Mr Affail Monney
Veteran Journalist, Mr George Sydney Abugri has launched a memoir, with a call on the government to provide support schemes to literary writers to enable them publish their works.
He said the manuscripts of many talented writers were gathering dust in their rooms due to the difficulties involved in publishing works while literary arts had been seemingly sidelined in the creative arts sector.
“As a result of the virtual exclusion of writers when it comes to government support for the creative arts industry, it has been difficult for the literary arts to flourish in Ghana.
If the government is indeed committed to promoting our nation’s creative arts, including the literary arts, it may consider taking steps to harvest and preserve for posterity through a publishing scheme, the fruit of the talents of budding, young and established Ghanaian writers,” he said at the book launch on Wednesday.
The 125-page autobiography with 19 chapters is entitled, ‘The Newsmonger’s Apprentice, the life and adventures of a Ghanaian Journalist.’ The book gives an account of his birth and upbringing and journalistic encounters.
Mr Abugri, best known for his famous weekly column in the Daily Graphic, ‘Letters to Jomo’, said if the literary arts received the needed support the poor habit of book buying and reading in the country would improve.
The President of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA), Mr. Affail Monney advocated the formation of writing clubs in the various journalism institutions to help student journalists develop the skill of writing before completing school.
According to him, a number of journalists lacked innovative skills in writing hence had become speech writers who reported the exact speeches presented to them in the various programmes they attend.
“Many journalists are addicted to speech journalism. They go to event, get the speech and go back and copy either right or wrongly the content of the speech and that is all that to them is journalism,” he noted.
Mr Monney therefore encouraged journalists to write an article every month in order to sharpen their skills and project them to the level they desired to be in the industry.
The GJA bought the first copy of the book for Gh?2, 000.
Mr Abugri, began his career in Journalism with the ‘The Punch’ weekly and moved to Daily Graphic in 1982 where he worked in various capacities as a reporter, features editor and columnist.
Between 2013 and 2016, he was the Editor of the defunct General Telegraph newspaper. He has been the recipient of seven awards for excellence in journalism including 1997 Journalist of the Year.
He has more than three publications to his credit.
By Jonathan Donkor and Abeduwaa Lucy Appiah
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