MTN Ghana has initiated the Bright Conversations series to host and celebrate distinguished personalities whose ideas, thoughts and services have helped influence our society positively.

The first of the series hosted Nana Kwasi Gyan Apenteng, the immediate past chairperson of the National Media Commission under the theme: 'Nana Kwasi Gyan Apenteng @ 70; Reflections on the media as a lived experience’.

Speaking on a wide range of issues, the former NMC chairperson shared a lot of his life’s experiences and said that the time had come for Ghana to have a holistic discussion on what the media space, especially broadcasting, needed to do. “The time has come to conduct a major comprehensive national conversation and to take a look at how best we can resource the NMC and make the constitutional provisions of media freedom and independence work for us. The state owned media for me, is a vitally important part of the media mix. We need it because that is what belongs to all of us.’’

On the use of technology by older people he said: “technology is creating communities and these communities are supposed to be 'inclusionary', but if you are not within it, then, at some point, you find yourself left out. My advice to the people of my age is they should keep up with technology. Our journalists must be a bit more adventurous, they must be a bit more curious to think outside the box. Look for new angles and these are the things that I think can happen now but are not happening.”

He said that the job of an Editor is very challenging and revealed how he worked for only six hours as an Editor; “I went to work in the morning and by noon, I was fired.”

Nana Gyan Apenteng said that he entered journalism through his love for magazines. He said that he had his first story published when he was in secondary school and continued writing while at the University of Ghana.

He got into broadcasting through a programme called the 'Uncle Frank Show' while he was still at the University and commenced serious journalism practise as a vacation job.

He said that his first assignment was to cover the opening of the Office of the Northern Regional House of Chiefs, which he did but was told the next morning that what he wrote was not a news story. He said the late Edward Ameyibor of the GNA taught him vividly, the basics of news writing and one lesson he had gotten from him, which was vital in journalism, was note taking.

The former Chairman of the NMC called on young and upcoming journalists to cultivate the spirit of volunteerism and endeavour to take notes when they went on assignment, because it vindicated the reporter when issues came up with stories. “These days l see many journalists drop their mobile phones to record without taking notes. It is a bad habit,” he added.

He commended journalists and media houses, who were doing their best, to continue to uphold the ethics of the profession and urged others to fall in line with good practices of the craft. “Journalism should first serve the public interest before any other interest,” he added. He said what was lacking currently in the journalism space was intellectuals; academics, columnists and sources that journalists could fall on anytime to seek their opinion on issues of national interest.
Professor Kwame Karikari, a Communications Specialist and the Chairperson for the event, said that there were many opportunities that had the potential of making journalists better placed to meet the demands of democracy. He called on journalists to continue to read regularly to broaden their perspectives on issues surrounding them.

Prof Karikari, who is also the Board Chairman of the Graphic Communications Group Limited, said there should be a national dialogue to discuss issues on media content and that should not be left to only the National Media Commission.

The discussion was moderated by Miriam Osei Agyeman of 3FM.