CEO of Media Excel and a prominent member of Table of Men (ToM) Kwasi Ernest has reacted to music fans asking TOM to raise a campaign for Gospel musicians in the Telecel Ghana Music Awards (TGMAs) Artiste of the Year category (AoTY).

For the 2025 edition scheduled for May 10, Team Eternity Ghana (TEG) and Joe Mettle are the Gospel acts contesting Black Sherif, King Paluta, King Promise, and Kweku Smoke’s claim to supremacy.

In 2017, Joe Mettle made history as the first-ever Gospel musician to win the AoTY accolade. In 2021, another Gospel star, Diana Hamilton, lifted the trophy. In 2023, Piesie Esther came close to the crown but lost it to Black Sherif.

ToM famously campaigned for Diana Hamilton’s win, and judging from TEG’s valiant work on the music charts following the release of their Testimony tape which houses the megahit Defe Defe, social media conversations have been about what significance support from ToM would hold for their chances to be declared Artiste of the Year.

Kwasi Ernest, however, told Graphic Showbiz, ToM did not campaign for an artiste simply because they sang Gospel. He underlined he and his colleagues were dedicated to the Gospel musicians but recognised campaigns were appropriately led by an artiste’s team, despite ToM’s steadfast readiness to always complement the artiste’s team’s efforts.

“Table of Men is not bias. People have to understand that the group isn’t a PR machine for any gospel artiste so it's only proper for any artiste who got nominations to tell their team to lead the campaign,” Ernest said.

“However, if they feel Table of Men have any influence and campaigning for them will strengthen their chances of winning, why not? We are ready to help because we stand for the promotion and well-being of the gospel music industry.” 

He added, “We can’t just get up and start campaigning for an artiste. Besides, we don’t even know the strategy the artistes’ management might have adopted so until we are tasked to support, which we will gladly do, there’s no point blaming us. I think that should be the standard.”

“At the moment, we are on break from advocacy works and looking at initiatives to boost the industry. This includes artistic trainings, vocal seminars, distribution services, marketing and promotion among others,” he revealed, also.