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By Mzalendo Reporter - Moreen Majiwa (@mmajiwa)
This was my second visit to the media roundtable on media reporting on the ICC at the Alliance Française. The panellists this round were John Mwendwa of K24, Alex Chamwada, Evelyn Kwamboka and Harun Ndubi the only non-journalist on the panel.
The media round tables are intended to generate debate around media coverage of various issues and enhance media accountability. In an environment in which accountability and transparency are like gold i.e. scarce, it is admirable that members of the media establishment would hold public forums that open them up to scrutiny of the sharp-eyed public.
While it is generally agreed that the media’s coverage of political issues has improved since the coverage of the 2006-2007 election campaigns, election chaos and ensuing post election violence it was evident at the roundtable that the media establishment still faces a storm of criticism over its informative yet sometimes mishandled coverage of the trial of the 6 ICC suspects.
From the roundtable the consensus seems to be that despite the improved quality of coverage of the ICC, the media has once again succumbed to the politics of the day, negative ethnicity, and is currently being manipulated as tool for 2012 campaigns.
The result - while media is doing well the performance of its duty to convey information to Kenyan’s on the ICC process, it is doing less well in its duty to propagate truth. The impact - media coverage of the International Criminal Court (ICC) trial is skewed heavily towards what the ICC means for different politicians, what it means for political careers, what it means for the future of political parties as opposed to what the ICC process means for justice, and its implications for a just prosperous Kenya.
It was however acknowledged it would be difficult to divorce the coverage of the ICC trial from politics given the context. 5 of the suspects are prominent political figures, 2 of the suspects are also members of the Cabinet, 3 are also members of parliament, and 2 of the six have declared their intention to run for president in 2012.
Another issue that was raised was the issue of ownership of the media - who owns the media outlets? What personal, professional and financial ties do media owners have the various persons in the political establishment? How does this impact direction of stories carried by the media, and affected the media’s ability to hold politicians to account.
It may be simple to point an accusatory finger at the media over its coverage of the ICC suspects, however, in this instance it would also be fair to acknowledge that the media does not have the easy option of covering just the ICC 6 san politics...instead it faces hard choices on whether and how to do this.
Several suggestions were proffered - contextualise coverage; to hold political actions, and actors to the values that Kenyans aspire to see in their leaders i.e. those enshrined in Chapter 10 of the constitution; constantly provide the historical background to how the 6 came to be before the ICC; and juxtapose politicised rhetoric about the ICC process with real facts. It still remains to be seen if status quo in media content will remain or if it will change.
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