GBA has chosen to be silent in 2022 – Prof Kwaku Azar

The GBA, in 2014, responded to the arrest of some media personnel, by noting that “the BNI’s action was not only an affront to free speech and press freedom but also a crude reminder of the era of the culture of silence and the dark days in the nation’s developmental history.”

The association also was gravely concerned by “a growing trend by the National Security, the BNI and other state security agencies to ‘invite’ journalists ostensibly for questioning or assist in investigations in media reportage where a government agency or person in government happened to be mentioned.”

The association of learned men reminded Ghanafuo that “free speech is a right which is necessary for the survival of any democracy, and it is a doom to democracy and a dent on the international reputation of a country when its security agencies try to stifle the media.”

The association put the arrests in comparative perspective by observing that “it is important to note that there is a world trend towards non-criminalisation of speech and Ghana should not be seen as swimming against this tide.”

The association told us that “the Constitution and laws of Ghana have provided processes for redress (however inadequate one may consider them to be) for any person whose reputation is maligned in any manner in a publication by the media.”

Moreover, it added that “it is unacceptable for the government to use its security agencies to invite the media to explain or provide the source of their reportage while the citizen’s recourse to media excesses is through due process.”

Finally, the GBA noted that “such ploys in the name of the security of the state or national security have the tendency of silencing or intimidating the media to withhold blowing the whistle on matters in which the government and its functionaries were connected to. This is an abhorrent trend which should not be allowed in our present democratic dispensation.”

GOGO accepts that the GBA has chosen to be silent in 2022 but endorses the GBA’s 2014 statement issued and signed by the then President and current SC Justice Nene Amegatcher.

Ghanafuo’s main problem is our ability to support the repeal of the criminal libel laws on Monday and cheer the arrest of media men for false reportage about our Godfathers on Tuesday.

#SALL is the cardinal sin of the 8th Parliament.

Da Yie!