Ghanaians my age would remember the timeless lessons our older High-Life musicians left in the sands of time.
They didn’t only deliver soothing melodies for our dancing feet; they told stories—about life, love, greed, anger, and how to speak to our elders.
Music was for them a vehicle to project uncomfortable truths and highlight our collective hypocrisy or complicity in the many evils around us.
Almost free speech
Take, for instance, J.A. Adofo’s ‘Nya asem whe’ (Get into trouble and see what awaits you).
Or Nana Kwame Ampadu’s ‘Obra’ (vicissitudes of life), and Akwasi Ampofo Agyei’s ‘If you do good, you do for yourself’, which teaches the values of accountability, integrity and retribution.
A music and theatre critic summed up the enduring lessons in one word: Abronye (Evil begets evil).
The Zeitgeist of the times didn’t favour vile commentary about people in authority.
And if a rude person called the chief a fool, the person who reported that fool to the chief was the bigger fool.
When the old high-life gave way to the newer, sexier genre, it tore crudely into our social inhibitions and our reverence for order and old age.
All it takes is a few Ghana cedis to purchase data to feed a crusade of insults on social media.
Where does a 17 year old SHS girl get the courage to say anything untoward about the president of her country.
Before social media, we even respected our school prefects. The headmaster was our god.
The Odikro had the final word and friends of our parents had powers to reprimand us and teach us how to say good morning properly.
Today, there is only one elder in town; his name is uncle social media.
If I ever get the privilege to sit under the distinguished tutorship of Professor Kwesi Yankah again, I would ask him what aspects of sociolinguistics is responsible for the current degeneracy in social communication, where young people suddenly have the carte-blanche to talk about their elders in any language unknown to public ethics and social decorum.
Before social media, we never spoke carelessly about our elders. We respected our politicians when Nana Ampadu songs blared through giant speakers at market places, not on streaming apps. Ambition and appetite for big money were not high in those days; we sought the public good.
Freedom of fear
Abronye and other political commentators, including Baba Amando, are today giving free speech a real test, and are alleged to be eating it up with both hands–freely.
There are more audacious characters on social media who are testing our laws and freedoms with their charged commentaries, interesting publications and speculative/false news.
Sometimes, they charge mercilessly at anybody in political and public office, including presidents, parliamentarians, judges, opposition politicians and holders of traditional office such as chiefs.
Have they taken Christian charity too far or our law enforcement bodies are seeing too much in too little?
The provisions under Article 21 of our 1992 constitution guarantees freedom of speech and expression, including freedom of the press and other media.
Our laws encourage the expression of divergent views and dissenting opinions.
If they must express divergent views, they expect to be protected from the consequences that follow that exercise.
Otherwise, we should scrap ‘divergent’ and ‘dissenting’ and limit the expression to only those that endorse, align, and promote popular opinion.
The constitution does not admonish us to be wise; it only expects us to be measured in our exercise of those freedoms.
So, it introduced section 108 under publication of false news with intent to cause fear and alarm to the public, and warned: “Any person who publishes or reproduces any statement, rumour or report which is likely to cause fear or alarm to the public or to disturb the public peace knowing or having reason to believe that the statement, rumour or report is false is guilty of a misdemeanour”. Experts say this is too vague and broad.
Thresholds and no-holds
When arrests of some media people and political personages became rampant in the last 20 years, the words ‘alarm’ ‘fear’ and ‘panic’ have become familiar in our lexicon of public and social discourse.
If a credible media house publishes false material on their social media page, alleging that the only river in Gomoa Manso has poisoned octopus, and Abeiku Koomson sitting under a mango tree in Gomoa Manso, picks up the same false material and splashes it on his facebook page, he could be arrested for causing fear and panic. Where are the thresholds?
In another scenario, if Abeiku calls into the community radio station and calls the chief of the community a fool for not doing anything about the situation, and jumps on his social media TikTok page to joke that his uncle had just died from eating poisoned octopus, do we allow him to speak from every side of his mouth, simply because our constitution encourages freedom of speech?
Abeiku’s joke may cause Auntie Araba, who makes a living selling octopus, to go out of business.
We have heard a lot of insensitive and careless talk lately.
We cannot repeat what NPP’s Chairman Wontumi alleges about President Mahama’s relationship with his domestic staff.
Abronye had also threatened a judge at an Adentan court for being political, alleging bias.
Then another NPP commentator, Nana Addo Nyame, also made threatening remarks about a prominent chief of Akyem Asuom, Nana Amponim Obo-dade III.
There were similar arrests of NDC activists in the previous administration.
Naturally, the politicians will slug it out. But what becomes of a law that wants you to speak freely, but doesn’t want you to freely speak?
By KWESI TAWIAH-BENJAMIN
Tissues Of The Issues
bigfrontiers@gmail.com
Ottawa, Canada
