Mr Timothy Gobah, a Staff Writer of the Daily Graphic (right), interviewing Mr Binney in Cape Coast He was introduced into the newspaper business right after he completed the Catholic Jubilee School in Cape Coast in 1971 and ever since he has been an agent of the Daily Graphic and other brands of the group.
Mr James Binney, the Daily Graphic’s oldest agent in the Central Region, had to make a choice between his love for selling the Daily Graphic, The Mirror and being enrolled in the Cape Coast Polytechnic, and the former took precedence.
When he completed Middle School Form Four and could not go to the polytechnic due to financial constraints, his aunt, an ardent reader of the Daily Graphic, introduced him to Mr John Acquah, who was then the agent of the paper, to work under him.
His work
Mr Binney said Mr Acquah, who was a storekeeper at the University of Cape Coast (UCC), entrusted the work to him. He said after working with him for two years, he decided to transfer the agentship to him. “The agent, after recognising my commitment and loyalty to work, decided to change the agent position into my name and encouraged me to work harder,” the ever smiling agent told our reporter.
He said when he took charge of the business, he was selling about 1,500 copies of the Daily Graphic a day, with students from Adisadel College, Mfantsipim School, St Augustine College, Wesley Girls, the Ghana National College being the biggest patrons of the paper.
“I tell you, students of those secondary schools used the Daily Graphic as the Bible, and queued for it every day, thereby making me do a lot of sales,” he recounted.
Mr Binney, whose, sales outfit is located in the building of the Ghana Commercial Bank in Cape Coast, said he had 12 vendors, with three at the UCC alone.
Impact
He said the newspaper business helped him to support his three daughters to acquire tertiary education.
He said in addition to the Daily Graphic, he now sold the The Mirror, the Junior Graphic, the Graphic Showbiz and Graphic Sports. Nkansah serves Tema Mr Samuel Nkansah who hails from Obo-Kwahu in the Eastern Region travelled to Accra in 1978 in search of greener pastures after completing Middle School Form Four.In the thick of the struggles on the streets of Tema to make ends meet, he met a friend, […]