Muheeb Saeed: A fallen pillar in campaign for media freedom

IN the ever-constant campaign for media freedom and freedom of expression in Ghana and Africa, Muheeb Saeed may be a silent name but his works are very loud.

Undoubtedly, his demise recently is a big loss to the media fraternity, and the only way to preserve his memory is to stay the course for media freedom and freedom of expression.

I first met Muheeb in 2019, at a flag-raising ceremony organised by the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA), at the Ghana International Press Centre, Accra, to commemorate World Press Freedom Day (WFFPD).

When it was time for solidarity messages, the Master of Ceremony (MC) introduced Muheeb as representative of the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) to deliver a speech.

He walked to the podium, looking very unassuming, holding nothing in hand and lacking the swag with which other speakers had mounted the podium.

I looked at him with much disdain and utter contempt: “Ah! Who is this one too?”

“Sulemana Braimah, I know; Kwame Karikari, I know, but who is Muheeb Saeed?”

Well, maybe, since Sulemana could not make it, he had sent someone to come and deliver an “I wish you well” message, I thought.

But as he began speaking, the firmness of voice, command in tone, finesse of language, depth of knowledge and coherence and articulation of thought, with which he delivered his speech extempore stunned me.

“Boy! This guy is deep,” I muttered.

Muheeb delivered the best speech on that occasion, in my humble opinion, and he did not need a prepared speech, demonstrating his depth of knowledge in the matters of media freedom and freedom of expression.

Indeed, the sages can never be wrong: “Don’t judge a book by its cover”.

I quickly engaged him in a chat after the ceremony and thereafter, we became friends and force in the campaign for media freedom and freedom of expression.

Silent worker

Working with Muheeb on many projects, I got to know him better; he was a workaholic but always remained silent and operated in the background.

As the Programme Manager for Media Freedom and Freedom of Expression at the MFWA, he had a strong appetite for research and detail, constantly tracking issues in that space quite vividly.

His articles and updates on media freedom and freedom of expression in Ghana and beyond are profound and insightful.

At the international level, particularly in the West African sub-region, Muheeb also made a huge impact in the promotion and protection of media freedom and freedom of expression.

In November 2024, we met in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, at the commemoration of the 2024 International Day to End Impunity for Crimes Against Journalists.

With good articulation in French and enormous experience in francophone countries, he leveraged his strong bilingual asset to make impactful contribution at the international level.

Until his death on March 31, 2025, he was a member of a media team working to make an input into the current constitution review process.

What a big loss!

Admirable personhood

Muheeb had an admirable persona; he was down-to-earth, respectful, resourceful, kind, selfless, humane and jovial.

These virtues were loudly touted by Sulemana Braimah, Anas Aremeyaw Anas, Manasseh Azure Awuni and many other brethren who participated in a memorial ceremony for him at the MFWA offices at Ogbojo, near Madina, on Friday, April 11, 2025.

In an article on African Ethics published in the Stamford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2011 Edition), Prof Kwame Gyekye submits that the word for ‘person’ in Akan (Ghanaian language) is onipa, adding that onipa also means ‘human being’.

He further submits that when a person does good, he is described as ‘oye onipa’ (he is a person) but when he does wrong or bad, he is described as ‘onnye onipa’ (he is not a person).

Thus, establishing a distinction between the concept of a ‘human being’ and the concept of a ‘person’, he asserts: “an individual can be a human being without being a person.”

Gyekye’s concept of moral personhood is quite compelling, and invoking same in this tribute, I firmly submit that with his positive character traits, Muheeb was not just a human being; oye onnipa (he was a person).

Back in Addis Ababa, while returning to our respective hotels after the day’s activities, Muheeb and Pa Louis Thomasi (Director, Africa Office, International Federation of Journalists) told me about how Addis Ababa had sprung from slum to splendor with skyscrapers dotted all over the city within a short space of time.

Muheeb shared memories of a black market in a slum he once patronised but the following year when he returned to Addis Ababa, that slum had given way to a skyscraper.

But as to how a tower in the campaign for media freedom and freedom of expression slumped into the earth and got silenced by death is a memory I cannot hold and share.

Fare thee well, comrade.

 

The writer, Kofi Yeboah is the General Secretary of the Ghana Journalists Association and communications lecturer at Wisconsin International University College, Ghana / Email: [email protected]

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