Issues upon Issues

Today i would speak about issues , not just one but a couple.Let me start with this piece, i begun on radio presenters in my previous post.Gone are the days of Tina Moses and the Richard Hammond who ended up in BBC, Dusty Wayne,and Peter Clottey whom i believe is still with the BBC. These radio personalities eluded high standards, clarity in expression and they researched and mastered pronunciation of words that they were not familiar with.Those days you mispronounce a name, or a word , you are sent back to the classroom, and this is why i insist that GBC like BBC and Voice of America should still be state controlled.These state broadcasters provide something the private sector cannot produce, government should still provide subvention to GBC and stop being lazy.You dont tune into GBC radio and hear presenters laughing their lungs out as if they are in their closet, what really bores me is the colorization of serious news item and misrepresentation of facts .Massacre of the local language is something i find inexcusable, for instance someone dies and you hear a newsreader say in twi ''Abrantie no bo nmoden wu y3''.which means the young man tried very hard and succeeded in dying,question who does that?.For me GBC should be the benchmark for radio and Tv, in the sense that after attending your Journalism schools and getting certificate you don't just sit on the screens or sit behind a consul straight away, you must go for a refresher course and certification from GBC so we uphold standards. Even if you are from a local station or you have no journalistic training, maybe some wofa ase being brought into radio to report in the local language.

My good friend Kwame Sefa Kayi started from GBC, and name the rest of the heavyweights on radio in Ghana ,you see they all had their affiliations with GBC, though Kwame sometimes sings over the songs he plays which is a no, no for any serious person who knows broadcasting standards.I hope he stops that one day.

I took serious exception to last Saturdays edition of entertainment review, Kwasi Aboagye is out of town so Halifax Ansah Addo sits in to host the program, i thought this was going to be a good program since i love that guy Halifax,then Catherine Afeku is introduced as a guest, i said to myself this is going to be fireworks because Halifax once described Catherine as the weakest link in the creative arts & tourism industry when she was Minister in that sector.This woman instead of being asked hard questions about her role in the latest audit findings is allowed to talk freely and she just speaks about what she did right, no evidence, and i asked myself are the guys at Auditor General block heads?If you say marine drive funds have been refunded , when and where and how?Misapplication of funds is a serious matter , you just don't get up and divert funds because you are a minister, you follow procedure and that is why there is an Audit finding and you don't talk like those Auditors don't know their left from their right,in any case when the issue about Kumdum festival came up a chief from Axim called in and this is where i had issues with Halifax. As a host you don't take sides, but Halifax was trying to stampede the chief in a very disrespectful manner just to arrive at a certain conclusion, he had predetermined what he wanted to hear.In the end the Chief went off the line and worst of all, Catherine described the chief as an Ndc chap and provided a picture of the chief in Ndc shirt and cap at a function and that was enough to conclude he had no case. Halifax as a host joined Catherine to ridicule this chief but i was happy Arnold Asamoah and Olla who were guests on the show stated that was a low point of the interview.The Chief sent a message subsequently that he is proud of the party he belongs to.The point of the chief was simple,he received 70 000 for Kumdum and not 200 000,so he was dissociating himself from the audit findings, thats what he sought to do, but Halifax position was Kumdum is celebrated in other areas apart from Axim so the chief had no case contesting the 200,000.But the cheque narration indicated kumdum festival 1st to 9th September which applies to the Axim chief's area.Today my fears have been vindicated , the remaining areas where Kundum is celebrated have also issued a press release that they never received any funds for the festival then, so Halifax attack on the Chief was just an empty vituperation .

Agenda 111 is really a step in the right direction, maybe !!!!, but where are the 88 hospitals promised last year?And i take serious exception to the embarrassment caused to the President and he does not even know that the very place he cut a Sod for the commencement of agenda 111, a similar sod was cut earlier for the beginning of a hospital by the Health Minister.La hospital was razed to the ground when they could have built into the existing structure as was done in Ridge and the other regional hospitals whiles the hospital continues to operate.You are not Jesus Christ to demolish a temple and rebuild it in 3 days.As reality check would always prove itself the La hospital project is now a spot for breeding of snakes since those reptiles like to hide under blocks.In HR Management one skill that employers look out for is a person who can think strategically even under pressure, now it is referred to as resilience test by some ,and we have a Health Minister who is confused and cannot take decisions because of COVID scare and not because he has contracted the disease.In the face of all these facts they say they wont allow him to go because he is the best guy in town.

My sincerest conclusions on this is that those hospitals wont be built, not even one, and come next year it would be a repetition of numbers, agenda 222, we moved from 88 to 111 and 222 would be next.