The media, election 2008 and beyond

RECENT political events ? Eric Amoateng?s drug case in the US and the so called ?Esseku tape? have, first, shown the good, bad and ugly faces of the media, and, second, brought to the fore the lack of coordination and/or cooperation between the organs of government responsible for dealing with the media and their ?rapid response? capabilities.

Politics, globally, has moved from the soap-box to the media, because politics in these modern times is theatre, panache, showmanship, stagecraft and public relations - the American (US) style. Most people, today, learn about the choices they face in presidential/national elections not from personal contacts with politicians, public fora, rallies or even conversation with others, but from the mass media - newspapers, radio, and television.

Nine months before the December 2004 general election, in March/April of that year, the School of Communication Studies of the University of Ghana, Legon, undertook a scientific survey of the views/opinions of Ghanaian voters; on governance, the New Patriotic Party administration and Election 2004.

When respondents were asked for their main source of information about the government, close to six out of every ten (59.6%) of them said radio. Nearly a quarter (24.2%) cited TV, and almost a tenth (11.0%) said newspapers ? which brings total media to 94.8%!! Friends and co-workers were the main source of information for 2.4% of the respondents while family/relations accounted for 1.3%. An interesting, but perhaps a very important finding of the study was that some 0.3% of respondents cited the Internet as their main source of information about government; more than the 0.1% who named the poster. However, not all elections are driven by the mass media. Campaigns for lower offices, such as parliament and local elections - District Assembly, Town Council, Unit Committee - are personal affairs.

Print they say is slow, TV is very technical, radio is cool (relatively simple and fast). Research shows that Radio (86%) is the leading mass medium of communication in the country, followed by TV (77%). Newspaper readership is low (24%) and even these readers are among the middle-income class and urban dwellers with the Daily Graphic being the most widely read. In spite of the low readership, it is the newspapers - both state-owned and the private/independent press - which set the (political) agenda. Most of the radio and TV stations depend on the print media for information for their news bulletins, newspaper reviews, topical issues for discussions, talk-shows and phone-in programmes, etc.

Unfortunately, after five years in power, the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) does not have a single paper of its own to counter the NDC?s Palaver, two Lenses, two Democrats, etc, while seasoned editors like Eben Quarcoo who defended the party at the risk of their lives in the 1990s wallow at home doing practically nothing. Again, with the exception of the Statesman, and Accra Mail, which are published/edited by NPP sympathisers, the rest of the independent newspapers are mostly ?CPP? owned/edited ? Kweku Baako, Freddie/Gina Blay, Ben Ephson, late Tommy Thompson, Kofi Coomson, Kwesi Pratt, Kabral Blay Amihere etc. The NPP, (just as the NDC did when they were in power), must find the money to publish a serious and credible paper, not an in-house ?newsletter? - the NPP NEWS - now and well before election year 2008.

Besides the state-owned GBC Radios, thanks to Radio Eye (of which I am proud to have been the Managing Director) ? for having insisted on our rights under Article162 (3) of the 1992 Constitution ? there are over 80 FM stations spread over the country today.

After we ? the Independent Media Corporation of Ghana (IMCG) ? the operators of Radio Eye were arrested and put before court in December 1994, frequencies for FM radio stations were quickly dished out to NDC ?members?, supporters and sympathisers by the Ghana Frequency Registration and Control Board (GFRCB), which at the time was directly under the Castle. For example, 99.7Mhz, a GBC allocated frequency in March 1995 was re-assigned to Rawlings? friend to form Joy FM, which is supposed to be a joint venture between GBC and Multimedia Co. Ltd. We immediately took Joy to court sometime in 1995, but sensing that the NDC Government would lose the case, it was never called and as I speak today, it is still pending at the Supreme Court. It is also alleged that GBC has not benefited, financially, from that unfair arrangement.

Some of us - the pioneers of the business - have complained in private for far too long about these injustices of the past and the current ?chaos? on the airwaves; and it is about time the Ministry of Information and the National Media Commission, (which are responsible for GBC), and the National Communications Authority (NCA), the regulator, investigated these matters thoroughly and let justice prevail. Another example to note might be Radio Gold, which belongs to the Ahwois and ?friends?.

The electromagnetic spectrum is a finite resource and must therefore be used efficiently, effectively, economically and judiciously. FM stations even in the US are not permitted to ?travel? more than 75km radius and that is why they are allowed to syndicate, especially, their news programmes, while community radios, like Radio Universe of the University of Ghana, should not exceed 25km by law. These rules, regulations and laws are there, in the books. What is left, as usual, is the enforcement and monitoring by the NCA. My good friend Wereko Brobbey, Chairman IMCG, can do a whole thesis on this subject. When you come to the field of TV broadcast, GBC has stiff competition from the Malaysian owned TV-3, and Metro-TV, which is also supposed to be a joint venture between GBC and Talal Fatal. Press reports in the past had suggested that the Government and the relevant MDAs should take a second and hard look at both the divestiture and joint venture agreements of the two TV stations. Press Secretaries and Spokespersons Globally, today, every major political campaign, president or prime minister has either a press secretary, director of communications and/or spokesperson to manage information.

Information has three interdependent characteristics. It is user-dependent, medium-dependent, and time-dependent. Information, therefore, is the combination of message and medium which enables the receiver/receptor (voter) in a particular context to decide whether to take action (how to vote). Under the US system, there is a press secretary at the presidency, who is a senior official, sub-cabinet level and is of equal rank as very powerful officials like the National Security Advisor, Counsel, Director CIA, Director FBI and Chairman Federal Reserve Board. Each federal department (ministry under the British system), including Defence has a spokesperson who is a political appointee.

The No. 10 Downing Street (Prime Minister?s office) in the UK has a director of communications, who is head of the press office and is also the Prime Minister?s official spokesman.

For more on Tony Blair?s slick information management system and the lessons which should be learnt here in Ghana, read the concluding part of this article in The Statesman Wednesday.