GJA at Jubilee House: Akufo-Addo pledges to reward previous Journalists of the year

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has accepted the request from the Ghana Journalists Association to honour four previous journalists of the year with vehicles who till date have not received any reward for their award.

President Akufo-Addo donated a made in Ghana VW sedan for the 2019 Journalist of the Year and said he felt that if the previous winners also get some, it would bring equity.

The President made the promise when the leadership of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) led by its President, Roland Mr Affail Monney and some previous journalists of the years paid a courtesy call on him the Jubilee House on Monday.

President Akufo-Addo said in so far as the current winner has got it, I think there is a need to have this certain equity in seeing to it that the past winners also get, noting that “I think very soon we will make sure that the four past winners which are on my lists are also duly honoured”.

Intercourse

President Akufo-Addo noted that he did not perceive the intercourse between the media and the government as a way of the latter buying the former adding that I don’t believe that the Ghanaian press is buyable.

He said he was not interested in buying the Ghanaian press but was keen on having a press that could serve the larger society and play its role in building a strong democratic Ghana.

Buildings

Touching on the request for a new media centre that would replace the current Ghana International Press Centre, President Akufo-Addo urged the leadership of the association to commence discussions with the Minister of Information, Mr Kojo Oppong Nkrumah.

He said it would not be out of the way to assist the association because after all the NPP “one” led by President J.A. Kufuor donated the building and that the NPP “Two” should have the possibility of building a new one.

Package

On the fiscal package for the media to cushion them from the ravages of the COVID-19, he said the isuue would be discussed by government to find some way to assist them with some fiscal measures and waivers, explaining that this was an area he would like to be guided by the Minister of Finance.

Commend

Mr Affail Monney commended the President for donating a VW vehicle for the Journalist of the year 2020 and said it had been difficult to get prizes for four others and appealed to the President for help.

Stimulus Package

He said all media houses in the country were suffering under the covid-19 pandemic and proposed that a stimulus package be extended to them in the form of waivers on spectrum and regulatory fees for the electronic media for one year and waiver of corporate tax and tax on wages of media practitioners for three months.

He also called the injection of Ghc5 million into the operations of the private media to help them recover and was of the believe that this would help bring the media to normal.

Attacks

He recognised that the attacks on journalists dominated national discourse but these attacks have subsided.