Managing editor of the Insight Newspaper Kwesi Pratt Jr. has chastised the President and any other person who believes that journalists are supposed to be neutral as being naive and perhaps, even stupid.
Kwesi Pratt, speaking on the Radio Gold political discussion program ‘Alhaji and Alhaji’ earlier today, tackled recent assertions by the President that a ‘cabal’ of people have seized control of the media and are suffocating his message.
According to him, it’s a mark of naivety, ‘and ‘of something else’ – to expect journalists to be neutral in their reportage.
“Stop looking for neutral communicators…it’s a mark of naivety and some times, a mark of something else, to be looking for neutral communicators.” Pratt said on the program.

Pratt went on to add that it is the responsibility of public officials of that sort, such as the President, to put relevant information in their speeches so that reporters would have no choice than to cover.
“Now, I listen to all these officials including Presidents, Ministers, opposition leaders and so on. Is it possible to report everything they say? It is not…It is not possible.” he continued.
“That is why when public officers, when prominent people are speaking; they have to choose what they say. So, if you’re going to speak at a public place somewhere and you, yourself, you add irrelevant things in your speech; you create the conditions for people to pick what you consider to be relevant which they may consider to be most relevant,” the veteran journalist added.