National Peace Council trains journalists to counter hate speech, promote peace

The National Peace Council has held training for journalists to equip them with the requisite knowledge and skills to counter hate speech and promote peaceful coexistence.The two-day training, which ended in Tamale, was also to enhance participants' understanding of conflict-sensitive issues, fact-based and accurate reporting, and community resilience.This had become necessary as the country approached the general election in December.Participants, who were drawn from the Northern Region, included editors, managers of media houses, and reporters.The training, which was in partnership with the Catholic Relief Services (CRS), formed part of the Preventing Violent Extremism through Social Accountability (POVETSA) project being implemented by the CRS with funding support from the Kingdom of the Netherlands.Mr Nuhu Abukari, Senior Programmes Manager for Conflict Management and Resolution at the Northern Regional Office of the National Peace Council, speaking during the training, said it had become neces sary in view of the pivotal role the media played in ensuring peace and stability.He emphasised the need for media houses to discourage hate speech and other forms of indecent expressions on their platforms since such expressions had the tendency to trigger violence and conflicts in the region.Dr Eliasu Mumuni, Vice Dean, Faculty of Communication and Media Studies, University for Development Studies (UDS), who made a presentation on violence and conflict-sensitive reporting, urged media practitioners to hold in high esteem the principles of accuracy and impartiality to promote peace.He urged them to avoid the temptation of stereotyping and biased reporting since such acts had the potential to trigger violence and conflicts in communities.He told media practitioners to 'Give voice to all parties' views; not merely the leaders of two antagonistic sides.'Mr Frank Wilson Bodza, Deputy Director of Conflict Management and Resolution at the National Peace Council, emphasised the need for the media to disco urage utterances that were dehumanising, and degrading.Mr Yakubu Abdul-Majeed, Northern Regional Chairman of Ghana Journalists Association commended the National Peace Council for the training and called for collaboration to ensure peace before, during and after the elections in December.Source: Ghana News Agency