Associate Professor at the Department of Labour and Human Resource Studies, University of Cape Coast (UCC), Professor Akua Opokua Britwum, has been elected the Chairperson of the National Media Commission (NMC).
She will serve a three-year term and become the first-ever female chairperson of the NMC since its establishment in 1993.
Justice Noble Jerome Nkrumah of the Court of Appeal administered the oath of allegiance and the Official Oath to the 18-member commission at the Supreme Court in Accra on Wednesday.
Prof. Biritwum and Richard Mawuli Quashigah are the two representatives of the Office of the President on the NMC.
Other members of the commission are sports journalist and lawyer, Eva Okyere, who is representing the Ghana Bar Association; Ernest Owusu Addo – Publishers and Owners of Private Press; Anthony Obeng Afrane, representing the Ghana Association of Writers and the Ghana Library Association; Rev. Ruby Amable – the Christian Group, comprising the National Catholic Secretariat, the Christian Council and the Ghana Pentecostal Council, and Hajj Muhammad Amir Kpakpo Addo, representing the Federation of Muslim Councils and Ahmadiyya Mission.
Others include; Professor Isaac Abeku Blankson (training institutions of journalists and communicators); Esther Amba Numaba Cobbah (Ghana Advertising Association and the Institute of Public Relations of Ghana); Rev. Isaac Owusu (Ghana National Association of Teachers), and Kobby Asmah and Kofi Yeboah, both representing the Ghana Journalists Association.
The rest are Mahama Shaibu, Philip Fifi Buckman and Korkor Laurette Asante, all representing Parliament; Abena Annobea-Asare (National Council on Women & Development); Joseph Yao Hotor (Trades Union Congress (Ghana), and Cecil Sunkwa-Mills, representing the Association of Private Broadcasters.
Justice Nkrumah encouraged the members to uphold their mandate by protecting media freedom and independence, promoting diverse viewpoints, and tackling disinformation.
“At the end of the day, when your tenure has come to an end, it will all be praises for the wonderful work you have done,” he said.
As an old student of Aburi Girls Senior High School, Prof. Biritwum is a distinguished scholar and activist, who holds a doctorate from Maastricht University, Netherlands; a bachelor’s and master’s degree from the University of Ghana, Legon; and a Postgraduate Certificate in Education from UCC.
She previously served as Director of the Centre for Gender Research, Advocacy, and Documentation at UCC.
In addition, she held the Ela Bhatt Guest Professorship at the University of Kassel, Germany, and was an associate fellow of the Global Labour University.
Prof Britwum is a former Convenor of the Network for Women’s Rights in Ghana, a reviewer for several academic journals and serves on the editorial board of the Global Labour Journal.
She also sits on the advisory boards of Feminist Africa and the International Review of Social History.
Her academic work focuses on gender and labour studies, development theory, union democracy, and women in the informal economy.
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