The media can be a foe or a friend. At the height of their power, Kenyan politicians have tended to treat the media as a foe. From the current Deputy President and his boss back along the list of Kenyan leaders, they have had choice statements to make about the media.

These statements, however, have not been mere words; they have been backed by actions. The political class has not hesitated to use derogatory terms like “githeri” to refer to the media and has even dismissed newspapers as nothing more than meat-wrapping material at the butchery.

Unfortunately, journalists are often treated as mere extensions of the events they cover rather than as critical contributors to national discourse. This dynamic persists as long as politicians hold power. However, the tune changes dramatically when politicians find themselves out of power and suddenly need a platform to engage with the public.

In Kenya, the political class has passed laws designed to limit the place of media in society. It is one of the countries with a tightly regulated press choking it from every side.

Not only the software of media, journalism, but also the hardware of media is subject to tight regulation. There are layers of taxes for setting up the operations and a host of licences that must be acquired. To the Kenyan political class, the fewer the media outlets, the better.

This is not new. For years, the Kanu regime could not countenance a plurality of media. After much public demand and agitation, licences were eventually distributed to regime friends.

Only after the 2002 elections did media liberalisation, particularly electronic media, kick off in earnest. But even then, government honchos were still keen to give licences only to regime friends. Those perceived to be in the good books got privileges and subsidies that allowed them to enter the market easily.

But occasionally, the government still lets its claws out. The old mechanisms of controlling the media remain in place: denying them access to advertising, which was probably first applied in 1979 against the Weekly Review, or threatening journalists, which was a standard tool in the early 1980s.

In recent times, save for the overt targeting of newsrooms by a former first lady and later some goons, the government has transitioned to more subtle forms of operation. Part of it has been discrediting the media before the public and seeking to privilege social media.

The popularity of social media notwithstanding and its new role in the community, it still has its limitations. The most effective strategy remains a combination of the latest and old tools. Thus, it came as little surprise when recently Kenya’s number two ranking politician has not only been giving interviews left, right and centre but has come to a new appreciation of the importance of media in society. The old hubris is gone, replaced by the desire to see a more robust fourth estate.

This new recognition of the media is welcome for the many roles it plays in society. Given our demographics, radio, part of the legacy media, still remains king of the industry.
With over 200 stations now in Kenya, many of them provide a range of content in local languages, and they remain critical communication tools for anybody interested in reaching the furthest corner of the country.

Radio is a popular socialisation tool through talk-back programmes, music, and salams, but more critically, it is an essential cog in two-step communication. It is on the radio that national issues are reduced to local understanding, thereby gaining local relevance. They provide a common avenue through which social media is amplified; local tweets gain a new life.

It is not that politicians who criticise the media at every opportunity are not aware of this, or that the media, like a chameleon, changes its colours. If anything, it is the political class that changes colour with the changing fortunes. Perhaps this is just simple advice to the political class – not throwing stones when the going is good but remembering that a rainy day is coming.
— The writer is the Dean of Daystar
University’s School of Communication