The Herald tabloid has been rehashing old fabricated claims this week in an attempt to chip away at my reputation and credibility.
I must state categorically that these publications are false, malicious, and nothing more than a figment of a very fertile conspiratorial imagination. These claims were false in 2021 when they were first published and remain false in 2023.
1. EXCOMsult Media, a firm in which I am a proprietor, has provided and continues to provide communications consulting services for various organizations, including Aker Energy Ghana Limited since December 2019. I have always openly disclosed this information including on my LinkedIn profile. To comply with the Code of Conduct requirements of my employers and to avoid any conflict of interest in editorial situations, I have never hidden this information from my colleagues at JOYNEWS and the management of Joy FM. This is not news!
- EXCOMsult Media has not been paid USD 500,000 by Aker Energy, nor USD 125,000 as alleged. Both of these claims are completely false, and the alleged figures are grossly exaggerated! All contract and payment details are verifiable.
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The repetition of the palpably false claim that I have bribed or facilitated bribes to individuals is equally spurious and malicious. All the individuals whom the tabloid alleges have been bribed have issued categorical public statements of denial dating back to 2021. The internet is replete with stories from 2021 where these individuals deny this baseless allegation because it never happened. See
i. Ghanaweb of 3rd September 2021
ii. ModernGhana of 3rd September 2021
iii. Asaaseradio.com of 4th September 2021 -
I have not and cannot kill stories at Joy FM or JOYNEWS. I am a consummate professional working in a newsroom that has the most rigorous checks and balances you can find anywhere in the world. In the newsroom where I work, every editorial decision is vigorously scrutinized and subjected to thorough peer review three times a day. No one person can dare attempt to suppress a story. Such attempts would be fiercely resisted. This has been the working environment in which I have served for the past 19 years. What the tabloid alleges never happened and can never, ever happen.
These tabloid fabrications, along with the individual sponsoring the allegations, who left his digital footprint in the Excel document in PDF, based on which these false stories were written, must be treated with contempt.
