{"id":234706,"date":"2016-07-27T17:58:39","date_gmt":"2016-07-27T17:58:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=234706"},"modified":"2016-07-27T17:58:39","modified_gmt":"2016-07-27T17:58:39","slug":"montie-fm-radio-gold-off-air-in-solidarity-with-jailed-trio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=234706","title":{"rendered":"Montie FM, Radio Gold off air in solidarity with jailed trio"},"content":{"rendered":"

Accra-based Montie FM, and it’s affiliate Radio Gold, are off air ostensibly in solidarity with the host of Montie FM’s\u00a0‘Pampaso’ political show, Salifu Maase, alias Mugabe, and two panelists, Alistair Nelson, and Godwin Ako Gunn, who have been\u00a0given a four-month prison sentence by the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n

The three were found guilty<\/a><\/strong><\/span> of contempt charges after the panelists issued death threats to judges on radio over their handling of the lawsuit that had to do with the credibility of the voters’ register.<\/p>\n

[contextly_sidebar id=”pPMMaKSke28LWoahFh80fXSQzznZaWZd”]<\/span>The four\u00a0directors of \u00a0Network Broadcasting Limited, owners of Montie FM; Ato Ahwoi, Edward Addo, Kwesi Kyei Atuah, and Kwesi Bram Addo, are also to pay a fine<\/a><\/strong><\/span> of GHc 30,000.<\/p>\n

Mr. Harry Zakuor, owner of Zeze media, which owns Montie FM frequency, 100.1, is also to pay a separate fine of GHc 30,000.<\/p>\n

Judges were harsh on Montie FM trio – Hanna Tetteh<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hanna Tetteh, has come out to describe the\u00a0sentence given to the three as harsh<\/a><\/strong><\/span>.<\/p>\n

Mrs. Tetteh, is of the view that, the judges could have \u201ctempered justice with mercy\u201d given the remorse of the convicted trio.<\/p>\n

In a post on Facebook, the Foreign Affairs Minister noted\u00a0that, her response to the verdict was not an endorsement of the threats of the Montie FM panelists, but she\u00a0stated that there have been \u201cprevious situations where our esteemed Judges had been attacked and had not responded in the same way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Background<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Supreme Court issued a warrant for the owners of the station, host of the station\u2019s \u2018Pampaso\u2019 programme, and the panelists, to appear before them to answer for contempt charges.<\/p>\n

At the second hearing last week, the accused persons were found guilty of contempt.<\/p>\n

Nelson blames \u2018strange disease\u2019 for outburst <\/strong><\/p>\n

Alistair Nelson, at that hearing, blamed his comments on a disease called \u201ckpokpogbligbli.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to him, \u201ckpokpogbligbli is an unknown disease that takes over a person\u2019s body and controls what he says and does.<\/p>\n

Nelson made the confession when he appeared before the Supreme Court to explain why he and others should not be \u201ccommitted to prison for contempt of court, for scandalizing the court, defying and lowering the authority of the court, and bringing the authority of the court into disrepute.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mugabe blames absence of producer<\/strong><\/p>\n

On his part, the host of the show, Maase Salifu, popularly known as Mugabe, apologized for his comments, also adding that his producer fell ill and there was no one to control him in the studio.<\/p>\n

Mugabe also stated that he regrets his comments and pleaded with the judges to forgive him as he has been a journalist of good repute for 15 years.<\/p>\n

–<\/p>\n

By: Delali Adogla-Bessa\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Accra-based Montie FM, and it’s affiliate Radio Gold, are off air ostensibly in solidarity with the host of Montie FM’s\u00a0‘Pampaso’ political show, Salifu Maase, alias Mugabe, and two panelists, Alistair Nelson, and Godwin Ako Gunn, who have been\u00a0given a four-month prison sentence by the Supreme Court. The three were found guilty of contempt charges after […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":234717,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-234706","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-slider-1","category-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=234706"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234706\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/234717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=234706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=234706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=234706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}