In the name of God the Father, the very bad and ugly, Ghana is where it is because we play too much.
“What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.”
I am not sure when exactly Sir Ahmad Salman Rushdie made the above pronouncements, but On 14 February 1989, a fatwā requiring Rushdie’s execution was proclaimed on Radio Tehran by Ayatollah Khomeini, the spiritual leader of Iran at the time, calling his Satanic Verses book “blasphemous against Islam” .
A Prize money of two million dollars awaits any Muslim who manages to kill Ahmad. He now lives in London and is very much ‘aware of his steps’. He doesn’t stray to much away.
Sir Ahmad played, and according to over 15 Islamic states worldwide, he must pay for his free expressions about their darling Prophet Mohammed.
For them, it only a matter of time.
Maybe it’s only a matter of time for Ato Kwamina and Ken Agyapong as well.
Maybe only time shall reward them their due for how free they express themselves.
Ever since Ghana started ‘playing’ on radio, some good people have claimed the rights to have their say on their own terms and verbally devoured all men of all standing including women, the weak and especially the poor.
They take no prisoners.
And walk the corridors of Ghanaian powers of varying degrees to cheers and thumb ups. Both of these fellow Ghanaians have always played and reveled in their play. After all, this is Ghana, and we don’t confer or issue fatwas on people for ‘playing’.
IF there is any such thing as ‘Media Relation(s)’, I’d want to believe they came into being way after ‘human relation(s)’ had been firmly engraved in the DNAs of men.
As evidenced in what my senior sister Ato Kwamena Dadzie and my very lovely but brash aunty Hon. Ken Agyapong have verbally exhibited, these renowned women are completely oblivious of any pinch of ethics required of men of any societal standing.
As part of man’s efforts to sanitize the art/vocation of what I term ‘linguistic reportage’ and its many mushroomed side attractions in traditional media (print, online and electronic), the men and women who practice or own media relations enterprises for a job have certain responsibilities that comes with their rights and privileges as serious agents of civilization.
In this day and age, and in view of the free range system we all enjoy and suffer, what you ‘report’ via your space on social media is your own cup of tea. How you drink it is entirely up to you.
Anuanom ne Adofonom, Ato Kwamina, who has been described as a senior news editor with the reputable Accra-based Joy FM radio station, has lodged a complaint with Ghana’s Police for having been assaulted and ‘promised’ by Hon. Rev. and MP for assin-fosu Kennedy Agyepong of some to be dealt with later.
I don’t know why the grown and responsible member of parliament managed to miss, in the very least, landing a jab or punch in the fracas that ensued between himself and the lightweight Ato at the forecourt of Multimedia group of companies.
He couldn’t just pounce on him and land a few safe punches or slaps? I mean how?
I also can’t seem to come to terms with how and why Ato Kwamina didn’t live up to the numerous expectations available to him when the Honorable and revered law maker verbally laid into him.
I just don’t see how Ato could let this slide. Or he is a gentleman so he doesn’t throw punches? Really? Oh Uncle Ato stop that koraaa? Have you heard your little self speak on radio before? Especially when you are in your element? The tantrums and salvos you spit at anyone and anything?
But what took you so long to lodge the complaint on the day that the honorable man delivered your fatwas to you? The incident happened in the morning and you lodged the complaint much much later.
You had second thoughts?
Anyway.
Under the Republic of Ghana’s Criminal Code, assault of any form or degree could if convicted, carry a prison term depending on what the mood of the Trial Judge.
Maybe a certain Sister Afia Schwarz should pray.
Uncle Ato, did you read your 6th February Facebook message directed at someone who you averred and believe has since his party left power is no longer able to waltz through the airport with his ‘merchandise’ and that that ‘someone’ who is a drug dealing MP from the Central Region has been sniffing his own stuff and getting disproportionately high?
Uncle, gyai ai? Midaase.
So now the Police have been brought in.
Ghana Police.
Mr Cephas Arthur’s Ghana Police.
Well the case is closed.
And I wish us all the best of luck as we resolve to make Ghana a free, responsible and better place for media and human relations.
Oh and both of them hail from the Central Region of Ghana aloo?
Maybe they are indeed distant relatives. Just maybe.
#stillwerise
By Kwame Agyemang Berko
(Poet. Essayist. Humorist)
@uhurubardman on Twitter
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