard we worked. Bigups to all artistes in the category but I can’t do this without Bhim Nation Ghana. All the way from the Volta Region to Ashaiman to the rest of the world.

matter what you do, the higher you go the more your haters so you keep going higher and higher. I want to say shoutout to my lovely wife for being there. She’s my friend and my companion,” he said.

Background

The 2019 Vodafone Ghana Music Awards (now known as the TGMA) were marred by a violent altercation between fans of Shatta Wale and Stonebwoy on Sunday morning.

The incident occurred when Stonebwoy was announced as the winner of the 'Reggae/Dancehall Artiste of the Year' award and was called on stage to receive his prize.

The reason for the fight is unclear, but Stonebwoy was seen pulling out a gun on stage before exiting. According to reports, Shatta Wale and his fans had approached the stage to congratulate Stonebwoy, but his team perceived this as a protest against Stonebwoy's win.

The resulting chaos halted the event and live broadcast for approximately 30 minutes. Stonebwoy later returned to the stage, accusing Shatta Wale of seeking to incite violence and death in Ghana. After order was restored, the show continued, and Stonebwoy apologised when he accepted the 'Songwriter of the Year' award.

“I am really sorry for the incident that happened earlier on and I only had to react out of natural instincts because we all know how premeditative some people can be. We’ve seen on social media the threats and everything so we couldn’t come in unprepared because anything could have happened as you guys saw. I come in peace and I go in peace and I apologise to the whole masses of Ghana that the Awards is going to continue. Thank you very much for supporting my music, for supporting everybody else’s music. By their deeds we have all seen [them].”