I don’t know why but we seem to have a huge aversion to the truth in this country. Especially when it comes to something concerning ourselves, in which case no matter how bad it is, you have to hold your tongue because it would be ‘unpatriotic’ to speak out.
The Ghana Premier League is in terrible shape. This is a fact, independent of whether Ghanaian journalists say so or not. So to try and lay the blame of its demise on them, as everyone seems intent on doing these days- is simply disingenuous and a huge matter of shifting the goalposts.
The GFA are right there, they presided over this sorry state of affairs.
The MP for South Tongu Kwabena Mensah Woyome, mirroring the comments made in recent times by Ibrahim Sani Dara, says the local journalists have destroyed the Ghana league. He comes in from the angle of not giving it exposure being the problem, rather than Sani’s absurd claim that incessant criticism is somehow bringing the league down.
“You sports journalists are making the league unattractive to all of us. You are not giving prominence to the competition but rather giving foreign leagues and teams publicity,” Woyome, who is the chairman of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Sports, told Starr Sports.
“For example in the past, Hearts and Kotoko [game] was big in such a way that my father and his friends gather to discuss it always.
“But now, my little boy can’t even mention names of local players but he can mention the starting line -up of Chelsea which is bad, you people must wake up,” the legislator added.
His criticism is true, inasmuch as Hearts and Kotoko games having lost their relevance. But that has happened because the league is poor, the football on offer has massively declined, and the fervour surrounding the fixture has died down due to both teams steady decline. In the good old days he talked about, nobody had to even hype Hearts and Kotoko games, the feeling was just in the air.
And I don’t think in those days, journalists were running around criticising the game. They started when there was a staggering drop in quality. In this case, there is no chicken and egg scenario- the league declined, and that attracted criticism. It wasn’t the other way around, and it is a dereliction of one’s duty to suggest so.