Is it ideal to peddle falsehood about opposition leader?

By Mildred Siabi-Mensah

The arrest and detention of Fadi Dabbousi, an avid critic of President John Dramani Mahama and the National Democratic Congress government, last week by the Bureau of National Investigations has sparked interesting commentaries among Ghanaians, as well as in the media.

In its editorial of yesterday, September 28, 2016, The Insight Newspaper sought to justify the arrest, arguing that even though disagreeing with the President and criticizing him is part of the democratic process, deliberately peddling damaging untruths in order to vilify, denigrate and lower his esteem cannot be acceptable.

We agree with anybody or group that sees peddling of damaging untruths about any person as reprehensible, more so when the victim is the president, the number one gentleman of the land.

In an apparent allusion to an article, which reportedly formed the basis of Fadi’s arrest and detention by the BNI, The Insight newspaper asked: “How can anyone think that falsely calming (sic) that the President has HIV is okay?

How can any decent person believe that it is okay to falsely claim that the President has been sleeping with other peoples (sic) wives? Or how can it be okay, if you photo-shop the president to make it look like he is engaged in criminal and illegal actions?”

We at the Daily Statesman believe it can never, under circumstance, be okay for anybody to make such false claims about the President, just as it must not be made about any other person.

The BNI certainly arrested Fadi because its officials believed he had made false claims about the president. We don’t have any problem with that.

Our problem, however, has to do with why the security agency does not take the same action against other people who make same dangerous, false claims against other leading political figures like opposition leader Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, who has been vilified more than anybody in our contemporary times.

We also ask, how can anybody think it is okay to say Nana Akufo-Addo murdered his wife? How can anybody say falsely claiming that Nana Akufo-Addo is a drug addict is okay? Yet, all these, and many other, wicked lies have been peddled about the leading opposition leader, with the BNI not taking any action.

The Insight newspaper is absolutely right when it says deliberately peddling damaging untruths about the president, in order to vilify, denigrate and lower his esteem, cannot be acceptable, hence the justification for the arrest and detention of Fadi by the BNI.

But we all know when worst false claims were made about Nana Akufo-Addo, the BNI did nothing about it, neither was the security agency called to action by any media house. Does it mean it is okay to peddle damaging untruths about opposition leader?