Kenyans,
basking in the so genannte expansion
of Press freedoms gained after the revolution of 2002 will hardly pay any
attention to the increasing tightening of the screw on the Standard Group and
its employees.
Likely many
of us already retain an animus against the East African Standard, the worn
phrase being that it is a tabloid, given to an obsessive publication of
untruths and hyperbole that is unbecoming for a newspaper of its influence or
size. There will be a schadenfreude in many quarters as financial pressure is brought to bear on the Standard, especially among its competitors but the pain that is now the Standard's will soon be shared by all Kenya.
While it is
true that the Standard (perhaps fittingly for a red-top) is sometimes less
officious than the other major national paper, it is also a fact that the
Standard occupies an important place in our political landscape. It is often
the only paper willing to go toe-to-toe with the establishment and to suffer
the consequences. One need only ponder for example, what Kenya would be
if the newspaper had folded or taken an attitude similar to its larger
competitor. Not only would we know nothing about the Arturs, we would likely
lay naked to all manner of plots and schemes exercised by them and by whatever
powers brought them into our midst. These schemes may have amounted to nothing,
these men may be nothing but adolescent poseurs, but they may also be dangerous
to national security, and if the blasé attitudes of the police and intelligence
services are anything to go by, we would foolish to trust them with our care. Absent
the Standard, the Arturs would be the comical subjects of bar-room gossip, even
as they claim to have received offers to assassinate Kenyan politicians, even
as they brandished guns at State security, even as they drove around in government
plates, as they threatened the Commissioner of Police even as they enjoyed
access to sensitive national sites and morphed from wanted international
criminals to Deputy Commissioners of our own police.
If, as
anyone with a shred of common sense will no doubt agree, power corrupts then it
must also be said that this power needs to be checked. If all Kenya has for a public
watchman are a press whose editorial policy colludes with the powers that rule
over us, tip-toeing gently to avoid offence, then we are much poorer for it and
our freedom of speech is a nonsense. That there are small newspapers that are willing to take up the the crusade for the
public interest is not sufficient. Few Kenyans read these newspapers, and their output no matter how well researched suffers the eternal tag of ‘gutter-press'
and is not taken seriously. A large and constantly visible anti-government
press is a vital part of any functioning democracy, especially one where the
rules of engagement in parliament are such that large elements of the political
class, even those in the opposition, have interests inimical to the public good.
Now this loud noise is the sound of the directors of the
Standard Group nailing their (in this case) 13 theses to the door of justice and good
governance. The papal bull is on its way, riding on the waves of public apathy
an if as the State seems intent on ensuring; the Standard Media Group goes
under, the edict from on high will return us to cold dark days we thought we
had left behind. We ignore the plight of the Standard at our peril; an
unfettered Press is the very cornerstone of democratic government.
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But can the media use the same tactics as say opposition politicians in criticising the government? That in my mind would be wrong since the media would be accused of lacking objectivity. It is however possible to do this if the media house identifies itself with a particular political leaning. In the UK it is easy to know the media that support the labour party or the conservative party.
What is happening in Kenya is perhaps a new phenomenon where the media plays politics whilst informing the citizenry of their government's folly.
It is therefore inevitable that the political leadership in government will view the attacks as sponsored by their political opponents, and will attack those sections of the media that do not agree with them.
It is clear that the government apart from declaring martial law on the Standard, it has also decided to go for the commercial jugular of the newspaper. The government and its departments and commercial organisations control a huge chunk of the media advertising and will give it those that support it since advertising is not entirely subject to the procurement rules that control how many biros we shall buy and from whom. It is therefore very likely that the Standard will be starved off advertising and this will seriuosly hurt it financially. No newspaper can survive on circulation sales only.
In the meantime their friends at Kimathi house put on an objective critical face against the government and in the process reap most of the revenue from government advertising.
This brings up the question of whether the media houses first thrive for commercial reasons or public service. If I had shares in nation media group, you can bet my first check is the balance sheet of the paper and not how many slug fests the media house has had with the government.
Sadly, soon rather than later, the commercial owners of the Standard will start seeing the financial power of the government and will force change on the editorial floor.
Thereafter we can all come to the net and moralise about how bad the government is etc. Remember always that commercial consideration overrides many others!