Minister of Information Kojo Oppong Nkrumah is cautioning the public against the deliberate churning out of fake news to cause disaffection.
He charged the mainstream media to assist in stemming the tide by denouncing such untruths and exaggerations.
Mr Oppong Nkrumah was virtually addressing the 2020 National Public Relations and Communications Summit and the 27th Annual General Meeting in Ho.
It was on the theme, “The Future-Fit PR Practitioner: Post COVID-19.
He encouraged the Ghanaian population to make some time to “verify things you see flying on social networks so that you are the protector of the kind of Information that you consume,” that way you can be more trusting to be consuming more reliable information.
The minister called on leaders of media organisations to continuously engage with the Ministry and align their plans and programmes to elicit the necessary support towards developing a stronger policy framework for nation building.
On the implementation of the Right To Information (RTI) law, he said the Ministry had recruited and trained about 100 information officers to provide timely information to the population in addition to equipping the departments with tools to enhance their work.
He said a number of platforms had been established at the Ministry to ensure government communication was regularly available, accessible, and transparent and detailed for the various publics.
He said the Summit was relevant as it set the stage to update skills and innovate, in view of the complexities of information communication technology to overcome the hurdles of PR.
The Minister said the profession has its high and low points, but the COVID-19 pandemic had placed the sector even at the front-burner, assisting to deepen and uphold compliance for prevention protocols and instructions for defeating the virus, while commending all.
He expressed indignation for the continuous delay of the passage of the IPR Bill still undergoing fine-tuning and appealed to the group to up their game.