By Kwesi Yirenkyi Boateng
In January 2019, investigative journalist Ahmed Hussein-Suale was shot dead near his home in Madina, Accra. His killing remains a troubling reminder of the risks journalists can face when their work unsettles powerful interests. Years later, with the several incidents of attacks on journalists, one question continues to haunt the public conscience: who will answer for this?
That question was part of the moral weight surrounding the Public Forum on Ending Impunity for Crimes Against Journalists organized by the Media Foundation for West Africa, held on 2nd November 2026. Journalists, rights advocates, justice and security actors, and peace practitioners came together to tackle a problem that reaches far beyond the newsroom. The call by a former President of the Ghana Journalist Association, Mrs. Gifty Afenyi Dadzi, for journalists and media organisations to make safety issues an integral part of their operations is edifying. I left the forum with a long-held conviction as a communicator and peacebuilder that the safety of journalists is not simply a media freedom concern but a peace and security concern.
What impunity teaches
When an attack on a journalist goes unpunished, the consequences travel well beyond the victim. It sends three messages at once. To journalists, it says: be careful what you uncover. To those who use violence or intimidation, it suggests: you may escape accountability. To the public, it warns: the truth comes at a price, and those who pursue it may pay that price alone.
Over time, these messages alter the habits of society. Reporters begin to soften difficult questions. Editors hesitate before publishing stories that expose wrongdoing. Sources retreat. Citizens become accustomed to knowing less than they should. The resulting silence is dangerous precisely because it may not look like conflict. It can look calm, even as fear steadily narrows the space for public scrutiny.
Why this belongs to a peacebuilder’s desk
Peace is more than the absence of violence. It depends on trust, justice and the ability of people to express grievances, contest decisions and resolve disagreements without resorting to force. Journalism is part of the civic infrastructure that makes this possible.
Journalists can serve as an early-warning system, bringing neglected grievances and emerging tensions into public view before they deepen. They are record-keepers, documenting events so that public memory is not surrendered to the loudest or most powerful voice. They also help sustain a shared public square in which citizens with competing views can question, debate and disagree without becoming enemies.
When journalists are threatened, that civic infrastructure weakens. Where credible information is scarce, rumour finds room to grow. During election periods, when social media can rapidly amplify half-truths, inflammatory claims and deliberate falsehoods, an intimidated or weakened press leaves communities more exposed to misinformation, hate speech and manipulation. Ghana’s democratic stability is an achievement, not a permanent guarantee. It must be renewed through institutions that protect accountability and public trust.
Go back and fetch it
The Akan have a saying: “Sɛ wo werɛ fi na wosankɔfa a yɛnkyi.” It is not wrong to return for what you have forgotten. Sankɔfa is more than a cultural expression; it is an instruction to recover what has been lost, neglected or left unfinished.
Justice delayed is not justice forgotten, unless we choose to forget.
Too often, unresolved cases become old news. A public forum is held, a communiqué is issued, a promise is made to investigate, and attention moves to the next headline. Sankɔfa demands a different response. It asks us to return to unfinished business: retrieve the files, pursue the evidence, reopen stalled conversations and insist that institutions complete the work. Every unresolved attack on a journalist is a debt owed to the victim, the profession and the public.
This is why policy without implementation and accountability risks becoming little more than a statement of good intentions. Frameworks are important, including the model safety of journalists policy discussed at the forum. But their credibility will ultimately be measured by what happens after an attack: whether complaints are properly recorded, investigations are pursued, perpetrators are brought before the courts where evidence supports prosecution, and outcomes are communicated transparently.
Ghana should consider establishing a publicly accessible tracker of attacks and threats against journalists. It should record the nature of each incident, the responsible investigative institution, the status of the case and its eventual outcome, while protecting victims, witnesses and sensitive investigative information. Such a mechanism would help expose patterns, monitor institutional responses and prevent cases from disappearing from public attention. What is documented can be followed up; what is followed up is harder to forget.
The harder conversations
Two uncomfortable points also deserve to be stated plainly. First, journalist safety extends beyond physical violence. The freelancer who is not paid on time, the young reporter working without insurance or adequate protective equipment, and the woman journalist subjected to coordinated online abuse are all vulnerable. Their experiences may never appear in a police report, but they can undermine the freedom and independence with which journalism is practised. A credible safety agenda must therefore address digital threats, gender-based harassment, unsafe working conditions and economic precarity, alongside physical attacks.
Second, the media must take its own professional responsibilities seriously. A press that rightly demands protection must also work to earn and sustain public trust. Partisan capture, “brown envelope” practices, unverified reporting and sensationalism that inflames tensions rather than informs the public weaken that trust. They can blur the distinction between independent journalism and political or commercial advocacy. This is not an argument for making protection conditional on a journalist’s popularity or perfection. No professional lapse justifies violence, intimidation or unlawful obstruction. It is an argument for recognising that press freedom, and professional responsibility must reinforce each other.
I make this point as someone who has worked in journalism and continues to believe in its public value. Safety and standards are not competing claims. Both are necessary to a credible media environment and a resilient democracy.
Three asks
To the state: investigate attacks and threats against journalists promptly, independently and professionally. Where evidence warrants, prosecute those responsible, and communicate the progress and outcomes of cases without compromising due process or the safety of those involved. Accountability must be visible enough to deter future attacks.
To media organisations: strengthen newsroom safety systems, provide practical support for freelancers and young reporters, and establish clear procedures for responding to threats, including online and gender-based abuse. Invest in ethical reporting, verification and conflict-sensitive journalism. Protecting journalists must be an institutional responsibility, not an expectation placed on individuals to fend for themselves.
To peace institutions and peace practitioners: move beyond expressions of solidarity to practical cooperation. Regular dialogue between newsrooms and peace actors, shared early-warning channels, referral pathways and joint safety protocols can help identify threats before they escalate. Such arrangements must respect editorial independence and protect confidential sources. Peacebuilders working in sensitive communities also face risks; their safety belongs in this wider conversation. As our elders say, “ti koro nkɔ agyina” to wit ‘one head does not go to council’. The protection of civic space requires collective responsibility.
The last word
Scripture calls on us to speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. But that call also depends on people being free to speak, to ask difficult questions and to bring uncomfortable truths into the open without fear of violence.
A journalist silenced by a bullet, a threat or the quiet pressure of impunity leaves more than an empty chair in a newsroom. The public loses a witness. Communities lose a channel through which grievances can be heard. And the institutions that depend on scrutiny lose an important safeguard.
A nation that cannot protect those who bear witness to its truths will struggle to protect the peace those truths help sustain.
The views expressed here are personal and do not represent the position of the National Peace Council.
*Kwesi Yirenkyi Boateng is a Ghanaian writer, poet and development communication practitioner with over 17 years of experience in journalism, civic education and public communication.*
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