Attack On Journalists Is Attack On Democracy

Attack On Journalists Is Attack On Democracy … Media Unions Warn

Date published: September 16, 2014
By Mohammed Awal
Email: awalm19@gmail.com

Dr. Affail Monney

“If we allow the torch bearers of public openness to be cowed by physical attacks, there would be nobody to speak in defense of society when the entire community comes under attack,” the National Media Commission (NMC), Ghana Journalists Association (GJA), Private News Publishers Association  (PRINPAG) and Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association (GIBA) said in a joint statement, issued yesterday.

According to the three groups, the attacks on journalists must be seen as an attack on the poor and vulnerable in the society, whose cause the media champion. They promised to ensure that those who perpetrate such barbaric activities are punished by law.

Reading the statement on behalf of the other three organizations at a press conference in Accra yesterday, the president of the GJA, Dr. Affail Monney, said these attacks were coming from a wide range of sources, indicating that the “propensity for using violence in processing claims on society is widening.”

He observed that the consistency, rapidity and sheer audacity of some of those attacks suggest that respect for law and order and due process could suffer a massive decline if nothing was done to check the system.

Continuing, Dr. Monney bemoaned how those attacks on free expression metamorphosed suddenly from traditional source – government to a generalized arena of “ordinary folks and petty officialdom. It is a spreading canker that must be halted,” he noted.

When the 1992 Constitution guaranteed freedom and independence for the media, it did so to safeguard public safety, respect for human rights and the rule of law, the group said with the hope that it would create atmosphere for journalists who would hav

e the courage to speak the truth and reflect the nation back to its realities.

“As a result, any attacks on the media constitute an attack on our democracy itself,” they noted, assuring that they will stand united to use all appropriate measures within the law to fight impunity”.

The four institutions encouraged the police and other security agencies to exercise the greatest restraint in dealing with journalists and also entreating the latter to be extremely circumspect in the way they go about their work, “knowing that we all serve one nation” and that it was our collective effort which would develop Ghana.

Background

 In recent times, there had been many physical attacks on journalists in the course of doing their work. Some of these attacks had come from people who felt aggrieved by the content reported by the former.

Some were simply by people who did not want their concealed actions and inactions to be brought into the daylight of “public scrutiny,” and from people who are irritated by freedom of expression and democracy, the group’s statement said.

The NMC’s investigations catalogued series of attacks on journalists since January when police arrested three persons in the studios of Sungmale FM at Wa.

Also in February, irate youth vandalized the premises of Gift FM in Dormaa Ahenkro in the Brong Ahafo region.

March also saw the arrest of TV Africa crew at Adjei Kojo by the Tema Metropolitan Assembly. In that same month, a Ghanaian Times photographer was assaulted by a soldier in Tamale for attempting to take pictures of a confrontation between soldiers and some group of young men.

Other incidents the NMC recorded were the assaults on Nana Konadu Agyemang of the Daily Graphic for attempting to take a picture of Eric Amoateng, a former MP for Nkoranza, Daniel Kenu by Gyan brothers, and arrest of staff of Multi TV by AMA etc.

Short URL: http://thechronicle.com.gh/?p=80598