Gloria Hiadzi will be laid to eternal rest on Saturday, February 28, 2026, but her memory, especially among the media fraternity in Ghana, will never be buried for the huge impact she made in the media industry.
As Executive Secretary of the Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association (GIBA) (until her untimely death), she played a key role in drawing policy and driving advocacy for media growth and development in Ghana.
Her contribution to the civil society coalition advocacy for the enactment of a right to information law in Ghana is well noted and appreciated.
During my tenure as General Secretary of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA), I worked closely with Gloria on many projects, and I found a pearl of character in her.
In many of our collaborative projects (involving GJA, GIBA and other media partners), Gloria and I (as secretaries of our respective institutions) had to jointly draft the decisions and actions of our collective resolve, and her inputs were always valuable.
She applied lubricant to our drafts; whenever I drafted it grit and fiery, or hard and stiff, she applied the lubricant to soften and tone it down.
Interestingly, her calm and quiet demeanour belied her robust and solid persona, especially on matters of media freedom and independence.
The depth of her knowledge on issues we engaged, which was obviously cast in her vast experience across field in the media landscape, was impeccable and admirable.
She was a silent servant and dedicated vanguard of media freedom whose deserved tribute had been buried before now, an attitude that regrettably marks the dearth of humanness in the living.
Gloria had very positive character traits that I found template for public service – regular at meetings, punctual to meetings, temperate in language, eloquent in speech, respectful to all, simple in dressing and slow in anger. In fact, I never saw her anger, even if she had any.
The media fraternity in Ghana has lost a truly trusted and worthy servant, and at the Christ The King Parish in Accra, family and friends would pay their last respects to her.
But the pain inflicted by her death in the heart of loved ones may not heal soon; not with a last salute.
Indeed, the death of Gloria has left many in the cold, but we trust her Maker would receive her in His warm embrace.
The solemnity surrounding her death on December 24, 2025, a day before Christmas (birth of Christ), and her burial on February 28, 2026, during Lent, a period of purity that heralds Easter (death of Christ), cannot be misconstrued and spiked as divine misinformation; rather, it can only be construed and splashed as banner headline: ‘God grants Gloria Hiadzi peaceful rest’.
Fare thee well, ‘Gloriaous’ woman.
The writer is a communication lecturer at Wisconsin International University College, Ghana, and former General Secretary of the Ghana Journalists Association / Email: kofiyebo@yahoo.com
