Fact-check so that we can stop the lying by politicians in the media

Nation Media Group Data Editor Dorothy Otieno receives the Africa Fact-checking Award for 2017. 

What you need to know:

  • During the 2017 election campaigns, Newsplex, the Daily Nation’s data journalism desk, fact-checked claims made by candidates.
  • PesaCheck verifies statements about public finances and service delivery, as well as claims made by government officials in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda.

Is it possible for NMG to introduce fact-checking, especially of statements by senior politicians, asks Gilbert Muyumbu. Something is truly amiss when important news media outlets like the Daily Nation let politicians lie to the public, he adds.

 “It has become a habit of senior politicians in this country to say things that are contrary to what things actually are,” says Mr Muyumbu. “I, therefore, request that a fact checker be juxtaposed against statements made by politicians.”

NMG has some history in fact-checking. During the 2017 election campaigns, Newsplex, the Daily Nation’s data journalism desk, fact-checked claims made by candidates. The “Before you vote” series won the English-language 2017 African Fact Checking Award. Last year, Newsplex fact-checked President Uhuru Kenyatta’s State of the Nation speech.

The team was established to deal with data news, fake news and misleading information so as to provide readers with factual information beyond the “he said, she said” type of journalism.

Post-truth era

Interrogating what news makers say in this post-truth era, where untruths, misinformation and disinformation are prevalent, has become a common practice and dedicated fact-checking organisations have sprung up around the world.

In 2003, the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania, in the US, launched the pioneering FactCheck.org. In 2008, the St Petersburg Times (now the Tampa Bay Times) set up the trend-setting PolitiFact to fact-check the 2008 US election campaign.

PolitiFact featured the “Truth-o-Meter”, which rated statements as “True”, “Kinda true”, “Half-True” and “Wrong”. The Truth-O-Meter became a hit and fact-checkers around the world have copied the format. Most fact-checking organisations now use meters, true-false ratings or similar systems.

Not to be left behind, Facebook launched its own fact-checking outfit in December 2016 following US President Donald Trump’s post-truth statements and tweets.

Locally, apart from the Nation Newsplex, PesaCheck verifies statements about public finances and service delivery, as well as claims made by government officials in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. Then there is africacheck.org, launched in 2012 by the AFP Foundation in partnership with the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg.

Public domain

But despite the existence of these organisations, it’s not always possible to check all stories — especially political stories laden with half-truths and political spin — before publication or immediately afterwards. In my article, “Why it is important to get our facts right before placing them in the public domain” (Daily Nation, October 29, 2015) I pointed out how we are bombarded daily with unverified information.

Fact-checking is also costly as it requires employing extra manpower at a time when the media are experiencing diminishing revenues from their traditional sources of information. It is, therefore, easy for newsmakers to make false or misleading statements in the media without being corrected.

As I pointed out in my article, “Errors that would have gone unnoticed but for the vigilance of eagle-eyed readers” (Daily Nation, September 24, 2015), false or misleading information is commonly passed on to the readers as politicians are let to freely pollute journalism with falsehoods, untruths, half-truths, mis-statements and distortions.

Mr Muyumbu may not be aware of the past efforts by NMG or may be asking for more regular fact-checking. He is also, obviously, assuming that fact-checking works. Does it?

Nathan Walter, a disinformation researcher at Northwestern University in the US, has found evidence that people’s beliefs become more accurate and factually consistent after seeing a fact-checking message. However, the benefits are minimal, even absent, when it comes to political campaign statements.

Certainly, in Kenya, most people seem to vote with their hearts, not minds.

The Public Editor is an independent news ombudsman who handles readers’ complaints on editorial matters including accuracy and journalistic standards. Email: [email protected]. Call or text 0721989264.