By Robert Gaize
In Ghana and parts of the world, we know the name Anas Aremeyaw Anas only when it comes to undercover journalism and exposing wrongdoing in society. What many don’t know, which I learnt this past weekend, is that the man can also expose mediocrity with a sting that can last forever.
I’m one of the many young people who admire Anas for his work. When he gave a speech at the 2013 TED conference in California, I downloaded that video immediately it became available online. As an aspiring journalist, I play it anytime I need inspiration (which is actually all the time). So when I heard he was going to be a speaker in a lecture series organized by my school, I was more than happy. My school is the African University College of Communication (AUCC), founded by Kwasi Yankah, one of Ghana’s fine media personalities.
So here’s how Anas did his thing:
The wait for his coming was long. When the day finally came, a 100-capacity classroom was filled with about 200 students. Everyone wanted to see or hear the James Bond of Journalism in Ghana. (Or?) The lecture was supposed to start at 5:30 p.m. on Friday, February 20.
Right around that time, the organizers informed us that Anas had arrived. As evidence, a bearded young man came in with one of the organizers with what seemed to be some of Anas’ videos. From where I sat in the room, I noted that meaning as the beginning of AUCC’s woes. The very laptop which the school was using to play the videos was borrowed from a student. Once the videos started playing, we all realized there was no audio outlet. How can we enjoy a documentary without sound! Some students started grumbling. It appeared the organizers, including the Dean of students and the school Administrator, did not take that into account.
The single biggest factor to have disrupted this gathering would have been power outage but the school had solved that with a standby generator that meant that at every point work could still go on. Forward thinking!
But of what propriety is to make provisions for a bigger problem and allow a much smaller one as a microphone and batteries to drag a community that grooms people to take over the mantle of social leadership? This certainly was an avoidable and needless lapse in planning.
After some running around, they found a quick fix. But the sound from the speakers was terrible. It was like a radio struggling for its frequency module in a mining pit. The sound was all sshhheee… Time was ticking… There and then, I knew we had more embarrassing moments coming.
then Anas came in. “My name is Anas Aremeyaw Anas, I’m a reporter,” he started. “We’ve lost so much time trying to fix sound. I’ve been around since 4 pm, but it looks like there was no sound when I was ready to come in.”
“I wanted to reschedule, so we can have a longer time together. I don’t see the reason why I’ll go and speak in schools in New York or Ashesi for over an hour, but come here and speak for a shorter time. You don’t deserve any less”, he said. We all cheered.
It appears the school administrator went to convince Anas that the time didn’t matter as long as the students see him. So Anas Aremeyaw Anas decided to go the full haul. The bad sound was still unresolved, but he proceeded.
Five minutes into his lecture, his microphone died, making it impossible for all the students to hear him. New batteries were inserted into another microphone and handed over to him. That died in less than 2 minutes.
“Oh AUCC!” I heard one student shout. In my mind, that was game over for us all. Though I wanted to hear Anas, I found it embarrassing that an institution that prides itself on training communication professionals will fail so miserably on such basic provisions. For most students, we were well aware of such inadequacies and inaction by school authorities to provide the right tools for our education. It didn’t start with Anas that night. It’s a canker that could eat the school up if not checked.
With the second microphone dead and unfixed, Anas moved up front. Raising his voice as high as possible, the spoken but courageous journalist nailed it with his words to AUCC.
He told us how we cannot afford to get things like sound in order if we want to pursue excellence. He mentioned how the initial glitches could have been prevented with careful planning. “Tell those in charge to put things in order. When you do, we can fix a new date.” He then said thanks, to a rousing applause from the students.
Indeed, all of us had come to hear the man speak, but he ended up doing far more than we could’ve have asked. For a long time, many of us had thought our school was losing its edge as a preferred school for aspiring journalists and other communication professionals. The focus on money by the school’s administration did not reflect in any form of investment into tools needed by students. For it to escape management to put their house in order, even when they had invited Ghana’s chief spy, one can see how north this school is moving from its focus.
Anas has exposed AUCC, but not in his usual way. This time, it’s only a signal to the wise. Even though we boast of life-size images of award winning alumni hanging delicately in front of ?Discovery House,? the happenings of that Friday when Anas visited was one of shame and self imposed ridicule.
Hopefully one day AUCC will have the opportunity to redeem what should not have been.
