Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa (right) Deputy Minister of Information, Ransford Tetteh (middle) GJA President and Kabral Blay Amihere (Left) NMC Chairman hoisting flags.
Posted on: www.dailyguideghana.com
By William Yaw Owusu
Wednesday May 4, 2011.
Kabral Blay Amihere, Chairman of the National Media Commission (NMC) has reiterated the need for journalists to act responsibly in order that the public and the government do not take back the freedoms currently enjoyed by journalists.
He cautioned that the public will soon lose its trust and confidence in the media if practitioners do not deal with unethical journalism and corruption as well take steps to mend their ways.
Ambassador Kabral was speaking at a ceremony held in Accra yesterday to mark this year’s World Press Freedom Day themed: “21st Century Media: new frontiers, new barriers.”
Addressing top media practitioners, heads of institutions and other civil society organizations at the Ghana International Press Center where they used the occasion to also inaugurate a Browse House and raise flags, the NMC Chairman said transgressions of journalists and the entire media could be used as an excuse by the authorities to limit the frontiers media freedoms.
He said “all freedoms go with responsibility and for us at the NMC we do so with great sense of responsibility. The framers of our constitution were mindful of history that is why they gave us a constitution that has no frontiers in media practice.”
He said the 1992 Constitution should be defended and protected not just by the NMC alone but by all journalists adding “we do not want to return to the culture of silence and we should therefore display responsibility.”
Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, a Deputy Minister of Information said journalists continue to face threats and as a result there should be strenuous efforts to offer them protection.
He said the gains made in the media landscape should be guarded jealously saying “the gains we have made as a country could not have come about without media pluralism.”
Ransford Tetteh, President of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) said the digital age has come to change the way and manner journalism is practiced and called on journalists to make continue to uphold ethical principles.
He said social media and citizen journalism which have virtually taken over traditional journalism should be utilized effectively to accelerate the development of the country and not serve as a curse for the country.
May 3 is declared World Press Freedom Day by the United Nations General Assembly and is celebrated around the world to commemorate freedom of expression and the fundamental principles of press freedom.
Yesterday’s celebration also marked 20 years after the Windhoek Declaration when African journalists met in Namibia in 1991 to chart a new path for press freedom resulting in the institution of the annual World Press Freedom Day.
There were solidarity messages from United Nations agencies, Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association (GIBA), Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC), National Communication Authority (NCA), Editors Forum, Ghana and Private Newspaper Publishers Association of Ghana (PRINPAG).
The rest were Ghana Community Radio Network (GCRN), Media Training Institutions, Institute of Public Relations (IPR), Trades Union Congress (TUC), and Coalition on the Right to Information as well as Accra Brewery Limited who were sponsors of the event.
Speeches tackled the emergence of new media, social networking, citizen journalism and their effects on media, as well as the need for traditional media to adapt in the face of a rapidly changing industry.
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