(MFWA/IFEX) – On 7April 2006, Ghana’s deputy minister of Trade and Industry, Kofi Osei Ameyaw, filed a suit against “The Insight”, a tri-weekly independent newspaper, and two other bi-weekly independent newspapers, “Ghana Palaver” and “Ghanaian Democrat”, in an Accra High Court, for allegedly defaming him. The deputy minister is seeking damages of 2 billion Cedis […]
(MFWA/IFEX) – On 7April 2006, Ghana’s deputy minister of Trade and Industry, Kofi Osei Ameyaw, filed a suit against “The Insight”, a tri-weekly independent newspaper, and two other bi-weekly independent newspapers, “Ghana Palaver” and “Ghanaian Democrat”, in an Accra High Court, for allegedly defaming him.
The deputy minister is seeking damages of 2 billion Cedis (approx. US$225,000) and a court order restraining the newspapers from further publishing damaging stories about him.
In five editions, “The Insight” newspaper carried front page interviews with Margaret Agyepong, a former business partner of the deputy minister, in which she consistently accused him of using her as a conduit to supply cocaine to a Ghanaian company, Pointer Ltd., for subsequent export to Germany.
She also alleged that the deputy minister took her to a shrine where her tooth was extracted for ritual purposes to ensure that the ruling New Patriotic Party stay in power as long as she lived.
The “Ghana Palaver” and the “Ghanaian Democrat” published the same information in various issues of their newspapers.
The editor of “The Insight”, Peter Kojo Apisawu, told Media Foundation For West Africa (MFWA) that his newspaper had no intention of damaging the deputy minister’s reputation. He said the stories were written in conformity with the newspaper’s style of presenting all sides of every topic.
“We contacted the minister several times and I personally telephoned him to get his side of the story. I made sure I reported whatever he told me. So he cannot say we have been unfair to him. I can’t accept that”, Apisawu stressed.
For his part, the editor of the “Ghana Palaver”, Ekow Essumang, said on a radio station that the deputy minister failed to respond to all requests for his version.
MFWA notes with great concern the speed with which public officials resort to the use of the courts to seek redress for alleged civil libel, instead of using the arbitration avenues available through the existing regulatory body (the National Media Commission).
MFWA is also alarmed at the high damages being sought.
