Members of the MCI/Earth Institute Accra team were treated to upbeat premiere performances of the first “Millennium City” song, composed in honor of Accra’s recent designation as a Millennium City.
The catchy tune was premiered by famed Ghanaian singer/songwriter Akosua Agyapong and her band during a festive evening jamboree in the historic Jamestown neighborhood of old Accra. Responding to popular demand, Akosua and her talented group performed the song again the following day in Independence Square, before Ghana’s First Lady, the Honorable Mayor of Accra, leaders of the diplomatic community and hundreds upon hundreds of Accra residents, at the ceremony celebrating the launch of Accra as a Millennium City.
Cheers broke out as Akosua’s group took center stage, clad in crisp new Millennium City T-shirts, bamboo brooms in hand. The musicians used the brooms to sweep and dance, and swept some more:
“This place looks so neat, so beautiful and hygienic, too,” Akosua sang, over a lively back-up featuring guitar, winds, bass and percussion, as she showed through her irresistible music what it would mean to inhabit a city that had achieved at least some of the Millennium Development Goals.
“The gutters are all cleaned up, so there’ll be no floods, when it rains, hey hey hey!
The gutters are all cleaned up, there’ll be less malaria when it rains.
Millennium City, yeah: a new Accra for a better Ghana!”
What a thrill – an original, super-appealing “Millennium City” theme song, composed by one of Ghana’s leading pop artists, a stunning dancer, delightful person and mother of four.
“It’s possible to make Accra clean and orderly, progress and decongestion’s there for all to see!” sang Akosua, whose first name means “Sunday-born,” as she brought home the meaning of this day to the level of ordinary citizens, reminding all of us – Earth Institute experts, top Ghanaian officials and Accra slum-dwellers alike – to take responsibility for making Ghana’s capital a true “Millennium City,” in which all citizens and friends invest real thought and care so it can better serve the needs of its 3+ million inhabitants.
With her infectious, salsa-like syncopations ornamenting her visionary charge to all her fans, Akosua has set the perfect tone. Now it’s up to the city administration, with the support of the MCI/EI team, to live up to such an inspirational beginning and lead the way.
Listen to Accra’s Millennium City song!
