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  By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 26 October, 2018. The closure of KNUST is a management disaster; a public relations crisis. This week in my Management class, we discussed Bureaucracy in organisations. My students asked my views on the crisis at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). I told them I didn’t know the details but I was sure it was a leadership crisis purely from the perspectives of organisational bureaucracy and public relations. The management structure of the KNUST at its apex is modelled on a tripartite system following international best practice; the chancellor, the vice chancellor and the university council. AtRead More →

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By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 24 October, 2018.   The World Health Summit (Berlin 2018) ended last week with many success stories. Intelligent glove Manovue won an award for using Artificial Intelligence to provide the visually impaired with a personal assistant! Germany pledged 115 million Euros to the World Health Organisation for the next four years. And, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine signed an MOU with the Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin to collaborate and identify joint research opportunities. “We welcome this new partnership with the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, one of the world’s leading centers for research and postgraduate education inRead More →

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By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 22 October, 2018. Jamal means beauty in Arabic. There are other variants; Jamel, Gamal or Gamel. At the current rate of international pressure with the latest confirmations by Turkey’s MIT and admissions by his native Saudi Arabia of what happened inside their Turkish embassy in Istanbul; let’s all agree that Jamal Khashoggi has been murdered. ‘Shut up if you want to return to Saudi Arabia’, one of the 15 trusty fellows dispatched by the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman (MBS), is heard saying, published www.theguardian.com on Sunday. Now let me do a Naeem. My friend Naeem Ahmed Abdul Ghafaar,Read More →

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  By Isaac Ato MENSAH Accra- 20 October, 2018.   ‘I’m trapped in a Salvadore Dali painting”, thought Robert Langdon in the Da Vinci Code. Dan Brown’s character felt both a symbolic and surreal moment. That is how I feel right now about the final funeral rites of the late Oblempong Nii Kojo Ababio V, the king of James Town British Accra (Ngleshi Alata). Some in the media and elsewhere say they do not have a recent feel of him so they will not arrange any formal tributes nor programmes in his memory. Others such as the minister for chieftaincy affairs were informed of whoRead More →

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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 →

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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 →

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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 →

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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 →

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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 →

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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 →