UP AND COMING ARTISTE Arnaud Muhoza, commonly known by stage name as Big Banks, has said that he will consider taking Muzika Nyarwanda Ipande (MNI) to court should they not give him the prize he won during the 4th countdown as earlier announced. MNI Selection rates songs based on how music fans vote for them and then awards artistes with highest votes in a countdown that takes place every quarter. The awarding activity has been happening since 2019 and no one complained anything that has something to do with malpractices in the MNI voting system until Big Banks did so shortly after a prize he won in the first place went to somebody else during the just-concluded Quarter 4 of the MNI countdown held on December 11 live on TV10. The countdown deadline day saw Big Banks and his opponent Seyn go toe-to-toe on votes until the voting system stopped at 9pm. According to the results broadcast live on TV10, Big Banks finished top of the voting charts with 803 votes and presenter Khamiss Sango announced him as the winner of the countdown and that he was going to bag Rwf250, 000 worth of a cash prize. Shortly after announcing Big Banks as the MNI countdown winner, Seyn surprisingly complained that the system showed that he checked the system and found that he had more votes than Big Banks, prompting MNI to change their minds and instead announced Seyn as the winner of the countdown instead of Big Banks. MNI explained that time explained to the artists that a technical error occurred because the journalist made a mistake to announce Big Banks as a winner of the countdown without refreshing the results provided by the system. “The journalist made a mistake because he did not refresh the system before announcing the winner of the countdown. When we cross-checked the results in the system, we realised that Big Banks did not win the countdown but Seyn, because the prize goes to the artiste with the highest number of votes,” said Jean-Christian Ndikubwayo, the brains behind the MNI countdown concept. “I don’t think anyone was robbed because artistes are encouraged to monitor the results in the system rather than relying on someone else. They have access to check the results themselves,” he added. Big Banks, however, protested against the decision to hand the prize to Seyn and has expressed his disappointment towards MNI for unfairly getting the prize from him yet the results showed that he won the countdown. He claimed that the votes that Seyn gathered to surpass him came late in the system after the voting deadline (after 9pm). “I was announced as the winner of the countdown as shown by the votes in the system during the time the presenter announced me live on TV10. But I was surprised to see them change their mind and give it to somebody else,” the 22-year-old told this publication in an interview. Blame game The scenario sparked a blame game between MNI and TV10 who broadcast the countdown every quarter. Jerome Mugabo, the Director of TV10, blamed MNI’s system as the reason behind the issue which had never happened before since the concepts inception in 2019 because nothing wrong would have happened had the system been automatic. “Their system is not automatic. The system they are using is manual which obviously made us announce the artiste who was not top of the charts because the system was not refreshed, yet no instruction was issued to us that we had to refresh before announcing the final votes,” Mugabo told The New Times. “I think their system should always be on time so we can see every change in votes live. We don’t have any problem with Big Banks that could have motivated us to favour Seyn because we are here to play our part in the development of the music industry,” he added. Despite the malpractices in the system, Mugabo revealed that TV10 tried to play an intermediary role by bringing the two parties, Big Banks and MNI, to solve the disputes. MNI agreed to re-count the votes in the system before Big Banks, but the young artiste was no longer interested in anything other than being announced the winner of the countdown. “I don’t see the importance of re-counting the votes. The countdown was live on TV10 and I was announced the winner of the countdown reference on the votes provided by the system. If MNI cannot give me my cash prize, then I could consider seeking justice from a competent court because it’s the only option I have,” the singer said. “It requires investments at some point to win the countdown and I had to mobilise my friends and family to vote for me and voting for me means spending money,” he added. Ndikubwayo said they tried to explain the results to Big Banks though he did not want to listen to them. He says they have got no choice left until they are summoned to explain it to court. “It’s not our wish to go to court, but if he was not satisfied by what we explained to him, he is free to go. We can’t change our mind because someone is going to court,” he said. Asked why the presenter happened to announce an artist who did not win the countdown, as per MNI’s revised results, Ndikubwayo admitted they will, next time, make sure a presenter waits for their confirmation about the voting results before announcing the winner of the countdown to avoid a similar mistake from happening in the future. “The error was committed and we don’t wish to let it happen again. we are going to find a durable solution to it because we know we spent over a week exchanging arguments with Big Banks about improvised issues like that,” he said.
