Executive Director of the Center for Public Opinion and Awareness (CenPOA), Michael Donyina Mensah, has called on the government to adopt more proactive measures to tackle harmful content on social media rather than waiting for such content to go viral before pursuing those responsible.
Speaking to Isaac Addae on Morning Starr on Starr FM, Mr Donyina Mensah said authorities should focus on practical mechanisms that can identify and limit harmful content before it spreads widely, instead of relying primarily on arrests.
“If we mean to say that now the police is going to be chasing anybody who says anything that is harmful, that can cause inflamed passions, that can cause problems, then they really have a lot of work to do,” he said.
Mr Donyina Mensah questioned whether the police service, which he described as highly under-resourced, has the capacity to monitor and pursue every individual who makes potentially harmful statements across social media platforms.
He said the focus should instead be on finding “real pragmatic solutions” that can prevent harmful content from gaining traction in the first place.
Mr Donyina Mensah proposed the development of Ghana-specific community guidelines for TikTok to help regulate harmful content on the platform.
“Why can’t we have a Ghana-specific community guidelines for TikTok?” he asked.
He suggested that such guidelines could establish a TikTok content code under which harmful content could be blocked, while accounts that repeatedly violate the rules could be restricted or required to remove offending content.
According to him, this approach would allow harmful content to be addressed at the platform level rather than relying solely on the police to track down individuals after their posts have already circulated widely.
Mr Donyina Mensah argued that allowing harmful content to go viral before taking action makes the response largely reactive.
He maintained that authorities should instead put mechanisms in place to prevent or limit the spread of such content while developing clear guidelines for social media users and platforms.
“This would provide a more pragmatic approach to dealing with harmful online content than making arrests the primary response after the damage may already have been done”. He stated.
Source: Starrfm.com.gh/Pamela Quayson
