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Mr Mustapha Hamid, Minister for Information Designate, has told the Appointments Committee of Parliament of sanitising the political atmosphere and creating an environment devoid of insults and invectives at political opponents.

He expressed regret at comments attributed to him for some derogatory remarks against former President John Mahama, saying the then politically charged atmosphere gave room for the invectives, something he said both sides of the political divide were guilty of.

The nominee, spokesperson for President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo, explained that the comment was in response to insults levelled against his then flagbearer Nana Akufo-Addo that he was an ethnic bigot.

The nominee, who turns 46 next June 11, is a Muslim scholar, with two wives and awaiting to be declared a Doctor of Philosophy in the Study of Religions, by the University of Cape Coast.

He explained that he knew the President, then flagbearer of the current governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) was and is not an ethnic bigot and he had to defend him.

“I regret the polluted political environment that allows people to make insulting comments…I will contribute my quota to make sure that we have a sane political environment. I will work to rid our political environment of invectives and sanitise it.”

He said both sides of the political divide are guilty of throwing invectives, and promised if approved to work towards sanitising the political atmosphere.

Mr Hamid, who had trailed a career path as media person, working with a number of both electronic and print media houses, and later a politician had served as spokesperson, for Nana Addo from who he received allowances when he served him as spokesperson.

He said he was convinced that serving as the President’s Spokesperson for ten years, would have qualified him to take up another challenge instead of the current position, which would still require him to be a communicator.

That position, a Committee member noted, implied that the nominee had not wanted to accept the position, to which Mr Hamid replied that “I am very much excited about the position,” and used the opportunity to refute claims that he did not come from the Upper East Region.

He assured the Committee of using the position to work on retooling the Ghana Publishing Corporation to be modernised, explaining that it was not in a good state because it did not have the necessary machinery.

The Information Minister Designate said the proposed retooling of the Company would make available the correct machinery in order to be competitive, and once they retool, an appeal would be made to public institutions to give them jobs.

Mr Hamid advocated more resources for the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) to raise its standards to meet those of other internationally recognised media houses.

Mr Hamid said: “it is important that we are able to raise the standard of GBC to a BBC,” adding that he would ensure that measures were put in place to ensure that GBC was independent.

“We look forward to a GBC that can fund itself and be independent,” Mr Hamid said, and assured Ghanaians of ensuring that the media were not censored.

On what use he would put the Media Development Fund, the nominee said he would champion the use of parts of the Fund to build the capacity of media persons.

On improving access to television signals in some parts of the country, the nominee said Ghana Television was currently undergoing some modernisation efforts which was in its final stages, and announced that there had been preliminary discussions with the Finance Minister who had promised to release some funds for the completion.