South Sudan music tycoon says tribalism ‘one of concerning factors’ affecting industry

JUBA – South Sudanese prominent music promoter, Koryom Awet Alor Kuol – who is better known to music fans as Promota Kay Two – has decried tribalism as one of the most critical challenges affecting the growth of music industry in the world’s youngest country.

South Sudan’s music industry has been described by experts as “underdeveloped” and local artists have largely been ignored regionally and internationally with the most devastating issue affecting their growth internally being the scarcity of music promotion agencies.

In an interview with Sudans Post on Saturday, Alor said tribalism is affecting the growth of the lucrative music industry within the country and that the government of the world’s youngest country must also help promoters in changing the tribal narratives if the industry is to grow for the greater national good.

“Well tribalism is one of the concerning factors that the industry must address, being a music promoter comes with a lot of sacrifices that one must get used to,” Alor said when asked by a Sudans Post reporter as to what challenges affecting his career.

“If I promote five musicians today and three come from Dinka then tomorrow you’ll hear people saying, ‘ooh look at him he is only promoting his tribesmen’. I see that as a bad habit and need to change,” Alor who seemed calm, said.

The music tycoon further said he would be impressed to see the government interfering in order to address the tribal narrative to help the country grow as music industry has always been described as one of the uniting factors in any society.

“Definitely I would say I will be impressed to see our government involved in changing the narrative of tribalism in this country, there should be an awareness to educate our population on what tribalism is all about,” Alor said.

“I believe this is a role we can all play whether you’re in the music industry or not. I see this as a collaborative step to solve all this,” he added.

When asked of what he wanted to achieve and what he would be proud of as an achievement today, Alor said he “had enlisted the services of different promotion companies in the country to promote different genres of music that would be performed across the country and that was always my first priority to see no artist left behind.”

“That was one of the catalysts that inspired me to start a music PR company based on deliverables. So I would say that I’m proud to see changes in our music industry, we have managed to achieve the global sell-out of our music to neighboring countries like Kenya and Uganda,” he calmly said.

He added: “Today our music is being played overseas for example the likes Of Silver X, John Frog and Lady Kola have become a dominant factor in my watch.”