KB Asante: Voice From Afar column

The response to the announcement of the National Seminar on Religious Broadcasting by the National Media Commission (NMC) has been positive.

Ghanaians from all walks of life have encouraged the NMC and the other collaborators to make sure the seminar, which is set for December 15 at the SDA Conference Hall at Ringway in Osu, succeeds.

The reason is very simple. An overwhelming number of Ghanaians are religious; we don’t even need any official statistics to confirm this fact. You just have to look around this country to realise that perhaps the sector of biggest growth is religion.

Churches, mosques and other places of worship spring up by the minute in our communities.

Indeed, sometimes travelling in Ghana feels like being in heaven; the traveller is welcomed to every town by an assortment of bishops, prophets and prophetesses, evangelists, imams, all purpose “spiritualists” and “fetish priests”. 

Given the high number of businesses involved i

Perhaps, no other business has benefitted more from large screen printing and the introduction of digital printing in the country.

Inevitably, the competition has shifted onto the broadcasting domain, especially radio, and no night in Ghana is complete without the nocturnal exhortation by scores of mainly Christian preachers. Other faiths also have their slots which they utilise to the max.

Of course, the Constitution of Ghana allows all citizens and residents to worship freely in accordance with their faiths in this country. We have thousands of dedicated religious leaders from all faiths who are working hard within their faiths and communities to produce good citizens, as we say, for God and country. We commend their efforts.

As we know from across the world, religion or its abuse can have grave consequences. Today, parts of many countries, including some in our sub-region, have become unsafe and unstable due to religious tensions or extremist violence.

Fortunately for us, we have religious tolerance and friendship in this country. All religious faiths exist peacefully in our communities and people of different faiths are able to participate in all activities together in peace.

However, we cannot take this peace for granted, which is why the NMC, in collaboration with the National Communication Authority, Religious Broadcasts Advisory Council of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association, and other stakeholders, has decided to team up with other key stakeholders to organise the seminar to start a process that will in the very near future culminate in the adoption of guidelines for religious programmes on all radio and television stations in Ghana.

We have seen and heard religious broadcasts on radio and television in Ghana or transmitted into Ghana that should not be transmitted at that time or allowed at all. Some scenes are so violent that in any other context the police would be called in to cause arrests.

We have also seen explicit scenes showing indecent activities all under the guise of “faith”.

As we all know, religious issues tend to excite emotional responses and people feel justified to cite “faith” as an all-encompassing reason for doing things that would not be acceptable under any other guise.

However distasteful a practice might be to most people, a small group of people would claim that activity or notion as the cornerstone of their faith. This is why we must tread cautiously on this matter.

Of course, the NMC cannot stop religious leaders from doing bad things to their followers; that must be for other branches of the state and society to deal with. However, the NMC and society as a whole must not allow our broadcasting airwaves to be used to do and say bad things that cause harm to people or bring tension and disharmony in our country.

Next year is an election year and it promises to be an exciting one too. Politics on its own should not frighten us, but as we have seen elsewhere, trouble brews when politics is mixed with ethnicity, religion or chieftaincy issues.

The guidelines, which will be created with the involvement of religious broadcasters, must ensure that religious broadcasting does not lead to any trouble in the coming political season.

Above all, the guidelines will enable all citizens of all faith and none who wish to enjoy religious broadcasts to do so without experiencing anger, fear, annoyance or embarrassment of any sort.

Of course, this does not mean people should not voice their faiths and beliefs, but as all holy books teach, this should be done without taking the name of the Lord, or anyone, in vain.