While at home for the Christmas break, I could not turn on the television or open a newspaper without being informed of the Israeli-Palestinian fighting or the state of Zimbabwe under Mugabe. In fact, if I cast my mind back, both these issues have been reported and reported on by the British press for years and years and years. Meanwhile there have been the keenly contested Presidential Elections in Ghana. Not that many non-Ghanaian’s know anything about it: I’ve had to search and search for any information in the press, eventually getting the result from one of the Ghanaian security men that work at my halls.

Professor John Atta-Mills of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) just pipped Nana Akufo-Addo of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to the post in a set of run offs held on the 28th December. The NDC was formed by former President Rawlings in 1992 and is of Socialist leanings. The NPP (leans centre-right) supplied Ghana with its last President of two four-year terms, President Kufour, who has just stepped down. I know the politics of a small West African Republic may not be right up everyone’s street, but surely, fair, democratic and violence-free elections in one of Britain’s former colonies is worth at least a few column inches.

The over-exposure of Mugabe’s reign of cruelty towards his people, Somalia’s continuing civil unrest and piracy, and acts of genocide in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Sudan has skewed public opinion of African even further. Many hundreds of people see Africa as the world’s basket-case and flock to do charity work with a severely unattractive paternalistic attitude.

Not to make light of the Middle-East crisis, but really, do we need quite so many gloomy reports, when there are plenty of more upbeat world news stories breaking all the time? I accept that hard-hitting journalism changes the face of history but in these gloomy times, we could all do with reminding that humanity isn’t just inherently war mongering. Actually, I am vaguely surprised that the media didn’t pounce on Ghana and it’s imminent elections as I’m sure that many people were expecting a performance worthy of ‘those corrupt African leaders’ and an opportunity to say ‘I told you so’. Yes, today guys, I am a rampant cynic. When I’m the editor of a National paper (a fantasy that I’ve harboured for a long time), I will make sure the ratio of morbidity to cheer is reversed.