President of the Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association (GIBA), Cecil Sunkwa-Mills, has lamented some of the obsolete laws set aside to prosecute media stations which violate the tenets of media.

According to him, there have been various proposals to bring into play a new law, being the broadcasting law through the broadcasting bill, which would have addressed the problem.

Reacting to National Media Commission’s flagging of 13 television stations following 318 complaints of televising money doubling schemes, pornography, money rituals among others, Mr Sunkwa-Mills indicated that such a law would have given a united front between the NCA and NMC in terms of what should happen when such things do occur.

However, he noted that such proposal hasn’t been accepted despite requesting for it a number of times in speeches and whenever there was the possibility to do so.

“We’ve always known that some of the laws and regulations are a bit outdated and it does not give them the opportunity to deal with that. I’ve said that there still are laws that we can use to manage this situation… So, in the interim, that was why we said if now NMC is going to identify these infractions, let’s sit around the table and tell us how exactly you will chart this path.”
Cecil Sunkwa-Mills

Justifying the reason for ratifying some of the laws, Mr Sunkwa-Mills explained that the reason NMC cannot bite is because “the laws sometimes question themselves. He stated that although there are code of ethics, they are not enough to properly deter television stations from flouting the laws.

“Ethics are ethics, it may not necessarily run into certain aspects they want but let’s see what we can bring on the table. So, once they’ve brought us on board including GJA and PRIMPAG, let’s see what will happen. We want to look out for the positive of the country. So, once the attempt has been made, we’ll go along and see how far we go.”
Cecil Sunkwa-Mills

Efforts in addressing inappropriate content on TVs

Furthermore, Mr Sunkwa-Mills expressed that following the joint monitoring report launch by the National Media Commission and the National Communication Authority which described the situation as staggering, stakeholders are committed to ensuring sanity within the media space.

He revealed that it is good to see that there is some action of actually identifying these infractions.

“After the launch, this is the new direction that we are heading. We were part of the launch and we’re seeing that something is coming out of it… What we have done on our side, because the release came yesterday, we have reached out to the NMC because one of the things we indicated during the launch was we wanted to see exactly the steps of action that will be taken and also the parties who were involved in executing this process so that it is fair and very transparent and impactful.”
Cecil Sunkwa-Mills

Moreover, Mr Sunkwa-Mills indicated that GIBA is currently waiting for the NMC to clarify steps for dealing with these stations based on the offences and the role of the association in ensuring compliance. To this end, he expressed that the association along with GJA are also involved in making sure that this is done fairly at the same time.

“The other thing is that on our part as GIBA, we have our code of ethics. You would see that during the launch, it was a key part of what was mentioned to be used to bring some sanity in the airwaves. So, we’ve got the list, we’ll also proceed to look at what the code of ethics says, and we would proceed on that path. But in the meantime, we are waiting for the NMC to come back to us, and we’ll discuss the way forward.”
Cecil Sunkwa-Mills