That the media has played and is still playing crucial roles in the nurturing and sustenance of our democracy cannot be an understatement. Indeed, between 1992 and 1996 when the opposition parties decided to boycott parliament following an earlier disputed presidential election, the media took up the role of the Minority in Parliament and consistently kept the antagonistic Jerry Rawlings’ government on its toes.
Among these roles was the persistent exposure of corrupt deeds among some of the ministers. In fact, some of the ministers were found guilty of abuse of office and corruption by the Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), following media reports on them.
Though the Flt. Lt. Jerry John Rawlings-led government, which was all along unhappy with the exposure of the ills by the media, issued a white paper to exonerate its ministers, at least the objective of forcing the government to be more accountable to the people was achieved.
But this struggle to make the media more vibrant in order to sustain our nascent democracy did not come on a silver platter, as most of the media personalities suffered various forms of harassment and imprisonment. Here, names such as Kofi Coomson, Eben Quarcoo, Kwaku Baako, Haruna Atta and others come to mind.
Even today, the fruits of the democracy we are enjoying cannot be coming from the politicians alone – the media has also played its role.
It is, therefore, not surprising that the constitution recognises the role of the press and made provisions to protect it. The state-owned media in particular, were insulated from any form of governmental control, so that they could discharge their duties without any fear of sanctions by the political class.
With this background we have laid, and what the constitution says about the state media, The Chronicle was surprised at the arrogant and unfriendly posture the Minister of Communications, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, adopted during her recent fracas with the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC), until President Akufo-Addo came in to ease the tension that was building up.
The Minister, per her own letter to the management of the GBC, said she had a virtual discussion with the managers of the state broadcaster on June 25, 2020, tabling a proposal to reduce their channels on the National Digital Terrestrial Television platform (DTT) from the current six to three. A day later, precisely June 26, 2020, the Minister wrote officially to GBC to yank the three channels from its stock.
Listen to her: “This is to ensure there is redundancy on the National DTT platform, which is currently at full capacity. You (GBC) will, therefore, be required to consolidate your programming in line with this directive.”
GBC of course took a serious exception to this letter and subsequently wrote to the National Media Commission to intervene. “Complying with the request of the Minister will mean GBC has to lose three of these channels. It will virtually mean that GBC will have to reduce its operations by half. This request will also impose serious budgetary and human resource challenges on the operations of GBC, and, indeed, can collapse the Public Service Broadcaster,” Prof Alhassan, Director General of GBC, argued in his letter to the NMC.
When the petition was presented to the NMC, The Chronicle was expecting Mrs Ekuful to have kept quiet and wait for the outcome, but she surprisingly jumped the gun and went on air to state that the NMC cannot resolve the issue, and that her decision to take three channels from GBC would not affect its content, a claim which has been proved wrong by the NMC.
“The Commission wishes to state clearly that the directive given to GBC and Crystal TV by the Minister for Communications purports to usurp the constitutional mandate and authority of the National Media Commission, and same cannot be obliged under our current constitutional dispensation. It is the view of the Commission that any action by any entity, which culminates into limiting or depriving the media of the use of public resources, legitimately allocated to them, undermines their capacity to serve the nation, as anticipated by the Constitution,” the NMC noted in its ruling.
On the same day the NMC ruling came out, President Akufo-Addo directed the Communication Minister to suspend the implementation of her directive to the GBC until further notice. A statement signed by the Director of Communications at the Presidency, Eugene Arhin, said the President had directed the Minister “to suspend the implementation of the directives given to the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) in connection with the reduction of GBC’s channels on the Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) platform, pending further consultation with stakeholders.”
In our view, this embarrassment could have been avoided if the Minister had done wider consultations with stakeholders, including the NMC, Ghana Journalists Association, and others before writing officially to the management of GBC. It is mind boggling that on such a sensitive issue, the Minister used just a day, as stated in her own letter to GBC, to do consultation.
As a British historian, Lord Acton, put it, “Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely.” We do not, however, believe that Madam Ursula Owusu-Ekuful’s conduct fit into this statement, but if that is really the situation, then we dare say she can bring down her own government, and President Akufo-Addo is right in stopping her in her tracks.
The post Editorial : Communication Minister’s gaffe could have been avoided appeared first on The Chronicle Online.
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