It is not about what the media has done or failed to do. It is about what people in power intend to do and what the media should not do about it. I am an old doctor. I can tell a mortal ailment from a passing cold. We are in the throes of the former.
It will be 30 years on December 5, since I walked through the gates of Broadcasting House to begin my tour of duty in public information. God only knows how we navigated our way through the heady 1980s to deliver the Second Liberation in November 1991.
Maybe you were too young to understand what we are talking about. You may not even have been born. Don’t worry. You may not have to scratch your head over these things for too long. The Kenya Information and Communication Bill (2013) sailed through Parliament on Thursday. This should be the time machine to roll you back into the dark past. You will no longer need people from the so-called Analogue Age to tell you about things like State oppression and liberation. You will take the blows squarely on your body.
A despotic Communications and Multimedia Appeals Tribunal is about to be born. It is one of the imminent babies of the monster of a Bill. Its bath pangs are pulsating.
It is now a matter of a few strokes of the pen from President Kenyatta’s left hand. This should sound the death knell for free media, democracy and the promise of common decency in Kenya.
The second coming of the reign of terror is clearly at hand. To paraphrase William Butler Yeats’ famous poem, “The darkness drops again. But now I know that fifty years of stony sleep were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle. And what a rough beast! Its hour come round at last, slouches towards State House to be born?”
The signs have been there. We have seen malefactors from Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army purporting to speak for individuals in the Government of Kenya. There was the mystery of the comedy of errors in the Westgate Saga. There were State denials, half-truths and innuendo. There were threats to arrest journalists. The serpent hisses where the sweet birds sing. What is someone trying to hide?
Elsewhere, six men defiled a 16-year-old girl. They dumped her into a 22-foot pit latrine. When she was eventually rescued, she reported the matter to the police. She identified three of the rapists. The police let off these beasts with the mockery of cutting grass. The media brought the scandal into the limelight. Once again, the Inspector General of the Police was quick to deny. The matter was never reported, he said. This, we were told, was “irresponsible journalism.” To date, the monsters remain free.
You often hear powerful people “advising” the Media to be “objective” and “patriotic” in its work. Every journalist worth his or her salt knows this. Our profession is not about maligning people. It is not about causing undue anxiety, discontent and disaffection about the country and the leadership. We are not in the business of hate mongering and divisiveness. We are indeed sensitised, from the very outset, about our privileged role and how harmful our work could turn out to be, if we comported ourselves irresponsibly.
We are the gatekeepers in the courts of information, knowledge and opinion. We decide what the public will be told and what it will not. In this, our role is three-tiered. First, we inform by presenting plain facts, hence the saying that facts are sacred, opinion free. It is understood that the very moment you infuse your opinion into a fact, it suffers dilution. This is regardless of how fair your opinion is.
It is also true, however, that facts have implications. We have been trained to delve into the province of implications. We approach this space with due balance, fairness and decorum. This is where our second mandate comes in. We are opinion leaders in matters of public interest.
Notions like balance, decorum and fairness in journalism are, however, semantic oxymora. With profound respect, I don’t know whether the Inspector General of the Police knows what semantic oxymora are. I don’t know that they teach such things at the Police academy in Kiganjo. Only highly trained professionals in the mass media can determine these notions in a piece of journalistic work. This is why we have been saying, “Leave it to the Media Council.”
Finally, the Media has the role of setting public agenda, whenever the occasion demands. When other institutions abdicate their responsibilities, we will point this out. We will call for action. We will do so with speed, spice and credence. And we have done so. We have been particularly outstanding in fighting corruption and ineptitude in high places. We unearthed Goldenberg, Anglo Leasing, the maize scandal and a cocktail of other acts of malfeasance by State functionaries. We called for action. To silence us, a tribunal of political appointees is about to be born. If they decide that what you have said is “controversial” you must produce a million shillings.
They say we are not “patriotic.” Patriotism is not keeping quiet about ineptitude and scandal in government. Mark Twain taught us long ago that patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it is right. When the fellows in government fumble and mess, the patriot must speak up. This is not because he loves them less. He only loves his country more.
I don’t have a million shillings. I have never had it. The threat of producing a million will, however, not bow me. When my government does what is not good for my country, my professional sense of responsibility to my country, and to my fellow citizen and my conscience will prevail. That is patriotism.
But President Kenyatta still has the last ace card.
He still has the chance to demonstrate that, on March 4th, we did not vote for impunity and for reversals and negations. He can reject this Bill. Your Excellency, over to you, once again.
The writer is a publishing editor, special consultant and advisor on public relations and media relations
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