Soon Parliament in Kenya will have to accept or reject the Media Bill which the Minister for Information and Communications, Mutahi Kagwe, has tabled and seen it through the First Reading. When it reaches the Second Reading it will be the cause of what promises to be a very heated debate among parliamentarians before they reject or accept it as the law regulating the media in Kenya. So far the public debate about the Bill shows that very many people oppose it though the debate itself has been extremely biased for a number of reasons.
To begin with the debate has been conducted mainly in the print media where editors determine what will be printed. Secondly the print media are all controlled by the media owners who would like the Bill killed and have publicly said as much. Thirdly media owners today control the Media Council which they claim should not be statutory as the Bill suggests. Fourthly media owners oppose professionalization of journalism which the Bill indirectly backs.
Kenyans, therefore, have never been given an opportunity to examine the Bill objectively and they are not in a position to know whether Kagwe’s intentions are to muzzle or protect the media. The only solution is to examine the Bill thoroughly before either accepting or damning it. The Bill’s Memorandum of Objects and Reasons claims its principle object is to provide for the establishment of the Media Council of Kenya and the Media Advisory Board, bodies which “will regulate the practice of journalism in Kenya.”
The Bill, according to the memorandum, seeks to create the framework that will allow journalists and other media practitioners “to exercise their freedom freely and responsibly in a sound and professional manner and also seek to promote self regulation and accountability in the media industry”. It is without a doubt that the mass media in Kenya today enjoy one of the freest environments on the continent of Africa ; but everyone also agrees that professional standards of journalism could do with some improvement. Whether that improvement could come about through the law regulating the media or be left to independent self regulation should be the focus of the debate on Mutahi’s Bill.
The arguments currently advanced by those who oppose the Bill warn that a statutory Media Council could only be controlled by the Government and could not possible be self regulating. This tough stand is not supported by the Bill which clearly says in Section 3 (2) that the Council will be a body corporate which will promote and protect freedom and independence of the media. If he Bill is passed that obviously will be the law. There is nowhere in the Bill that says the Council will be part of the Government and, as a matter of fact, Section 5 (h) says one of its functions will be to advise on various regulatory authority on matters pertaining to professional education and training of journalists and other media practitioners .
Today there are all sorts of bogus training institutions all over the country purporting to be training journalists yet the current Media Council, of which I happen to be a member, can do absolutely nothing about it. The only way the mushrooming schools of journalism could be controlled is to make the Media Council stronger with enough powers to close down sub-standard so called schools. The power and strength of the Media Council could only come about by making it a statutory body.
Section 5 (i) of the Bill empowers the Council to make recommendations on employment criteria for journalists. All properly trained journalists in Kenya have been crying for that because proprietors who as I said earlier own the Media Council, have not only been exploiting journalists unfairly but have also been employing really unqualified people who have been responsible for the bad name journalism has in Kenya as far as professionalism is concerned. On matters of ethics the draft Bill suggests that one of the functions of the Council shall be to uphold and maintain ethics and discipline of media practitioners.
The Bill provides on the Third Schedule the Code of Conduct for the Practice of Journalism which includes Accuracy and Fairness, Independence, Integrity, Accountability, Opportunity to Reply, Unnamed Sources, Confidentiality, Misrepresentations, Obscenity, Taste and Tone in Reporting, Paying for News and Articles, Covering Ethnic, Religious and Sectarian Conflict, Recording Interviews and Telephone Conversations, Intrusion into Grief and Shock, Sex Discrimination and Financial Journalism.
With very few exceptions these are the same principles of the current code and conduct and practice in Kenya as agreed upon in April 2001 by eight members of the Media Industry Steering Committee which is made up of the Kenya Union of Journalists, Media Owners’ Association, Editors’ Guild of Kenya, the Alternative Press, Media NGOs and State Media. With the exception of the Alternative Press, Media NGOs and State Media all the rest will be represented in the suggested Council. There are probably very good reasons to exclude the three from the new Council and among them is the fact that the owners, practitioners and editors of both the alternative media and state media could belong to other institutions which will compose the statutory body. Media NGOs are really not practicing journalists and if they have the evidence that they are then they should either belong to the union of media owners’ association.
Questions have been asked as to why COTU, religious organizations, Association of Professional Societies in E.A, United Disabled Persons of Kenya, Kenya National Chambers of Commerce and Industry and Kenya Private Sector Alliance should belong to the Media Council. I believe the membership of these institutions should be reviewed though they happen to be the ones that have always complained of mistreatment by the media. Also to be reviewed should be Section 7 (2) (b) of the Draft which disqualifies any person who is directly or indirectly an owner, shareholder, director or partner of media establishment in Kenya. With this part of the Draft unchanged it would be difficult for members of Media Owners’ Association to be represented in the Council.
The one part of the Bill which will be willingly accepted by most Kenyans in Section 6 which deals with operations of the Council. This part of the Draft suggests that the Council shall operate without any political or other bias or interference and shall be wholly independent and separate from the government, any political party or any nominating authority. This will be the law and the government will be breaking the law if it interferes with the operations of the Council.
The controversial part of the Bill deals with the establishment of the Media Advisory Board whose principle function is to advise the Council generally on the exercise of its powers and the performance of its functions. As a non corporate it looks like the Board is likely to be used by the Government to influence the Media Council. If the Board will be part of the Government how can it be expected to “advise” the Council when Section 5 (h) says it is indeed the Council which will have the role of advising the Government? So who will be expected to advise whom? That deliberate confusion should be disentangled during the Second Reading and may be even the Third Reading if the Bill reaches that stage.
Though Section 22 of the Bill categorically says the Board shall, in performance of its functions, not be subjected to direction or control of any person or authority it says that it shall include the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Information and Communications who is likely to be its most powerful individual in it. The fact that the money to run both the Board and the Council will be appropriated by Parliament proves that both institutions will be public and could easily be influenced by the powers that be.
The most positive yet controversial aspect of the Bill is to be found in Part V Section 29-37 which deals with provisions on making complaints and resolutions of disputes that arise. One of the weakest aspects of the present Media Council is the manner in which it deals with complaints and dispute resolution. Its ineffectiveness has led it to be described as “toothless”. So the establishment of a statutory Media Council will, without a doubt, give the Council some teeth which unfortunately could also be used to bite journalists. Section 33 9(d) for example gives the Council powers to deregister a journalist and withdraw his or her accreditation for a specified period. This section is probably going against Section 79 of the Constitution of Kenya which protects freedom of expression.
The powers of the Council’s Complaints Committee to be found in Section 33 (b) will
not go down very well with editors as it gives the Council authority to order an offending party to publish an apology and correction in a manner as the Council may specify. This is despite the fact that Section 38 (3) says the Council shall not seek to control or direct journalists in the execution of their professional duties. Is correcting an error not part of those duties? Rather than throwing the Bill in the dustbin, however, I believe it should be discussed objectively and be reshaped in such a manner as to be acceptable to both sides . The Bill could be saved and serve a useful purpose in protecting freedom of expression in Kenya.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Raila is the Media Darling in Elections
Media bias in Kenya generally in favour of ODM and particularly in support of Raila Odinga became conspicuously evident on April 1st 2007 when all the papers splashed Steadman poll results which indicated that Mwai Kibaki was in a clear lead by 34 %. Rather than presenting this fact in a straight forward manner, however, Jeff Otieno and David Mugonyi of the Sunday Nation wrote the story with a splash headline screaming “The Man to Watch”. The story mendaciously expressed the two journalists’ opinion that that man was Raila.[1]
Though the paper admitted that Kibaki had “widened his lead at the top”, it still thought that that meant “the President is losing to ODM.” This despite the fact that all the top ODM leaders combined i.e. Raila Odinga and Kalonzo Musyoka had a total popularity rate of 31% compared to Kibaki’s 51 %. In an inside page story of the polls Jeff Otieno and David Mugonyi amplified Raila’s popularity overtaking that of Kalonzo Musyoka even though they admitted the polls actually showed that “Musyoka would perform better than Mr. Odinga if he was to confront Mr. Kibaki as the joint opposition candidate.”[2]
The Sunday Standard of the same date treated the Steadman polls in the same manner of downplaying Kibaki’s lead in favour of glorifying Raila’s triumphant defeat of Kalonzo Musyoka. In another screaming headline praising Angwambo the paper said: “Raila Finally ‘Hummers’ Kalonzo”. In the story Patrick Mathangari wrote: “Raila Odinga has taken the lead from his ODM-Kenya colleague Kalonzo Musyoka in the latest opinion polls”. It is not until the second paragraph of the story that we are told that the real leader according to the polls was in fact President Mwai Kibaki. It is in the third paragraph that readers are told the truth: “The ratings gave Kibaki 51%, Raila 17% and Kalonzo 14%.”[3]
The story was much more professionally handled by both the Sunday Times and The People.
The examples given above show clearly that the mainstream national newspapers have journalists who appear to be participating in the election campaign that is now going on in the country. The dangers of journalists participating in election campaigns rather than reporting them professionally are obvious. In a paper I presented to the African Studies Centre at the University of Leiden, the Netherlands in 1998, I warned against journalists becoming sycophants by engaging in the game of hype and hoopla while covering election campaigns.
At that time I said: (whenever journalists took sides) “the so called party leaders received favourable coverage while their opponents got hostile coverage because journalists were not able to promote equality between all the candidates of all the political parties…What happened in Kenya in 1997 was what many journalism scholars would call horse-racing journalism where the readers, viewers and listeners were told simply who was wining and who was losing just as in the game of horse-racing.”[4]
There is little doubt that journalists in Kenya are already engaged in the horse-racing game and what is more they have either consciously or unwittingly taken the liberty of placing Raila Odinga in the lead. On any given day Raila’s name appears in no less than ten times in each of the national papers.
Despite his harsh criticism of the Steadman polls which placed him ahead of Kalonzo Musyoka, its results made Raila go to Nairobi’s Bishop Joseph Ogutu of St. John Evangelical Gospel Church at Imara Daima to be “anointed for the country’s top job”. The story was the Kenya Times front page splash by Edwin Mutai who mentioned Angwambo’s name 15 times.[5] The Standard story by Andrew Teyie was also the page one splash and mentioned Raila’s name 24 times.[6] Though the Nation used the story by Lucas Barasa on page seven, he too used Raila’s name 15 times.[7]
The deliberate repetitive usage of Rala’s name has been a subject of controversy which led to his main rival in the ODM-Kenya Kalonzo Musyoka’s complaint to journalists publicly. It is a well known propaganda tactic which was perfected by the Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler. According to the Centre for Media and Democracy, which strengthens participatory democracy by investigation and exposing public relations spin and propaganda, if you repeat something over and over, no matter how outrageous it may be, people will come to believe in it.
The non-profit making international organization says: “A good example of this is the claim that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001. No evidence has been found suggesting collaboration between Iraq and the Al Queda network, yet Bush Administration officials have repeatedly mentioned the two in tandem.” [8] As a result a recent opinion survey by the Council of Foreign Relations shows that more than 40% of the American people believe that some or all of the attackers on 9/11 were Iraqi nationals, when in fact none were.[9]
Today the majority of Kenyans must believe Raila is the most important presidential candidate because of the sheer number of times his name appears in the mainstream print media.
According to Randal Marlin one of the pioneers of the techniques was US Senator Joe McCarthy “whose name is associated with ‘guilt by association’. He named Communists with whom some target individual was associated in one way or another, without dwelling on whether the association was significant or not.” Marlin says the mere repetition of the target name in the context of so many communist helped to seal the impression that the target shared the same political persuasion.[10] The daily repetition of Raila’s name in all the four national dailies has not only happened to seal the impression that he is a formidable power to reckon with but also driven home the belief that he is the undisputed leader of the Luo people in Kenya.
Marlin says propaganda must be simple and easy to understand and remember as far as possible. Propagandists, he says, must make their appeal in simple, catchy slogans that they repeat over and over again. He says the Nazi Dictator wrote: ‘The intelligence of masses is small. Their forgetfulness is great. They must be told the same thing a thousand times’[11]
In many parts of the world media manipulation to sway public opinion in political matters has been a subject of open condemnation by journalism scholars. In America one of those scholars is Robert L. Hilliard who is the Professor of Mass Communication f Emerson College. He says the media manipulation of the American political process occurs in several ways. In that country “individual reporters frequently allow the ego satisfaction of reading thousands or even millions of people with their words and pictures to result in the injection of personal opinion and bias within the context and under the guise of factual reporting”.[12]
Are there some Kenyan journalists who are guilty of manipulation of news either actively or passively? If there are, however few, it would most certainly be reprehensible. What would be even more so is the endorsement of top editors of such unethical behaviour. It would be foolhardy to expect journalists to cover the current election campaigns in Kenya without making very good use of prominence as a news value. While doing so, however, the people of Kenya expect professional journalists to hold high their own ethical principles of Accuracy and Fairness.
[1] Otieno, Jeff and Mugonyi, David. “Raila Tops Kalonzo as Kibaki Leads in Poll” in the Sunday Nation Issue No.15398 of April 1st 2007.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Mathangari, Patrick. “Raila Finally ‘Hummers’ Kalonzo” in the Sunday Standard No.1406 of April 1st 2007.
[4] Kadhi, Joe. “The Kenyan 1997 Election Media Coverage: Their Impact, Influence and Bias” published by African Studies Centre. University of Leiden, the Netherlands.
[5] Mutai, Edwin. “Raila anointed” in the Kenya Time No.3418980 of April 2nd, 2007.
[6] Teyie, Andrew. “Do Not Fear Me” in The Standard No.27759 of April 2nd 2007.
[7] Barasa, Lucas. “Church Anoints Raila for Top Job” in the Daily Nation No. 015333 of April 2nd , 2007.
[8] Centre for Media and Democracy. “PR Watch” published in 2002.
[9] Ibid
[10] Marlin, Andrew. Propaganda and the Ethics of Persuasion. Broadview Press. (2002)
[11] Ibid
[12] Hilliard, Robert L. “ Political Reporting: Active and Passive Manipulation.” In Vol. 5 No.2. Fall 1992 edition of Media Ethics Update.
Though the paper admitted that Kibaki had “widened his lead at the top”, it still thought that that meant “the President is losing to ODM.” This despite the fact that all the top ODM leaders combined i.e. Raila Odinga and Kalonzo Musyoka had a total popularity rate of 31% compared to Kibaki’s 51 %. In an inside page story of the polls Jeff Otieno and David Mugonyi amplified Raila’s popularity overtaking that of Kalonzo Musyoka even though they admitted the polls actually showed that “Musyoka would perform better than Mr. Odinga if he was to confront Mr. Kibaki as the joint opposition candidate.”[2]
The Sunday Standard of the same date treated the Steadman polls in the same manner of downplaying Kibaki’s lead in favour of glorifying Raila’s triumphant defeat of Kalonzo Musyoka. In another screaming headline praising Angwambo the paper said: “Raila Finally ‘Hummers’ Kalonzo”. In the story Patrick Mathangari wrote: “Raila Odinga has taken the lead from his ODM-Kenya colleague Kalonzo Musyoka in the latest opinion polls”. It is not until the second paragraph of the story that we are told that the real leader according to the polls was in fact President Mwai Kibaki. It is in the third paragraph that readers are told the truth: “The ratings gave Kibaki 51%, Raila 17% and Kalonzo 14%.”[3]
The story was much more professionally handled by both the Sunday Times and The People.
The examples given above show clearly that the mainstream national newspapers have journalists who appear to be participating in the election campaign that is now going on in the country. The dangers of journalists participating in election campaigns rather than reporting them professionally are obvious. In a paper I presented to the African Studies Centre at the University of Leiden, the Netherlands in 1998, I warned against journalists becoming sycophants by engaging in the game of hype and hoopla while covering election campaigns.
At that time I said: (whenever journalists took sides) “the so called party leaders received favourable coverage while their opponents got hostile coverage because journalists were not able to promote equality between all the candidates of all the political parties…What happened in Kenya in 1997 was what many journalism scholars would call horse-racing journalism where the readers, viewers and listeners were told simply who was wining and who was losing just as in the game of horse-racing.”[4]
There is little doubt that journalists in Kenya are already engaged in the horse-racing game and what is more they have either consciously or unwittingly taken the liberty of placing Raila Odinga in the lead. On any given day Raila’s name appears in no less than ten times in each of the national papers.
Despite his harsh criticism of the Steadman polls which placed him ahead of Kalonzo Musyoka, its results made Raila go to Nairobi’s Bishop Joseph Ogutu of St. John Evangelical Gospel Church at Imara Daima to be “anointed for the country’s top job”. The story was the Kenya Times front page splash by Edwin Mutai who mentioned Angwambo’s name 15 times.[5] The Standard story by Andrew Teyie was also the page one splash and mentioned Raila’s name 24 times.[6] Though the Nation used the story by Lucas Barasa on page seven, he too used Raila’s name 15 times.[7]
The deliberate repetitive usage of Rala’s name has been a subject of controversy which led to his main rival in the ODM-Kenya Kalonzo Musyoka’s complaint to journalists publicly. It is a well known propaganda tactic which was perfected by the Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler. According to the Centre for Media and Democracy, which strengthens participatory democracy by investigation and exposing public relations spin and propaganda, if you repeat something over and over, no matter how outrageous it may be, people will come to believe in it.
The non-profit making international organization says: “A good example of this is the claim that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001. No evidence has been found suggesting collaboration between Iraq and the Al Queda network, yet Bush Administration officials have repeatedly mentioned the two in tandem.” [8] As a result a recent opinion survey by the Council of Foreign Relations shows that more than 40% of the American people believe that some or all of the attackers on 9/11 were Iraqi nationals, when in fact none were.[9]
Today the majority of Kenyans must believe Raila is the most important presidential candidate because of the sheer number of times his name appears in the mainstream print media.
According to Randal Marlin one of the pioneers of the techniques was US Senator Joe McCarthy “whose name is associated with ‘guilt by association’. He named Communists with whom some target individual was associated in one way or another, without dwelling on whether the association was significant or not.” Marlin says the mere repetition of the target name in the context of so many communist helped to seal the impression that the target shared the same political persuasion.[10] The daily repetition of Raila’s name in all the four national dailies has not only happened to seal the impression that he is a formidable power to reckon with but also driven home the belief that he is the undisputed leader of the Luo people in Kenya.
Marlin says propaganda must be simple and easy to understand and remember as far as possible. Propagandists, he says, must make their appeal in simple, catchy slogans that they repeat over and over again. He says the Nazi Dictator wrote: ‘The intelligence of masses is small. Their forgetfulness is great. They must be told the same thing a thousand times’[11]
In many parts of the world media manipulation to sway public opinion in political matters has been a subject of open condemnation by journalism scholars. In America one of those scholars is Robert L. Hilliard who is the Professor of Mass Communication f Emerson College. He says the media manipulation of the American political process occurs in several ways. In that country “individual reporters frequently allow the ego satisfaction of reading thousands or even millions of people with their words and pictures to result in the injection of personal opinion and bias within the context and under the guise of factual reporting”.[12]
Are there some Kenyan journalists who are guilty of manipulation of news either actively or passively? If there are, however few, it would most certainly be reprehensible. What would be even more so is the endorsement of top editors of such unethical behaviour. It would be foolhardy to expect journalists to cover the current election campaigns in Kenya without making very good use of prominence as a news value. While doing so, however, the people of Kenya expect professional journalists to hold high their own ethical principles of Accuracy and Fairness.
[1] Otieno, Jeff and Mugonyi, David. “Raila Tops Kalonzo as Kibaki Leads in Poll” in the Sunday Nation Issue No.15398 of April 1st 2007.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Mathangari, Patrick. “Raila Finally ‘Hummers’ Kalonzo” in the Sunday Standard No.1406 of April 1st 2007.
[4] Kadhi, Joe. “The Kenyan 1997 Election Media Coverage: Their Impact, Influence and Bias” published by African Studies Centre. University of Leiden, the Netherlands.
[5] Mutai, Edwin. “Raila anointed” in the Kenya Time No.3418980 of April 2nd, 2007.
[6] Teyie, Andrew. “Do Not Fear Me” in The Standard No.27759 of April 2nd 2007.
[7] Barasa, Lucas. “Church Anoints Raila for Top Job” in the Daily Nation No. 015333 of April 2nd , 2007.
[8] Centre for Media and Democracy. “PR Watch” published in 2002.
[9] Ibid
[10] Marlin, Andrew. Propaganda and the Ethics of Persuasion. Broadview Press. (2002)
[11] Ibid
[12] Hilliard, Robert L. “ Political Reporting: Active and Passive Manipulation.” In Vol. 5 No.2. Fall 1992 edition of Media Ethics Update.
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Friends of ODM-Kenya in the Media
Nothing exposed Kenyan journalism's lack of impartiality more than the coverage of the aborted ODM leaders’ trip to London for reconciliation. When the announcement was made by some top party officials at the beginning of March, The Standard treated it as a page one splash with a sympathetic headline “Operation Save ODM-K”. The paper pushed the first anniversary of the barbaric raid to its offices by John Michuki’s hooded hooligans to the second place on the same page.
The splash story by Dennis Onyango and Ayub Saluva described the trip to London as a “bonding and peace making retreat”. Not a word was said in the story about Bishop Gilbert Deya financing the trip. All that the paper said was that the “sojourn to the distant land (was) organized by ODM-Kenya sympathizers in the Diaspora, (as) part of a series of measures crafted to defuse the rising internal tension and fears that the ambitions of those fighting for its ticket could burst the Orange.”[1]
Though its proprietor, William Ruto, was denied a visa to the UK as a suspected corrupt politician, the Saturday Times of March 3 glorified the trip to London as a mission of hope where warring party presidential candidates “would stay in one hotel as assign of unity and trust as well as bonding among themselves.”[2] The writer of the Times story, Philip Mulee, either due to ignorance or lack of initiative, never said a word about the possibility of the disgraced Bishop Deya’s hand behind the entire trip.
The only journalist who was courageous enough to look at the whole drama in a professionally critical manner was Sunday Nation’s Gitau Warigi who hit the nail on the head when he called the trip to London “laughable”. In his Sunday View column he said: “Have you ever heard anything as laughable as people going to a foreign city to try and mend fences? When you face a problem, you sit down where that problem is and thrash it out. If it is land dispute in Mathare, it is ridiculous to travel to Congo to discuss it there. Even as ODM honchos go to London ostensibly to ‘bond’, plus doing a little shopping and carousing on the side, one has to be pretty daft to expect that the deepening rot in the Orange can be wished away.”[3]
Warigi’s courage singles him out as the only writer with the ability to point out anything unpalatable to the ODM leadership. But alas, even he did not seem to have a clue about the funds financing the trip to London. It was not until March 9th when David Mugonyi of the Daily Nation told the country that the trip to the British capital aborted because some of the leaders “learnt that Pastor Gilbert Deya was one of (its) organizers.” He explained that the pastor came to “fame” during the miracle babies’ saga and that he was wanted by the police in Kenya.
Despite being quite an eye opener Mugonyi’s story was only published after Kalonzo Musyoka and Uhuru Kenyatta pulled out of the trip.[4] It was therefore not an exposé as such.
If Bishop Deya financed the whole trip to London not many Kenyan journalists were too eager to expose that fact. All that Philip Mulee of the Kenya Times could say, for example, was that “officially” Kalonzo Musyoka, Uhuru Kenyatta, William Ruto and Dr. Julia Ojiambo rejected the trip “complaining it had been hijacked by some unnamed group with the ulterior motive of allegedly painting the party in bad light.”[5] He made no effort to reveal the names of the people accused. What their motive was did not concern the journalist at all. This is despite the fact that Mulee’s splash story was supposed to expose why the UK trip aborted!
As a matter of fact it was not until in the 15th paragraph that Mulee told his readers about the involvement of Bishop Deya in the organization of the trip and the possibility of his being responsible for its failure. He said : “ It also emerged last evening that one of those said to be sponsoring the trip is Bishop Gilbert Deya of Gilbert Deya Missionaries who has in recent years received stinking publicity relating to the ‘scandal’ of miracle babies . This development is understood to have put off other ODM-K presidential hopefuls who did not want to be associated with the controversial bishop wanted in Kenya to stand trial for illegally kidnapping babies.”
Any first year undergraduate student who has mastered his news values and the inverted pyramid form of story presentation would easily tell you that that should have been Mulee’s intro. A senior journalism student would have insisted that the Deya original story should have been an award wining exposé instead of an appendix of a story from police files.
Despite the rotten skeletons in the ODM cupboard, some journalists were still trying to paint a picture of unity in the party that could not send a united team to London. In the Saturday Times story of March 10, Benson Amollo and Bernard Onyari were telling the people of Kenya that ODM-K leadership embarked on damage control measures in the face of an aborted UK trip, with the party’s top guns “ putting on a brave face and for the umpteenth time restating their unity.” The two went as far as quoting a Mr. George Muruli from London who denied what they called “claims that discredited Archbishop Gilbert Deya of the miracle babies’ saga was part of the organizing committee which invited the leaders to London.[6] On the same day the Saturday Standard published a story from Ben Agina in London and Standard team in Nairobi now quoting ODM leaders distancing themselves from claiming “ they pulled out of (the trip to London) on learning that the UK based controversial cleric , Archbishop Gilbert Deya, of baby making scandal, was involved in the planning of the excursion .
After interviewing Raila in London, Agina filed a story quoting the politician denying Deya’s involvement, “particularly claims that he paid 10,000 British pounds for the upkeep of ODM politicians in London. But he quoted the ODM –UK Publicity Secretary George Muruli saying Deya as a Kenyan in UK was “free to participate in these crucial functions that bring ODM –Kenya leaders together.”[7]
May be the journalist who dug deeper into the ODM story than anyone else was Bernard Namunane of the Nation. He exposed for the first time that there was “deep seated suspicion, personality clashes and mistrusts among some ODM-K leaders.” In a story published on the March 10th edition of the Sunday Nation Namunane touched a nerve when he exposed that “there were allegations that some politicians allied to a certain presidential hopeful were giving tips to the news media about unfavorable stories regarding rival camps.”[8]
This is the first time “tips” between journalists and politicians have been mention in actual print instead of through spoken words usually in whispers. What the real “tips” were on and in what form Namunane never revealed. As the journalists in the mainstream media were beating about the bush on the real reason for the cancellation of the London trip by some of the most powerful ODM presidential candidates, The Weekly Citizen of March 12-18 quoted Najib Balala openly saying: “Deya is an access baggage that should not be allowed into ODM Kenya”. The story revealed that Deya had offered to the party the latest range of Mercedes Benz and Land Rovers to the dignitaries who agreed to go to London for the ODM meeting.
The paper boldly said: “Deya, a fellow Lou like Raila, appears to be working overnight to ensure his tribesman from Siaya becomes the next tenant at State House.” [9]
These few examples help to illustrate how the media in Kenya took one incident to report the 2007 electoral process at its early stages. It shows an open bias in favour of ODM even when there were obvious cracks on the party’s walls. Like in many election campaigns in the world there were many unsubstantiated statements regarding the cancelled trip by top ODM leaders. Despite the publicity mileage the event got in both the print and electronic media, it was in the print media where the issue was treated in the most prolific manner but very strangely without digging deep into the substance of the matter.
The majority of the published stories appeared to be the result of spoon-fed mash rather than the result of investigative journalism. The weakness was most noticeable in the lack of effort to establish the accuracy of what the politicians said and what made them say whatever they said when they were either boycotting the trip to London or backing it.
Examining the presentation of stories concerning the London trip controversy brought into my mind the coverage of the 2000American presidential election on the internat. At that time journalists engaged in lively debates about a number of issues but their debates were as confusing as they were wide in their variety of subjects. The trip to London was without a doubt the beginning of the 2007 elections but the manner the journalists handled it was confusing as some of them were doubtlessly protecting ODM from being tarnished by Bishop Deya’s involvement in the planning and financing the trip.
According to Barb Palser, the Director of Digital Media for McGraw-Hill Broadcasting Co. the thrilling debates by journalists during the 200 American presidential elections showed that the internet had the potential to make debates and campaigns much more substantive. He says the election debate on the internet in 2000 also had the potential to paralyze, confuse and overwhelm.[10] Whereas the trip to London debate and opinionated coverage in the Kenyan print media was overwhelming, it was also certainly confusing. May be that was so because the Kenyan journalists failed to realize the potential to make the trip-to-London debate more substantive.
[1] Onyango, Dennis and Savula, Ayub. “Operation Save ODM-K” in Saturday Standard No.061 of March 3, 2007.
[2] Mulee, Philip. “ODM-K Top Guns for London Mediation in the Saturday Times No.341955 of March 3, 2007.
[3] Warigi, Gitau. “Conflicting Ambitions are ODM Leaders’ Key Challenge” in Sunday Nation No. 15370 of March 4, 2007.
[4] Mugonyi, David. “Kalonzo and Uhuru Skip Bonding Trip” in the Daily Nation No.15375 of March 9, 2007.
[5] Mulee, Philip. “Why UK Trip Aborted” in Kenya Times No.341960 of March 9, 2007.
[6] Amollo, Benson and Anyari, Bernard. “UK trip Jigsaw Puzzle” Saturday Times No. 341061 of March 10th , 2007.
[7] Agine, Ben. “ODM- Kenya in Denial” in Saturday Standard No. 062 of March 10, 2007
[8] Namunane, Barnard. “The Real Problem in ODM in Saturday Nation No. 15376 of March 10th 2007.
[9] Citizen Team. “Assassination Fear Grips Top) DM-K Men” in Weekly Citizen Volume 10 issue No 13 of March 12-18 2007.
[10] Palster, Barb. “ You want Politics, You Got It” in American Journalism Review, December 200 issue.
The splash story by Dennis Onyango and Ayub Saluva described the trip to London as a “bonding and peace making retreat”. Not a word was said in the story about Bishop Gilbert Deya financing the trip. All that the paper said was that the “sojourn to the distant land (was) organized by ODM-Kenya sympathizers in the Diaspora, (as) part of a series of measures crafted to defuse the rising internal tension and fears that the ambitions of those fighting for its ticket could burst the Orange.”[1]
Though its proprietor, William Ruto, was denied a visa to the UK as a suspected corrupt politician, the Saturday Times of March 3 glorified the trip to London as a mission of hope where warring party presidential candidates “would stay in one hotel as assign of unity and trust as well as bonding among themselves.”[2] The writer of the Times story, Philip Mulee, either due to ignorance or lack of initiative, never said a word about the possibility of the disgraced Bishop Deya’s hand behind the entire trip.
The only journalist who was courageous enough to look at the whole drama in a professionally critical manner was Sunday Nation’s Gitau Warigi who hit the nail on the head when he called the trip to London “laughable”. In his Sunday View column he said: “Have you ever heard anything as laughable as people going to a foreign city to try and mend fences? When you face a problem, you sit down where that problem is and thrash it out. If it is land dispute in Mathare, it is ridiculous to travel to Congo to discuss it there. Even as ODM honchos go to London ostensibly to ‘bond’, plus doing a little shopping and carousing on the side, one has to be pretty daft to expect that the deepening rot in the Orange can be wished away.”[3]
Warigi’s courage singles him out as the only writer with the ability to point out anything unpalatable to the ODM leadership. But alas, even he did not seem to have a clue about the funds financing the trip to London. It was not until March 9th when David Mugonyi of the Daily Nation told the country that the trip to the British capital aborted because some of the leaders “learnt that Pastor Gilbert Deya was one of (its) organizers.” He explained that the pastor came to “fame” during the miracle babies’ saga and that he was wanted by the police in Kenya.
Despite being quite an eye opener Mugonyi’s story was only published after Kalonzo Musyoka and Uhuru Kenyatta pulled out of the trip.[4] It was therefore not an exposé as such.
If Bishop Deya financed the whole trip to London not many Kenyan journalists were too eager to expose that fact. All that Philip Mulee of the Kenya Times could say, for example, was that “officially” Kalonzo Musyoka, Uhuru Kenyatta, William Ruto and Dr. Julia Ojiambo rejected the trip “complaining it had been hijacked by some unnamed group with the ulterior motive of allegedly painting the party in bad light.”[5] He made no effort to reveal the names of the people accused. What their motive was did not concern the journalist at all. This is despite the fact that Mulee’s splash story was supposed to expose why the UK trip aborted!
As a matter of fact it was not until in the 15th paragraph that Mulee told his readers about the involvement of Bishop Deya in the organization of the trip and the possibility of his being responsible for its failure. He said : “ It also emerged last evening that one of those said to be sponsoring the trip is Bishop Gilbert Deya of Gilbert Deya Missionaries who has in recent years received stinking publicity relating to the ‘scandal’ of miracle babies . This development is understood to have put off other ODM-K presidential hopefuls who did not want to be associated with the controversial bishop wanted in Kenya to stand trial for illegally kidnapping babies.”
Any first year undergraduate student who has mastered his news values and the inverted pyramid form of story presentation would easily tell you that that should have been Mulee’s intro. A senior journalism student would have insisted that the Deya original story should have been an award wining exposé instead of an appendix of a story from police files.
Despite the rotten skeletons in the ODM cupboard, some journalists were still trying to paint a picture of unity in the party that could not send a united team to London. In the Saturday Times story of March 10, Benson Amollo and Bernard Onyari were telling the people of Kenya that ODM-K leadership embarked on damage control measures in the face of an aborted UK trip, with the party’s top guns “ putting on a brave face and for the umpteenth time restating their unity.” The two went as far as quoting a Mr. George Muruli from London who denied what they called “claims that discredited Archbishop Gilbert Deya of the miracle babies’ saga was part of the organizing committee which invited the leaders to London.[6] On the same day the Saturday Standard published a story from Ben Agina in London and Standard team in Nairobi now quoting ODM leaders distancing themselves from claiming “ they pulled out of (the trip to London) on learning that the UK based controversial cleric , Archbishop Gilbert Deya, of baby making scandal, was involved in the planning of the excursion .
After interviewing Raila in London, Agina filed a story quoting the politician denying Deya’s involvement, “particularly claims that he paid 10,000 British pounds for the upkeep of ODM politicians in London. But he quoted the ODM –UK Publicity Secretary George Muruli saying Deya as a Kenyan in UK was “free to participate in these crucial functions that bring ODM –Kenya leaders together.”[7]
May be the journalist who dug deeper into the ODM story than anyone else was Bernard Namunane of the Nation. He exposed for the first time that there was “deep seated suspicion, personality clashes and mistrusts among some ODM-K leaders.” In a story published on the March 10th edition of the Sunday Nation Namunane touched a nerve when he exposed that “there were allegations that some politicians allied to a certain presidential hopeful were giving tips to the news media about unfavorable stories regarding rival camps.”[8]
This is the first time “tips” between journalists and politicians have been mention in actual print instead of through spoken words usually in whispers. What the real “tips” were on and in what form Namunane never revealed. As the journalists in the mainstream media were beating about the bush on the real reason for the cancellation of the London trip by some of the most powerful ODM presidential candidates, The Weekly Citizen of March 12-18 quoted Najib Balala openly saying: “Deya is an access baggage that should not be allowed into ODM Kenya”. The story revealed that Deya had offered to the party the latest range of Mercedes Benz and Land Rovers to the dignitaries who agreed to go to London for the ODM meeting.
The paper boldly said: “Deya, a fellow Lou like Raila, appears to be working overnight to ensure his tribesman from Siaya becomes the next tenant at State House.” [9]
These few examples help to illustrate how the media in Kenya took one incident to report the 2007 electoral process at its early stages. It shows an open bias in favour of ODM even when there were obvious cracks on the party’s walls. Like in many election campaigns in the world there were many unsubstantiated statements regarding the cancelled trip by top ODM leaders. Despite the publicity mileage the event got in both the print and electronic media, it was in the print media where the issue was treated in the most prolific manner but very strangely without digging deep into the substance of the matter.
The majority of the published stories appeared to be the result of spoon-fed mash rather than the result of investigative journalism. The weakness was most noticeable in the lack of effort to establish the accuracy of what the politicians said and what made them say whatever they said when they were either boycotting the trip to London or backing it.
Examining the presentation of stories concerning the London trip controversy brought into my mind the coverage of the 2000American presidential election on the internat. At that time journalists engaged in lively debates about a number of issues but their debates were as confusing as they were wide in their variety of subjects. The trip to London was without a doubt the beginning of the 2007 elections but the manner the journalists handled it was confusing as some of them were doubtlessly protecting ODM from being tarnished by Bishop Deya’s involvement in the planning and financing the trip.
According to Barb Palser, the Director of Digital Media for McGraw-Hill Broadcasting Co. the thrilling debates by journalists during the 200 American presidential elections showed that the internet had the potential to make debates and campaigns much more substantive. He says the election debate on the internet in 2000 also had the potential to paralyze, confuse and overwhelm.[10] Whereas the trip to London debate and opinionated coverage in the Kenyan print media was overwhelming, it was also certainly confusing. May be that was so because the Kenyan journalists failed to realize the potential to make the trip-to-London debate more substantive.
[1] Onyango, Dennis and Savula, Ayub. “Operation Save ODM-K” in Saturday Standard No.061 of March 3, 2007.
[2] Mulee, Philip. “ODM-K Top Guns for London Mediation in the Saturday Times No.341955 of March 3, 2007.
[3] Warigi, Gitau. “Conflicting Ambitions are ODM Leaders’ Key Challenge” in Sunday Nation No. 15370 of March 4, 2007.
[4] Mugonyi, David. “Kalonzo and Uhuru Skip Bonding Trip” in the Daily Nation No.15375 of March 9, 2007.
[5] Mulee, Philip. “Why UK Trip Aborted” in Kenya Times No.341960 of March 9, 2007.
[6] Amollo, Benson and Anyari, Bernard. “UK trip Jigsaw Puzzle” Saturday Times No. 341061 of March 10th , 2007.
[7] Agine, Ben. “ODM- Kenya in Denial” in Saturday Standard No. 062 of March 10, 2007
[8] Namunane, Barnard. “The Real Problem in ODM in Saturday Nation No. 15376 of March 10th 2007.
[9] Citizen Team. “Assassination Fear Grips Top) DM-K Men” in Weekly Citizen Volume 10 issue No 13 of March 12-18 2007.
[10] Palster, Barb. “ You want Politics, You Got It” in American Journalism Review, December 200 issue.
Friday, March 2, 2007
Snakes in Kibaki's Cabinet
Exactly a year ago on the night of 1st March 2006 the pride that Kenyans had of enjoying the freest press south of the Sahara and north of the Limpopo was destroyed by an act of vandalism when The Standard and KTN offices were invaded by State hooligans who wanted to prove that might was right. Since then the tables have been turned and right is proving to be mightier than might itself!
Today the world is on the side of The Standard and indeed the pen has been proved to be mightier than the sword -- at least the sword that was held on that night by one John Michuki of the British home guards disgrace during Kenya’s struggle for independence in the 1950s, when he was notoriously known as “Kimendero” the crusher. The pen in Kenya did not win its envious position lightly. It was at a very bitter price and the role played by the journalists at Kenya’s oldest newspaper to win the global respect that Kenyan journalism now commands, must today be recalled by reminding ourselves of what really took place on that sad day.
On that night journalists at both The Standard and the KTN had put their paper to bed and aired the most important story of the day. Very much like today the story was the result of the KCSE examination. A very important story indeed; but hardly a threat to state security. And as the papers with examination results were being printed armed hooded police commandos invaded Standard offices. They seized and burned copies of 2nd March issue .They disabled the newspapers printing press. They confiscated equipments including computers .They shut down Kenya Television Network (KTN) broadcasting station. And why? Because Michuki had given his orders which were followed to the letter.
A spontaneous demonstration by the people of Kenya illustrated the bitterness they had against Michuki. He was pushed against the wall and had to speak and tell the people the reason for his dastardly act. So he spoke: “When you rattle a snake you must be prepared to be bitten (by it).” Who was the snake? What was the rattle? And what was the bite? After Michuki spoke there were more questions raised than answered and some of these questions are still lingering in our minds.
Whether or not President Mwai Kibaki’s Government is a snake, history alone will tell. But before the historians come into the picture to demystify the cobwebs of these events, it is the view of many observers that in Kibaki’s Government there are many snakes of the most dangerous kind. The venom they spread is not only harmful to journalists but to the establishment itself. It is venom called corruption which has seen a number of heads roll in the very cabinet itself. History will record the roll played by the media in the fight against corruption. In that war The Standard is a foot soldier in the forefront trying to kill Goliath with a homemade knife. To many people therefore the snake is still alive and just as dangerous if not more so. It can still bite and it can still cause a lot of harm.
The snakes in Kibaki’s government are the people who have become millionaires overnight and they have the arrogance to exhibit their wealth with impunity. The snake in Kibaki’s government is the colonial Penal Code which allows Michuki to behave like a hooligan and get away with it. The snake in Kibaki’s government is Section 79 of the current constitution which gives freedom of expression with one hand and takes it away with another.
On March 2nd Kenyans were shocked by the barbaric raid and it must be recorded that The Standard’s main rival, the Daily Nation , comes out with a special edition and condemned police brutality in Kenya. This showed that it takes very little to rekindle journalistic fraternity back to life in this country. This fraternity should be kept alive at all costs because it is now quite clear there are evil forces out to destroy it. Following the Daily Nation’s special edition the police denied ever setting the papers on fire though pictures taken at the scene proved they actually did it.
At that time the Minister for Internal Security, John Michuki, said the commandos were indeed part of the police force. They were members of the notorious Kanga Unit which consisted of 12 policemen working under the then Police CID boss Joseph Kamau. Was this the team of rattle snakes whose number one duty is to muzzle the press when the country’s security is as stake? Another question still lingering in our minds!
The journalistic courage of The Standard was exhibited on the 2nd of March when the issue which was burned was back on the street plus a special Standard edition which sold like hot cakes. It described in details how the Kanga thugs invaded the editorial offices and the printing plant. There are few places in the world where journalists are so fearless in the face of real danger. May be it is because of the courage shown by journalists in Kenya in general and those in The Standard in particular that Michuki quickly realized that the Kenya of 2007 is very different from that of the 1950s.
The war against Michuki’s attempt to muzzle the media was not fought by The Nation
and The Standard alone , indeed the Kenya Times of the 3rd of March was in a fighting spirit too it had a courageous headline screaming “State Thuggery”.It also had a front page editorial in which it called the police “ terrorist”. It talked of scenes of arson and robbery .The Standard of that day had a one word headline “OUTRAGE” and praised the people of Kenya for uniting against dictatorship. If the watchdog role of the Fourth Estate that was shown by the media at that was still maintained today, many of our social, political and even some economic problem hidden in corruption would have been on their way out. Apparently it is not Michuki alone who want to muzzle the Press in Kenya. There are many dangers scattered all over the country threatening the media including some people who claim to be champions of free speech.
The Daily Nation of March 3rd exposed a split in the Cabinet over the police raid. In a front page editorial it urged Kenyans to resist bullies. At that time 27 diplomats condemned the raid and The Sunday Nation of March 5th revealed that the President was under pressure to declare his stand on the raid. Until today he has not opened his mouth about the issue but since Kenyans have not forgotten the event of March 1st and 2nd a at this election time the sooner he says something the better it will be for everyone including his own political future.
Today the world is on the side of The Standard and indeed the pen has been proved to be mightier than the sword -- at least the sword that was held on that night by one John Michuki of the British home guards disgrace during Kenya’s struggle for independence in the 1950s, when he was notoriously known as “Kimendero” the crusher. The pen in Kenya did not win its envious position lightly. It was at a very bitter price and the role played by the journalists at Kenya’s oldest newspaper to win the global respect that Kenyan journalism now commands, must today be recalled by reminding ourselves of what really took place on that sad day.
On that night journalists at both The Standard and the KTN had put their paper to bed and aired the most important story of the day. Very much like today the story was the result of the KCSE examination. A very important story indeed; but hardly a threat to state security. And as the papers with examination results were being printed armed hooded police commandos invaded Standard offices. They seized and burned copies of 2nd March issue .They disabled the newspapers printing press. They confiscated equipments including computers .They shut down Kenya Television Network (KTN) broadcasting station. And why? Because Michuki had given his orders which were followed to the letter.
A spontaneous demonstration by the people of Kenya illustrated the bitterness they had against Michuki. He was pushed against the wall and had to speak and tell the people the reason for his dastardly act. So he spoke: “When you rattle a snake you must be prepared to be bitten (by it).” Who was the snake? What was the rattle? And what was the bite? After Michuki spoke there were more questions raised than answered and some of these questions are still lingering in our minds.
Whether or not President Mwai Kibaki’s Government is a snake, history alone will tell. But before the historians come into the picture to demystify the cobwebs of these events, it is the view of many observers that in Kibaki’s Government there are many snakes of the most dangerous kind. The venom they spread is not only harmful to journalists but to the establishment itself. It is venom called corruption which has seen a number of heads roll in the very cabinet itself. History will record the roll played by the media in the fight against corruption. In that war The Standard is a foot soldier in the forefront trying to kill Goliath with a homemade knife. To many people therefore the snake is still alive and just as dangerous if not more so. It can still bite and it can still cause a lot of harm.
The snakes in Kibaki’s government are the people who have become millionaires overnight and they have the arrogance to exhibit their wealth with impunity. The snake in Kibaki’s government is the colonial Penal Code which allows Michuki to behave like a hooligan and get away with it. The snake in Kibaki’s government is Section 79 of the current constitution which gives freedom of expression with one hand and takes it away with another.
On March 2nd Kenyans were shocked by the barbaric raid and it must be recorded that The Standard’s main rival, the Daily Nation , comes out with a special edition and condemned police brutality in Kenya. This showed that it takes very little to rekindle journalistic fraternity back to life in this country. This fraternity should be kept alive at all costs because it is now quite clear there are evil forces out to destroy it. Following the Daily Nation’s special edition the police denied ever setting the papers on fire though pictures taken at the scene proved they actually did it.
At that time the Minister for Internal Security, John Michuki, said the commandos were indeed part of the police force. They were members of the notorious Kanga Unit which consisted of 12 policemen working under the then Police CID boss Joseph Kamau. Was this the team of rattle snakes whose number one duty is to muzzle the press when the country’s security is as stake? Another question still lingering in our minds!
The journalistic courage of The Standard was exhibited on the 2nd of March when the issue which was burned was back on the street plus a special Standard edition which sold like hot cakes. It described in details how the Kanga thugs invaded the editorial offices and the printing plant. There are few places in the world where journalists are so fearless in the face of real danger. May be it is because of the courage shown by journalists in Kenya in general and those in The Standard in particular that Michuki quickly realized that the Kenya of 2007 is very different from that of the 1950s.
The war against Michuki’s attempt to muzzle the media was not fought by The Nation
and The Standard alone , indeed the Kenya Times of the 3rd of March was in a fighting spirit too it had a courageous headline screaming “State Thuggery”.It also had a front page editorial in which it called the police “ terrorist”. It talked of scenes of arson and robbery .The Standard of that day had a one word headline “OUTRAGE” and praised the people of Kenya for uniting against dictatorship. If the watchdog role of the Fourth Estate that was shown by the media at that was still maintained today, many of our social, political and even some economic problem hidden in corruption would have been on their way out. Apparently it is not Michuki alone who want to muzzle the Press in Kenya. There are many dangers scattered all over the country threatening the media including some people who claim to be champions of free speech.
The Daily Nation of March 3rd exposed a split in the Cabinet over the police raid. In a front page editorial it urged Kenyans to resist bullies. At that time 27 diplomats condemned the raid and The Sunday Nation of March 5th revealed that the President was under pressure to declare his stand on the raid. Until today he has not opened his mouth about the issue but since Kenyans have not forgotten the event of March 1st and 2nd a at this election time the sooner he says something the better it will be for everyone including his own political future.
Saturday, February 10, 2007
The Media and Kibaki's Government
Following the departure of President Daniel arap Moi’s media-bashing regime, the political vacuum created was filled by people many journalists believed would open the democratic space necessary for free speech and courageous journalistic exposes. Both the Narc leaders and journalists believed the final outcome of the demise of Moi’s administration would be better and friendlier relations between the new Executive and the Fourth Estate. That expectation, however, proved to be futile. On the government side leadership was gradually becoming just as secretive as Moi’s rule and on the media side it was quickly realised that survival depended on upholding professionalism through investigative journalism which, as we all know today, exposed new skeletons in the young government’s cupboards.
As the felicity of prose prospered wananchi began to respect the media and accept the Fourth Estate not as an appendage of the government but as a powerful institution capable of criticizing those in power and abusing it. Among the first journalists to take the publish-and-be-dammed attitude in exposing corruption in Mwai Kibaki’s regime was Kamau Ngotho of The Standard; but in doing so he made some powerful ministers, particularly Mr. Chris Murungaru, to be so appalled that he made a public statement early this year threatening to take drastic steps against journalists like Kamau Ngotho. No sooner did Murungaru make his threat than Ngotho was quickly arrested and charged with criminal libel.
The Anglo Leasing Scandal
The story that annoyed the government most concerned the now well known Anglo Leasing scandal. Though still convoluted and obscure, the scandal sprawled across Kenyan’s both print and electronic media. Murungaru was obviously rattled by the ferocity of the media onslaught and when he rolled out his gun Ngotho was behind bars. It took the condemnation of international media institutions to make the government water down its fury and realize it was heading for a fight not only with local journalists but with the entire journalistic fraternity in the free world. The international pressure was so great that on January 17th this year the Attorney General, Amos Wako, decided to drop charges against Ngotho.
Soon after that Reporters San Frontières (RSF) praised the Kenya as one of the few countries in Africa that was determined to ensure that press freedom was respected. Realizing that Kibaki’s Government cared so much about what the Western world thinks about it the RSF emphasized that Wako’s move was supported by Western Embassies and reiterated that this kind of initiative should be taken more often. According to RSF the charge against Ngotho for implicating a government official and an associate of the President in alleged corruption outraged many ambassadors, who noted that the prosecution would violate certain provisions of the constitution.
In the eyes of many international journalistic organizations, the Ngotho case exposed Kibaki’s government as a dictatorial one. Long before he was freed, both the Committee to Protect Journalists and the International Federation of Journalists had called on press freedom advocates to write protesting letters to the Kenyan Government.
The world was about to forget the rough times journalists in Kenya go through when on May 2nd this year the First Lady ,Lucy Kibaki, reminded everyone that she was not so happy with the media in this country and was not intending to turn the other chick. In that feeling she was joined by the First Lady in Nigeria, Stella Obasanjo , who also wanted journalists in that country to realize that she was not just another market woman they could play about with. The two ladies decided to take drastic steps against the media and their actions made the RSF to express shock over what they saw as the abuse of authority. In Nairobi Lucy went to the premises of Nation Media Group and spent five hours complaining about “unfair” reports. The nature of her complaints exploded beyond her control when she was televised assaulting a KTN cameraman ,Clifford Derrick Otieno, who was filming the First Lady as she was shouting to journalists in the newsroom. She was clearly shown slapping Clifford.
Abuse of Authority
On May 6th RSF expressed shock over the abuse of authority displayed by the wives of Presidents Mwai Kibaki of Kenya and Olusegul Obasanjo of Nigeria in assailing and imprisoning journalists in separate incidents on May 2, 2005, in response to critical press reports. In a statement the French organization said: “We are stunned that the Presidents’ wives went so far just to seek personal revenge. We therefore call on Lucy Kibaki to apologize to the cameraman she hit and we call on Stella Obasanjo to have the Midwest Herald’s publisher released from prison immediately as such meddling harms the image of the respective countries.”
Unfortunately for both Kenya and Nigeria, statements issued by the international organizations are circulated all over the world and we are made a laughing stalk as a people with little respect for free speech when we pretend to be democracies. On May 20 this year RSF issued yet another global statement and voiced concern over what it called “current state of relations” between the Kenyan media and President Mwai Kibaki’s administration, which had deteriorated sharply over the past two weeks in a series of public clashes that were all the more shocking as Kenya was regarded as a country that had enjoyed relative stability until then. The French said President Kibaki should realise this battle with the privately owned media would only lead to an even worse situation. The mounting threats, harassments and attack against the press were not only very bad examples for Kenyan society, but also the sign of something beginning to go awry with the country’s democracy.
One of the most abominably notorious characteristics of despotic regimes out to muzzle the media is to make use of the courts as battlegrounds and the laws of libel – both defamatory and criminal – as lethal weapons against outspoken journalists. The awards of very high damages to plaintiffs complaining of exposure to hatred, ridicule and contempt by the media have made many observers of Kenyan Fourth Estate’s relationship with the Third Branch wonder whether or not the Bench here is not used as a political weapon. One such award took place in May this year when a Mombasa High Court ordered the Nation Media Group to pay ten million shillings in damages for allegedly libeling Justice David Musinga in a 1999 when Musinga was a lawyer.
International critics of mistreatment of journalists in Kenya were quick to unearth this phenomenon as they observed that Press offences in Kenya were no longer punishable by imprisonment but through disproportionate sums in fines and damages ordered by judges and magistrates. Sometimes the Attorney General stepped in to disrupt the flow of justice whenever journalists were the victims. The most recent example of this was when Wako blocked legal action against Lucy Kibaki as Clifford Derrick Otieno wanted the assistance of the Judiciary to make sure that justice was not only done but it was manifestly seen to be done following the Nation House May 2nd disastrous behaviour by the First Lady. Though unknown to most Kenyans, Wako’s action was globally condemned by no less an organization than the International Press Institute (IPI) which expressed its concern about the decision to discontinue criminal legal proceedings against Lucy Kibaki. Clifford Derrick Otieno had filed the criminal proceedings against Lucy on May 16th this year.
According to the IPI, the global network of editors, leading journalists and media executives in over 120 countries, the exercise of nolle prosequi by Amos Wako should not have been used as a political tool to frustrate the legislative rights of Kenyan citizens to pursue legal proceedings against politically powerful people who habitually disregard the law. The IPI saw the move by Wako as political in nature and intended for the sole purpose avoiding undue embarrassment to the political leadership of Kenya. It added that the fairness of any legal system rests on the belief that the rule of law is applied without fear of favour to any individual, group or institutions. The international organization told the world that the law had been applied in Kenya in an arbitrary fashion and revealed what it called twin-track legal system that assists those in power, and their partners, while denying rights to ordinary Kenyan citizens such as Otieno.
International Watchdogs
It is very easy to criticize international watchdogs and whistleblowers commenting negatively against Kenyan anti media heavy handedness and hostility to journalists as unfairly imposing but it must be remembered when good things happen in our courts international organizations also notice. When, for example, the Sunday Standard Managing Editor, David Makali was acquitted of criminal charges on April 4th this year the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) wrote from New York to tell the world about the case which was pending since 2003 when the paper published leaked excerpts of confessions made by suspects in the Odhiambo Mbai murder case. Acquitting Makali Nairobi Chief Magistrate Aggrey Muchelule said to convict Makali would contravene guaranteed access to official information.
“We welcome this verdict and interpretation it provides in favour of Press freedom,” said Ann Cooper, Executive Director of CPJ. “We hope this verdict will help to ensure that all Kenyan journalists are free to report on matters of public interest without fear of reprisal.” Soon after those words of caution from a respected international organization were circulated all over the world, the court imposed a heavy damage of three million shillings against Royal Media Service to Foreign Affairs Minister Ali Makwere. The suit arose from a story published in the Press alleging that a Cabinet Minister, an Assistant Minister and an MP had been filmed by police along Nairobi’s Koinange Street picking up prostitutes. The defendant attempted to bring a witness, Miss Immaculate Mwende, obviously trying to use the defence of justification, but Makwere’s lawyer successfully blocked her from testifying.
According to a respected media law scholar, G.F.L. Bridgman, justification is the most complete and final defence that can be made to libel (by proving) that the words complained of were true in substance and fact. He argues that this defence to an action will be seen when it is appreciated that an action for defamation is an action for injury to reputation and a man cannot recover damages for injury to a reputation, which he either does not, or ought not to possess. To plead justification successfully, he says, the whole of the libel must be shown to be substantially true. But Justice Phillip Ransley agreed with the plaintiff’s lawyer and rejected Mwende’s evidence even before it was presented to the court. Instead he seemed to agree with Makwere’s implied claim to have evidence of the depth of degradation to which the Kenya media would stoop to throw mud at Kibaki’s administration by alleging that he had made a nocturnal visit to Nairobi’s red light district along Koinange Street.
Both journalism and legal scholars have always regarded libel laws as possible political weapons to muzzle free speech. According to Donald M. Gillmor, Professor of Media Ethics and Law at the University of Minnesota, libel litigation has become a devastatingly effective weapon for silencing those who dare to challenge the morality of power, privilege, and prestige. He says plaintiff and defendant battle in a confined judicial arena (where) public discourse is circumvented. He argues that “libel law is a powerful weapon for shutting up those with whom you disagree.” Recent awards of huge sums of money, including a 14 million damage given to Joseph Kamotho, against the Nation Media Group, inevitably make one wonder whether there is some collision between the Judiciary and the media. The awards have provoked so much soul searching and debate in both media and academic circles making the two groups have reservations about whether libel cases in Kenya are conducted in a fair way.
Frequent Libel cases
The toughest question to answer is whether frequent libel cases and high damage awards are healthy for freedom of expression. Whatever court pronouncements may be on this issue the fact remains that the Kenyan society will always need both a probing and vigorous Forth Estate to achieve real transparent and accountable democratic uprightness needed in a free society. Indeed even court proceedings themselves require an enterprising media to ensure that justice is not only done but it is manifestly seen to be done.
Yet, when all is said and done, both the Fourth Estate and the Third Branch need one another. In the words of Judge Judith S. Kaye, the Chief Judge of the State of New York: “We live in a society awash in media accounts of law, feeding a seemingly insatiable public thirst for legal subjects. Pick up a newspaper , flick on TV, and chances are you will find depictions – real of fictional – of the latest trial of the century, analyses and current trends in crime or punishment, reports on the doings of high-profile attorneys and plethora of pundits commenting all the above.” Rather than imposing heavy damages against the media, Kenyan judges, should try to implement Judge Judith’s call to both the Bench and the Fourth Estate. To begin with she suggest that there should be a more balanced coverage of courts which would recognize the limitations of judicial speech and seek out the views of those with less access to media coverage – representatives of the local bar , for example , or academics – when legal decisions are criticized.
She says this may require legwork, but given the enormous power of the media to shape public opinion, and the tremendous role that the public confidence plays in the effectiveness of the judicial branch the extra effort is surely warranted.
From colonial days the various Executives in Kenya have had their quarrels with the independent Kenyan Press. The free Press, likewise, have not been particularly happy with the performance of those in political power. The fundamental misunderstandings have always been based on two divergent outlooks: The politicians in power have always wanted to manipulate the Fourth Estate to get their best image across to the wananchi and yet the journalists have always wondered how they could fulfill their obligation to publish the truth about information and news without proper accessibility to vital information without governmental hindrances.
It is probably with this in mind that President Mwai Kibaki recently announced at the International Press Institute conference in Nairobi that his Government intended to introduce a Freedom Of Information (FOI) Act. No sooner did the President make that announcement than Raphael Tuju, the Minister for Information, published a FOI Act of 2005. The draft Act has both good and bad news for journalists. The good news is to be found in Section 45 of the Act which proposes to repeal the draconian Official Secrets Act CAP 187. Among the bad news that is brought about by the Tuju Act is to be found in Section 7(2) which says a person is not entitled to obtain access under this section to a document or a part of document that became a document of agency before the date of commencement of this part. In a layman’s language it means journalists will not be able to get accessibility to important information of past dirty activities of the powerful such as the origin of Goldenberg scandal and massive land grabbing under Jomo Kenyatta. Of what use then, one is tempted to ask, is Tuju’s FOI Act to this country?
As the felicity of prose prospered wananchi began to respect the media and accept the Fourth Estate not as an appendage of the government but as a powerful institution capable of criticizing those in power and abusing it. Among the first journalists to take the publish-and-be-dammed attitude in exposing corruption in Mwai Kibaki’s regime was Kamau Ngotho of The Standard; but in doing so he made some powerful ministers, particularly Mr. Chris Murungaru, to be so appalled that he made a public statement early this year threatening to take drastic steps against journalists like Kamau Ngotho. No sooner did Murungaru make his threat than Ngotho was quickly arrested and charged with criminal libel.
The Anglo Leasing Scandal
The story that annoyed the government most concerned the now well known Anglo Leasing scandal. Though still convoluted and obscure, the scandal sprawled across Kenyan’s both print and electronic media. Murungaru was obviously rattled by the ferocity of the media onslaught and when he rolled out his gun Ngotho was behind bars. It took the condemnation of international media institutions to make the government water down its fury and realize it was heading for a fight not only with local journalists but with the entire journalistic fraternity in the free world. The international pressure was so great that on January 17th this year the Attorney General, Amos Wako, decided to drop charges against Ngotho.
Soon after that Reporters San Frontières (RSF) praised the Kenya as one of the few countries in Africa that was determined to ensure that press freedom was respected. Realizing that Kibaki’s Government cared so much about what the Western world thinks about it the RSF emphasized that Wako’s move was supported by Western Embassies and reiterated that this kind of initiative should be taken more often. According to RSF the charge against Ngotho for implicating a government official and an associate of the President in alleged corruption outraged many ambassadors, who noted that the prosecution would violate certain provisions of the constitution.
In the eyes of many international journalistic organizations, the Ngotho case exposed Kibaki’s government as a dictatorial one. Long before he was freed, both the Committee to Protect Journalists and the International Federation of Journalists had called on press freedom advocates to write protesting letters to the Kenyan Government.
The world was about to forget the rough times journalists in Kenya go through when on May 2nd this year the First Lady ,Lucy Kibaki, reminded everyone that she was not so happy with the media in this country and was not intending to turn the other chick. In that feeling she was joined by the First Lady in Nigeria, Stella Obasanjo , who also wanted journalists in that country to realize that she was not just another market woman they could play about with. The two ladies decided to take drastic steps against the media and their actions made the RSF to express shock over what they saw as the abuse of authority. In Nairobi Lucy went to the premises of Nation Media Group and spent five hours complaining about “unfair” reports. The nature of her complaints exploded beyond her control when she was televised assaulting a KTN cameraman ,Clifford Derrick Otieno, who was filming the First Lady as she was shouting to journalists in the newsroom. She was clearly shown slapping Clifford.
Abuse of Authority
On May 6th RSF expressed shock over the abuse of authority displayed by the wives of Presidents Mwai Kibaki of Kenya and Olusegul Obasanjo of Nigeria in assailing and imprisoning journalists in separate incidents on May 2, 2005, in response to critical press reports. In a statement the French organization said: “We are stunned that the Presidents’ wives went so far just to seek personal revenge. We therefore call on Lucy Kibaki to apologize to the cameraman she hit and we call on Stella Obasanjo to have the Midwest Herald’s publisher released from prison immediately as such meddling harms the image of the respective countries.”
Unfortunately for both Kenya and Nigeria, statements issued by the international organizations are circulated all over the world and we are made a laughing stalk as a people with little respect for free speech when we pretend to be democracies. On May 20 this year RSF issued yet another global statement and voiced concern over what it called “current state of relations” between the Kenyan media and President Mwai Kibaki’s administration, which had deteriorated sharply over the past two weeks in a series of public clashes that were all the more shocking as Kenya was regarded as a country that had enjoyed relative stability until then. The French said President Kibaki should realise this battle with the privately owned media would only lead to an even worse situation. The mounting threats, harassments and attack against the press were not only very bad examples for Kenyan society, but also the sign of something beginning to go awry with the country’s democracy.
One of the most abominably notorious characteristics of despotic regimes out to muzzle the media is to make use of the courts as battlegrounds and the laws of libel – both defamatory and criminal – as lethal weapons against outspoken journalists. The awards of very high damages to plaintiffs complaining of exposure to hatred, ridicule and contempt by the media have made many observers of Kenyan Fourth Estate’s relationship with the Third Branch wonder whether or not the Bench here is not used as a political weapon. One such award took place in May this year when a Mombasa High Court ordered the Nation Media Group to pay ten million shillings in damages for allegedly libeling Justice David Musinga in a 1999 when Musinga was a lawyer.
International critics of mistreatment of journalists in Kenya were quick to unearth this phenomenon as they observed that Press offences in Kenya were no longer punishable by imprisonment but through disproportionate sums in fines and damages ordered by judges and magistrates. Sometimes the Attorney General stepped in to disrupt the flow of justice whenever journalists were the victims. The most recent example of this was when Wako blocked legal action against Lucy Kibaki as Clifford Derrick Otieno wanted the assistance of the Judiciary to make sure that justice was not only done but it was manifestly seen to be done following the Nation House May 2nd disastrous behaviour by the First Lady. Though unknown to most Kenyans, Wako’s action was globally condemned by no less an organization than the International Press Institute (IPI) which expressed its concern about the decision to discontinue criminal legal proceedings against Lucy Kibaki. Clifford Derrick Otieno had filed the criminal proceedings against Lucy on May 16th this year.
According to the IPI, the global network of editors, leading journalists and media executives in over 120 countries, the exercise of nolle prosequi by Amos Wako should not have been used as a political tool to frustrate the legislative rights of Kenyan citizens to pursue legal proceedings against politically powerful people who habitually disregard the law. The IPI saw the move by Wako as political in nature and intended for the sole purpose avoiding undue embarrassment to the political leadership of Kenya. It added that the fairness of any legal system rests on the belief that the rule of law is applied without fear of favour to any individual, group or institutions. The international organization told the world that the law had been applied in Kenya in an arbitrary fashion and revealed what it called twin-track legal system that assists those in power, and their partners, while denying rights to ordinary Kenyan citizens such as Otieno.
International Watchdogs
It is very easy to criticize international watchdogs and whistleblowers commenting negatively against Kenyan anti media heavy handedness and hostility to journalists as unfairly imposing but it must be remembered when good things happen in our courts international organizations also notice. When, for example, the Sunday Standard Managing Editor, David Makali was acquitted of criminal charges on April 4th this year the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) wrote from New York to tell the world about the case which was pending since 2003 when the paper published leaked excerpts of confessions made by suspects in the Odhiambo Mbai murder case. Acquitting Makali Nairobi Chief Magistrate Aggrey Muchelule said to convict Makali would contravene guaranteed access to official information.
“We welcome this verdict and interpretation it provides in favour of Press freedom,” said Ann Cooper, Executive Director of CPJ. “We hope this verdict will help to ensure that all Kenyan journalists are free to report on matters of public interest without fear of reprisal.” Soon after those words of caution from a respected international organization were circulated all over the world, the court imposed a heavy damage of three million shillings against Royal Media Service to Foreign Affairs Minister Ali Makwere. The suit arose from a story published in the Press alleging that a Cabinet Minister, an Assistant Minister and an MP had been filmed by police along Nairobi’s Koinange Street picking up prostitutes. The defendant attempted to bring a witness, Miss Immaculate Mwende, obviously trying to use the defence of justification, but Makwere’s lawyer successfully blocked her from testifying.
According to a respected media law scholar, G.F.L. Bridgman, justification is the most complete and final defence that can be made to libel (by proving) that the words complained of were true in substance and fact. He argues that this defence to an action will be seen when it is appreciated that an action for defamation is an action for injury to reputation and a man cannot recover damages for injury to a reputation, which he either does not, or ought not to possess. To plead justification successfully, he says, the whole of the libel must be shown to be substantially true. But Justice Phillip Ransley agreed with the plaintiff’s lawyer and rejected Mwende’s evidence even before it was presented to the court. Instead he seemed to agree with Makwere’s implied claim to have evidence of the depth of degradation to which the Kenya media would stoop to throw mud at Kibaki’s administration by alleging that he had made a nocturnal visit to Nairobi’s red light district along Koinange Street.
Both journalism and legal scholars have always regarded libel laws as possible political weapons to muzzle free speech. According to Donald M. Gillmor, Professor of Media Ethics and Law at the University of Minnesota, libel litigation has become a devastatingly effective weapon for silencing those who dare to challenge the morality of power, privilege, and prestige. He says plaintiff and defendant battle in a confined judicial arena (where) public discourse is circumvented. He argues that “libel law is a powerful weapon for shutting up those with whom you disagree.” Recent awards of huge sums of money, including a 14 million damage given to Joseph Kamotho, against the Nation Media Group, inevitably make one wonder whether there is some collision between the Judiciary and the media. The awards have provoked so much soul searching and debate in both media and academic circles making the two groups have reservations about whether libel cases in Kenya are conducted in a fair way.
Frequent Libel cases
The toughest question to answer is whether frequent libel cases and high damage awards are healthy for freedom of expression. Whatever court pronouncements may be on this issue the fact remains that the Kenyan society will always need both a probing and vigorous Forth Estate to achieve real transparent and accountable democratic uprightness needed in a free society. Indeed even court proceedings themselves require an enterprising media to ensure that justice is not only done but it is manifestly seen to be done.
Yet, when all is said and done, both the Fourth Estate and the Third Branch need one another. In the words of Judge Judith S. Kaye, the Chief Judge of the State of New York: “We live in a society awash in media accounts of law, feeding a seemingly insatiable public thirst for legal subjects. Pick up a newspaper , flick on TV, and chances are you will find depictions – real of fictional – of the latest trial of the century, analyses and current trends in crime or punishment, reports on the doings of high-profile attorneys and plethora of pundits commenting all the above.” Rather than imposing heavy damages against the media, Kenyan judges, should try to implement Judge Judith’s call to both the Bench and the Fourth Estate. To begin with she suggest that there should be a more balanced coverage of courts which would recognize the limitations of judicial speech and seek out the views of those with less access to media coverage – representatives of the local bar , for example , or academics – when legal decisions are criticized.
She says this may require legwork, but given the enormous power of the media to shape public opinion, and the tremendous role that the public confidence plays in the effectiveness of the judicial branch the extra effort is surely warranted.
From colonial days the various Executives in Kenya have had their quarrels with the independent Kenyan Press. The free Press, likewise, have not been particularly happy with the performance of those in political power. The fundamental misunderstandings have always been based on two divergent outlooks: The politicians in power have always wanted to manipulate the Fourth Estate to get their best image across to the wananchi and yet the journalists have always wondered how they could fulfill their obligation to publish the truth about information and news without proper accessibility to vital information without governmental hindrances.
It is probably with this in mind that President Mwai Kibaki recently announced at the International Press Institute conference in Nairobi that his Government intended to introduce a Freedom Of Information (FOI) Act. No sooner did the President make that announcement than Raphael Tuju, the Minister for Information, published a FOI Act of 2005. The draft Act has both good and bad news for journalists. The good news is to be found in Section 45 of the Act which proposes to repeal the draconian Official Secrets Act CAP 187. Among the bad news that is brought about by the Tuju Act is to be found in Section 7(2) which says a person is not entitled to obtain access under this section to a document or a part of document that became a document of agency before the date of commencement of this part. In a layman’s language it means journalists will not be able to get accessibility to important information of past dirty activities of the powerful such as the origin of Goldenberg scandal and massive land grabbing under Jomo Kenyatta. Of what use then, one is tempted to ask, is Tuju’s FOI Act to this country?
How the Referendum was Covered
One of the most disappointing aspects of the coverage of the referendum by both the print and the electronic media in Kenya was that most journalists seemed to be more concerned with the “Game of Strategy” rather than the “Substance” of the referendum. It was very much like the way they covered the 1979 general elections and like Prof. Marcel Rutten of University of Leiden, Netherlands, and I said at that time in our Chapter of the book Democracy in Kenya, most of them obviously found the “game” to be of greater interest to both editors and the readers because it concerned itself with the race in the referendum. Journalism scholars call this kind of interest in the coverage of political contests the “Game of Strategy” because, like in any other game, it has a winner as well as a loser. The exciting story of how the race was taking place and how the Orange group was struggling to take over the leadership from the Banana group was always of a great interest to Kenyan readers, viewers and listeners. People enjoy competition and they take chances in backing both winners and losers. Many journalism scholars have compared election competition, and a referendum is a form of this competition, with that of horse racing and the excitement of the two is more or less the same.
When journalists get carried away with the competition element of the referendum they tend to forget a much more important aspect of the process which concerns the ‘Issues’ involved. According to Dean E. Elger, Associate Professor of Political Science at Moorhead State University in Minnesota, 70 per cent of all the news of political contests especially during election time is about the “Game” rather than the “Issues”. The coverage of the November 2005 referendum in Kenya was more or less based on the “Game of Strategy” rather than the “Substance of the Referendum”. To examine what the coverage of the referendum was like, it is important to separate the two aspects and look at them in greater details:
The Game of Strategy
As pointed out earlier, journalists in Kenya tended to pay greater attention to the “Game of Strategy” rather than the “Substance” of the referendum because they seemed to look at two major aspects of the two groups: (a) their styles and (b) their images. They wrote long articles about the various styles adapted by the Orange group and Banana groups which varied from addressing public rallies to open violence.
When all this happened reporters covering the referendum were more or less only concerned with the strategy and logistics of winning and so all they wrote about was what Elger would call ‘Appearance and Hoopla’. In other words the reporters were only concerned about how much popularity the groups were gathering as they conducted their campaigns.
There were many examples to prove this point and the following demonstrate Kenyan journalists’ overzealous concern with appearance and hoopla promoting horse racing journalism and emphasizing competition which bordered on dangerous conflict: The Standard of September 12 had a splash headline saying “Voices of Combat” with a strap-line reading: “CONSTITUTION: Ministers intensify ‘yes’ and ‘No’ battle over review Bill as some accuse Raila of plan to oust Kibaki govt through referendum”. The story said: “Chants of ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ continued to reverberate across Kenya yesterday as leaders intensified their support or opposition to the proposed new constitution. Roads Minister Raila Odinga led the ‘No’ brigade to a rally in Malindi where it declared the war was won as Vice President Awori, who is holding brief for President Kibaki who is in the United States , took the battle for the ‘Yes’ to Central Kenya.” In that well-done and punchy 70-word intro words that suggest adversarial confrontation are deliberately used again and again and they are: brigade, war, battle ! An excellent example of hype and hoopla!
The Daily Nation of September 13 had a splash headline reading “Shots Fired as Kanu MPs Clash over Constitution”. The kicker said: “Serut punched and kicked after bribery claim” and the story read: “Shots were fired as tension over the proposed new Constitution erupted into violence at a funeral attended by former President Moi and rival Kanu MPs. There was chaos in the VIP enclosure when local MP John Serut was punched and kicked after trying to talk to MP William Ruto.” An excellent example depicting the style used by leaders in the referendum contest – typical “game of strategy” story.
The Independent of September 31 had a sensational headline reading: “Referendum Shock as…Raila, Uhuru hire Mungiki.” The story claimed: “According to well-placed sources, Mungiki is back in full force and enjoying the services of a senior politician in the Opposition. The onset of campaign for the Draft Constitution has provided a fertile ground for all these organised bands of rumble (sic) rousers as the campaign for YES and NO heats up. The violence that was witnessed in the No rally at Thika Stadium last week is a pointer of things to come as the No and YES protagonist (sic) intensify their campaign ahead of the November 21 referendum”. This was yet another “Game of Strategy” story based on very scanty facts though it led to the arrest of suspected Mungiki leaders.
In a story headed “ 2007 Battle Begins” The Kenyan Spectator of September 29 said: “ Behind the headline chaos touching the campaign rallies ahead of November 21 constitutional referendum are strategic boardroom manouvers (sic) meant to woo voters, in styles similar to a general election. The Kenya Spectator opens the curtains in both the Orange and Banana camps, for you to see the game of money, wit, charm, deception and partly high-tech mechanism going on in the recently unveiled secretariats.” Typical hype and hoopla!
In its issue of September 23-29 The Leader splash story “We will Topple Kibaki, Orengo Finally Reveals” says: It’s no longer secret. The Opposition to the Wako Draft Constitution by the naysayers is an excuse to take over power from President Mwai Kibaki. This bold declaration last week by former Ugenya MP, James Orengo is bound to raise temperatures further in the banana-orange imbroglio over the country’s future constitutional dispensation.” Yet another “Game of Strategy” story.
The Times of October 4’s splash headline read “Wako, Kalonzo Clash” with a strap-line saying “Ministers Trade ‘lies’ Charge in Public over Constitution.”. The story said: “Attorney General Amos Wako and Environment Minister Kalonzo Musyoka yesterday clashed in public over the draft constitution. Elsewhere three Ministers found themselves in trouble when they attempted to crusade for Yes vote at an international conference . In the first incident, Mr. Wako uncharacteristically locked horns in public with colleague Kalonzo and accused the later who is a leading light in the Orange team of spreading malicious propaganda on the contents of the proposed constitution ….Meanwhile Cabinet Minister Joseph Munyao, Martha Karua and Assistant Minister Beth Mugo were booed and urged to return to their seats when they allegedly digressed from the official matters and delved into the Orange and Banana debate. The trio were guests during the official ceremony to mark World’s Habitat Day. This year’s ceremony was hosted by the Mavoko municipal council in Athi River.” Game of Strategy!
According to the first Chairman of the Constitution of Kenya Review Commission, Prof. Yash Pal Ghai, a referendum is an important device for the expression of the consent of the people. But we ought to remind ourselves, he says, that referendums can be manipulated and have been used by dictators to bolster their regimes. In an article published by The Sunday Standard of October 23, he says the referendum offered a choice between ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ (but) did not give the people the right to make decisions. He warned that a referendum was not necessarily a constructive device in multi-ethnic societies as it tended towards ethnic polarisation. The most important question to ask following that remark by the professor is whether or not the journalists engaging in the game of strategy in reporting the referendum were themselves victims of ethnic polarisation.
Journalists from all the national and alternative media mentioned above may very well claim that all the stories I am talking about did indeed take place and they were only fulfilling their professional duties of complying with the news values of timeliness, human interest , proximity, consequences , impact and prominence. That may be so but it does not change the fact that they highlighted the Game of Strategy and paid very little attention to the Substance of the Referendum which unfortunately they chose to sweep under the carpet despite its important role in the entire exercise. So what really could they have done? What was the Substance of the Referendum anyway?
The Substance of the Referendum
Given the fact that the Kenyans voters who are regular newspaper readers and customary TV viewers or constant radio listeners are among the elite in our society, the coverage of the referendum became more demanding than the provision of stories based on mere “Games of Strategy”. These were the people who wanted to know from the media a little bit more of the analysis of the various interpretation of the content of the proposed constitution.
Journalists who were interested in the substance of the referendum became serious writers who provided their readers with what professionals call ‘backgrounders’, news analysis and commentaries about new proposals compared with what is contained in the current constitution. The ‘race horse’ drama of who was winning the referendum and who was losing was brought about in their reports in the form of letting the people know what they stood to gain or lose by making whatever choice they made. This kind of analytical coverage of the referendum tended to be the exception rather than the rule and was mainly confined in a handful of the up market media of the Kenyan society such as The East African and The Daily Nation and to a lesser extent The Standard.
Two journalists were outstanding in their presentation of the substance of the referendum to the public – Louis Otieno of KTN and Rose Kamotho when she chaired the first great debate covered live by almost all the radio and TV stations in the country. Ms Kamotho as the chairperson of the debate was tough and tried her best to make the participants dwell on real issues rather than hype and hoopla. For this she was seriously attacked by David Ochami , a senior staff writer of Sunday Time who commented : “What had been anticipated and marketed as Kenya’s biggest debate easily degenerated into an anticlimax thanks to the moderator’s recklessness and bias. Rose Kamotho achieved what she and the Media Owners’ Association had planned beforehand i.e. to strike a blow for the banana campaign. As they celebrated their genius journalism was left the poorer and the silent majority of journalists the shamed.” Well presented argument but based on what evidence? The majority of readers’ views’ and listeners’ reaction called for more debates based on facts contained in the new proposals but obviously Ochami did not think so. Could he also be a victim of ethnic polarisation? The report of the debate was fully covered by the Daily Nation and a short story about it appeared in The Standard of October 19. Whether the debate and the Daily Nation story helped the voters make up their minds the result clearly tell whether or not Ochami accepts them.
Over a million Kenyans saw Ms. Kamotho stopping Prof. Anyang Nyongo from attacking Citizen Radio and urged him to be relevant and discuss the content of the proposed constitution. During the debate Raphael Tuju challenged his opponent to point out differences in the content of the Boma’s Draft and the proposed draft as far as land issues and Bill of Rights were concerned. The Orange team were up in arms arguing that the Boma’s draft was not the subject of the debate. Yet as soon as they left the studio they told various public rallies that they backed the Boma’s draft. Why couldn’t journalists pin them down to declare their real stand?
What was most noticeable among Kenyan journalists was their preference to concentrate on issues concerning disagreements among the leaders so that the stories they wrote tended to be rather sensational. This was in keeping with the journalists’ desire to highlight issues concerning conflict as human-interest stories. Another aspect of concern for reporters interested in the substance of elections was the two groups’ traits and record. In a minority of cases serious journalists reviewed all the candidates’ past positive and negative contribution to the society and predicted what was likely to happen when the people either rejected or accepted the proposed constitution.
This kind of analysis was not done adequately in the referendum yet it was clear if used effectively it could rid Kenya of the culture of blindly agreeing with leaders whose only qualification was the tribe they belonged to or the support they got from bigger godfathers. It was the kind of journalism that would have made people take a stand based on informed position rather than simply agreeing with leaders because they came from the same tribe or even clan. The notion that journalists would always highlight human interest issues caused by odd incidents was proved right during the campaign for both Orange and Banana groups when even the most serious among them pegged their otherwise unprejudiced analysis to petty incidents of conflict, adventure and self interest.
This meant no matter how much journalists wanted to dwell with the “Substance of the Referendum”, the factors and orientations of news production pushed them to see serious interpretation of the new proposal and comparison with the current constitution to quickly losing their ‘newsworthiness’ whereas campaign missteps and the bizarre events of the whole process were ‘fresh occurrences’ which adequately answered the journalist news value requirement of timeliness. Unfortunately once leaders made known their position on an issue, further statements concerning that issue declined in news value sense. Therefore journalists covering the referendum had to have a good nose for news to produce good copy after sitting through innumerable repetitions of speeches by the same people talking about the same issues in different parts of constituencies.
One area that totally failed in Kenyan journalism in so far as the coverage of the referendum was concerned was the little attempt made by the practitioners to get exclusive stories from leaders from the two groups on significant interpretation of specific parts of the new proposal and what is contained in the current constitution. That would have led to real assistance to the voters by laying bare at least two aspects of the two groups:
1. Whether they had adequate knowledge about the matters highlighted in the new proposal compared with the current constitution.
2. Whether their stand on such important issues as the country’s constitution were actually reasonable and not mere tactic to win peoples’ support.
On Kenyatta Day President Kibaki tried hard to dwell on the substance of the proposed constitution by explain to voters about the consequences of voting No. According to The Standard of the next day, October 21, the President said: “On November 21, we shall all be participating in a historic referendum to decide whether we adopt the proposed constitution or remain with the current Constitution.” The Standard report continued: “But the Orange team that is asking Kenyans to vote ‘No’ on the proposed Constitution reacted angrily to this assertion and accused the Government of hoodwinking Kenyans. In a statement faxed from its secretariat, the No campaign team said the referendum was not about the current or the proposed constitution. ‘It is about determining whether the proposed constitution is good for the country or not. The choice is between the flawed Wako Draft and the new, better constitution agreed through a consultative process that is acceptable to the majority of Kenyans”. So who was right? The President or the Orange secretariat? The Standard didn’t say.
The answer was probably to be found in the Daily Nation of September 6, a day after the Electoral Commission Chairman; Samuel Kivuitu launched the Orange and Banana teams. According to the splash story titled “D-day for Historic Constitution Vote” the paper said: If the Yes voters win, it will pave the way for the new constitution and will become the third since independence 42 years ago. But if the No voters triumph, Kenya will keep the current constitution that has governed the nation for the same period and has been vilified for vesting too much power in the Presidency.” At that time there was no reaction from the Orange group.
According to one great editor, C.P. Scott, comment is free but facts are sacred and that is the one aspect of Kenyan journalism where the ethical importance of Impartiality was be put to test during the coverage of the referendum .These famous words by Scott are at times forgotten by Kenyan journalists when they ignore the vital question of separation of news from comment, or the religious avoidance of what in current usage is termed tendentiousness. Americans simply call it editorializing. Though Scott’s words have been classic, they tend to lose much of their force if divorced, as they commonly are, from their context.
What C. P. Scott said was: “The newspaper is of necessity something of a monopoly, and its first duty is to shun the temptations of monopoly. Its primary office is not the gathering of news .At the peril of its soul it must see that the supply is not tainted .Neither in what it gives nor in what it does not give, nor in the mode of presentation, must the unclouded face of truth suffer wrong. Comment is free, facts are sacred. Propaganda, so called, by this means is hateful. The voice of opponents no less than of friends has a right to be heard. Comment is also justly subject to a self imposed restraint. It is well to be frank; it is even better to be fair.” According to yet another journalism scholar, Wilson Harris, the highest canons of journalism could find no better definition than that.
Yet even Harris admits that this is not quite all the story. He says the question how far it is the function of the Press to give the public what the public wants is still worth asking. Here, of course the element of competition enters in. It is convenient to speak generally of the Press, but what is meant in fact is a number of individual newspapers, each of them intend on increasing its circulation at the expense of the others .In the campaign the odds are all in the a paper that gives its readers what its readers want, as against a rival who gives them what it thinks they ought to have.
Despite the journalistic rules of impartiality, Kenyan readers have a special liking for editorialized presentation of news the way The Leader kept doing throughout the campaign period. Many of its front page stories presented to the people of Kenya as hard news stories were in actual fact commentaries. For example the story published on October 14-20 issue with a heading saying “Kibaki’s Patience Now Makes Raila Reckless” went ahead and pretended to give Kenyan news which in fact was opinion: “There is no doubt that Raila Odinga is the leader against the adoption of the Wako Draft, mainly because the proposed document does not contain a powerful executive Prime Minister, a position which is believed to have been custom-created for him by the Bomas conclave through his deft scheming.” Excellent editorial sadly presented to the people as hard news story.
In his book Press Bias and Politics Jim A. Kuypers discusses how media frame controversial issues. Analysing the book, Amazon.com says it charts the effects the printed press – and by extension, broadcast media – have upon messages of political and social leaders when they discuss controversial issues.
After examining 700 American press reports Kuypers concludes that media bias hurts the democratic process in general by ignoring non-mainstream left positions and vilifying many moderates and vast majority of right leaning positions. If similar studies were conducted in Kenya some form of bias in the Kenyan media will also be discovered. On October 17, 2005, for example, The Standard had a front page splash story with a heading saying “Kibaki Plans New Districts for Nakuru as Race Hots Up”.
That headline had a strap-line on top saying “Orange Sweeps Through Coast, Western and Predicts Victory while…” The ‘tone” of the entire story gave the impression that President Kibaki was planning to create new districts in Nakuru in order to win votes to support the proposed constitution in a referendum which was about to take place. The story below the headline said “ President Kibaki’s announcement is likely to be seen by the orange (No) platform as yet another campaign freebie planned by the government ahead of the November 21st referendum on the proposed new constitution.” On the back page of the Daily Nation of the same date the same story appeared with a very different tone. Its headline said “State To Consider District Plea.” Its kicker said “Kibaki agrees with MPs’ Call That Nakuru deserves Two New Units.” The story said: President Kibaki yesterday said the Government would consider proposals to create two new districts in Nakuru.”
The slant in the Daily Nation story was that the President was reacting to the demands of the people. It was a pro-Kibaki “tone”. The “tone” of The Standard was that the President was bribing people to support the new Constitution. It was an anti-Kibaki slant.
May be the most sophisticated coverage of the referendum came in the picture on October 22 when Public Opinion Journalism dominated all the front pages of both national and alternative media. Conducted by the respected Steadman Group the report made journalist write hybrid stories mixing the game of strategy and the substance of the referendum. From the report came out stories that indicated that Mwai Kibaki was still the most popular politician in the country and his popularity was steadily going up. Raila, the leader of the Orange team was fourth in line after Uhuru Kenyatta and Kalonzo Musioka.
The results also indicated that the current constitution was most unpopular with only 9 per cent of the voters backing it yet only ten per cent of Kenyans had attended civic education which would have made them realize backing the Orange camp was backing the hated constitution. The media had a lesson to learn from the polls because it revealed to them that 13 per cent of the people thought they had been very unfair in reporting the referendum and 30 per cent more thought they were “somewhat unfair”.
Public Opinion Journalism was introduced in Kenya by the Daily Nation on March 24 1999 when I predicted in May of that year in Expression Today’s Media Review that public opinion journalism “will become very popular in every aspect of the media. They will soon use opinion polls as a source of news. Soon it will dominate political reporting, with very major news organizations conducting their own polls, with results – true or false – reaching the people through hard news headlines.” What worried me at that time and still worries me now is the likely eventuality of journalists and pollsters joining hands in establishing their own agenda by conducting hypothetical polls simply by asking what journalism scholars call “what if” questions. As a mater of fact, “what if” journalism is an aspect of the profession which makes many defenders of the truth very wary of journalism, based on opinion palls.
Needless to say, I argued in 1999, polls result very much depend on the questions asked and the manner in which those questions are framed. Serious opinion journalism will be determined only by understanding the wording of the questions posed before readers , listeners and viewers can take seriously public conclusions arrived at after opinion polls . My misgivings about public opinion polls as a source of news notwithstanding, Kenyans will soon learn to accept the fact that the state of mind of a large population will inevitably influence major events in this country. What needs to be accepted at this early stage of connecting polls with authentic source of news, I said then, is the fact that the public state of mind could be artificially created by the mass media.
Used properly, I still maintain, public opinion journalism can enhance freedom of expression. Unfortunately that freedom of expression was threatened at the peak of the campaign when the Minister for Internal Security, John Michuki threatened to shut down Family TV for hosting Prof. Anyang Nyongo who backed the Orange team. According to The Standard of October 24 the Minstre warned the station by saying: “Let them look at the frequencies again and know that they belong to the Government. It will take them away if they continue to abuse the privilege.” Pathetic!
When journalists get carried away with the competition element of the referendum they tend to forget a much more important aspect of the process which concerns the ‘Issues’ involved. According to Dean E. Elger, Associate Professor of Political Science at Moorhead State University in Minnesota, 70 per cent of all the news of political contests especially during election time is about the “Game” rather than the “Issues”. The coverage of the November 2005 referendum in Kenya was more or less based on the “Game of Strategy” rather than the “Substance of the Referendum”. To examine what the coverage of the referendum was like, it is important to separate the two aspects and look at them in greater details:
The Game of Strategy
As pointed out earlier, journalists in Kenya tended to pay greater attention to the “Game of Strategy” rather than the “Substance” of the referendum because they seemed to look at two major aspects of the two groups: (a) their styles and (b) their images. They wrote long articles about the various styles adapted by the Orange group and Banana groups which varied from addressing public rallies to open violence.
When all this happened reporters covering the referendum were more or less only concerned with the strategy and logistics of winning and so all they wrote about was what Elger would call ‘Appearance and Hoopla’. In other words the reporters were only concerned about how much popularity the groups were gathering as they conducted their campaigns.
There were many examples to prove this point and the following demonstrate Kenyan journalists’ overzealous concern with appearance and hoopla promoting horse racing journalism and emphasizing competition which bordered on dangerous conflict: The Standard of September 12 had a splash headline saying “Voices of Combat” with a strap-line reading: “CONSTITUTION: Ministers intensify ‘yes’ and ‘No’ battle over review Bill as some accuse Raila of plan to oust Kibaki govt through referendum”. The story said: “Chants of ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ continued to reverberate across Kenya yesterday as leaders intensified their support or opposition to the proposed new constitution. Roads Minister Raila Odinga led the ‘No’ brigade to a rally in Malindi where it declared the war was won as Vice President Awori, who is holding brief for President Kibaki who is in the United States , took the battle for the ‘Yes’ to Central Kenya.” In that well-done and punchy 70-word intro words that suggest adversarial confrontation are deliberately used again and again and they are: brigade, war, battle ! An excellent example of hype and hoopla!
The Daily Nation of September 13 had a splash headline reading “Shots Fired as Kanu MPs Clash over Constitution”. The kicker said: “Serut punched and kicked after bribery claim” and the story read: “Shots were fired as tension over the proposed new Constitution erupted into violence at a funeral attended by former President Moi and rival Kanu MPs. There was chaos in the VIP enclosure when local MP John Serut was punched and kicked after trying to talk to MP William Ruto.” An excellent example depicting the style used by leaders in the referendum contest – typical “game of strategy” story.
The Independent of September 31 had a sensational headline reading: “Referendum Shock as…Raila, Uhuru hire Mungiki.” The story claimed: “According to well-placed sources, Mungiki is back in full force and enjoying the services of a senior politician in the Opposition. The onset of campaign for the Draft Constitution has provided a fertile ground for all these organised bands of rumble (sic) rousers as the campaign for YES and NO heats up. The violence that was witnessed in the No rally at Thika Stadium last week is a pointer of things to come as the No and YES protagonist (sic) intensify their campaign ahead of the November 21 referendum”. This was yet another “Game of Strategy” story based on very scanty facts though it led to the arrest of suspected Mungiki leaders.
In a story headed “ 2007 Battle Begins” The Kenyan Spectator of September 29 said: “ Behind the headline chaos touching the campaign rallies ahead of November 21 constitutional referendum are strategic boardroom manouvers (sic) meant to woo voters, in styles similar to a general election. The Kenya Spectator opens the curtains in both the Orange and Banana camps, for you to see the game of money, wit, charm, deception and partly high-tech mechanism going on in the recently unveiled secretariats.” Typical hype and hoopla!
In its issue of September 23-29 The Leader splash story “We will Topple Kibaki, Orengo Finally Reveals” says: It’s no longer secret. The Opposition to the Wako Draft Constitution by the naysayers is an excuse to take over power from President Mwai Kibaki. This bold declaration last week by former Ugenya MP, James Orengo is bound to raise temperatures further in the banana-orange imbroglio over the country’s future constitutional dispensation.” Yet another “Game of Strategy” story.
The Times of October 4’s splash headline read “Wako, Kalonzo Clash” with a strap-line saying “Ministers Trade ‘lies’ Charge in Public over Constitution.”. The story said: “Attorney General Amos Wako and Environment Minister Kalonzo Musyoka yesterday clashed in public over the draft constitution. Elsewhere three Ministers found themselves in trouble when they attempted to crusade for Yes vote at an international conference . In the first incident, Mr. Wako uncharacteristically locked horns in public with colleague Kalonzo and accused the later who is a leading light in the Orange team of spreading malicious propaganda on the contents of the proposed constitution ….Meanwhile Cabinet Minister Joseph Munyao, Martha Karua and Assistant Minister Beth Mugo were booed and urged to return to their seats when they allegedly digressed from the official matters and delved into the Orange and Banana debate. The trio were guests during the official ceremony to mark World’s Habitat Day. This year’s ceremony was hosted by the Mavoko municipal council in Athi River.” Game of Strategy!
According to the first Chairman of the Constitution of Kenya Review Commission, Prof. Yash Pal Ghai, a referendum is an important device for the expression of the consent of the people. But we ought to remind ourselves, he says, that referendums can be manipulated and have been used by dictators to bolster their regimes. In an article published by The Sunday Standard of October 23, he says the referendum offered a choice between ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ (but) did not give the people the right to make decisions. He warned that a referendum was not necessarily a constructive device in multi-ethnic societies as it tended towards ethnic polarisation. The most important question to ask following that remark by the professor is whether or not the journalists engaging in the game of strategy in reporting the referendum were themselves victims of ethnic polarisation.
Journalists from all the national and alternative media mentioned above may very well claim that all the stories I am talking about did indeed take place and they were only fulfilling their professional duties of complying with the news values of timeliness, human interest , proximity, consequences , impact and prominence. That may be so but it does not change the fact that they highlighted the Game of Strategy and paid very little attention to the Substance of the Referendum which unfortunately they chose to sweep under the carpet despite its important role in the entire exercise. So what really could they have done? What was the Substance of the Referendum anyway?
The Substance of the Referendum
Given the fact that the Kenyans voters who are regular newspaper readers and customary TV viewers or constant radio listeners are among the elite in our society, the coverage of the referendum became more demanding than the provision of stories based on mere “Games of Strategy”. These were the people who wanted to know from the media a little bit more of the analysis of the various interpretation of the content of the proposed constitution.
Journalists who were interested in the substance of the referendum became serious writers who provided their readers with what professionals call ‘backgrounders’, news analysis and commentaries about new proposals compared with what is contained in the current constitution. The ‘race horse’ drama of who was winning the referendum and who was losing was brought about in their reports in the form of letting the people know what they stood to gain or lose by making whatever choice they made. This kind of analytical coverage of the referendum tended to be the exception rather than the rule and was mainly confined in a handful of the up market media of the Kenyan society such as The East African and The Daily Nation and to a lesser extent The Standard.
Two journalists were outstanding in their presentation of the substance of the referendum to the public – Louis Otieno of KTN and Rose Kamotho when she chaired the first great debate covered live by almost all the radio and TV stations in the country. Ms Kamotho as the chairperson of the debate was tough and tried her best to make the participants dwell on real issues rather than hype and hoopla. For this she was seriously attacked by David Ochami , a senior staff writer of Sunday Time who commented : “What had been anticipated and marketed as Kenya’s biggest debate easily degenerated into an anticlimax thanks to the moderator’s recklessness and bias. Rose Kamotho achieved what she and the Media Owners’ Association had planned beforehand i.e. to strike a blow for the banana campaign. As they celebrated their genius journalism was left the poorer and the silent majority of journalists the shamed.” Well presented argument but based on what evidence? The majority of readers’ views’ and listeners’ reaction called for more debates based on facts contained in the new proposals but obviously Ochami did not think so. Could he also be a victim of ethnic polarisation? The report of the debate was fully covered by the Daily Nation and a short story about it appeared in The Standard of October 19. Whether the debate and the Daily Nation story helped the voters make up their minds the result clearly tell whether or not Ochami accepts them.
Over a million Kenyans saw Ms. Kamotho stopping Prof. Anyang Nyongo from attacking Citizen Radio and urged him to be relevant and discuss the content of the proposed constitution. During the debate Raphael Tuju challenged his opponent to point out differences in the content of the Boma’s Draft and the proposed draft as far as land issues and Bill of Rights were concerned. The Orange team were up in arms arguing that the Boma’s draft was not the subject of the debate. Yet as soon as they left the studio they told various public rallies that they backed the Boma’s draft. Why couldn’t journalists pin them down to declare their real stand?
What was most noticeable among Kenyan journalists was their preference to concentrate on issues concerning disagreements among the leaders so that the stories they wrote tended to be rather sensational. This was in keeping with the journalists’ desire to highlight issues concerning conflict as human-interest stories. Another aspect of concern for reporters interested in the substance of elections was the two groups’ traits and record. In a minority of cases serious journalists reviewed all the candidates’ past positive and negative contribution to the society and predicted what was likely to happen when the people either rejected or accepted the proposed constitution.
This kind of analysis was not done adequately in the referendum yet it was clear if used effectively it could rid Kenya of the culture of blindly agreeing with leaders whose only qualification was the tribe they belonged to or the support they got from bigger godfathers. It was the kind of journalism that would have made people take a stand based on informed position rather than simply agreeing with leaders because they came from the same tribe or even clan. The notion that journalists would always highlight human interest issues caused by odd incidents was proved right during the campaign for both Orange and Banana groups when even the most serious among them pegged their otherwise unprejudiced analysis to petty incidents of conflict, adventure and self interest.
This meant no matter how much journalists wanted to dwell with the “Substance of the Referendum”, the factors and orientations of news production pushed them to see serious interpretation of the new proposal and comparison with the current constitution to quickly losing their ‘newsworthiness’ whereas campaign missteps and the bizarre events of the whole process were ‘fresh occurrences’ which adequately answered the journalist news value requirement of timeliness. Unfortunately once leaders made known their position on an issue, further statements concerning that issue declined in news value sense. Therefore journalists covering the referendum had to have a good nose for news to produce good copy after sitting through innumerable repetitions of speeches by the same people talking about the same issues in different parts of constituencies.
One area that totally failed in Kenyan journalism in so far as the coverage of the referendum was concerned was the little attempt made by the practitioners to get exclusive stories from leaders from the two groups on significant interpretation of specific parts of the new proposal and what is contained in the current constitution. That would have led to real assistance to the voters by laying bare at least two aspects of the two groups:
1. Whether they had adequate knowledge about the matters highlighted in the new proposal compared with the current constitution.
2. Whether their stand on such important issues as the country’s constitution were actually reasonable and not mere tactic to win peoples’ support.
On Kenyatta Day President Kibaki tried hard to dwell on the substance of the proposed constitution by explain to voters about the consequences of voting No. According to The Standard of the next day, October 21, the President said: “On November 21, we shall all be participating in a historic referendum to decide whether we adopt the proposed constitution or remain with the current Constitution.” The Standard report continued: “But the Orange team that is asking Kenyans to vote ‘No’ on the proposed Constitution reacted angrily to this assertion and accused the Government of hoodwinking Kenyans. In a statement faxed from its secretariat, the No campaign team said the referendum was not about the current or the proposed constitution. ‘It is about determining whether the proposed constitution is good for the country or not. The choice is between the flawed Wako Draft and the new, better constitution agreed through a consultative process that is acceptable to the majority of Kenyans”. So who was right? The President or the Orange secretariat? The Standard didn’t say.
The answer was probably to be found in the Daily Nation of September 6, a day after the Electoral Commission Chairman; Samuel Kivuitu launched the Orange and Banana teams. According to the splash story titled “D-day for Historic Constitution Vote” the paper said: If the Yes voters win, it will pave the way for the new constitution and will become the third since independence 42 years ago. But if the No voters triumph, Kenya will keep the current constitution that has governed the nation for the same period and has been vilified for vesting too much power in the Presidency.” At that time there was no reaction from the Orange group.
According to one great editor, C.P. Scott, comment is free but facts are sacred and that is the one aspect of Kenyan journalism where the ethical importance of Impartiality was be put to test during the coverage of the referendum .These famous words by Scott are at times forgotten by Kenyan journalists when they ignore the vital question of separation of news from comment, or the religious avoidance of what in current usage is termed tendentiousness. Americans simply call it editorializing. Though Scott’s words have been classic, they tend to lose much of their force if divorced, as they commonly are, from their context.
What C. P. Scott said was: “The newspaper is of necessity something of a monopoly, and its first duty is to shun the temptations of monopoly. Its primary office is not the gathering of news .At the peril of its soul it must see that the supply is not tainted .Neither in what it gives nor in what it does not give, nor in the mode of presentation, must the unclouded face of truth suffer wrong. Comment is free, facts are sacred. Propaganda, so called, by this means is hateful. The voice of opponents no less than of friends has a right to be heard. Comment is also justly subject to a self imposed restraint. It is well to be frank; it is even better to be fair.” According to yet another journalism scholar, Wilson Harris, the highest canons of journalism could find no better definition than that.
Yet even Harris admits that this is not quite all the story. He says the question how far it is the function of the Press to give the public what the public wants is still worth asking. Here, of course the element of competition enters in. It is convenient to speak generally of the Press, but what is meant in fact is a number of individual newspapers, each of them intend on increasing its circulation at the expense of the others .In the campaign the odds are all in the a paper that gives its readers what its readers want, as against a rival who gives them what it thinks they ought to have.
Despite the journalistic rules of impartiality, Kenyan readers have a special liking for editorialized presentation of news the way The Leader kept doing throughout the campaign period. Many of its front page stories presented to the people of Kenya as hard news stories were in actual fact commentaries. For example the story published on October 14-20 issue with a heading saying “Kibaki’s Patience Now Makes Raila Reckless” went ahead and pretended to give Kenyan news which in fact was opinion: “There is no doubt that Raila Odinga is the leader against the adoption of the Wako Draft, mainly because the proposed document does not contain a powerful executive Prime Minister, a position which is believed to have been custom-created for him by the Bomas conclave through his deft scheming.” Excellent editorial sadly presented to the people as hard news story.
In his book Press Bias and Politics Jim A. Kuypers discusses how media frame controversial issues. Analysing the book, Amazon.com says it charts the effects the printed press – and by extension, broadcast media – have upon messages of political and social leaders when they discuss controversial issues.
After examining 700 American press reports Kuypers concludes that media bias hurts the democratic process in general by ignoring non-mainstream left positions and vilifying many moderates and vast majority of right leaning positions. If similar studies were conducted in Kenya some form of bias in the Kenyan media will also be discovered. On October 17, 2005, for example, The Standard had a front page splash story with a heading saying “Kibaki Plans New Districts for Nakuru as Race Hots Up”.
That headline had a strap-line on top saying “Orange Sweeps Through Coast, Western and Predicts Victory while…” The ‘tone” of the entire story gave the impression that President Kibaki was planning to create new districts in Nakuru in order to win votes to support the proposed constitution in a referendum which was about to take place. The story below the headline said “ President Kibaki’s announcement is likely to be seen by the orange (No) platform as yet another campaign freebie planned by the government ahead of the November 21st referendum on the proposed new constitution.” On the back page of the Daily Nation of the same date the same story appeared with a very different tone. Its headline said “State To Consider District Plea.” Its kicker said “Kibaki agrees with MPs’ Call That Nakuru deserves Two New Units.” The story said: President Kibaki yesterday said the Government would consider proposals to create two new districts in Nakuru.”
The slant in the Daily Nation story was that the President was reacting to the demands of the people. It was a pro-Kibaki “tone”. The “tone” of The Standard was that the President was bribing people to support the new Constitution. It was an anti-Kibaki slant.
May be the most sophisticated coverage of the referendum came in the picture on October 22 when Public Opinion Journalism dominated all the front pages of both national and alternative media. Conducted by the respected Steadman Group the report made journalist write hybrid stories mixing the game of strategy and the substance of the referendum. From the report came out stories that indicated that Mwai Kibaki was still the most popular politician in the country and his popularity was steadily going up. Raila, the leader of the Orange team was fourth in line after Uhuru Kenyatta and Kalonzo Musioka.
The results also indicated that the current constitution was most unpopular with only 9 per cent of the voters backing it yet only ten per cent of Kenyans had attended civic education which would have made them realize backing the Orange camp was backing the hated constitution. The media had a lesson to learn from the polls because it revealed to them that 13 per cent of the people thought they had been very unfair in reporting the referendum and 30 per cent more thought they were “somewhat unfair”.
Public Opinion Journalism was introduced in Kenya by the Daily Nation on March 24 1999 when I predicted in May of that year in Expression Today’s Media Review that public opinion journalism “will become very popular in every aspect of the media. They will soon use opinion polls as a source of news. Soon it will dominate political reporting, with very major news organizations conducting their own polls, with results – true or false – reaching the people through hard news headlines.” What worried me at that time and still worries me now is the likely eventuality of journalists and pollsters joining hands in establishing their own agenda by conducting hypothetical polls simply by asking what journalism scholars call “what if” questions. As a mater of fact, “what if” journalism is an aspect of the profession which makes many defenders of the truth very wary of journalism, based on opinion palls.
Needless to say, I argued in 1999, polls result very much depend on the questions asked and the manner in which those questions are framed. Serious opinion journalism will be determined only by understanding the wording of the questions posed before readers , listeners and viewers can take seriously public conclusions arrived at after opinion polls . My misgivings about public opinion polls as a source of news notwithstanding, Kenyans will soon learn to accept the fact that the state of mind of a large population will inevitably influence major events in this country. What needs to be accepted at this early stage of connecting polls with authentic source of news, I said then, is the fact that the public state of mind could be artificially created by the mass media.
Used properly, I still maintain, public opinion journalism can enhance freedom of expression. Unfortunately that freedom of expression was threatened at the peak of the campaign when the Minister for Internal Security, John Michuki threatened to shut down Family TV for hosting Prof. Anyang Nyongo who backed the Orange team. According to The Standard of October 24 the Minstre warned the station by saying: “Let them look at the frequencies again and know that they belong to the Government. It will take them away if they continue to abuse the privilege.” Pathetic!
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