The remarks were made during the opening ceremony of a three-day training workshop in Tamale, Northern Region, which brought together over 30 journalists and media professionals from the Upper West, Savannah, and Oti Regions.

Organized by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) under the ECOWAS Peace and Security Project (EPSG), in collaboration with the Ghana National Peace Council (NPC), the workshop aimed to strengthen journalists’ capacities to tackle hate speech, misinformation, and disinformation.

Participants were trained in key areas such as fact-checking, open-source intelligence (OSINT), applications of artificial intelligence, conflict-sensitive reporting, and media information literacy.

The initiative is part of a wider partnership between ECOWAS and the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), supported by GIZ, to equip media professionals with the tools needed to contribute positively to peace and development.

Dr. Ohene-Amoah highlighted the ongoing challenges posed by violent extremism in sub-Saharan Africa, including the rise of hate speech, misinformation, and governance changes. He assured that EPSG will work closely with regional and national stakeholders to ensure a comprehensive approach to peace and security.

He encouraged journalists to engage actively with the training, stressing that it provides the framework for delivering information that fosters peace, development, and societal harmony.

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The Peace Council is raising concerns about the use of insults and tribal statements to score political points.

Ahead of the official launch of the campaign season, the Council wants parties, representatives, and supporters as well as the Media to desist from using words that can put the peace of the country under threat.

The Council, with support from Star Ghana Foundation and the British Council, held a workshop in Kumasi for stakeholders to dialogue on matters that may affect the peace of the country going into the December 7 election.

Dr. Harriet Takyi, a member of the Peace Council stressed that, “We have diverse views, yet we need to express them in a much more peaceful way so that we understand ourselves and continue to live as Ghanaians.

Particularly again with journalists; they should use language that will bring peace not speech that will bring hate”.

Apostle Bright Sosu also admonished the youth to desist from any act of vigilantism.

“The measures we have in place is to educate the youth so that they don’t join any group that will destroy Ghana. Especially any vigilantism groups,” he said.

Meanwhile, some party representatives have called on the Electoral Commission to maintain its credibility during the December 7 parliamentary and presidential election.

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The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) said X Corp accused it of making “troubling and baseless claims” in its reports about the platform.

Elon Musk bought the platform last year promising to defend free speech.

Imran Ahmed, CCDH chief executive, said Mr Musk’s actions were “a brazen attempt to silence honest criticism”.

Twitter was rebranded as X by Mr Musk just over a week ago.

Since Mr Musk took over Twitter, the platform has been accused – including by former employees – of not doing enough to counter hate-speech and misinformation. Conversely, in December Mr Musk tweeted that hate speech was down by a third.

On Sunday the platform reinstated Kanye West after an almost eight-month ban for a series of offensive tweets – one of which appeared to show a symbol combining a swastika and the Star of David.

In the letter to the CCDH, X Corp lawyer Alex Spiro rejected the campaign group’s allegations that Twitter “fails to act on 99%” of hateful messages from accounts with Twitter Blue subscriptions.

Mr Spiro criticised the organisation’s methodology, writing that “the article is little more than a series of inflammatory, misleading, and unsupported claims based on a cursory review of random tweets.”

He also alleged that CCDH was supported by funding from “X Corp’s commercial competitors, as well as government entities and their affiliates”.

The letter accused the organisation of attempting to drive away advertisers and said X Corp was considering legal action. The company has lost lost almost half of its advertising revenue since his $44bn (£33.6bn) takeover, Mr Musk revealed in July.

In its reply CCDH’s lawyer Roberta Kaplan said the allegations in the “ridiculous letter” had no basis in fact but were “a disturbing effort to intimidate those who have the courage to advocate against incitement, hate speech and harmful content online”.

CCDH says it does not accept funding from social media companies nor government bodies, “both of whom we praise or criticise without fear or favour”.

British politicians backed CCDH for its work on highlighting hate speech on social media.

Damian Collins, a British MP on the UK board of CCDH, said Elon Musk’s commitment to free speech didn’t seem to apply when his firm was criticised.

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The social media giant has staffed 4,500 human workers with the task of reviewing posts on the site, which has resulted in the removal of about 66,000 posts a week.

Although Facebook is working on other methods, it understands that they are ‘a long way from being able to rely on machine learning and AI to handle the process’.

‘As more and more communication takes place in digital form, the full range of public conversations are moving online — in groups and broadcasts, in text and video, even with emoji,’ Richard Allan, VP EMEA public policy, shared in a blog post on Tuesday.

‘These discussions reflect the diversity of human experience: some are enlightening and informative, others are humorous and entertaining, and others still are political or religious. ‘Some can also be hateful and ugly.

‘Most responsible communications platforms and systems are now working hard to restrict this kind of hateful content.’ ‘Facebook is no exception.’

The firm has defined hate speech as attacks on people based on their race, sexual orientation and other ‘protected characteristics.’

And it mostly relies on its nearly two billion users to report any hateful posts they see.