The Government of Kenya's Communication Office has put out in yesterday's (Sunday) papers paid advertisements in which it aims to dispel the fears raised against the so called Media Bill, recently signed into law by the President.
We republish that paid advert here (for free) noting that it has been available on Dr. Mutua's website for a while now, the date on the website is 19th December. Kenyans would likely have been less surprised by the presidential assent if they had read this opinion then.
We think we heard KBC, the State broadcaster, rather the publicly owned broadcaster, issue a statement in its 7pm bulletin attempting to redefine the debate and to cast the law, which it had roundly condemned, in a much more favourable light.
Seeing as the Vice President and the Prime Minister had both given the public assurances that the state would not seek to gag the media and the Sunday Standard's description of their being just as surprised as the Kenyan public at the presidential assent, the bill's promotion into law is being seen as a sign that all is not well in the Grand Coalition.
Close associates of the PM and
Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka have confided in The Standard on Sunday
that they were not consulted over the decision to assent to the Bill.
"The
move is unpopular with the people and our feeling is that the President
wants to go down with everybody, forgetting that some of the key
players like the PM and the VP have a political future beyond 2012. Of
course Raila and Kalonzo will resist his unorthodox manouvres," a
minister observed.
That said, the Vice President's right hand man, the Minister for Metropolitan Development in the Sunday Standard and the Prime Minister himself in the news last night (taking a break from a photo-op with the President's family at the Coast) promised to seek to amend the act in parliament.
The Kenyan media meanwhile, persists with the shrill denunciations.
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This morning, as I walked to work, I came across people distributing leaflets trying to explain the government position. From the contents of the leaflets (similar to the document above), the media is making a mountain out of a molehill. The fact that a government must resort to paid advertisements and leaflets to get its point across shows that there's something wrong with our media.
The kind of reporting in Kenyan media is fast crossing the boundaries of what is acceptible politically, socially and morally.
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The kind of reporting in Kenyan media is fast crossing the boundaries of what is acceptible politically, socially and morally.