120 million Africans are on social media. 1.5 million of them are in Ghana.

That is power. It connects us, engages us and enables us to share information, tell stories and totally reimagine our continent.

I call it the four Ps of the world of online media: power, protest, profit and pain. The power comes in our ability to raise our voice through 140 characters on Twitter or a FB post; the protest through articulating displeasure about an issue, the profit from engaging potential customers as an entrepreneur and the pain comes with the abusive ways that online media sometimes engages and deals with women – often using sex, or sexual language.

Our voice matters within our media. Online media has transformational power.

With social media, one voice can engage with and connect to millions. That can turn an unknown issue into something that is highly visible, that impacts media agendas, creates a focus for politicians and can lead to change.

Ghana’s broadcast media is young, so change should be a pivotal part of our evolving agenda. That’s why I created and host an annual Ghana media summit. It’s called: – #reImagineGH2017: stories, standards, sex. This year the focus is the world of online media. We will have panelists and keynote speakers: Anita Erskine – Starr FM; Efo Dela – Blogger and Writer Nana Akosua Hanson – YFM, Actress, Poet and writer; Nana Ama Agyemang Asante – Citi FM and Writer; Kwame Acheampong – Starr FM Online. This year’s event is on Tuesday 4^th April, 5.30pm at Webster University, East Legon.

When Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie spoke of ‘The Danger of a Single Story’ in her now viral TedTalk, she was inviting her audience to understand the harm caused by creating and perpetuating one narrative about a Continent with 1.24 billion people that speak over 2,000 languages . Her call was for more stories in order to counter the single story of Africa as helpless, hopeless, victim to countless wars, hands out, on her knees, patiently waiting for that “kind, white foreigner” to save her.

The power of online media – including social media – is everyone with a Twitter handle, a FB page, and an Instagram can contribute to changing that single story. There is an extraordinary, beautiful, challenging, hilarious Africa via the world of online, digital and social media. It is individual and institutional.

Here in Ghana, the growth of online portals by broadcast media houses means expanding that narrative and increasing the numbers of available stories for the world to consume. It also makes the ‘Africa by Africans’ narrative real.

The ‘P’ for Protest offer us multiple examples. Globally, one is the Black Lives Matter movement in the US. Social media became a path for activists and protesters to go from the streets to elected officials and as far as the American president. Media and politicians were forced to acknowledge and confront the visualized growing reality and outcry over police brutality of Black men, women and children.

For Ghanaians, protest via Twitter was a powerful tool after our 2016 election. The global media giant CNN printed a story riddled with inaccuracies about Ghana. Ghanaians took to Twitter to protest CNN’s story swiftly and loudly. The protest led to CNN printing an edited version of the story. Such is the combination of power and protest.

Sometimes we protest those within our own government. Their words can cause harm. They can be the ‘P’ of PAIN. Such was the case due to the words from Ghana’s Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection.

Honourable Otiko Djaba was the speaker at the 90th anniversary of the Speech and Prize giving Day of the Krobo Girls Presbyterian Senior High School in the Eastern region. During her speech, she invited the girls to be bold, be confident and then cautioned them that short skirts may be fashionable, but they invite rapists and defilers.

The remarks were televised. Public outcry and intense discussion on Twitter and Facebook followed. I learned about the story on Twitter, and then further researched. I read Twitter threads filled with anger, outrage and justification. Some defended, some applauded, some castigated, some condemned. Calls for reason were made – as if rape were a thing about which a society should reason. Do we really have a Minister for Gender and Children who suggests hem length can cause rape as opposed to the criminal sexual behavior of rapists?

This particular issue requires scrutiny.

Recently, the Minister for Gender, Children and Social Protection intimated that violence response centres would be created particularly for the women porters – more often called ‘kayayei’ – who were vulnerable to sexual violence. An important move.

The Minister went from taking action to respond to the cancer of sexual violence for a group of vulnerable women to articulating a message that conveyed to school girls that their vulnerability was of their own making. Her words suggested vulnerability could be resolved by dropping the hem of a girls’ dress or skirt. Such comments go beyond the outrage of a social media thread – though that is instructive for seeing the degree to which some in society really do consider hem length as a valid contributory factor to rape.

This Minister’s portfolio is Gender, Social Protection and Children. Those three arenas are spaces of specific vulnerability in a society that is deeply patriarchal and hierarchical. Patriarchy is a global beast. Can girls have faith or trust their government if the Minister under whose portfolio they stand already makes them responsible for the crimes committed by men? Be clear. Telling girls a short skirt invites rape equals telling boys or men who rape they are not responsible – what could they do but rape – look at the length of her skirt!

It is a crucial time to reflect on the stories we tell, the standards we hold and this messy, challenging world we call sex.

Engage. Discuss. Reflect. Then Re Imagine.

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