Akwasi Agyeman solicits votes for GJA general secretary post
An aspiring General Secretary of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) Mr Akwasi Agyeman has assured members of the GJA, of his commitment to ensure the safety of journalists when elected into office.
“One of the issues I will passionately pursue is securing funding for the safety of journalists. When you go through books and courses of institutions there is nothing like safety journalism, hence journalists are always beaten or killed in the worst case, all due to the way we handle things.
“If I am given the privilege, more training would be given to journalists to address this threat,”Mr Agyeman gave the assurance during an interaction with journalists of the New Times Corporation, publishers of Ghanaian Times and The Spectator in Accra yesterday.
He was at the offices of the Corporation to solicit votes in the upcoming GJA elections.
Mr Agyemansaidhe would see to it that funding was secured from organisations like the European Union, British High Commission, United StatesEmbassy and other donors to support capacity building of journalists.
He added that “these funds generated would help train the younger ones in the industry to appreciate the work.”
The aspiring general secretary highlighted that some key issues that were missing when it came to journalism practice.
Among others, he said GJA members did not know each well other until elections were due. He said he would organised numerous engagements where members would have the opportunity to engage and fraternise.
He stated that his kind of general secretary would not be a “one man show” but rather, a teamwork in order to steer the affairs of the association in a more transparent.
“GJA should be vibrant with fresh links again, we cannot be doing the old things all the time, we need to work together because journalism is a shared responsibility and whatever is due journalists, they should receive as such,” he stated.
Referencing that, “it is in the constitution that every six months names of journalists in good standing should be published so we know each other. If the directive was followed we would not be seeing what we see today.”
He, therefore, appealed to members to massively vote for him during the national election slated for Friday, June 24, 2022.
Mr Agyeman is the current Editor of Adom FM and has over twenty years’ experience in journalism.
He has also worked at Peace FM as Editor and has also been member of GJA award committee in 2017.
The aspiring General Secretary holds a Masters of Arts Degree in Media Management, and Bachelor of Arts Degree in Communications Studies, and Diploma in Journalism from the Ghana Institute of Journalism.
BY ANITA NYARKO-YIRENKYI
