It is time to expose perpetrators of falsehood on social media

In just a week, rumours have been circulated on social media about two key political figures in Ghana, alleging that they had been picked up for criminal offences in Europe.

The first rumour to gain currency on Facebook was about the presidential candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, who was alleged to have been picked up in France for money laundering last Friday.

Another rumour spread like wildfire last Sunday that the Central Regional Chairman of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Ben Allotey Jacobs, had been arrested in the United Kingdom for drug-related offences.

There have been other such damning rumours and pranks on social media that end up defaming some individuals, some of them very respected in society.

The rumours have come at a time when the police are contemplating a shutdown of social media on election day to prevent the spread of rumours that have the tendency to compromise national security. 

The rumours, therefore, serve as ammunition for the police to justify a shutdown before and on election day and also carry out the threat.

Even though the Daily Graphic last Saturday made a case for social media in its editorial because of its many positive sides, we believe that the time has come for the security agencies to take on individuals who defame people using social media in the name of freedom of expression. 

In the recent false information circulated on social media, the individuals who posted the untruths about the individuals did not hide their identity. 

This is not the time to allow a few irresponsible people to hold the whole country to ransom through the peddling of such falsehood. 

We should not encourage such recklessness on social media until it is too late to do anything about it, for there is nothing like absolute freedom in our Constitution, as many have decided to stretch freedom of expression to its limitless level.

Article 164 of the Constitution says: “The provisions of articles 162 and 163 of this Constitution are subject to laws that are reasonably required in the interest of national security, public order, public morality and for the purpose of protecting the reputations, rights and freedoms of other persons.”

The Daily Graphic stands by its earlier stance that we stand to gain a lot from the positives of social media, but until we discourage its malicious use by the few irresponsible people in our midst, we may always see it as having a negative effect on social discourse.

Perhaps the threat by Mr Jacobs to sue Mr Hopeson Adorye, a Deputy Communications Director of the NPP, who has been credited with the rumour, for alleged defamation will serve as a test case for the malicious use of social media.

We urge people who have been defamed by people on social media to seek legal redress when the initiators of the false information are found out. We also urge both the citizenry and the police to collaborate to expose the bad lots and make social media clean and a pleasurable experience.