By Gibson W. Jerue
Mr. Eugene Fahgon did something interesting yesterday. He took government public relations to the whiteboard. He had a marker and was teaching the economics of price and commodity control. Well, he can do whatever he wanted. But I have two concerns: 1) Is he an authority in economics matters? 2) Could he have not left the technical part of market forces explanation with the Ministry of Commerce? Let’s not answer both questions today. It is just that one has to be very careful not to present oneself as a hoot. Not everything can be criticized. Fahgon may continue his professorial tutorial in the discharge of his duties.
Way #4: Galvanize Government Public Relations Officers: The position of deputy minister for public affairs at the Ministry of Information could be considered the engine of the government propaganda machinery. The Deputy Information Minister for Technical Services will concentrate on licensing media institutions, etc.; the deputy for culture and tourism would take care of Miss Liberia, cultural issues, etc.; or the deputy for administration takes care of staffing, payroll and other administrative issues. But when you look at the load of work the deputy for public affairs has you realize the position carries with it a whole lot. But let’s look at ways that the public relations officers of government can be galvanized.
Consider that each government ministry, public corporation or agency has public affairs department. These PR officers are responsible to fine-tune the information coming out of those institutions. In other words, these PR officers must put the right foot out and left in to boost the public image of the ministries and agencies. But many times we have witnessed disjointed articulation of public policy and dissemination of government related information. The Weah administration is still young, but past regimes have had serious problems with providing information to the public and how. This area is crucial and Mr. Fahgon can make himself useful in bringing together public relations officers in the various government offices.
Fahgon should start working on coordinating government information dissemination, organizing training for PR officers, networking with them to ensure that what goes out is uniformly beneficial to the public and to the government. Come to look at it…the deputy information minister for public affairs, in my mind is the senior PR person for the government, not negating the role of the Information Minister as chief spokesman and propagandist of the government. Instead of describing critics and oppositions as “stupid”, “parasites” and “mentally low”, Mr. Fahgon can help his colleagues to be more useful. I can assume that if he starts doing his job and keeping all hands on deck, Fahgon would not have time enough to come on social media and insult people who disagree with the government.
But listen and listen very good – you should stop going around and telling people that you sacrificed your life to make George Manneh Weah. As a matter of fact, Weah was already popular; he made himself, and you simply rode on his reputation to mount a Facebook shouting match with your reckless use of “cartel” and “country-concau” divisive grandiloquence. If you blunder, the government blunders!
