‘Experts’, this is how media works

 I have gone into a psychotic loop over the flak we got over our exposé about politicians trying to jump the Covid-19 queue a few days ago. Much of it was lots of shouting and a bit of the odd display of fake chest hair on social media. So, I am going to turn this into a service, a teaching moment, for purposes of therapy.

In this country, some of the biggest, most influential “media experts” are not journalists or media scholars. They are jobbers, crooks and ne’er-do-wells who think media work consists in frightening the daylights out of neophytes and not-too-clever public officials, collecting huge sums of money from them and distributing it to a coterie of their crook friends in the media and eating the balance of it. The average “media expert” couldn’t tell a message from their left elbow if you gave them a whole month of Sundays to work it out.

For their benefit, let me share some 10 random fun facts about the business of journalism.

One, confirmation is the job. The main activity around journalism is the collection and checking of facts, not invention and telling of tall tales. Media houses have gone to great lengths to put in place mechanisms to ensure that their output is thoroughly checked and decisions independently arrived at.

As a matter of fact, media houses have strongly enforced rules which ban external influences, including their own commercial interests, from impacting editorial decision-making.

To dismiss editorial work as a figment of the reporter’s imagination, especially when such a reporter works for a reputable organisation, is not very informed. Journalism is an evidentiary practice; we report the truth only when we can prove it.

Sacred cow

Secondly, the source is a sacred cow. He or she is protected with everything that journalism has. It does not matter how you ask for the identity; it will never ever be revealed.

Editors will publish grovelling apologies and take serious punishment not because they are wrong but because there is a small chance, even remote, that by defending their organisations the identity of a source might be compromised.

Thirdly, it is not the newspaper, TV or radio station or individual journalist fighting you: It is the source, who is usually closer to you than the bull dung to a blanket, has all the documents and knows where all the body parts are scattered. The reporter doesn’t care why the source is leaking; he just wants to know whether the information is good.

The source might have a vendetta from here to El Wak and back plus 50 agendas, but so long as his story checks out and his documents are good, the reporter doesn’t give a hoot about your internal kitchen politics. Learn to distinguish between the reporter’s motivation and that of the leaker.

No agenda, no vendetta

Fourth, in most cases there is no agenda and no vendetta. You are corrupt, incompetent or both and people are outraged about it and have decided to burn you. I am not saying all scandals are genuine and factual; I am saying most are.

Fifth, when you unfairly attack a reporter’s integrity or the credibility of the media, especially when journalists know the truth, in their eyes you are Osama bin Laden.

When you accuse them of having been bribed and they know they are reporting an honest story and have the facts, the documents you signed and the stuff you authorised, and they also know they rejected your grubby overtures, they will dislike you very much.

Sixth, the media are not Kenya’s problem; a corrupt ruling class is. Powerful people will steal anything that is not fastened with bolts to the ground. The media are guilty of exposing misdeeds, not of mischief or malice.

Economic war

Seventh, the economic war waged against the media over the past seven years or so is counterproductive. Will there be a TV camera when they come for you in the dead of the night? Who will fight for you when somebody unfairly takes away your property or business? Who will stand with the Wangari Maathais of the future at Karura Forest?

Eighth, journalists are not flamethrowers and war starters. Actually, they are quite patriotic and public spirited. The problem lies with the political class, which incites violence as a means to achieving power for purposes of stealing public wealth. Journalists do sometimes get sucked into their devious schemes.

Ninth, Kenya has traditionally had one of the freest and strongest media in Africa. A free media is a necessity for democracy. It is a good thing. Only bad people are scared of vibrant, free, strong, professional media. If media are not professional, do not kill them; professionalise them.

Finally, insults, threats and intimidation have never won anyone dotting coverage. Calm, rational, truthful and forthright transparency does. People invariably resort to the former because they don’t have a good story to tell. And even when they do, they don’t know how to tell it.

We journalists are not visitors to this country; this is our place too. And we have a right to serve it in accordance with our profession and fight for a place in the economy like all other Kenyans.

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