Its been an arduous journey - Let peace prevail
Perhaps, unconsciously, some politicians started waging a crusade of disaffection against particularly the police, causing mistrust among them the general public.
Then came the 'thunder bolt' of Tuesday July 24 which tended to have jostled the society into awareness, President Mills had passed on three days after his 68th birthday, Chief of Staff, John Henry Martey Newman announced to the nation.
The seeming political division suddenly waned and in its place, a new verve of national unity.
Political campaigning was suddenly suspended by all and the hitherto party colours which had become the adornment of party gurus and faithful, gave way to the red and black traditional Ghanaian mourning colours, a nation in mourning.
The shock, the grief and the pain of President Mills' sudden demise, at least put the breaks on the tension that was mounting for sometime.
With the resumption of political campaigning in late September, gigantic campaign billboards, posters, creative radio and television advertisements carved to attract the electorate, became primary forces, particularly among the NPP and the NDC.
Some media houses with the penchant for bad news started it all over again, helping to create tension, sometimes in situations when there was none.
Political watchers, critics and analysts also dissected the campaign manifestoes of the parties, while party activists and supporters went gay over opinion polls that posited their lead to annexing the presidential throne.
In spite of the general political campaigning assuming a new dimension where some level of decorum was employed, thus making it issue based as opposed to personality attacks which then defined the game, some media platforms conveyed messages that were meant to create divisions and divert attention from the country’s developmental challenges.
The era of playing secret tape recordings during prime air time and making big issues out of them at a point, became the order of the day, and the resultant effect as usual, was unnecessary tension.
While many political watchers have argued that Ghana’s democratic dispensation has become an enviable asset among its peers in the sub-region and in the Diaspora, can we say same of its media, the fourth estate?
While a vibrant media is a stakeholder in economic development within a multiparty democracy, democracy goes beyond freedom of speech.
Is it the case that the fourth estate, is being unduly influenced by the desire
to be the first to break the news. Whatever happened to the beautiful ethics of
the profession? Perhaps agenda setting is being taken out of context.
Otherwise, how could journalists who set the agenda which ultimately results in enmity, tension and even hatred, believe they are the tough ones who say it as it is?
As we go to the polls today, Friday December 7, some practitioners would very likely throw caution and ethical values to the wind, forgetting that neither they nor other members of their families would be immune to the chain of events and their effects that could result from the unguarded acts of a journalist on a day like this.
Let journalists rise to the occasion, spurred on by the great extent the various facets of society had travelled to ensure a peaceful poll and a peaceful thereafter
Writer’s email:
