By James Moxon
Accra, March 5, GNA – Freezing January is a favourite month for the North to conduct its business affairs in Africa and it was in that month in 1956 that Sir Christopher Chancellor, the General Manager of Reuters of London, arrived in Accra to interest the emergent independent nation in a fuller and more costly international, news service.
At that time the Gold Coast and most other British Colonies took a cabled daily service of news from Reuters, which was in effect little more than headline news. Indeed, that was the name of the service. It was made available to the press and radio services and it had the virtue of being cheap.
Sir Christopher had in his briefcase samples of a much more complete service that would be received by teleprinter throughout the day and night and would keep independent Ghana abreast of world events as and when they occurred. Also in his briefcase was a draft contract for the service, which would commit the new nation to the regular expenditure of a sizeable amount of sterling funds. Of course, this would be shared by a number of government, press, business and diplomatic subscribers; but it was nevertheless quite a substantial deal that Sir Christopher had come to negotiate.
On 25th January, he met the Press informally to explain the purpose of his visit and two days later, he met the Prime Minister, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, for the first time. What stands out in my memory about that meeting, exactly twenty-six years later, is that Kwame Nkrumah really wasn’t at all interested in the subject of the new Reuters service. This was the sort of thing that he took for granted, and expected his specialists to deal with. But, having pinned down the Head of Reuters as a captive audience in his office, there was another matter that he wanted to discuss, which was much nearer to his heart.
“If we buy your service,” he asked, “will you for your part help us to establish the first independent news agency in Black Africa? Will you help us to create a Ghana News Agency?”
Cricketer though he was, Sir Christopher was not expecting a fastball of this kind to be bowled straight at him and – rather than risk being out middle stump – he instinctively blocked the first ball.
He explained that Reuters had only once in its one hundred years’ history, helped to give birth to an entirely new agency, and that was in 1949 when Reuters (led by Sir Christopher) had played a leading part in helping to create the independent Press Trust of India. On the other hand, Sir Christopher himself, since he had assumed control in 1941 of what came to be known as “the New Reuters”, had played a very active part in “internationalising” the agency on a worldwide and commonwealth basis.
Quickly accustoming himself then to Prime Minister Nkrumah’s fast delivery, Sir Christopher made up his mind, there and then, that the Ghana News Agency would be the logical follow-up to the Press Trust of India pattern and at once entered enthusiastically into the spirit of the new venture.
It may be said that this was by no means the first or only time that Kwame Nkrumah’s infectious enthusiasm for one of his “pet schemes” communicated itself instantly to his “top brass” visitors. As the years went by his guests were frequently warned in advance that they would find it extremely difficult to say ‘no’.
So on 27th January 1956 the concept for a future GNA “took seed”.
The decisions having been taken, it was now necessary to implement them. Nkrumah, for his part, dumped his new baby fairly and squarely in my lap, and from that day onwards I assumed the role of midwife and nanny to the new infant. And equally Sir Christopher, true to his word and his enthusiasm, entrusted his share of the birth pangs to his deputy and right-hand man Walton A. (Tony) Cole, who in fact succeeded him as General Manager in 1959.
I think I shall always remember Cole’s arrival in Accra early in May, as it was the start not only of a long and wholly successful business relationship but, much more rarely, of a very close personal friendship which lasted till his early death in 1963. I had invited several representatives of the ‘media’ to meet Tony Cole at a dinner on the night of his arrival. I myself was returning from a pre-plebiscite visit to the North and British Togo that day. En route, I was unlucky enough to have two punctures and only managed to reach Accra by mammy lorry in the heart of a torrential rainstorm – and wheeling my punctured tyres – when the party was almost over. But the downpour was the Almighty’s way of putting his blessing on the future Reuter/GNA relationship, which was a very fruitful one.
In May 1956, which was also the month of Louis “Satchmo” Armstrong’s first triumphant visit to Accra, no date had yet been agreed for Ghana’s Independence, which most people believed would be in 1956 itself. It was not in fact announced, for March 1957, until 18th September (simultaneously in Accra and London) after the CPP resounding election victory in July.
I interpreted my instructions, therefore, to create the nucleus of a news agency with the utmost urgency, with the added advantage that all the preludes to Independence – the Togo plebiscite, the General election, the prolonged and often violent Federation struggle, and the detailed planning – would be excellent material on which the emerging Agency could cut its young teeth.
There was no time to think of new premises, nor indeed, at first, of recruiting new staff for we had the good fortune at our Ghana Information Services headquarters, down in James Town, to have just what we needed to make a running start.
Ever since the Ghana Broadcasting System was established in 1955 as a separate entity within the Ministry of the Interior, the local radio news bulletins had continued to be prepared in James Town by G.I.S. and we had a regionally structured news gathering organisation for this purpose. A motorcycle dispatch rider carried the bulletin, sometimes with only seconds to spare, from James Town to Broadcasting House on Ring Road and copies were made available to the press.
But its limitation, of course, was that it made no attempt to gather news or information from outside the government sphere. It was solely a government news bulletin.
Starting from the discussions that took place during Cole’s visit from Reuters, in May, we re-briefed our news gathering staff in Accra and the regions to the effect that, in addition to government information – which was of course our main purpose and priority – they should also start to include news items of a more general interest, such as prominent court and police cases, disasters, human interest stories and sports items.
Cole, for his part, undertook to supply us within a month or two with the basic teleprinters needed for the incoming international service and to carry the local bulletins from James Town to GBC, the press and other users – together with an experienced Reuters man to put it all together and make it work. Kenneth Valpy of Reuters, with all his equipment, arrived in time for the July Elections and the skeleton Agency was in business. And Jack Allen, a veteran Reuters reporter and news hawk, joined Valpy to work together with and help to teach the selected G.I.S. newsgathers.
Amongst these were Kwasi Afoakwa – the very first to switch from G.I.S. to GNA (or GCNA as it was obliged to be known,prior to Independence), K.B. Brown, G.N.A.’s General Manager from 1972, the late Gilbert Hansen, Reuben Abbey, C.B. Acquah in Kumasi, and Asare Konadu, who later switched to publishing and paperback writing. Fraser Ntem, subsequently a commercial public relations man, was the first News Editor.
On these simple but very solid foundations were laid six months of preparatory work which were not an end in themselves, for this was only a flying start, but which form 18th September onwards, when Kwame Nkrumah announced to a Parliament bubbling with excitement that Ghana would be born on 6thMarch 1957, were an assurance that, with Independence, Ghana would also have its own national news agency – the first of its kind in Black Africa.
Neither Chancellor nor Cole spared themselves in fulfilling their promise to Nkrumah and, when the preparatory stages were over, they moved into top gear with the appointment of one of their ace operatives, Donald Wright, who from 1957 till his departure four years later, was the real impresario of the Ghana News Agency as the sophisticated international news organisation that it was destined to become.
Ghana Information Services was the parent body but, as with broadcasting, filmmaking and the training of journalists, it was the Department’s declared policy to launch its progeny as independent bodies just as soon as they were ready to fly away. The G.N.A. flew away a year after its inauguration, when it moved, first to Ghana House, en route to its permanent home close to the Ministries Centre. Meanwhile, a busy Prime Minister, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, took time off before Independence Day to launch his newest “baby” in its very humble, but wholly effective temporary quarters just across the road from James Fort Prison where, six years earlier, he had earned his proud title of “Prison Graduate”.
It would be difficult for anyone not present on that day to imagine the Lilliputian setting for so significant an occasion. In one very small room on the first floor of the Information Services headquarters, in which the floor had been specially tiered up to create more space and visibility, Prime Minister Nkrumah, together with his necessarily small party of Ministers and officials took their places on the miniature dais.
It was my job to present to our founder – dressed for the occasion in a Northern Batakari smock – Kenneth Valpy, our resident Reuters representative and ‘guru’ and his tiny staff of one teleprinter operator, Mr Prah, one stencil cutter Mrs Amarteifio, and the handful of reporter/editors, together with their “parent” Information Services mentors. After the conventional introductions, Dr Nkrumah delivered his inaugural address. Making reference to the obviously temporary nature of the new agency’s first home he wondered how anyone in years to come could possibly imagine that so much had emerged from such a small beginning. At the same time he foresaw the day when the initials G.N.A. tagged to a news items would find an unchallenged place in any newspaper of standing wherever it might be.
He spoke of the great challenge that the Independence of Ghana now offered to the young men and women of the country to develop their skills.
And, linking directly the emergent GNA with Ghana’s Independence, he stressed that other great challenge facing the African Press and News Agencies – the part that they were destined to play in ensuring that the forces of freedom would triumph over colonialism.
He now recalled the “bargain” that he had made a year earlier with Sir Christopher Chancellor, the Head of Reuters, to help him to give birth to this agency and announced that, in a few minutes time, Sir Christopher himself would speak to him by radio telephone from the Reuters headquarters in London to share with them their pride in the emergence of the world’s newest news agency. At 3.15 p.m. sharp the call came through from London, and Prime Minister and Reuter Chief were able to congratulate each other on a job thoroughly well launched. Dr Nkrumah didn’t omit to refer proudly to “the birth of our baby” and looking around the crowded room, he made particular mentioned for Sir Christopher’s sake, of his own energetic representative, Kenneth Valpy, and of the host for the memorable occasion who was, to my everlasting pride, none other than myself. “I’m sure” said Prime Minister Nkrumah to Sir Christopher “That Jimmy is the happiest man around”.
It was true of course, but it was a shared happiness with Kwame Nkrumah himself who, as always, was the brilliant architect of these “dreams”, and Sir Christopher who had placed unstintingly – as he had done some years earlier in India – the full weight and skill of one of the world’s greatest news agencies at the disposal of a young and emergent nation.
Looking back, a quarter of a century later, it seems that one of Kwame Nkrumah’s touches of genius was his capacity to fire others with the excitement of his ideas and, having captivated their enthusiasm, to carry them along with him to a successful finale.
The Ghana News Agency, on the occasion of its Silver Jubilee, continues to be one of his many unforgettable memorials.
Editor’s Note: James Moxon wrote this (edited piece) to commemorate GNA’s Silver Jubilee Anniversary.
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