In November last year, when Mentor II television reality show winner, Prince Henry Lamptey was invited to participate in The Battle, another reality show by TV3, he jumped at the opportunity to win for himself another prize package.

For winning Mentor II, a year earlier, Prince took home ¢20million. His successor, Erico, winner of Mentor III received a handsome cash prize of ¢100m a couple of months before The Battle was organised.

Thus for The Battle, which was perceived as a kind of champions-of-champions competition, Prince set his sights on a much bigger prize of at least ¢150 million.

“I must win this one too,” he must have said to himself. So his extended family who had been his support in the earlier contest, mobilised resources to help Prince win the big prize. They took a loan of ¢90million to buy phone credits to vote for him.

Unfortunately, Prince was not lucky this time round. He came second in the contest and won only ¢40million.

The Battle, which brought together some contestants of the three Mentor competitions, gave 100 percent to public votes to determine the winner. Thus a contestant’s stay in the competition depended on the number of votes cast in his favour.

In a chat with Graphic Showbiz, Prince said if his family had known that the ultimate prize for The Battle was ¢60m, they wouldn’t have spent ¢90m to see him through the competition.

“We had no idea about the ultimate prize for The Battle till later on in the competition by which time my family had mobilised and spent the said amount on phone credit to keep me in the competition.

“You see, the winners of the first two editions of Mentor received ¢20m but the winner of Mentor III took home ¢100 so we assumed the ultimate prize for The Battle would be bigger since they were looking for the who-is-who in Mentor. That is the reason why my family spent so much in the bid to keep me in the competition with the hope to eventually win”.

Asked if spending so much on phone credit was worth it, Prince said “ I don’t think it was worth spending so much money. The Battle prizes were supposed to be very juicy. We thought it would be in the range of ¢120m to ¢150. So that even if we spent ¢90m, we would still not make a loss. But as it stands now, we have lost out and have to pay back the loan. I’m sure if my family had known, they wouldn’t have spent so much.”

Asked if his family spent so much when he participated in Mentor II, he said “ No, what was spent in Mentor II was not even up to ¢20m.”

He said he would have to pay off part of the loan with his prize money from The Battle when he receives it. “Although the finals of The Battle was held early January this year, I am yet to be given my prize. In fact the others haven’t received their prizes too. We have been going to TV3 but we are always told to hang on because the money is not ready yet.”

“I come from a close-knit family. I live in a family house and I believe my family did what they did for me and so I will also have to help out. We are still paying the debt”, he added.

Prince is in the studio working on a gospel album. “I am still in the studio working on my debut. I started work on it late but will be out soon and my fans should watch out for it.”

Prince took part in The Battle with 11 other contestants from the previous three editions of Mentor and came second.

The winner was Kofi Dedzie who interestingly placed third when he contested in Mentor II which Prince emerged the ultimate winner.