Nana Ama Agyemang Asante, a journalist at Citi FM, and a co-host of the award-winning Citi Breakfast Show, left Ghana in September, and will be away for six months.

The Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellows Program hosts democracy activists, scholars, and journalists for five-month fellowships, bringing fresh insights and perspectives to Washington, DC.

The fellowship offers an important opportunity to explore new ideas in a comparative context, undertake individual research, and share best practices with one another.

Nana Ama is there together eight others from different parts of the world.

While there, she will work on a report on how media women represent women’s issues for both women in politics and public space in general.

She will also be studying how the US media practices gender and minority inclusion to enhance democracy.

Nana Ama Agyemang Asante is one of the known female voices in the Ghanaian media, whose divergent views on one of Ghana’s most listened to radio shows, the Citi Breakfast Show, is appreciated by many, and also disliked by others, who are mostly against her strong stance on women issues.

With a solid background in human right activism and broadcast journalism, Nana Ama continuously remains a strong female voice, relentlessly advocating for the cause of women, children and the underprivileged.

More about the program

As part of the Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellowship program, fellows join an accomplished group of alumni. Inspired by their NED experience, fellows produce an impressive range of presentations and products. Some fellows go on to launch new initiatives and institutions based upon their fellowship work.

During their time in residence, fellows are asked to share their insights in various ways—via roundtable discussions, working groups, and public presentations. Each fellow gives a presentation at NED during their fellowship and has the opportunity to share insights with the Washington, D.C. audience.

Fellows often use this period of reflection and exploration to undertake a larger goal. Some have gone on to publish books, articles, and more addressing the state of democracy in their region.

While each fellow is expected to produce a product during the fellowship, the format may vary. Activists may produce a practical handbook or write memoirs, journalists may publish a series of articles and op-eds, and scholars may focus on writing an academic articles, monographs, or book chapters.

Fellows have chosen to devote their time in residence to exploring new frontiers in their democracy work.

Many alumni have returned home inspired to launch new initiatives and expand existing efforts, such as founding new organizations, developing civic education curricula and trainings, and even establishing new fellowship exchange programs.

National Endowment for Democracy

The program is funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a private, nonprofit foundation dedicated to the growth and strengthening of democratic institutions around the world.

Each year, NED makes more than 1,200 grants to support the projects of non-governmental groups abroad who are working for democratic goals in more than 90 countries.
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By: citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post Citi FM’s Nana Ama Agyemang Asante attends Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellowship program in US appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

I work on one of the most listened to breakfast show in Ghana, the Citi Breakfast Show. By the nature of the Show, I’m required to know more about everything we discuss, which means I know that only 2 out of 10 pupils in Primary 2 can read and write. I know that 36 percent of Ghanaians with salvageable injuries die because of the lack of emergency care services. I know the doctor-patient ratio stands at one doctor to 10,450 patients. I also hear shenanigans of the powerful. For instance, I know which elected official is using his family and friends to hide money in Dubai.

Knowing the things I know about the powerful, rich and connected makes me very angry about the ways we live, work and play in Ghana.  I get angry that some live fabulously on taxpayers’ money while babies die in hospitals because of the lack of incubators. It terrifies me that able-bodied young men are spending the best years of their lives, wiping windscreens for lunch while politicians spend millions on needless things like embossing John Mahama’s face on a bus. I fear what will happen to all these young men and women hawking China in traffic in their old age of no-pension-no-health-insurance. Overall the state of the nation infuriates me – the filth, the lawlessness, the public and private corruption, and the broken systems.

Sometimes my rage about the systemic corruption and incompetence that pervades every aspect of our lives shows in the articles I write and the things I say on the radio. When this happens my family and friends tell me to mind my blood pressure, safety and ignore the establishment. “They’re going to steal and chop anyway,” I’m often told. I know they mean well, they don’t want the people writing long emails and text messages to my bosses about my views to harm me as some of their supporters have suggested on Facebook.

I’m one of those naive, idealistic people who came to journalism believing Ghana could pull a Singapore without the tyranny. This wasn’t the job my father wanted for me, he didn’t want me to spend my days chasing soli. Still, I fought him because I had heard Matilda Asante grill powerful men on radio and rendered them incoherent and figured keeping the powerful accountable was a worthy job. I truly, sincerely believed that speaking truth to power and keeping citizens informed would help. And our small victories show it does in some cases.

But I have been thinking, writing and talking about Ghana since 2007, the year I started working as a journalist. My friend Tee, and I used to spend our evenings when we lived together talking about Ghana. We worried about the ineffectiveness of the National Identification Authority. We imagined the ways the government could, if it really, really wanted to, provide comprehensive health care. We thought of ways education could be improved and made accessible to all. We were also hopeful too.

It was after all, the season of hope. We weren’t in the Africa rising period, but the World Bank and other agencies said Ghana was on the growth path and the John Kufour government was praised for the nation’s stability and good governance. The Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER) described The years from 2006 through 2008 to 2011 as the best years for the economy.

But even in the best years, the hospitals were crumbling and top officials were traveling to go and die at the Lord Cromwell Hospital in London and other places. There were over 2000 public schools under trees, maternal and child mortality were high and hundreds were dying from avoidable diseases like cholera. In spite of this, we believed things could only get better. I figured all we needed was someone who cared to build on what John Kufour attempted.

Alas, we got John Dramani Mahama, a partisan, who assembled an incompetent government that thrived on corruption. Before him was John Atta Mills  who people claim would have done better had he not been sick. We won’t know how true this claim is, but one thing is for sure: John Mahama will forever be remembered as one of Ghana’s worst presidents. He was the reason I banned my mother from talking to me about Ghana, his government’s inadequacies were lethal and their corruption legendary. I couldn’t wait to see the back of his government.

They have been gone for nine months and we’re still reeling from their bad decisions. Everyone I know is incensed that the Social Security and Insurance Trust (SSNIT) spent $72 million on a software project while paying pensioners a pittance. The contract for the deal was incompetently written and it is obvious, the cost was inflated as the contract was awarded to the company that bid with the highest cost. The details of the AMERI power deal which was reportedly inflated by $150 million has everyone who cares about Ghana in knots.

Last year I read Nigerian Writer, Ayo Songunru’s Everything in Nigeria is Going to Kill You. I couldn’t believe how hauntingly the details fit Ghana. Many readers can testify, some books instantly remind of things and people we know. Ayo’s collection of essays is one of those books. In the book he writes: “I’m quite serious about the intent stated in the title: Nigeria is out to kill you. The country is going to hell in a handbasket. This is not a drill. And we have arrived at this point simply because you don’t care.”

He gives such a profound and insightful analysis of all that ails many countries on the continent. Among his reasons for this death by country are corruption, and incompetent presidents, sponsors of terrorists, high cost of living, the disappointing health care system and poor quality social services.

These are not unsolvable problems. They persist because citizens have somewhat accepted that incompetence, corruption and poverty will forever be our portion. In Ghana, folks have convinced themselves that by providing private solutions to public problems they can escape death by Ghana. They buy 4-wheel vehicles for the bad roads,  send their children to expensive schools abroad because who wants to send a child they love to school with windowless classrooms and avoid crime by moving to gated communities. None of these, however, is a shield from the death.

But caring about Ghana is so damn exhausting. I’m tired of reminding folks that, none of us, rich nor poor within the jurisdiction will escape this imminent death because ambulances won’t come when a stroke or an asthma attack or some other emergency occurs. After all, we all know rich, prominent and important somebody who died after making it to the hospital because there were no beds, doctors or equipment to care for them. I’m spent from all the conversations we have at work about the cost of living, crime and high levels of unemployment. My heart hurts to see the poverty majority of our people live in.

I get that we must care, that caring is the fuel to get our country fixed. But sometimes I want to have whatever Johnson Asiedu Nketia,  the General Secretary of the NDC, had to blissfully ignore the senseless policies and corrupt behavior of the John Mahama government. These days I wish to have the whatever Vice President, Mahamadu Bawumia has every morning to enthusiastically march to launch programs without detailed implementation plans. As I do not have the connections or the money to insulate my poor heart and soul from feeling, I escape Ghana by reading. These days I just want to flee in my body because my country is killing me. Slowly!

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By: Nana Ama Agyemang Asante/Ghana

The post Everything in Ghana is going to kill you [Article] appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

It has taken the president six months to restart this age-old practice where presidents sit and answer wide-ranging questions about their performance from members of the media.

Nana Akuffo-Addo came to the presidency on a huge mandate, one that indicates how desperate many Ghanaians were for the change he promised. As a citizen, I understand change takes time, but I look around Accra and wonder how long I must wait to walk without holding my breathe.

As a journalist, I’m not sure I have a sense of the government’s plan to change how we live, work and play.

I haven’t been invited to this presser, so here are my questions, questions that demand urgent answers so we may learn and know what the Akufo-Addo government has in store for us.

I don’t mind how the questions will be asked, I just want answers on the issues raised. I am hoping the selected journalists will go in there and get answers for these, and not spend precious minutes thanking or praising the president for the opportunity to grill him.

Here we go:

1. Can you explain why Accra is still filthy, chaotic and lawless, six months after you promised to make it the cleanest city in Africa? Or you mean work would start at the end of your term in office?

2. What exactly has the Minister for Sanitation and Water Resources been doing since his appointment?

3. Now that you’ve had time to work with the 110 ministers you chose, do you still insist that you made the best decision or you plan to review downwards based on current performance?

4. The Minister for Chieftaincy and Religious is facilitating a pilgrimage to Israel despite calls from the Christian Council and other quarters against it. Did Cabinet approve this trip and are those of us who think this is a waste of time and resources missing something important here?

5. The banner for this presser has the #6MonthsOfResults, can you list some of the results your people were referring to in there?

6. What do you think of the Ghana@60 celebrations so far, given that you allocated a budget of 20 million for the yearlong celebration?

7. It is safe to say that your first major scandal is the BOST saga, I hope it is also safe to assume you’re up to date on the peculiarities of the mess, so do you still think the Minister of Energy’s handling of all of it was the best for the future of the Bulk Oil Storage Transportation Company?

8. Did you sign off the BNI report that claimed the MD of BOST was innocent, even though there is evidence that shows that he awarded contract to unregistered companies?

9. We have been told by the MP for Assin North, Kennedy Agyapong that the BOST MD funded your campaign, which is why he wasn’t made to resign or thoroughly investigated. If this isn’t true, why hasn’t anyone at the top of your government and party vigorously debunked it?

10. You promised during the campaign to review contracts and retrieve stolen monies, you and your team have had six months, can you name some of the previous scandals being investigated for court?

11. Would you per chance know what has happened to the investigations into the Ameri power agreement which your team revealed was overpriced?

12. You also pledged to plug the loopholes in the public sector, to save money and reduce corruption. One of the most corrupt institutions is the passport office here in Accra. One, is there a reason that wasn’t one of the first things your foreign affairs minister tackled? Two, doesn’t it hurt you to know that citizens of this country queue at 5:00am to get a passport?

13. You recently appointed a new Chief Justice, what terms of reference did you give her about the judiciary? Is the radical transformation of the judiciary on the cards or it’s just business as usual?

14. Speaking of courts, long before the members of the Delta Force stormed the Kumasi High Court and the Regional Coordinating Council, there had been suggestions for a complete ban on such groups, what’s your view on this?

15. You never really explained why you were criss-crossing Africa, meeting all kinds of leaders, what are seeking to achieve with that?

16. First, is the job as you envisaged or you’re overwhelmed by the challenges?

17. What is the one thing you didn’t anticipate about this job that has you surprised, overwhelmed or shocked you at times?

18. Why has it taken you six months to meet the press?

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By: Nana Ama Agyemang Asante/citifmonline.com/Ghana

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