Media clampdown is doomed to fail

Some lessons are never learned. Or so it seems from the latest clampdown on media freedom in the country.

The ‘Big Brother’ high-handedness of the Ministry of the Interior to wind back the clock to the yesteryears policy of media intimidation will flop, as did all the other past attempts.

Freedom of expression and the related freedom of the media are not privileges handed down by the government to a compliant society.

They are intrinsic and very much the essence of what defines us as Kenyans.

RULE OF LAW
We fought for them. No one will take them away from us, because we fought for them for a reason.

The reason is that we want to live in a democratic society under a constitution that requires accountability to the people and where rule of law is an essential and indispensable aspect of governance.

A free media are the gel that makes democracy thrive. Without it, authoritarianism creeps in.

The decision to shutdown the three main private media outlets — KTN, Citizen TV and NTV — in order to prevent them from covering a political event that challenges the legality of the government as currently constituted, is as abhorrent as it is unlawful.

OATH
The decision smacks of authoritarian intolerance, which we thought we had eradicated with the passage of the 2010 Constitution.

National Super Alliance leader Raila Odinga did not take the oath of office prescribed in the Constitution.

He did not describe himself as the President of Kenya under the Constitution.

The oath was not administered by the Chief Justice or the Deputy Chief Justice as required under the Constitution.

The oath was not even taken within the hours between 10am and 2pm as prescribed by law.

PEACEFUL
The entire proceedings at Uhuru Park, Nairobi, happened under the watchful eye of the police, whose principal constitutional responsibility is prevention of crime.

The proceedings were peaceful. No law was breached.

There was, therefore, no reasonable or lawful basis for the media shutdown or the ensuing harassment of the organisers of the event — no matter how strongly one feels about the event the media houses were prevented from covering.

They were not abetting or aiding in the commission of crime. The media were performing an essential democratic duty.

OPPRESSION
One need not agree with the Opposition in order to protest against the government’s high-handedness.

The defence of a constitutional principle has nothing to do with Nasa or Jubilee.

We are defending a constitutional and fundamental right for which we have shed blood and for which many have lost their lives.

It is a fundamental right that Kenyans will not want to lose ever again.

Those who think that they can ride roughshod over our freedoms had better be warned.

FREEDOM

Indeed, watching Dr Fred Matiang’i, the Cabinet Secretary for Interior, on one of the State-friendly media houses that was not shutdown, I couldn’t but wonder whether this is the same Fred Matiang’i who, as an employee of an American NGO, was seconded to the National Assembly to help to set up a media centre.

I was then a Member of Parliament and I vividly recall the many meetings we had with parliamentary leadership not only to get authorisation for the setting up of the media centre but also for the introduction of live transmission of parliamentary proceedings.

At the time, Matiang’i understood and defended the value of a society to whom information was disseminated without curtailment of essential democratic values.

FAILURE
Here is a perfect illustration of how power corrupts.

A beneficiary of the freedoms under the 2010 Constitution is now actively involved in the dismantling of that very Constitution.

Neither you, Dr Matiang’i, nor the government you serve with zeal will succeed.

The colonial government failed; the Kenyatta I government failed; the Moi government failed, as did the Kibaki government.

And, as surely as the day follows the night, the current assault on media freedoms will follow in the footsteps of the previous failed attempts.

Mr Imanyara, a former member of Parliament, is a lawyer and the editor and publisher of The Platform Magazine.