DAILY GRAPHIC, Monday, October 8, 2012, Pg.80. Prof Abraham inducted as new NAFTI Rector

Prof. Linus Abraham holding his mantle of office (a sword) as he is being sworn in as the Rector of the National Film and Television Institute (NAFTI) by Prof. Kofi Anyidoho of the University of Ghana and Chairman of Council of University of Health and Allied Sciences, Ho (right), last Friday in Accra.

Story: Mary Ankrah
THE National Film and Television Institute (NAFTI) has inducted Prof Linus Abraham as the new Rector of the institute.

He is the first graduate of the institute to assume the high office of Rector of the school.

 Prof Abraham, who had been the substantive Rector of the Institute for over two years and  currently serving as a member of the advisory board for the Ministry of Information, is a professor in visual communication, broadcast journalism, cultural studies and new media studies.

Speaking at  the inaugural ceremony after he was inducted into office last Friday in Accra, Prof Abraham observed that although the institute had contributed substantially to the growth of the Ghanaian and African media industry, it had receive no or little support from the government.

"The Government of Ghana has not been able to make up for the shortfall in funding and the Institute has since struggled to survive”, he noted.

Prof Abraham was, however, optimistic that “we are now resolved to find solutions to the numerous problems that NAFTI was facing and have re-dedicated ourselves to becoming the centre of excellence for professional and intellectual training in the media arts”.

In that direction, Prof Abraham disclosed that the management and Board of Directors of the school had envisaged transforming NAFTI into a media arts university that would provide a modern and dynamic training environment to facilitate the growth of the creative and media arts industry in the country.

As a media art university, he said, NAFTI would provide training at the undergraduate and graduate levels in film, graphic and production design, photography, animation, video, multimedia production, broadcast journalism and entertainment business management among other programmes.

The process of transformation,  which had been on-going for the past two years, he said, was in two phase and the first phase involve the redefining of the governance structure of the school and promulgation of a new statue of incorporation which included the rehabilitation of the civil structures of its current location, re-equipping the school with digital machines and expansion of its academic programmes as well as establishment of new departments.

While the second phase is expected to be completed in about seven to 10 years’ time, the new NAFT Arts University, he indicated, would be relocated to a new site on the Dawhenya road where the expanded university would be built to facilitate commercial creative arts production in the country as well as generate funds for the school.

He said there was the urgent need to complete the school’s complex which was started over 30 years ago and rehabilitate its existing studios and students hostel to promote the strategic development and expansion of NAFTI into a Media Arts university and therefore appealed to the government to expedite funds for that purpose.

He observed that the strides made so far by the institute were possible with the help from international benefactors including the Germans, the France, the Australians, and some individual Ghanaians who, in diverse ways had provided support to the school.

The Minister for Information, Mr Fritz Baffour, expressed the government’s commitment to transforming the school into a first class university, adding that the government was soliciting a credit facility of 35 million Euros for that purpose.