An open letter to Ghana Media Houses and Owners

I have written to you in the past and urged you to employ your own paid analysts if your programs are to benefit the Ghanaian people. Over the years you have continued to rely on politicians especially both NPP and NDC to help discuss your issues. This approach maybe cheaper and help you to probably provide good dividends to your shareholders. But, it doesn’t help the Ghanaian people.

Unfortunately, year 2020, has changed everything all over the world including how we interact with each other and even how to work. Some people continue to work from home, some brick and mortar stores forced to transitioning to online for the first time in their operations. Traditional schools who only operate face to face classes have been forced to go online for the first time. It is not that they like to go online but the situation demands it. Most restaurants are closed and forced to only operate take away services. Dining in restaurants are no more allowed in so many countries. So many media houses anchors conduct the program from homes. The world is changing and continue to evolve because of coronavirus. Currently, the world seem to be transitioning well.

Interestingly back home, here in Ghana, you continue to engage the service of politicians to discuss everyday issues. Sometimes from archaeology to zoology, including coronavirus. Which is not right. You cannot continue to do same things you did in 20th century in 21st century and expect the country to move forward. You must evolve as a media organizations and practitioners especially in these trying times of the world.

COVID-19 (Coronavirus) is hitting the world hard and so many families are impacted. People rely on the media for reliable information to make better decisions for the future. You cannot and must not continue to employ the services of politicians to discuss a pandemic of this magnitude with no idea of how grave this disease is. You must help the Ghanaian people if we are to move forward in the fight against coronavirus and in our development agenda. This means that you must employ your own paid media analysts and these paid analysts must be people with domain knowledge in areas they are called to analyze including coronavirus.

Coronavirus has clearly shown that in times of trouble every country seems to look after themselves first before reaching out to others. Therefore, you must help Ghana to develop and must not be part of Ghana’s problem. Employing your own analysts to discuss the issues will not only help for the truth to be out there but will also increase the journalistic standards in the country and will usher in a dawn in our development agenda. It will also help our people to understand the issues better and know the actual impact of coronavirus.

Prince Akyereko Writes!

Prince Akyereko is a Senior Business Systems Analyst with TD Bank Group and NPP Canada Youth organizer