Remain Active In Tackling Social Ills Prez Tells Journalists
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has made a clarion on journalists across the country to remain resilient in the fight against social cankers.
This advice comes after the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA), on Saturday, awarded a number of media practitioners in the country, for their outstanding performances in the year 2017.
“I urge the media to remain active in tackling the social ills of our country, and advocating for investment that will contribute to Ghana’s development,” the president said in a tweet, yesterday.
Nana Akufo-Addo further congratulated the reigning Journalist of the year, Bernard Koku Avle and other journalists who had won various laurels at the 23rd GJA Awards Ceremony.
Mr. Avle
Akufo-Addo said Mr. Avle’s award was “thoroughly well-deserved.”
37-year-old Mr. Avle is the breakfast show host of Accra-based Citi FM, and also doubles as the Director of News Programming at the station.
He was presented with the 2017 PAV Journalist of the Year award and took home a cash prize, a three-bedroom house, as well as a Sports Utility Vehicle (SUV), a certificate and a plaque.
He takes over from Peace FM’s Kwami Sefa Kayi who won the award for the Year 2016.
Award Night
36 other journalists out of 548 applications received by the Awards Committee were presented with awards in the various categories.
This year’s awards event held at the Kempinski Hotel in Accra, was on the theme: “State of Investigative journalism: Boundaries of privacy and borders of the public interest.”
Touching on investigative journalism, the Chief Justice, Justice Sophia Akuffo, in her keynote address, said: “The limits of investigative journalism is privacy, and the limits of privacy is the public interest.”
According to her, Ghana’s journalism practice could not be compared to yellow journalism in developed countries, where media houses only published stories with screaming headlines just to increase sales.
The Chief Justice therefore advised journalists not to put out raw information without concrete background checks.
She said this would help place value on stories published by the individual and his or her media institution.
Justice Akuffo encouraged journalists to operate within the Code of Ethics, established by the GJA, especially the Guidelines that directs them to respect the individual’s rights to privacy and human dignity.
Media Capacity
The Minister for Information, Mr Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, has also announced government’s plans to commence a Media Capacity Enhancement Programme aimed at strengthening the capacities of personnel in Production, Analytics, Editorial and Specialisation.
The initiative, according to him, would help improve content and professionalism and would be jointly implemented by the School of Communication Studies, the GJA, the National Media Commission (NMC), and the Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association (GIBA) among other stakeholders.
The Minister also expressed worry over the welfare of journalists in the country.
Mr Oppong Nkrumah described the current situation as disappointing and therefore called on media owners to provide better remuneration and conditions of services to the journalists to help them improve service delivery.
Grace Ablewor Sogbey
Comments are closed.