Finally, election 2016 has come and gone!
Election 2016! The much awaited, much anticipated, much talked about event in 2016, the one event we have prepared for and discussed for well-nigh four years has come to an end.
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It happened on Wednesday all over the country and as they always do, radio and television played a major part of it.
I am writing this piece on Wednesday morning and I have my television set on when I started, flipping channels and also have my radio on changing from one channel to the other to see what is happening all over the country.
Meanwhile, I am also on social media monitoring, commenting, and doing banters on the happenings at polling stations. Thankfully, the Inspector General of Police refrained from carrying out the threat of shutting down social media, at least he hadn’t done so as of 9am, and so we can follow up on things from those platforms, especially Twitter and Facebook.
So far my monitoring indicate that they have been minor incidents that could thwart the electoral. No proper or widespread misbehaviour, only a few missing ballot boxes, late start of voting and just a few more.
Though the voting process is a 10-hour long exercise and anything could happen within that duration, it is my hope that we’ll sail through.
Flipping through the television channels, I have seen that most stations have taken the election reportage very seriously with well decorated studio, host and panel who are analyzing the polls and chatting about the happenings from across the country as reported by their correspondents.
Atinka TV for instance had Ekourba Gyasi in the studio sitting in a comfy chair and chatting with his team in the studio. It is a testament that Atinka TV which had been test transmitting probably wanted to use the elections to launch its transmission.
Down the road to GhOne TV, their first electoral coverage was anchored by Nana Aba Anamoah. She was in the studio with journalists and pollster Ben Ephson and another to analyze previous results and discuss what was happening from all over the country, as she the host chats with correspondents.
At Labone, Metro TV’s Kwasi Afriyie was the anchor as he together with a team in the studio discussed the issues that were arising from the field and analyzing other matters related to the 2016 election and others before now.
At Adesa We, TV3 had their analysis wall manned by Bright Nana Amfo, who was also the main anchor and supported by some of his colleagues along with a well-chosen panel that was helping to discuss and analyze the issues as filed by correspondents all over the country.
GTV, the nation’s premier television station, is not new to election reporting and would not let 2016 go by without showing a strong presence in the scheme of things.
As it turned out, Abdul Hayi Moomen was anchoring the stations coverage as correspondents across the country interacted with him about how the voting process was going. The coverage was multi-cast on GTV, GBC 24 and GBC Govern.
Obonu TV, the Ga-Dangme speaking station of GBC also had its own coverage with correspondents across the regions with Naa Ashia as the anchor who along with her studio audience discussed the issues as they came up.
Then there was UTV’s coverage that had Lawyer Tweneboah Kodua (or TK as he is known) as well as a female colleague standing in front of the screen that they were using for the analyses.
The screen allowed them to analyze previous electoral information related to the constituency where their correspondents were reporting from, thus when the correspondent comes on they look for the data to give a proper analysis of what was likely to happen.
The screen/wall reminds one of John King of CNN and how he analyzes the votes and results when they start coming during American elections.
Homebase TV would not be left in the fray of election coverage as they had their small studio properly decorated with “Beyond Ballot” backdrop with a host and panel of two analyzing the issues as they came in from all over the country. They had the audience to interact with them as issues happened.
On Net 2 TV, it was the morning show host Fiifi Boafo who took charge of anchoring the election coverage in the morning. He had his own panel as well to analyze the issues as they happened from across the country and shared by their correspondents.
Asylum Down based e.tv would not be left out of the coverage as a studio panel was set with morning show host Bismarck Brown as host, Kwame Gyan as his wingman and two other people helping with the analyses and interaction with correspondents across the country.
While flipping the channels, I also chanced on Viasat1 which also have some field report with Kokui Selormey and DKB in the studio to interact with them. I got the impression it didn’t take too long as when I checked back there was football on the channel.
Light TV also had a studio set decked with colours from their logo with a panel of two and a host to discuss what was happening at the various centres from across the country as well as picking comments from their viewers on the happenings in the ground.
Angel TV also had cameras at many polling stations to report live of how voting was on-going across the country as well as studio panel discussion on proceedings.
Thus far, there’s be civility around the polling stations with general comportment and decorum. Though it must be said that the proper analysis will start when the results start coming in after voting.
Perhaps this is the calm before the storm. However it goes, we have shown how tolerant and peaceful Ghanaians can be around tense moments as elections.
My observation across the various channels was that the Ghanaian media has taken the 2016 elections very seriously and want to be a part of how the whole caboodle will play out.
Television stations have invested immensely to get the right equipment and training of correspondents to report on the elections. Never mind that the radio stations are heavily involved in this as well.
As I end this piece so I can go and vote too, it is with the hope that by the end of this exercise, Ghana would have shown the world, once again, that we are a peace loving people, that we have our differences, but when it comes to choosing who should lead us, we can do so in the most civil manner.
By the time you read this, there will be a sense of who could be president and who will represent you in parliament. Whatever the results, I implore you to be an agent of peace. Let peace rain on us and let it reign among us!
@TheGHMediaGuru