Bobie-Ansah
Decency and irresponsible journalism are under threat as so-called journalists cross the red line of good conduct with tendentious comments which are anything but in the interest of national stability.
It is necessary to first point out that journalists, like other citizens, are not above the law. They would be dealt with when they infract the law as others would. Journalists are not different from the rest of the citizens and should therefore be arrested when their conduct or utterances breach the law.
Journalists should not be seen to be inciting the citizens against constituted authority in the name of freedom of expression.
A group of people appear to be deliberately stretching “freedom of expression” to achieve the parochial ends of their paymasters, with remarks which are not only novelties in our political culture, but intended to reduce public confidence in state institutions.
To seek to present our country as a failed state in which everybody do as they wish, with “freedom of expression” as a veneer, is unfortunate and melancholic.
We have lost it as a country with age-old values of decency of language because of our new breed of citizens who overstretch the freedom of expression.
Imagine somebody describing our critical custodians of the rule of law in a language which smacks of foulness and incompatible with our traditional morals and values.
Must we tolerate a situation where our Chief Justice and the judiciary he leads are described as ‘corrupt’ as observed last week? Certainly nope, please.
As if that was not enough, we woke up to yet another instance of irresponsible conduct when somebody insulted the Ghana Armed Forces for not embarking on a treason. Blimey? And a former President wants the law enforcement agency to fold their arms and even clap for the remark?
Ghana needs deliverance from the grip of this band of uncouth personalities, who long for the instability of a land they call the land of their birth and whose citizenship card they flaunt with pride.
The game-plan of the NDC is all too clear. They seek to encourage such insulting and treasonable remarks with a view to pushing the relevant state institutions to react and then the former President will step in with remarks such as “the creation of a blueprint unknown in the history of this country” should not be allowed. Such hypocrisy!
There are evidences of how the state security apparatuses were misused during the tenure of the NDC under circumstances which do not come close to the ones under review.
To make it look like under the previous dispensation, the security agencies did not react to what in the estimation of the regime a crossing of the red line of national security, is to display inordinate hypocrisy.
Under John Mahama, Fadi Dabbousi was arrested twice, first in November 2013, then another in 2016. Both arrests were, however, because his expressions in writing did not please the regime.
Felix Ofosu Kwakye’s reasons for the arrests, as flimsy and nonsensical as they were, are duly archived and therefore available for perusal.
Today, we have the police explaining the reasons behind every action they take to the public, something we find a refreshing novelty.
We have come a long way from the dark days of criminal libel and do not find the invitation by the security agencies of persons who incite the military untoward. We cannot think of any security agency worth their salt which would turn their attention elsewhere when the national security of the nation is threatened so palpably the way we are observing.
We long for the day when the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) would call erring journalists to order.