Re: Manasseh and Mahama
Ever since the criminal libel law was proscribed, some journalists in this country are abusing the new freedom, they have. This may soon make responsible citizens, through Parliament and government, call for the return of this law.
Instead of allowing maturity and honesty to guide their profession, some journalists rather choose to create situations and tag them on innocent citizens to make headline news. They take the glory while those innocent citizens take the shame.
Whenever these journalists are dragged before the Law, they would sing a song, they composed, “Freedom of Speech is being gagged!” and vulnerable and gullible Ghanaians would join in.
Why do the journalists get away with this murder? We have in this country, peoples who generally do not bother making enquires about what they hear, to be able to find out the truth. The era of “they-say, they-say,” has being hanging on most of our people ever since, God instituted time.
An era ago, we hear these words, “book-no-lie,” which implied everything written down is the truth. Those were the days, when good English appears in our dailies and school children could read and improve upon their grammar, but this can hardly be said of, what appears these days.
I cannot vouch for the contents of issues published, in those days. However, in this day and age, with the criminal libel law proscribed, any journalist believes he has the right to publish anything they dreamed of and force it on Ghanaians. Those attacked are mostly prominent people in society and angry Ghanaians would jump in support of what is published and cry that democracy must work.
With this now established, some journalists gladly abuse rules of journalism and attack any public figure. Even the Constitution, can be completely misinterpreted just to make the victim appear to have violated the laws of the land. And with the spirit of gullibility that holds sway over this land, almost everyone would come out condemning the poor victims of this journalistic terrorism.
We once had in a fine gentleman, Kwasi Nyantakyi, then head of our Ghana Football Association, a rising star in world soccer, marked to ascend the throne of the continent’s soccer body, CAF, and become a vice president of FIFA.
He was captured in a video, recorded by Anas Amereyaw Anas, brokering a deal with some businessmen in far away Middle East on something that had nothing to do with football. But once that video, was meant to destroy the image of soccer officials, Kwasi was wrongly accused of corruption.
Government was gullible and it succumbed to the gallery. So, just to be seen as fighting corruption, it went on to convince FIFA that Kwasi was corrupt and had to go. With Kwasi gone, so did the rising star of our country’s soccer, go dim. Meanwhile, no one asked where Anas got the tens of thousands of dollars from to bribe his victims in his exposés and how that money was recovered. Today, Anas, himself had been proven in court to be an accomplish to the very corruption he planted on his victims and had fallen from grace.
One other fine journalist, Manasseh Azure Awuni, had recently crossed swords with an honest businessman, Ibrahim Mahama and looks like he is going to get into problems. In a book, he published, “The President Ghana Never Got” which received national attention, Manasseh indicated that Ibrahim owed the now defunct Merchant Bank. It turned out not to be true. It was rather Ibrahim’s company, Engineers and Planners which once owed that bank, but that debt had long been paid off.
Manasseh who appeared like those journalists who know next to nothing about things they write about, is telling Ghanaians that a corporate body and its human founders are one and the same, when this is not correct.
If Manasseh had gotten education in business and commercial law and he would have known that when a company goes bankrupt, it is only the company that is in debt and not its owners.
Why he replaced Engineer and Planners’ name with Ibrahim Mahama, clearly indicates, his intentions to create sensation in Ghana and get gullible Ghanaians to support him and condemn Ibrahim.
Now, Ibrahim Mahama is demanding a retraction and apology, which to me is more than or equal to the very heavy fine awaiting Manasseh in court, if he is found guilty.
We hear of vehicle manufacturing companies, recalling cars they had produced, because something wrong had been detected in them. The faults get fixed and the cars go back on the market. There will be some extra cost here, but certainly there will be some gains.
Will this mean that Manasseh will have to withdraw all the books from the shelves, at a cost, delete that false statement and reprint? Will people be interested in the book again and how much will Manasseh sell the new edition to recover total cost?
This should serve as a big lesson to our journalists, who spew lies to create tensions in the country. They are the first to voice out any attack on journalists, crying “Press Freedom,” but are silent on their unjustified attacks on the freedom of innocent Ghanaian.
It is about time that we all rise up and condemn this act of terrorism in journalism.
Hon. Daniel Dugan
Editor’s note: Views expressed in this article do not represent that of The Chronicle
