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The Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) has won the bid to host the 3rd African Media Convention in Accra.
The convention – scheduled for May 2024 – is the largest gathering of media stakeholders and policymakers on the continent.
An initiative of The African Editors’ Forum (TAEF), a body of Editors and senior editorial executive on the continent, the convention is designed to safeguard the hard-won media freedoms and safety of journalists on the continent.
The GJA will be the first journalists’ association to host the event, which would bring together media experts, scholars, students, journalists, journalists' unions and associations; editors, the public and private sector, among others, to dissect pertinent issues confronting journalists within the African context.
The right to host the convention was won when the GJA President, Albert Dwumfour, led a delegation to bid for the hosting rights at the second convention held in Lusaka, Zambia, earlier this month.
Key personalities to attend the event, which coincides with the 75th anniversary of the GJA, would be from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), the African Union Commission, among others.
Addressing a news conference with the support of the Ministry of Information, Mr Dwumfour explained that the lobbying was successful due to the country’s exceptional performance in the consecutive World Press Freedom Index between 2018 and 2020 which ranked Ghana as the most liberated country on the continent.
Present at the news conference were the Head of Policy Planning, Budgeting, Monitoring and Evaluation at the Ministry of Information, Mawuli Segbefia; President of the Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association, Cecil Sunkwa Mills, among other executives of the GJA.
Stressing the association’s readiness to host the convention, Mr Dwumfour noted that hosting the gathering would present an opportunity for African media stakeholders to discuss issues on the revolving trends that impeded freedom of expression and freedom of the media, media viability and sustainability as well as the safety and security of journalists.
He added that the forum would also help promote the country’s tourist destinations.
He further urged the media and stakeholders to help implement a national minimum wage policy for journalists per country, addressing that the rising cases of violence against journalists and media workers on the continent, enactment of laws and policies aimed at enhancing control and curtailment of the digital civic space, surveillance and interception of communication, were all recommendations of the second convention.
Mr Dwumfour expressed gratitude to all stakeholders for their continuous support to the GJA in attaining that feat.
Messrs Segbefia and Mills congratulated the leadership of the GJA for winning the bid and expressed their support and commitment to the GJA in hosting a successful convention.
