US Embassy to support media enhance fair reportage
The United States Embassy in Ghana has expressed its willingness to support the Ghanaian media to ensure fairness in their reportage.
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The Press Attache of the embassy, Ms Sara Veldhuizen Stealy, said, “I think Ghana has such a great reputation for press freedom and we want to work with the media to build on that positive, so that the media would use that freedom responsibly.”
She was speaking during a courtesy call on the management of the Graphic Communications Group Ltd (GCGL) in Accra last Monday where she was introduced as the new Press Attaché to the embassy.
Purpose
The visit also afforded her the opportunity to interact with the management of the GCGL and to see how the embassy could collaborate with the company to build the capacity of journalists as the country prepares towards this year’s general election. She indicated that the embassy was putting in place series of training programmes for journalists over the next 10 months starting from February 16, 2016.
Reputation
Ms Stealy, who was accompanied by an Information Specialist and an Information Assistant at the embassy, Ms Zainab Mahama and Ms Joyce Okyere Asiedu respectively, said Ghana had a strong reputation for press freedom.
She asserted that management of all the media houses she had so far visited in the country had alluded to the fact that they were operating freely.
Ms Stealy assured that the embassy would further collaborate with various media establishments to push for free and responsible journalism in the country.
US elections
She said the embassy was ready to provide all relevant information on the forthcoming US election which would be held on November 8 this year.
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Ms Stealy said it was possible to arrange for Ghanaian journalists to cover the US general election, but explained that such a coverage would be a shared responsibility between any media house and the US government.
Graphic policy
The Editor of the Daily Graphic, Ransford Tetteh, who received Ms Stealy and her team on behalf of the management, briefed them on the company’s policies on responsible journalism, particularly in an election year.
He said as a state newspaper, “We are mandated to give equal opportunities to all the political parties and their presidential candidates.”
Mr Tetteh, however, indicated that “sometimes the smaller political parties, which do not often organise events, accuse the paper of not projecting them like the bigger political parties”.
He assured that, “we are committed to following our own guidelines and that of the GJA strictly as we have always done in elections.”
Writer’s email: severious.dery@graphic.com.gh