Blame media for society's waywardness – Lloyd Evans

Veteran journalist Lloyd Evans has said he subscribes to the school of thought that the media is responsible for the waywardness of children and the youth today.

He said this on the back of the recent murder of a 10-year-old boy by two teenagers in Kasoa for ritual purposes.

According to Mr Evans, the media has lost its way in setting the agenda mainly because industry-ignorant people are those who mostly own media houses.

Speaking on the Class Drive, he indicated that he was shocked by the ages of the suspects, alleged to have committed the act.

The teenagers, Felix Nyarko, and Nicholas Kini, confessed to being inspired to kill Ishmael Mensah, after watching a spiritualist on TV talk about how people could be millionaires through such means.

Juxtaposing media content during his practice to what pertains now, he noted that there were hardly any ritual shows on television, adding that religious programmes were pre-recorded to make sure they were just right for viewers before being telecast.

The former chairman of the Institute of Financial and Economic Journalists and former editor of Graphic Business, therefore, called on the National Communications Authority (NCA) and the National Media Commission (NMC) to take media censorship more seriously to protect the sanctity of the industry.

Meanwhile, the NCA, on 21 April 2021, announced that it is embarking on an exercise to shut down 49 TV stations for operating without authorisation.

According to the NCA, the exercise forms part of a continuous monitoring exercise conducted on various satellite free-to-air television platforms using the Broadcast Monitoring System (BMS) and the Radio Spectrum Monitoring System (RSMS).

The NCA noted in a statement that the monitoring revealed that some channels were operating without valid authorisation contrary to Section 2(4) of the Electronic Communications Act 775 of 2008, which states: ‘Except as provided by this Act or any other law not inconsistent with this Act, a person shall not operate a broadcasting system or provide a broadcasting service without a frequency authorisation by the Authority’.