NDC riles Volta journalists

The National Democratic Congress (NDC) seems not to have changed from its hostile attitude towards the media after spending almost four years in opposition. Last week Wednesday, not only did the party treat media personnel in the Volta Region with contempt, but also subjected them to public ridicule.

It all started when the party officially wrote to invite the media personnel to a meeting with Mr John Dramani Mahama, flagbearer of the party.

The venue for the meeting was the Regional Press Centre at Ho, and the time for the meeting was 7pm. Later, the journalists were informed that the venue had been moved from the Press Centre to Serene Hotel.

But when the journalists went to the Serene Hotel as directed, they were told that nobody had come to book the hotel for any activity.

A management member embarrassingly sacked the reporters from the premises, amid the use of unprintable words.

The said management member also claimed to have spoken to an aide to the former President who denied knowledge that Mr Mahama was to meet reporters at the hotel.

Following this fracas with the hotel management, a member of the regional executive of the Ghana Journalists Association directed his colleagues to move back to the press centre for the meeting.

Though the reporters sat at the press centre until 10pm, Mr Mahama failed to show up. His party leaders who were driving past the press centre also failed to tell them that their flagbearer will no more meet them.

However, as the media personnel were about to leave, the Volta Regional Vice Chairman of the NDC, Mr. George Loh, in the company of others, came to the center to inform them that Mr Mahama would not be meeting them.  “I don’t know how to say it, but whatever it is, we are sorry and it would never happen again,” he said.

The angry looking members of the media then asked him what might have prevented Mahama and the campaign team members from informing the media about the cancellation of the meeting with them until after 10pm.  In response, Mr Loh said he was not there to defend what had happened and that the reporters should forgive the party.

Meanwhile, the Volta Region branch of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) has written a protest letter to the national executives of the NDC, expressing disappointment and disgust over the way its members had been treated.

The letter, signed by the Acting Secretary, Mr. Hubert Mawuli Yevu-Agbi, and the Chairman, Anthony Bells Kafui Kanyi, noted that members who had travelled from across the region for an engagement with the NDC flagbearer on Wednesday, August 19, 2020 were made to wait from 7pm to 10pm without any explanation from the party officials at whose request the members gathered.

The letter continued that the members of the association felt embarrassed and humiliated when they were turned away from the Volta Serene Hotel, where the meeting was scheduled, after earlier notice of a change of venue from the press center.

According to the statement, to rub salt into injury, the Association had to incur cost in quickly arranging the press center and conveying members to the place after the venue was changed again from the Volta Serene Hotel to the center.

The GJA made it clear that a letter dated 13th August 2020, and signed by the Volta Regional Secretary of the NDC, Mr. James Gunu, invited the association and its members to the meeting. The Volta Regional Secretary of the NDC, Mr. James Gunu, has, meanwhile, apologised to the journalists for cancelling the programme and regretted the inconvenience caused them.

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