by Darrel Oko Sankah

It has become fashionable these days for persons in the uniformed state security agencies to take a swipe at journalists for supposedly doing their work in a manner that threatens national security.

Whiles they do not directly describe journalists as complete novices when it comes to issues of national security, the uniformed officers and men of the military, police and secret services have lately been making statements to suggest that the way journalists report on issues of national security is an indication that they have very little or no understanding of what national security is all about.

But recently in an interaction forum between mainly the Public Relations Officers of the security agencies and journalists, one bold journalist, Roland Arthur-Quayson from Radio Gold, dared to pose the question “what is national security”?

The forum was jointly organized by the Editors Forum Ghana (EFG) and the Ghana Journalists Association.

Indeed in posing that all important question Roland cited the 1992 Constitution, which only made mention of a National Security Council and its work but did even attempt to define national security.

The uniformed officers who had prior to that question read elaborate speeches and virtually criticized the journalists for aggravating situations of national security when they go bad, did not even venture answering that question, even though in reading their speeches, they came across as persons who knew it all and painted the journalists as the ones who needed tutorials on national security.

Indeed one of the uniformed men, a friend of the media, Colonel Emmanuel Nibo, Head of PR Directorate of the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) suggested that media houses should have security desks in their newsrooms and allow some of their editorial staff to specialize in security matters and, to put it in his words, “familiarize themselves with security jargons.” A good suggestion as that may be, it came from a person who was on a mission to do PR for his institution and seek to suggest that the ignorance of journalists about issues of national security is to be blamed for much of the internal security problems in country.

In other words journalists need to be tutored in what national security is and the tutorials must be administered by, guess who, the uniformed and plain-clothed officers of the national security apparatus.

Col. Nibo alluded to the overplayed suggestion that the some media was solely to blame for the Rwandan genocide and the Bosnian war.

He also quoted a number of famous world leaders on some very negative things they said about the role of the media in national security, supposedly to give Ghanaian journalists food for thought. One of the world leaders he quoted which sparked a near controversy at the forum was the nearly-impeached former President Richard Nixon of the United States of America.

President Nixon was supposed to have said something to the effect that the America he led to the Vietnam War lost the war because of negative propaganda by the American media.

What Col. Nibo failed to acknowledged was that Nixon later resigned to avoid impeachment over the famous Watergate issue and also because it later became sufficiently clear that he should not have gone to the war in the first place, much less blame the media for losing the war.

He also questioned why broadcast journalists in particular choose to call on “novices” and on persons whose knowledge on national security is outdated to comment on current security issues; a criticism that many in the inky fraternity thought was fair.

Another of the uniformed security officers, DSP Mr. Kwesi Ofori, Public Relations Director of the Ghana Police Service (GPS), also questioned why the media provided a platform for politicians in particular to make inflammatory, defamatory, ethnocentric and what-have-you statements through the media to incite people into violence. But he unknowing answered his own question by saying that “instead of using the media to tell the people what development plans they have for them when voted into power, politicians rather use the media to incite people into violence.” In other words the media is not necessarily to blame but rather the politicians who make those statements, which people get to hear not necessarily through the media but even during political party rallies and other forums.

In any case the Political Party Code of Conduct, which is nothing more than a compilation of national laws by which political parties and politicians should be guided, is clear about constitute inflammatory and inciting speech.

The National Enforcement Body of the code has said over and again much as the media has the responsibility to restrict politicians from making inflammatory statements, the security agencies has the right to pick up politicians and anybody for that matter who make inflammatory statements through the media.

But the question is how many of the known politicians who make those wild allegations and such violent inciting statements have been picked up by the security intelligence. A typical example is the disgruntled former President of this country who it a habit to make boom speeches and does not want to answer questions from the media.

Mr. Ofori picked issue with the media for criticizing the police for dealing harshly with recalcitrant civilians in some of the recent police/civilian clashes in the country.

Whiles the security PROs were talking those at the high table, including the Chairman of the National Media Commission, Mr. Adu Gyamfi and Ms Adwoa Yeboah Afari, Chair of EFG kept nodding their heads like lizards, particularly in approval of the criticisms against their colleague journalists.

After the forum some journalists described the whole forum as a charade where the PRO of the security agencies were the actors and the journalists were supposed to pay rapt attention and be able decipher what the true definition of national security is as propounded by the supposed uniformed experts. But the charade failed because the journalists questioned why for instance a journalist was not included in the speakers to give a journalist’s perspective of the national security situation.

One crack Daily Graphic Reporter on national security issues, Albert Kofi Salia, pointed it out to the uniformed men that recently in America a journalist who was considered a threat to national security because of his critical writings on America’s invasion of Iraqi, has now become a highly sought after national hero.

In other words, someone who the security capos in Accra thought of as a threat to the security of the people of America and therefore seized his accreditation to the White House, the Pentagon and to other state security areas have become the toast of the same people for whose security he suffered at the hands of the state security apparatus.

Simple, the people of America thought his work was rather in the interest of national security whiles those who are supposed to have been trained and understand what constituted national security thought he was a threat to the people.

That reminds me of my headline – what is national security – is it what the security capos say it is – is it what the journalists say it is or is it what the people say. Who defines national security and what constitutes a breach of national security.

Another question is, in seeking to protect national security, who or what do the uniformed security officers really seeking to protect – is it themselves, the powers that be or the masses? Same question could go for journalist – who and what do they seek to protect when they file stories on national security issues.

Talking about America, a National Geographic documentary on the 9/11 unfortunate incident, titled “Inside 9/11” sufficiently indicated that the US security intelligence had at least 30 hints of a possible terrorist attack and nine out of the 30 pointed to the use of commercial airline by terrorist. Guess what, they ignored every single one of the hints because they trusted in the efficacy of their national security apparatus to deal with terrorist.

The question then is, in ignoring the hints, some of which came from journalists who did independent investigations and had evidence of possible attacks, whose interest did the US security capos protect in terms of national security?

On the other hand, in cooking up non-existent evidence to warrant their infamous invasion of Iraq, when the Al-Qaeda is known to be based in Afghanistan, who and what were they trying to protect, the American people or their own failure to heed the hints prior to the 9/11 attacks; or perhaps they just used 9/11 as an excuse to eliminate a long standing enemy, Sadam Hussein, an action which has nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11.