The constitution of the Republic of Ghana is a
written document that spells out the fundamental laws of which the state is
governed. It consists of the norms, rules, codes and conventions which serve as
authoritative direction for rulers and the ruled. All citizens are bonded by
the constitution. The Chapter One Article four (A) states, “All citizens of Ghana shall have
the right and duty at all times to defend this constitution, and in particular,
to resist any person or group of persons seeking to commit any of the acts
referred to in clause(3) of this constitution.” This statement therefore conferred
right to all citizens to duly protect and defend the constitution as the
supreme law of the state. In regards to this, when there is a defect in the
constitution, individuals or group of persons or even the media cannot change any
law in the constitution but can only suggest to parliament through their views
expressed on the platform of the media to alert parliament on such defect to review
the constitution by an act of parliament. Article 289 (1) expressly designates
Parliament as the body that “may amend any provision of the constitution.”
The
media in Ghana is the fourth most powerful arm of the state. They act as a watch
dog to the government that is the legislature, executive and judiciary. They
are also intermediaries between the government and the public and through its
activities and programmes they educate the public on government policies and
create awareness of issues that are of public interest and vice versa use their
medium to alert the government about issues that affect the state for them to
take effective decisions that would enhance development. In order to function
effectively, the constitution has provided its rights and freedom to make it
effective and protect the media from undue confrontation by individual or government.
The media criticize government; educate the public on government policies and
debates on policies seeking public opinions before some laws are passed, an
example is the Female Genital Mutilation among others.
Obviously, the 1992 Ghana Constitution
has had its ups and downs. Many Ghanaians have expressed concerns over the
flaws that are associated with the constitution. They challenged some
provisions of Chapter 20, which deals with decentralization and local
government, because those provisions tended to make the District Assembly and
its municipal and metropolitan variations only extensions of the central
government. Article 240(1) declares that “our system of Local Government shall,
as far as practicable, be decentralized”. The vagueness of this Article,
however, weakens it and some citizens have expressed their views on it for an
amendment. The media carried the discussion of this Article for public
discussion and debate thereby drawing the attention of the constitutional
Review Council to consider it for parliament amendment.
Secondly,
when there is a defect in the constitution the media through its programmes set
the agenda for public discussion to alert the government on such defect that
may cause harm to the development of the state. The media raises concern by
holding group discussion on the defect with resource personalities to ignite
both the public and the government of such out-sighted problem. They write
articles, publish press releases and seek public views on a particular topic
related to that defect. When this is done, it draws the concerns of parliament
who are alerted by the media through headlines on newspapers and radio and
television programmes to take necessary action to that effect.
More so, the media
influences the importance attach to issues through the subtle means of
"framing." They select some aspects of a perceived reality and make
them more salient in a communication context, in such a way to promote a
particular problem definition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation and treatment
or recommendation for the item described. Recently, the media in its various
activities and news content in newspapers, radio and television have alerted
the public and the government about the shortcomings of some articles in the
constitution that has provided limited power to the NMC thereby making it
ineffective in its operations and with opinions expressed by the public
advocate for an amendment of that section of the constitution. For example,
Article 162 sub-section (4) of chapter twelve states that “editors and
publishers of newspapers and other institutions of the mass media shall not be
subject to control or interference by Government, nor shall they be penalized
or harassed for their editorial opinions and views, or the content of their
publications.” This sub-section gives provision to editors and publishers who
appeared before the NMC only to be exonerated because the NMC as a body has no
control to penalized or harassed these “professionals” for their views.
In a nutshell,
the media has a responsibility of awareness creation about certain policies and
laws that are detrimental to the citizens and the nation as a whole to bring to
bear such issues in the media content for authorities to take necessary action
to amend those laws.
No comments:
Post a Comment