The Executive Secretary of the Media Foundation for West Africa, Sulemana Braimah has backed claims by founder of the International Central Gospel Church (ICGC) Pastor Mensa Otabil that the Ghanaian media is full of mediocrity.
Pastor Otabil told his congregation on Sunday, 4 March during the church’s 34th anniversary service that the Ghanaian media choose to wallow in ceaseless political discussions all-year round.
“…If you listen to our national conversations, you wonder: are we serious? We eat and drink politics. Turn on radio; here [Ghana], there is no political vacation. From the time the vote is cast to the time the next vote is cast, we argue politics morning, afternoon, evening.
“Check all your top radio talk shows, take politics out and they have nothing to talk about again. I won’t even say take politics out, take NPP and NDC out – just say this morning, no NPP, no NDC, there’ll be no conversation because we can’t even think beyond two parties, we can’t think any ideas, we can’t think solutions and we are driving ourselves into this abyss of hopelessness,” Pastor Otabil stated.
He added: “I will watch animals, I’ll watch cheetah, I’ll watch lion, I’ll watch antelope anytime, I’ll watch cheetahs anytime, I’ll watch giraffes anytime because, at least, they’ll tell me how to hunt, how to get your goal, how to avoid being eaten. I’ll learn that from the antelope. At least, I’d come back and say: ‘Nobody will eat me’. But you [listen to] Ghanaian radio, watch Ghanaian TV and you wonder: ‘are we still here; the mediocrity?’”
Speaking to Morning Starr Monday, Braimah said the media is a reflection of the society adding that standards in the media have fallen all over in Africa.
“Over the years, the quality of our media has been dropping. We have to see what is going wrong and deal with it,” Braimah told Nana Aba Anamoah adding mostly, some managers are interested in the discussions that will bring in money to the media house.
“Sometimes, some of our journalists do not research thoroughly the issues they are reporting and that is a problem. There is a lot to be done as a media…a lot will depend on the managers of our media managers.”
Source: Ghana/Starrfmonline.com/103.5FM
