A member of the National Peace Council (NPC), Rev Amu Darku has urged Ghanaians to pursue the path of peace with their utterances than the use of hate speech.
Speaking to the Ghanaian Observer Newspaper moments after launching a week long evangelism project by an international group called the African Enterprise, Rev Darku stressed it was good to pursue peace than to embrace evil.
According to him, the repercussions of hate speech were serious that its attendant devastation could be far reaching if not checked.
He, therefore, charged political actors to be decorous with their speech even as mainstream campaigning for the upcoming presidential and parliamentary elections heats up in the country.
ADMONITION:
Rev Darku urged politicians to vigorously flag the policies they intend to implement when they are given the chance to govern.
This, he intimated was a better alternative to the use of insults, hate speech and divisive comments on media platforms.
He rallied party heads to call to order any foul-tongued assign so as to ensure the maintenance of a peaceful atmosphere before, during and after the upcoming polls.
The Peace Council member tasked political party leaders to show the way forward by conducting themselves well both in speech and lifestyle so as to ensure the country stuck together even after the polls.
MEDIA:
The media, the Reverend Minister mentioned played a crucial role to ensuring the maintenance of peace and order in the country.
According to him, a careless word from politicians on the media landscape had the potential of causing havoc to the peace the country was enjoying.
He, therefore, called on media owners to sieve through the people they bring on their programs, including the monitoring of all that goes on air as the election approaches.
Rev Darku urged the activation of the right discretion by media practitioners on any information they got on hand before releasing them to the public so as to ensure a united country.
CRUSADE:
Disclosing the purpose of the launch, Rev Darku said the African Enterprise Christian group was by their mandate from the Lord working to win souls for Christ.
He said as part of the group’s week long activity in Kumasi, it would be conveying peace messages to the youth who are mostly used to foment trouble.
He stressed God was particularly after the souls of the youth who are agents of change in every country, adding the group will from this Monday be organizing outreach programs to engage them for Christ.
Students, Christian groups and associations he noted would be engaged in seminars and conferences to equip them to effectively win souls for Christ since that was the mandate God has given to the Christian community.
Sir, it is not a good idea for a populace to be in the “Fight or Flight” mode if a nation seeks peace. Loud noise such as one finds emanating from churches, information centres, merchants, bars and so forth can cause people to enter the stress induced state of “Fight or Flight”. This is a scientific fact as are the various diseases caused by noise. Even the WORLD HEALTH ORGANISATION (WHO) has said “Noise Can Kill”
Sir, if you want peace then I suggest you start with your own industry: THE CHURCH, and stop the noise harm that it produces throughout Ghana. I am certain making people sick is not what Jesus had in mind about loving your neighbour. Do you realise that the noise coming from Churches defies sections of the Criminal Code, The Constitution, the Bible, Municipality bye-laws and the U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights?
Truly Sir, one needs to deal with the beam in one’s own eye before trying to help others to see.