No "Neutral" Journalists; it's "Naivety" & "Futile Exercise" To Search For One - Pratt

Managing Editor of the InsightNewspaper, Kwesi Pratt Jnr. believes there are no neutral journalists so far as media practice is concerned. To him, it will be an "exercise in futility" for one to go in search of such a journalist; implying that every media practitioner has an agenda. In a apparent response to President John Dramani Mahama's lamentations that there's a media cabal blocking the good news of his government to Ghanaians, Mr Pratt cautioned political leaders to "stop looking for neutral Communicators...it's a mark of naivety and some times, a mark of something else to be looking for neutral Communicators." President Mahama, in a recent interview with Ovation International Magazine, bemoaned the blocking of his administration's transformational agenda by a group he describes as a "media cabal", sieving their (government's) good performance before it reaches Ghanaians. “It is populism, a certain group has taken control of the media in Ghana and it makes it difficult for people to discern the truth. So as much as you are putting out the information, it is either being blocked or distorted,” he said. Speaking to the issue on Radio Gold's "Alhaji and Alhaji", Kwesi Pratt emphasized that it's a naive person that thinks that media practitioners are neutral people. Mr. Pratt further blamed leaders and government officials for causing their own problems, noting that journalists are not obliged to pick news angles from their perspectives. He advised them to rather sift their speeches. "Now, I listen to all these officials including Presidents, Ministers, opposition leaders and so on. Is it possible to report everything they say. It is not...It is not possible. That is why when public officers, when prominent people are speaking; they have to choose what they say. So, if you're going to speak at a public place somewhere and you, yourself, you add irrelevant things in your speech; you create the conditions for people to pick what you consider to be relevant which they may consider to be most relevant," he said.

Source: Ameyaw Adu Gyamfi/Peacefmonline.com/Ghana