Oppong-Nkrumah clears air on Al Jazeera's 'we don’t owe the president an apology' statement

The Minister for Information and Member of Parliament (MP) for Ofoase-Ayirebi constituency, Kojo Oppong-Nkrumah, has indicated that the media reports on the response from Al Jazeera to the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, were skewed and biased.

Speaking on Asempa FM’s Ekosiisen earlier this week, the minister indicated the response from Al Jazeera, to the letter by the president demanding an apology and retraction, added the reasons why they don’t owe the President an apology but that was not included in the media reportage.

“The Al Jazeera response, I saw a lot of headlines stating that Al Jazeera said they don’t owe President Akufo-Addo any apology. But I was hoping that those who published that story will add that, ‘Al Jazeera said they don’t owe Akufo-Addo an apology because,” he said.

According to him, the international news agency exonerated the president from the claims in the documentary as such does not owe him [the President] another apology.

“...because of the letter is that, after the documentary, I included the suspect who made the claims the president has rescinded his comments and we inquired from the presidency and it also responded that they have no connection with the suspect because of that, we don’t owe him an apology,” he added.

Background:

The International cable TV giant, Al Jazeera, wrote to Accra-based Media General in response to whether the channel had received the letter demanding a retraction and apology from the government and whether they would respond to same.

The response from Al Jazeera suggested that they do not owe President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and the Ghana government an apology for the contents of the fourth instalment of its Gold Mafia documentary.

The Government via an April 25, 2023 letter signed by Nana Bediatuo Asante, demanded that Al Jazeera retracted and apologizes for portions of its documentary that suggested that Akufo-Addo had dealings with a self-acclaimed money-launderer and gold smuggler, Canadian Alistair Mathias.

The which was shared response shared on the May 4, 2023, edition of the New Day programme, TV3 published the email response from Al Jazeera suggesting that the channel had taken care of all concerns raised by Akufo-Addo before the said documentary aired.

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