Makers of Ghana’s journalism, Radio, TV
In 1894, a young Italian inventor, Guglielmo Marconi, invented radiotelegraph, or wireless telegraphy, after experimenting on long-distance wireless transmission systems.
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He based his experiments on the Hertzian waves or radio waves principles.
Marconi read available books on experiments on radio waves by others, and developed devices, such as portable transmitters and receiving systems, that could transmit signals over long distances.
Then, Marconi achieved what Oliver Lodge, a British physicist, had predicted in 1894 that radio could travel a maximum distance of half a mile.
With further experiments, Marconi increased the distance to two miles – by raising his antenna and grounding his transmitter and receiver.
Thus, Marconi successfully completed his invention of the radiotelegraph transmitting system that was patented by the British government in 1896.
Marconi later established a radio station on the Isle of Wight, England, and transmitted a message across the Atlantic Ocean to Signal Hill in Saint Jones, Newfoundland.
His first use of radio to transmit news began in 1904 when he established a commercial service unit of his company to transmit news summaries to ships that published, on board, newspapers.
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The use of audio-radio signals was invented by Reginald Fessenden, a Canadian-American, in the 1890s.
In 1906, on Christmas Eve, Fessenden broadcasted by audio-radio the song Holy Night, which he played on the violin, and he read a passage from the Holy Bible.
An American, Lee de Forest, invented the Amplitude Modulated (AM) audio transmission in 1907.
In August 1920, Deloitte News started transmitting news by “radiophone”.
The same year, in October, an African-American electrical engineering student, Wendel Wilford King, of Union College, used radio to broadcast night concerts over 100 miles (160km), which he later increased to 1,000 miles (1,600km).
A Scottish inventor, John Logie Baird, produced the “first ever public display of moving visuals on television” in March 1925, which signalled the birth of modern television.
However, it was a mechanical television he invented after experimenting with what is called an electronic cathode ray tube.
In 1927, Philo Taylor Farnsworth demonstrated the first electronic TV in San Francisco after experimenting for seven years.
Electronic TV is defined as “a type of television that uses electronic signals to produce images on a video screen”.
It is a visual television “that transmits images and sound using radio waves, microwaves or infrared rays”.
Broadcasting started in Ghana on July 31, 1935, from a wired relay station in Accra.
Governor Sir Arnold Hodson of the Gold Coast introduced broadcasting into the country.
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The radio station was called Station ZOY, which was the code name of the station.
A British Engineer, FAW Byron, helped the governor to set up Station ZOY.
On July 31, 1935, gramophone records of martial and other music were transmitted at 5:54p.m in Accra.
Later, the voice of Sir Arnold Hodson was heard on air saying: “One of the main reasons for introducing the relay service is to bring the news, entertainment and music into the homes of all and sundry.
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“This will bring an end to the barrier of isolation and ignorance in the path of progress and also enable the people of the Gold Coast to improve on their rich cultural music.”
Wireless radio broadcasting began in the Gold Coast in 1940.
The Gold Coast Broadcasting Service was established in 1953, in compliance with a recommendation by a commission of enquiry.
From then on, the service became a separate department of government and was no longer a unit of the Ministry of Information.
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It was renamed, in 1957, Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, after the Gold Coast attained independence on March 6 and the country changed its name to Ghana.
Earlier, Station ZOY, a wired rediffusion network, had transmitted programmes from British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), initially, to some 300 colonial residents and some Ghanaians who could afford the radio rediffusion box receivers.
From Accra, transmission later spread to Kumasi, Secondi, Koforidua and Cape Coast.
After several decades of the state monopoly of radio and TV broadcasting, pressures mounted from the public on the government to liberalise the airwaves. However, the government hesitated until late 1993 when Radio Eye, owned and operated by Dr Charles Wireko-Brobbey, burst into the air, bringing music and news to the homes of Ghanaians.
The establishment of Radio Eye was not authorised, so it was closed down and its equipment seized.
Radio Eye operated for about a month before it was shut down.
It would have been the first independent radio station in Ghana. However, because it was not licensed and did not receive an authorised frequency, it was closed down.
To operate a radio station without a permit from a designated public institution, such as the National Communications Authority, would have made broadcasting in the country a chaotic business.
There would have been no order in the airwaves and the situation could have been described as a pandemonium.
State control over radio broadcasting continued until July 1995 when liberalisation started with the issuance of licences and frequencies to ten private commercial radio stations in Accra, Kumasi and Sekondi-Takoradi.
Television was introduced in Ghana in 1965.
It was located by the government at the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation premises and was named Ghana Television (GTV), managed jointly with Radio Ghana.
As of 2022, 513 radio broadcasting stations were operating in Ghana.
In March 2023, 164 TV stations were operating as well.
Has broadcasting pluralism resulted in high journalistic standards and professionalism?
Some of the individuals who advocated and worked hard for an end to the radio and TV monopoly by the government, including this writer, must have regretted doing so.
Why? It is because liberalisation has produced low broadcasting quality and professionalism.
Radio and TV are part of what is called mass communication.
Journalism is an essential part of mass communication.
Journalism seeks to provide systematic and reliable gathering, processing, packaging and dissemination of public information, public education, public opinion and public entertainment.
The functions of journalism are performed through such tools as news, feature articles and pictures in newspapers and magazines, and news reports and other programmes on radio and TV.
News is, essentially, an accurate, reliable and unbiased first-hand report of an event, occurrence, situation or idea that is of interest to news consumers and profitable or beneficial to the mass media owners.
For a news report to be accorded the description of ‘news’, it must be factual, balanced and evidential.
The content of a news report must cover all sides of an event or situation, especially where and when the news report appears unfavourable to one side and favourable to the other.
Presently, while broadcasting pluralism, the quality and quantity of news reporting are being compromised.
Except for the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation news outlets, most of the numerous radio stations publish fewer news items which they described as “top stories”, “big issues’’ or “big bulletin”.
This kind of reporting is characterised by selecting two or three “big stories” of the day, with the stories not properly treated or processed to become news reports.
Prime news-report time must be for news, for pure news only, which must be devoid of personal opinion, editorialising and others.
Expression of opinions and personal views must be reserved for what are called “newsreels” and panel or group discussion programmes on radio and TV.
When journalism is not practised properly and professionally, the country is deprived of the gains therefrom.
This is because unprofessional journalism practice generates misinformation, disinformation, fake news and deformation that lead to economic, political, social and cultural poverty.
In an age where information has become an indispensable adjunct of political, economic, social and cultural development, a nation that thrives on misinformation, disinformation, fake news and deformation cannot be on the path of real growth, progress and development.
Email: therson.cofie@yahoo.com