Executive Director of the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), Sulemana Braimah appears unsatisfied with a public statement by Media General, operators of TV3, explaining circumstances which led to the TV station’s inaccurate projection of the outcome of the parliamentary election.
According to Sulemana Braimah, the media entity hurriedly made the projection without due diligence and should have admitted in the statement issued by management that its failure to diligently cross-check the results it had received led to the “terribly” wrong projection.
“You must admit that you rushed in wanting to be the first and got it terribly wrong,” he said.
This follows a statement by the media conglomerate dismissing assertion that TV3’s projection of the parliamentary election results which has turned out to be inaccurate was an attempt to pre-determine the election in favor of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP).
It argued in the statement that the TV station’s projection of 149 and 126 seats for the NPP and the NDC respectively was based on available information at the time and not an attempt to favor the ruling party.
But the reacting to the statement, Mr. Braimah asserted that the TV station, in its bid to beat competition, failed to take steps necessary to verify the information it had received.
For him, the media entity should have admitted that its fault and apologize instead of attempting to justify the blunder.
Mr. Braimah said “you were emphatic in the projection. What you do is to apologise and give assurance of your commitment to fact-based, unbiased reporting as we know you to be.”
