Nation Media Group (NMG) management has been asked to go slow on sacking journalists to protect its reputation after a barrage of condemnation for what is viewed as a clampdown on press freedom. In the past three months alone, the media house has lost three senior editors and the region’s most respected cartoonist in very controversial circumstances.
Pinched by the negative publicity, His Highness the Aga Khan, NMG’s principal investor, is said to have asked the board headed by Mr Wilfred Kiboro, a former Nation CEO, to take steps to restore public confidence in its editorial independence, starting with a halt on further exits of top editors. He issued the orders on his recent tour of Kenya during which he launched NMG’s new state-of-the-art printing press.
The decision not to renew the 23-year-old contract of cartoonist Godfrey Mwampembwa, popularly known as Gado, the acrimonious exit of Denis Galava, the Managing Editor, Special Projects and Investigation and the sudden sacking of Sunday Nation News Editor Mugumo Munene and Investigations Editor Andrew Teyie fed into a series of actions that critics said were influenced by State House in the wake of negative coverage of the Jubilee administration’s handling of the affairs of State.
The most reported reason on why Gado’s services were discontinued was a cartoon in the East African newspaper that made nonsense of former Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete’s commitment to fighting sleaze. This severed Nation’s relations with Dar es Salaam which saw the paper banned for a while from circulating in the country. But it is an open secret that Jubilee mandarins also had bones to pick with the cartoonist.
Indeed, top managers at Nation Centre are said to have frequently received calls over Gado’s tendency to portray President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto as men whose conduct of government business was bogged down by their cases at the International Criminal Court. Uhuru’s charges have since been discontinued while a major ruling in the case against Ruto and former radio journalist Joshua arap Sang is due next week.
Mwampembwa, learned of his fate from editor-in-chief, Tom Mshindi, when he attempted to return early from a sabbatical, which had been initially agreed on to let things cool down.
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On the other hand, Galava was shown the door after he authored a stinging editorial that censured President’s score card for 2015 for “failing to follow the laid down procedures and endangering NMG’s business interests.”
Then Mugumo and Teyie were declared redundant, sparking reports that more senior editors and reporters were targeted as part of steps discussed at a State House meeting on Jamhuri Day last year where the Aga Khan was a state guest alongside Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.
The sackings did not go unnoticed both locally and internationally with press freedom defenders and journalists accusing the Aga Khan of scheming with the government as the country heads into tense elections next year.
However, State House has denied claims of state-led pressure. “This has nothing to do with the presidency,” said Manoah Epinisu, presidential spokesman. “Anyone saying that must be absolutely mad.”
But with NMG already engaged in a frenzied campaign to win back audiences, the Aga Khan is said to have chosen to act to avert any further denting of credibility.
Next Read >> Gado joins international media house after being sacked by Nation
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