The National Media Commission (NMC) has said it is committed to developing a long-term plan to deal with the rampant use of inflammatory language in the media space.
The Chairman of the Commission, Kwasi Gyan Apenteng, disclosed this to journalists on Monday, while announcing the Commission’s commitment to ensure that the media does not contribute to election-related violence.
This follows the recent inflammatory comments by two radio panelists on Accra-based Montie FM.
[contextly_sidebar id=”kDZj7uYOvWjo9Ks0BaUjpv6vcZFdp0u3″]The two panelists are said to have threatened to eliminate the judges of the Supreme Court if they did not handle the lawsuit on the credibility of the voters’ register properly.
“By and large, the media have done well over the years in performing election-related assignments to contribute to our democracy. However as we have seen, in the course of political campaigns, some people resort to the use of inflammatory, distasteful and provocative language and this situation has understandably caused alarm among the population. The recent offensive effusion by some radio panelists underscores the alarm and the need for the nation to ensure that the abuse of our airwaves does not lead to violence before during and after the elections. We are all aware of the role of the media in the election related violence in some countries and the Rwandan genocide of 1994 among many such tragedies.”
Mr. Apenteng said inasmuch as the Commission will take action against such irresponsible conduct as and when they occur, there is also in place a long-term plan to sanitize the media space.
“There have been many calls on the NMC to do something about the deteriorating standards of political communication in the media and we really appreciate why this is so. However we would like to assure Ghanaians that while we are able to deal with these eruptions as they occur, we have deployed and continue to use strategies that in the long-term will rid of us of such abuses of our media resources especially broadcasting. The NMC has developed a number of documents that contain guidelines for many media activities. These include the guidelines on political journalism, which directly addresses many of the violations in question. Other guidelines in the series are; guidelines for political advertising, guidelines for local language broadcasting, guidelines on fair and equitable coverage of all parties by the state owned media, print media guidelines and others. We urge all practitioners to incorporate these guidelines in their everyday work.”
NMC sued by GIBA over controversial L.I
The Commission also justified the new Content Standard Regulation (LI 2224), which is seeking to sanitize the media space, and urged the Supreme Court to expedite action on the LI, which is being challenged by the Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association (GIBA).
The NMC Chairman said “It is stated that the NMC has no teeth to bite. It is true that the law encourages the NMC to use the acts of mediation and negotiation to settle disputes. But the law also anticipated changes in the nature of the media, society and the relationship between controllers of the media and the vulnerabilities inherent in a new democratic era. As a result, it also gave authority to the commission under sections 24 1B Act 449, to make legislative instrument to provide for any matter that may be necessary for the efficient discharge of its functions. We believe that we need this law to safeguard the peace of our society.”
GIBA wants the Supreme Court to interpret the Legislative Instrument, which was passed by Parliament last year.
The new L.I empowers the National Media Commission to grant content authorization to an electronic operator or revoke same if it goes contrary to the L.I.
The Content Standards Regulation 2015 also entreats all radio and television stations seek content authorization from the NMC before airing a particular programme.
Lack of content standards cause of media disorder – NMC
The National Media Commission (NMC) has attributed the open disregard for sanity on the airwaves to the absence of content standards to regulate the activities of the media.
According to the Executive Secretary of the NMC, George Sarpong, various stakeholders have not expressed the desire to devise mechanisms that will censor the information the media churns out.
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By: Ebenezer Afanyi Dadzie/citifmonline.com/Ghana
Follow @AfanyiDadzie