Kenyan editors have done very good job protecting the truth

One day, during this long and rather eventful career, a national leader was fighting to stay awake during a boring public function in Kwale, if my memory serves me right.

It was sweltering hot and humid and the leader loosened his belt for a bit of comfort.

When it was his turn to address the gathering, the sleepy, overheating man stood up, having completely forgotten about having loosened his belt.

He stood at the mike in his underwear, his trousers around his ankles.

Being a rather clumsy fellow, his futile attempts to regain and fasten his trousers were not just comical, but sad too.

In 2004, a national leader told a gathering that it would be a disaster if George W. Bush won the US election, whose results at the time were impending.

Hours later, Mr Bush won the election handily.

The country was faced by a diplomatic disaster because the leader was of such seniority as to have his private views interpreted as the views of the government in which he served.

In 2003, we spent a lot of time sending teams to comb Othaya for old men who claimed to have accompanied then President Mwai Kibaki to pay dowry for Ms Mary Wambui.

Mr Kibaki called a press conference, the first of a few, and was quite categorical: “I have only one wife.”

A journalist’s first responsibility is to find the truth and get it to his readers as quickly as possible.

But a journalist also has a responsibility to be circumspect.

You live in a country whose stability and welfare are also your responsibility.

It is also your job to protect the reputations of both individuals and institutions, unless those persons and institutions have no reputation by virtue of wrongdoing.

UNFAIR POSITION
It always surprises me when I get complaints from the government and the public, accusing the Daily Nation of being sensational, gutter, and only interested in selling copies.

Because nothing could be farther from the reality.

Right now I am, as is often the case, under siege.

On the one hand is a government suffering a very deep siege mentality of itself and which believes that the Daily Nation is working with the opposition to bring it down and precipitate a 2007 kind of situation.

The government has at times withdrawn advertising, withheld payment for long periods, and leaders have told their followers that these “Raila newspapers” are worthless, good only for wrapping meat.

On the other hand, the opposition is categorical that the Daily Nation is a “Kikuyu” paper which is working to sustain Jubilee in power.

As a result, ODM bloggers have been working on us viciously for a time now.

There are leaders who have encouraged their followers not to read us for that reason.

I cannot remember the last time I had a civil discussion with an opposition leader.

Content analysis by more than one international expert returns the obvious finding: our reporting is neither government nor opposition leaning.

But in the minds of our politicians, if you are not in bed with me, you must be my enemy.

There is no such thing as an independent position.

COURAGEOUSNESS
The government is the author of its own predicament.

It has gagged itself by not investing in effective communication and creating a stricture in the flow of information to the public through this mongrel called the Government Advertising Agency.

How will people understand you if you cannot talk because you have stuffed paper in your mouth?

Secondly, the government has abdicated its communications to brokers, jobbers, and ne’er-do-wells.

These charlatans know that if there is an effective relationship between government and the media, then they will become irrelevant.

So they feed the politicians’ paranoia, they create monsters in the media, they create danger, they paint us as wild-haired anarchists working feverishly to destroy everything.

Solution? Bags of money to calm down the wild-haired madmen.

It is the most stupid con job in town where people trade in the names of editors they have never met.

And nobody picks up the phone to check their claims.

If you look at the facts, editors have been more thoughtful and responsible in their decisions than politicians.

They have protected the truth and acted with courage even under the most dangerous of situations.

CLARITY

Politicians often retreat behind their heavily protected mansions and looked down their publicly funded noses at those who dare to speak the truth to power.

The picture of an important gentleman in his underwear never made it to the front pages.

It would have served no purpose other than to embarrass a blameless man.

And it is unfair for a man with a loose tongue to jeopardise the welfare of a whole nation just because he could not govern his hot mouth.

And if a man tells you a woman is not his wife, who are you to say that she is?

And by the way, headlines do not sell newspapers. Stories do. But yes, the headlines sell the stories. Confused?       

[email protected]. @mutuma_mathiu