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African Studies • Media Studies Hasty THE PRESS THE PRESS AND POLITICAL CULTURE IN GHANA THE PRESS AND POLITICAL CULTURE “ A serious contribution to the still understudied (but AND centrally important) matters of the public sphere and civic culture in Ghana . excellent and informative . , POLITICAL CULTURE sharp, astute, reflective, and suggestive.” —T. C. McCaskie IN GHANA In The Press and Political Culture in Ghana, Jennifer Hasty looks at the practices of journalism and newsmaking at privately owned and state-operated daily newspapers in Ghana. Hasty decodes the styles and uncovers the strategies that characterize Ghana’s major printed news media, focusing on the differences between news generated by the state and news that comes from private sources. Not only are the angles radically different, but so too are ways of gathering the news, assigning beats, using sources, and writing articles. For all its differences in presentation, however, Hasty shows that the news in Ghana projects a unified voice that is the result of a contentious and multifarious process that joins Ghanaians in global, national, and local debates. An important engagement with the production of news and news media, this book also explores questions about the relationship of popular culture to state politics, the expression of civic culture, and the role of the media in constituting national and cultural identities. JENNIFER HASTY is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Pacific Lutheran University. Cover photo by the author indiana Jennifer Hasty http://iupress.indiana.edu 1-800-842-6796 THE PRESS AND POLITICAL CULTURE IN GHANA THE PRESS AND POLITICAL CULTURE IN GHANA JENNIFER HASTY INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS Bloomington & Indianapolis This book is a publication of Indiana University Press 601 North Morton Street Bloomington, Indiana 47404-3797 USA http://iupress.indiana.edu Telephone orders 800-842-6796 Fax orders 812-855-7931 Orders by email [email protected] © 2005 by Jennifer Hasty All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses’ Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition. The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984. Manufactured in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Hasty, Jennifer. The press and political culture in Ghana / Jennifer Hasty. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-253-34524-3 (alk. paper) — ISBN 0-253-21748-2 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Press and politics—Ghana. 2. Government and the press— Ghana. 3. Political culture—Ghana. I. Title. PN5499.G4H37 2005 070.4’493209667—dc22 2004018269 1 2 3 4 5 10 09 08 07 06 05 Kwan war a owie abow ano. However long the distance, it ends at the door. —Fante Proverb CONTENTS Preface ix Acknowledgments xv List of Abbreviations xvii Introduction 1 part i. the state press 1. National Discourse and the State Apparatus 31 2.“Who-Leads” and Who Follows: House Style at Graphic 47 3. Practice and Privilege in the State Media 71 part ii. the private press 4. The Private Press and Professional Solidarity 91 5. Corruption, Investigation, and Extraversion 124 Conclusion 157 Epilogue 165 Notes 169 Bibliography 175 Index 185 PREFACE In 1995, I first came to Ghana to check out the feasibility of my dissertation project on news media. I had originally planned on fieldwork in Nigeria— and had just defended my qualifier thesis on the press and politics in Lagos. At that time Nigerian journalists were embroiled in conflict with the Abacha government, staging a series of marches and protests to criticize the contin- ual harassment, arrest, and detention of journalists by the state. In addition, the Ogoni activist Ken Saro Wiwa and eight of his companions were under prosecution by a military-appointed tribunal and subsequently sentenced to death, sparking a massive outcry in the oppositional media. A few days before my scheduled departure for Lagos in late June, my visa application was returned to me in the mail. The Nigerian consulate was un- able to issue me a visa, the accompanying letter explained, because of the po- tential dangers involved in my project. In addition to the points of contact I had already made with editors and journalists in Nigeria, I would need to es- tablish a stronger set of relationships with media scholars, practitioners, and institutions before I would be allowed in the country. Of course, in times of political turmoil, such contacts can be difficult to consolidate unless one is already in the country. Rehearsing this argument in various tones of confi- dence, supplication, and urgency, I finally gave up with the consulate. I then spent several hours, head in hands, ruing my fate. Rather frantic at my predicament (plane ticket and grant money in one hand, rejected visa application in another), I devised a plan to fly initially to Ghana and then make my way to Nigeria from there. Changing my ticket from Lagos to Accra, my somewhat dubious but remarkably resourceful air- line consolidator miraculously produced a Ghanaian entrance visa for me in a mere forty-eight hours. So off I went, consulting The Lonely Planet for Twi phrases and scheming for a way to get myself to my field site in Nigeria as soon as possible. Arriving in Accra, I began to make arrangements for my transit to Nige- ria. I quickly made my way to the Nigerian Embassy, only to be spurned with the same set of concerns and stipulations. In the midst of further head- hanging and ruing, I started buying all the local newspapers and reading the intense debate over the sudden resignation of President Rawlings’ popular and reputedly brilliant finance minister, Kwesi Botchwey, engineer of Ghana’s structural adjustment program in the early 1980s. Botchwey had quit in dis- gust, charging allegations of corruption in the Ghana National Petroleum x | PREFACE Corporation. The state press deflected these allegations of corruption while the private press chastised Rawlings for losing such a brilliant tactician with such strong global links. Although the Ghanaian news media certainly had- n’t captured the same international reputation as Nigerian journalism, the complex political passions of this debate impressed me with the vibrancy and openness of news discourse in Ghana. One afternoon shortly after my arrival I met a local young man hanging out in the foyer of my hotel who told me he knew the editor of the best-sell- ing newspaper in Ghana and would be happy to introduce me. Somewhat suspicious of my new friend I nonetheless took him up on his offer, and the next day we went to the Graphic compound where we checked in at the gate and were ushered to a spacious, air-conditioned office. I noticed with some surprise that the walls were oddly decorated with labels from Chicken of the Sea cans. After a brief wait, in walked a rather stout and ruddy white man who introduced himself as the manager of “Graphic.” Befuddled by his whiteness, as well as his choice in office decor, I introduced myself and ex- plained my interest in news media.“Oh,”he replied amiably,“you’ve come to the wrong man, I’m the manager of Graphic Corporation. We print labels for local products like tuna and beer,”he said, gesturing to his handiwork on the walls.“You want to meet the editor of Daily Graphic, Elvis Aryeh. Let me call him for you.” (At this point, my young friend took the opportunity of leaving for some business in town.) Minutes later I found myself in the office of the editor in chief of Daily Graphic, with a long row of local newspapers archived along the wall. An ex- troverted Ghanaian, Elvis Aryeh greeted me effusively, questioned me on my project at length, and then insisted on taking me and his secretary out for a leisurely lunch at the poshest place in town, the restaurant at the Labadi Beach Hotel. By the end of the day he had invited me to come to work for his newspaper the following year, encouraging me to abandon my plans for Nigeria and relocate my project in Ghana. Seriously considering this notion, I began interviewing the editors of the major newspapers in Accra. A cosmopolitan group, they all spoke the trans- national language of political liberalism, emphasizing the centrality of the press to the democratic process and the obligation of the journalist to act as a watchdog in the public interest. As an editor for the state-funded Graphic, Aryeh stressed the importance of responsibility and the commitment of his newspaper to the national interests of unity and development. Editors of the private newspapers dismissed the sycophantic journalism of the state press and voiced their own set of commitments to editorial independence, free- dom of speech, and human rights. I was fascinated by these two contradic- tory interpretations of the democratic functionality of the press. Further- PREFACE | xi more, I was continually surprised by the welcome access I received at nearly every newspaper office in town. Editors assured me that I could easily work for state and private news organizations without any concerns about state harassment or visa problems. “This is Ghana, nobody will worry you,” I heard again and again. Convinced that Ghana was indeed the place I could freely pursue such a controversial political topic, I went back to Duke, explained the situation to my dissertation committee, and wrote my project proposal on the press and politics in Ghana.

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