Isaac Ato Mensah (Page 24)

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 18 October, 2018.   The Ghana Police Service (GPS) is not being managed properly; virtually every news item about them is miasma. This is not the case of the media giving them bad press. There are a series of bad decisions that have left all of us in a conundrum. It will be the eighth wonder of the world if David Asante-Appeatu, the IGP himself is not as puzzled as the rest of us. In the latest reshuffle of officers, Superintendent Cephas Arthur, the former public affairs director has been posted to head the Mamprobi District. Superintendent Cephas Arthur andRead More →

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 16 October, 2018. 1978 is recognized as the year of the three popes. Today is the 40th anniversary of the election of Pope John Paul II. On 6 August 1978, Pope Paul VI died. His successor, Pope John Paul I, on being elected reigned for only 33 days and died. Then on 16 October, 1978, Karol Josef Cardinal Wojtyla, was elected Pope. He chose the name Pope John Paul II to honour the memory of his predecessor. Pope John Paul II reigned until his death in April 2005. Pope John Paul II, visited Ghana in 1980, during the administration ofRead More →

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 14 October, 2018. I used to read about writers who say they’re moved to tears about a situation. Sadly that is how I now feel about Ghana. And I have to admit I used to challenge my mentor a lot; always eager to offer my ‘opinion’. But as JB Danquah’s poem says, ‘I engaged the English….and I loved them’. So I engaged my mentor in a vigorous fashion. Then a few years ago, he sent me a story about a train that had derailed in Accra, despite media publicity of the restoration of the Accra to Tema railway line. ‘IRead More →

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 10 October, 2018. The history of modern Public Relations practice affords many glorious and distasteful examples. The latter include public health disasters (for example, cigarette smoking and cancer) and armed conflict (example, the Iraq War). PR practice is not the preserve of specially trained and certified people, for, PR is human communication itself. ‘You cannot not communicate’, says the axiom of communication, which means all humans communicate and whatever they communicate, verbal or otherwise, will be analysed and acted on. The negative effects of modern PR practice which has its roots in the USA, are still with us. Today, Public RelationsRead More →

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 7 October, 2018.                 When I was prompted that this blog had not written about the visit of Melania to the land of melanin, I already knew what our angle should be.    I guess we all agree it was a successful trip; Melania Trump got to work on her tan, hug babies and say the right things. And we of course, welcomed her with our traditional Ghanaian hospitality. It’s all in our DNA. And yes, Donald we do have some good things. Etsew na dokon (wona de otsiaw)…Balls of starch made fromRead More →

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 4 October, 2018.     Pre-Vas TV started test transmission yesterday 3 October, 2018. Hurray…it is indeed an October to remember. Now the real work begins; ask anyone who has been declared a winner on election night. The television set is a very powerful medium of communication; ask any 40 year old American about Sesame Street. So whilst we congratulate the directors and founders of Pre-Vas TV, we shall ask many questions for their reflection. The owners have their religious and ethnic biases- which one will hold sway? Will they be able to transcend both? Will the financial motive beRead More →

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 2 October, 2018.   The United Nations General Assembly has raised the stakes further on illegal global migration. This December, it will hold an intergovernmental conference on the troubling phenomenon in the great African city, Marrakech in Morocco. Of the 193 member nations and territories, only the United States of America and Hungary are not in favour of the move. True to form, Donald J. Trump sees the non-binding Global Compact on Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration as a threat to his America First agenda. ‘America is governed by Americans,’ Trump declared last Tuesday at the 73rd UN General Assembly on the matter.Read More →

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 29 September, 2018.   The question in the title of this story gets an A from us. You can never tire of asking what the problem is with our Ghanaian leadership. Many of them are highly schooled. We respect that. But alas, need we repeat that there are differences between schooling, training and education? The question which forms the basis of this story, is about Nigerian traders, in particular, being driven out of the retail trade business in Ghana. Ken Ukaoha, one of the speakers at a demonstration at the Ghana High Commission in Abuja and the ECOWAS Secretariat inRead More →

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 26 September, 2018. The unanswered question in John 18:38 from the New Testament Bible formed the basis of several days of debate among my friends and I as young undergrad students. ‘If Jesus had given an answer it would have settled the debate forever,’ a friend of mine offered. We ended the debate, acknowledging our cluelessness. This truth debate flashed back when the Institute of Public Relations (IPR)- Ghana press conference held last week and the German Catholic church conference of this week hit the news. In this season of truths as we call it on our blog, there areRead More →

By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 24 September, 2018.   September 21 is now celebrated in Ghana and throughout Africa as Africa Day of Peace in honour of Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s first president. And yes, Nkrumah was an active practising journalist! Critics of Kwame Nkrumah have perhaps not realized that Prof Ali Mazrui has settled the debate about Nkrumah to their consolation. Speaking in Accra in 2002 on the topic Nkrumah’s Legacy And Africa’s Triple Heritage Between Globalization And Counter Terrorism, the respected African Scholar said, ‘Nkrumah was a great African but a small Ghanaian’. Mazrui was fully aware of the Preventive Detention Act (PDA) and theRead More →