From scribes and sailors to printing presses and streamed broadcasts, what it means to be a journalist has evolved over the course of centuries and Kwame Afrifa-Mensah, host of ‘Epa Hoa Daben has propounded his own definition of journalists manning Ghana’s airwaves as ‘allow cash out journalists’.
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He made these assertions, during his Friday rant when he was reviewing the issues he addressed during his rant segment throughout the week.
‘’The journalists in Ghana have turned themselves into political consultants and party communicators, who instead of addressing issues of national concern and being the voice for the voiceless now take delight in sycophancy and doing the bidding of their political paymasters, that is what I call ‘allow cash out’ journalism’’, he stated obviously with pun intended.
‘Allow cash out’ is done, during mobile money withdrawal transactions, when cash out is allowed it allows the mobile money vendor to send you a notification where you enter your mobile money pin and voila! You take your cash.
He bemoaned how journalists in Ghana have reduced the profession into a propaganda machinery for politicians for money.
‘’When they come on air all they do is attack the opponents of their paymasters and ask their producers to cut that portion of the audio or video, send it to the politicians and take money’’, he said.
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During the same rant recap, he encouraged Ghana to shift from the theory-driven educational system to entrepreneurial and technical based education.‘’ We need to reform our education to give premium to technical and entrepreneurial training. It will help us a lot. We need a skills audit to know the number of doctors, nurses and so on that, we have in the country. This will inform our universities the number of enrolments they should take for certain courses. We need to also export doctors like Cuba is doing’’, he stated.
The Friday rant review, unlike the usual monologue, was a lively banter between the host, Kwame Afrifa Mensah and the producer, Kwame Frimpong of ‘Epa Hoa Daben’ political show.
Catch ‘Epa Hoa Daben’ from 1:00pm to 4:00pm, weekdays (Monday to Friday) on Happy 98.9 FM.