Creating this vibrancy, across all media channels, are an estimated 3,000 journalists.
For many years, Kenya has beenthe place to run to for journalistsfrom more repressive neighbouringcountries. It has been a hub wheremost foreign journalists coveringAfrica have operated from. Howeverthe sense of Kenya as a safe havenhas changed dramatically in recentyears. It is a country that has becomeincreasingly unsafe for journalists,bloggers and media workers, whohave been forced to operate in anenvironment of insecurity, andimpunity. Violence against journalistshas become the new normal, ratherthan the exception.
This week, in our joint report -Not Worth the Risk: Threats to FreeExpression Ahead of Kenya’s 2017Election - ARTICLE 19 and HumanRights Watch examine the risks tofree expression ahead of the electionsin Kenya this year. This is not a reporton a state experiencing active conflictbut on Kenya, one of the leadingeconomies and most prosperousnations in Africa.
The report highlights 14 specificcases over a four year period wherepolice have arrested journalists butthen released them without charge.Journalists and bloggers have beenthreatened, intimidated, harassed,beaten, physically attacked andarbitrarily sacked. Since the beginningof the year, not one week has passedwithout a recorded incident againsta journalist. The act of reporting oncorruption, disputed land acquisition,counter-terrorism operations,and electoral-related violence, hasbecome a dangerous occupation.
It is clear that the perpetrators ofthe attacks are mostly security agents,government officials or politicians andthe levels of violence and impunityare on the increase. ARTICLE 19recorded 38 incidents of attacksagainst journalists in 2014. By 2015that figure had jumped to 65 recordedincidents, including the murder ofJohn Kituyi, the 62 year old editor ofthe Mirror Weekly newspaper.
Women journalists and bloggershave not been spared. In 2015, anunidentified assailant, who somebelieve was a government securityofficer, physically assaulted ahuman rights and anti-corruptionblogger, Florence Wanjeri Nderu,leaving her with serious injury toone eye. The attacker warned heragainst continuing with her blogson corruption, yet despite a detailedreport to the police provided by Nderu, police have failed to investigate hercase.
The number of attacks droppedin 2016: we recorded 46 incidentsof attacks on the Kenyan media, butthere is significant concern that theactual numbers are hidden due tofear of reprisals.
On September 7, 2016, a brutal attackoccurred against a photographer atthe hands of unidentified assailantswho forced themselves into the houseof photojournalist Denis Otieno, in thetown of Kitale in the Rift Valley. Theydemanded photos in his camera, andthen shot him dead. Otieno is believedto have photographed police officersshooting to death a motorcycle taxirider at a Kitale bus station a fewdays earlier. Nine months after thegruesome murder of Denis Otieno,no one has been arrested or chargedwith his killing.
In 2017, an election year, 31 attackson the press have been recorded byARTICLE 19. In over 90 per cent ofthose recorded cases over the lastfour years there has been no credibleand timely investigation opened bythe police. In the cases where someinvestigation is initiated, generallyas a result of pressure on the police,little progress is made and theinvestigations have lapsed.
Impunity is embedded in theculture of the authorities responsiblefor investigating crimes. Eight yearsago the murder of journalist FrancisNyaruri who disappeared in January2009 after he went to interview apolice officer remains unresolved.Nyaruri’s body was found decapitatedtwo weeks after his disappearancewith evidence of torture.
Foreign journalists are not immuneto the hostile behaviour of theauthorities. In December 2016, JeromeStarkey, Africa Correspondent for theTimes Newspaper was deported afterbeing held incommunicado in theairport on arrival from the UnitedKingdom. No explanation was givenfor his expulsion. Other journalistshave been threatened with a ban forinvestigating alleged police deathsquads implicated in extrajudicialkillings.
The situation in Kenya isdeteriorating. There is strongevidence to support the view thatmost of those suspected of attackson journalists and media workersare state security agencies or publicfigures that enjoy connections withthe ruling elite.
Nevertheless, the judiciary havebeen consistent in protecting freedomof expression. In three separate cases,during the last three years, the HighCourt of Kenya declared eight sectionsof the Security Laws AmendmentAct, two sections of the penalCode and one section of the KenyaInformation and Communication Actunconstitutional. Parliament alsopassed a comprehensive access toinformation law and repealed someoffending sections of the OfficialSecrets Act.
While the legislature remainsrobust, the situation on the groundrequires strong and unequivocalleadership. Ahead of the generalelections in August this year,President, Uhuru Kenyatta mustdemonstrate that Kenya is safe forfree expression by systematicallycondemning the attacks andencouraging police, governmentofficials and security forces to endimpunity. Attacks of all kinds; killings,threats, harassment, obstruction,intimidation and arbitrary arrests ofjournalists and bloggers, has to stop.We need the Director of PublicProsecutions to ensure prompt,thorough, independent and effectiveinvestigation of all attacks, and toadopt a plan that would address thefailure to adequately investigate thecases.
In the run-up to the electionpoliticians and public officials shouldensure full respect for internationallaw by allowing full, open reportingand commentary on any issuesduring the election period and after.Matters of pressing public interest,including security, corruption, andaccountability for election-relatedviolence will have a bearing on thelegitimacy of the government to leadthe country.
Without open and transparent lawenforcement, and a genuine culture offree expression where journalists andbloggers are free to carry out theirwork, Kenya risks losing its status inthe world as a progressive and vibrantdemocracy.
Henry Maina is the RegionalDirector of ARTICLE 19 EasternAfrica
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