President Nana Akufo-Addo has described the current media landscape as “loud and crowded” with some bouts of recklessness.
Nonetheless, the President said he very much preferred this current state of the media to the one in times past.
President Akufo-Addo made these remarks in a speech delivered on the theme “Ghana, A Rising Star of Africa”, at an event organised by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, in Berlin, Germany.
President Akufo-Addo said of the current media: “it is a loud and crowded media that we now have, and some feel that many journalists err on the side of recklessness.”
He noted further that, there was a lot to be taught those who practice journalism in Ghana “but, I must say, I would much rather have the loud and reckless media than the meek and praise singing one that used to characterize our newspapers, radio and television.”
Ghana has come a long way since protests in 1995 over the seizure of equipment from a pioneering private station, Radio EYE, forced the government to issue many FM frequencies for other private stations.
There are now over 200 radio and television stations operating in Ghana, offering wide-ranging content in different dialects.
“We probably have one of the most vibrant media on the African continent, if not in the world. Like many of the other institutions of state, the media in Ghana came into its own in the Fourth Republic, where the national Constitution guarantees freedom of the media,” the President said.
On the matter of media training, President Akufo-Addo noted that “it’s one of the sectors in which the Konrad Adenauer Foundation has been active in Ghana, with funding for the continuous training of our journalists, and it is one of the many things for which we owe you the Foundation a debt of gratitude.”
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By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana