On issues of privacy and public interest, there is often no clear-cut distinction between right and wrong.  
Even within the journalism fraternity, opinions are divided where the right of society to be informed conflicts with the right of individuals to privacy.
This is an area where sensitivity and responsibility are important because it is often difficult to separate a person’s private life from their public role.
However, the question as to how far can a journalist probe into a person’s private life to get news, is most easily answered where the individuals are public figures.
Infact, the distinction almost ceases to exist in cases where an individual’s work or professional life depends entirely on them presenting their total selves to the public.
Here, we are talking particularly about people like politicians, group leaders, clergymen and all those people whose personalities and private morality are essential parts of their work.
For instance, marriages rarely make news. Many people married in this country, but did not worth a column inch.
However, when president Jammeh wedded a second wife, it was announced on the state-owned news media outlets and private news media outlets were not left behind. Then, the public commented and imams prayed for them. The move was hailed and congratulatory messages flooded in.
But when this paper published a story on headlined: ‘Jammeh makes a u-turn’ in marrying a second wife, there was an issue in some quotas because some believe that we had intruded.
Some queried that such stories could only be published in the West where journalists can write everything because there is freedom of expression and we dare add where in their view there are loose morals.
But we have a reason. And in our today’s edition, we carried a story that again talks about Jammeh’s marital life. We still stand by those reasons, though for the purpose of this editorial commentary, we will limit our intervention and leave the rest for the public to debate.
A presidency is not just another position. People elect them into office for who they are, not just for their skills in a particular job. A president does not just manage the socio-economic and political life of a country. He or she is as well a custodian of his country’s cultural and traditional norms and values.  The citizens of a country look up to their presidents just the children look up to their parents. How he or she behaves even out of public view matters to the whole country.
Presidency is a position that comes with its challenges as well as its benefits.
If the benefits are not good enough in any one’s eyes to risk the challenge, one should not be a candidate for the job.
It is in this respect that even the family of a president is rarely spared from public scrutiny.
For instance, stories concerning a president’s son’s misdeeds should be covered not from the angle of a president’s son’s misdeeds, but the effect it has on his famous father.
That is a challenge. The benefits are that you will be better financially rewarded. You have privileges no one will be entitled to. Your family will not be excluded from this benefit. This is provided by the tax payers. They therefore have a right to know whether a president’s son is going to school because taxes are being put to that effect. The wives too have benefits by virtue of their husband’s position. The tax payers therefore need to know whether Halima is still under their bankroll.
Thus, it is the duty of a journalist to examine the whole life of a president in detail. It’s not about being in a free or close society neither is it about importing foreign values. It’s about accountability.