The Speaker of Parliament, Rt. Hon. Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin has stirred a debate about the welfare and conditions of service for Ghanaian media personnel.
According to him, if the media were that important, how come the country has failed to clearly spell out the conditions of service for media personnel?
“If the media is that important, how come the country has not spelled out conditions of service, even if they’re minimal for media personnel? If the media is that important, how come the people don’t appreciate the product of the media, whether it is from private or public media?” he stated.
He said this whilst addressing Journalists in Takoradi on Saturday, August 5, 2023 ahead of parliamentary engagement in the region, on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of Parliamentary democracy in Ghana.
Speaker Bagbin indicated that it was important that: “we look at the welfare and conditions of media personnel so that they do not respond to the pressures of society but stand on their own and hold the government and everybody to account.”
This, he mentioned, was the intent behind the framers of the 1992 constitution, where the media function is clearly outlined.
He continued that whatever the media do is for the public good and its services nourish the country and “as you can see our human rights record is on the decline because of what is happening to the media.”
Speaker Bagbin mentioned specifically that he was unhappy about what he described as intrusion and a lot of intimidation, threats and violence towards media personnel.
“Yes, Parliament is really worried about the state of the media—it is not only the fear and intimidation and attacks against media personnel, but the working environment.”
For this reason, he said parliament has been visiting media houses, such as Graphic, GBC, TV3 and XYZ to hold discussions with them over the attack and intimidation on the media. The rest of the media houses, including the print media, would soon see the team arrive at their media houses.
He said Parliament decided to reach out to the media houses because it was concerned about the attacks.
Nevertheless, Speaker Bagbin, who described himself as a friend of the media, says it was expected of the media to play its role well because it is an arm of government.
The media, he pointed out, is an arm that links the other three arms of government together with the people, so the importance of the media cannot be underestimated.
Unfortunately, this has not been seen because it has not been formalised as the most important arm of government.
