Private legal practitioner, Kwame Jantuah, has intimated that free speech in any dispensation comes with responsibilities.
According to Mr. Jantuah, reckless speech has the potential of instigating unrest and therefore, the need for every freedom of speech to come with limitations.
“Barker-Vormawor is a constitutional lawyer and he should know better, shouldn’t he? And we talk about free speech; free speech comes with responsibility. You don’t just get up and say things and just walk free because free speech comes with responsibility and limitations.
“And the thing about it is that it’ll instigate others who want a leader or somebody to help them run that cause. I’ve lived through all the coups, from childhood to adulthood, it has not been a nice event. Nobody should even think about it because it won’t help us. The situation we’re in today will be 10 times worse if there’s a coup.”
Kwame Jantuah
Mr. Jantuah’s comments follow the arrest of some individuals including media practitioners by the Ghana Police for allegedly spreading false news and also inciting the army.
The recent among these arrest is the picking up of social media activist and convenor of pressure group #FixTheCountry, Oliver Mawuse Barker-Vormawor, for allegedly stating that he would stage a coup in Ghana if Parliament passes the E-Levy bill.
According to Police reports, he stated that, “If this E-Levy passes after this cake bullshit, I will do the coup myself. Useless Army”. He is expected to be put before court on Monday (14 February).
This came days after Kwabena Bobie Ansah, a presenter with Accra FM was arrested for publishing false news. A statement issued by the police on Friday (11 February) noted that his arrest became necessary after turning down several invitations from the Police to assist with the investigation.
CSOs condemn journalists’ arrest
Meanwhile, some civil society organizations (CSOs) have condemned recent arrests of media practitioners over their on-air and social media comments, describing it as a subtle re-introduction of the abolished criminal libel law.
The four CSOs – Ghana Center for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana), IMANI Africa, Africa Center for International Law & Accountability (ACILA) and Star Ghana stated that they are deeply troubled by the growing use of the prosecutorial and judicial power of the State to punish criminal speech that allegedly falsely injures or damages the reputation of other persons or of an institution of State.
“Instructively, during the heyday of the criminal libel law in the 1990s, the criminal law was used in precisely the way it is now being used: to prosecute and punish journalists and public speakers for allegedly false or defamatory statements against certain family members or associates of the President.”
CSOs
The CSOs urged media practitioners and users to tone down the inflammatory rhetoric that has contaminated the public square and airwaves, desist from knowingly or recklessly making or publishing false statements, and use, to the extent possible, the Right to Information Act and its processes to access information from public authorities.
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