A new law that, if passed, will allow the Kenyan
government to determine the content, style, manner and schedule of
broadcasting, has drawn fierce resistance from the media industry.
The Kenya
Communications Amendment Bill 2008, which is now in its final stages of
the legislative process in Kenya's Parliament, proposes to set up a
communications commission appointed by the government to issue licences
to broadcasters and a raft of heavy fines and prison sentences for various offences.
The
media industry has rejected the law as draconian and retributive
for its critical stance on Kenya's intransigent parliament. Compared to
other laws in Kenya, the fines prescribed by the bill are generally too
high and suggest a discriminatory and vindictive attitude towards the
media.
Considering that this law is essentially about the
fundamental freedom of expression and opinion, the extreme measures are
unwarranted and unjust.
On 1 December 2008, the Media Institute
and Kenya Editors Guild called for the bill to be withdrawn to allow
for more consultations. The bill seeks to amend the Communications Act
of 1998 that was hastily enacted but which has
proved hopelessly inadequate in addressing the growth and performance of the broadcast media.
Media
Institute's director David Makali said the decision to lump
together professional aspects of the media with technical and
infrastructural ones was an affront. "Regulation of professional or
editorial content should be
left to professionally inclined
mechanisms of the existing Media Council to encourage both media
diversity and pluralism. Furthermore, given this government's track
record of relations with the media over the past six
years, the
media has cause to be apprehensive that the amendments as proposed will
seriously curtail media freedom," said Makali.
The Act empowers
the minister of information to control and regulate every aspect of
communications, including usurping editorial management by prescribing
what content should be aired and when, through a draconian
coding system.
The
Institute has also taken issue with provisions that duplicate the
roles already assigned to other institutions by law, such as the Media
Act and the Penal Code.
The Editors Guild described as alarming
the rush to legislate control of the media while "soft-pedaling on the
enactment of companion legislation such as the all-important Freedom of
Information Act."
"It is of urgent interest to just governance
and the future democracy of the country to legislate free and universal
access to information, which is not receiving the necessary attention,"
said Macharia Gaitho, chairman of the Kenya Editors Guild during a
joint press conference with the Eastern Africa Editors Forum and The
Media Institute on 1 December.
The bill, now in its third
reading stage (of four), is expected to be debated in Parliament this
week. It provides for a seven-member commission appointed by the
minister, four of whom are top government bureaucrats and a chair
appointed by the president. Its functions include issuing broadcasting
and ICT licences, ensuring the broadcasts are of good taste, and
generally overseeing the ICT sector.
The bill preserves the
powers of the minister for information (Section 86) to unilaterally,
without recourse to Parliament or the courts, enter, search and seize
broadcasting stations and apparatus and telecommunications
equipment
and dismantle and dispose of such stations and apparatus; intercept and
disclose telecommunications between persons and also to intercept,
disclose and dispose postal articles, which is an intrusion in privacy.
The bill also gives the information minister powers to "issue policy guidelines" to the "independent" Commission.
Said
the Media Institute: "To legislate good taste as a standard upon
which a broadcaster can be held criminally liable is both ambitious
and ambiguous. Culturally diverse societies such as Kenya do not have
a universal value of what is good or abhorrent, and the discretion of
the editor, guided by professional ethics and the existing laws on
public
nuisance and morality is in our view adequate."
The
proposed law is potentially beyond the powers of the Constitution
of Kenya and the Media Institute has vowed to challenge it in court if
enacted without amendments.
In January the government banned
live broadcasts after disputed presidential election results triggered
violent protests. A political settlement brokered by the African Union
set up a coalition government and a timeframe for constitutional reform
which is yet to begin.
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The media industry in this country has been given numerous opportunity to regulate themselves but have failed. If they had not failed to control themselves ,there would have been no need for parliament to keep on trying to regulate them.Have we ever seen anybody punished by the media council,or any other agency that the media fraternity may have? i am yet to see that happening .It is for this reason that some form of regulation is necessary.
If you leave in this country and by chance travels on matatus ,am sure if you are like me, get offended by the content of morning and evening talks by most of our FM stations.These station are just too vulgur .Sometimes you feel very embarrased if you are seated next to your parent or if you are travelling with your young ones because next time you will here them say somethings and just get overwhelmed and if you ask them where they had that ,they will narrate to you very well who said it......,our FM station are too preoccupied with the loin as if this is the only thing they can talk about on air.
If they are not talking about condums found in a car,a married man who went out with a lady and did it without condum and now does not know what to do,married ladies who do it with their husbands best men .......,then there are discribing the act its self.this is madness and needs a regulator.