It was gratifying last week to see several articles celebrating World Press Freedom Day marked on May 3. The 2020 World Press Freedom Index by lobby group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) ranks Kenya at position 103 out of 180 countries. The country has dropped three ranks from 100 last year.
Kenya is still the best country to practice journalism in East Africa compared to Tanzania (124), Uganda (125), South Sudan (138), Rwanda (155) and Burundi (160).
RSF says: “Kenya has seen a slow erosion of media freedom in recent years. The political situation and security concerns have been used since 2016 as grounds for restricting the freedom to inform. During election campaigns, the media are routinely subjected to physical attacks by the security forces and the public, as well as to threats and intimidation by politicians, confiscation of equipment, and censorship of journalistic content.”
To media watchers this statement is indisputable. The coronavirus pandemic has brought to light the increasingly difficult media environment in Kenya. Numerous attacks on reporters by security officers enforcing government preventive restrictions have been documented.
Yet the media is listed as an essential service that is exempt from certain restrictions. One shudders at the thought of what the situation would have been if the media were not listed as such.
By all accounts, the government is the chief violator of press freedom, although politicians and members of the public are also culpable.
What is often missing in analyses of press freedom in Kenya is the role of the business community. Everyone knows the pressure advertisers impose on journalistic freedom.
Important stories have been tossed into the dustbin or significantly watered down because they exposed the dirt in a certain company that spends millions of shillings in advertising. There are firms in Kenya with terrible records but whose stories will never be told in the media. They are sacred cows.
If they don’t use the threat of withdrawing advertising, they will ask their lawyers to demand retractions and apologies for critical stories, failure to which they would sue. Hardly a week passes in Nairobi without a demand letter sent to a media house.
Sometimes brave media managers scoff at those letters and the hungry lawyers scurry off, tails between their legs. But more often, media houses are forced to negotiate to avoid the disruptions of litigation and likely hefty awards by the courts.
Journalism must be practiced within the law. The reputations of individuals and organisations are important and must be respected. That said, the threat of litigation now hangs over media houses like the sword of Damocles. It has caused a chilling effect on media freedom.
What is the way forward – apologies for the ugly cliché? Two things, one, individuals and organisations fighting media freedom are part of corruption fighting back. No one should fear factual, professional journalism – unless they have something to hide. That means media managers and individual journalists must be brave and never give in to threats to silence them.
And two, journalists must observe professional rigour. Do your work well. Report accurately and fairly. Keep safely all documents, notes, recordings and any other material in sensitive stories. You never know what some hungry lawyer is thinking.
A free and bold media is essential in the urgent task of cleaning up the rot in this society.
