The mainstream media has been taken hostage

Journalists

A battery of journalist cover President Uhuru Kenyatta's arrival at Parliament Buildings for the State of the Nation Address on November 30, 2021.


 

Photo credit: Jeff Angote | Nation Media Group

What you need to know:

  • Important stories that the nation should be ruminating on are being given a blackout.
  • Journalists are simply re-enacting what tweeps are talking about, which is mostly politics.

I’ve noticed some stories in the newspaper are social media throbs, especially from Twitter. Trending topics which sometimes include sleazy topics even make it to the headlines. 

Cases in point are these stories which made headlines: “Boniface Mwangi: People treat me like God; they deny I exist... until they need me”, Sunday Nation, October 24, 2021, “Lillian: My life, love and break-up with Mutua”, Saturday Nation, November 6, 2021, and “Lillian: Juliani has made me better person; Mutua should move on”, Sunday Nation, November 7, 2021.

I understand social media is also a source of news stories for journalists. But I feel other important stories that the nation should be ruminating on are being given a blackout. For instance, the ongoing drought in Northern Kenya. 

I also feel journalists are simply re-enacting what tweeps are talking about, which is mostly politics. I think, even as the new media has taken hostage of the mainstream media's traditional role of setting the agenda, journalists should still strive to promote serious stories of national importance.

— Allan Kipchirchir, Eldoret

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Sloppy, biased reporting

While I have your attention, I must congratulate you for doing a very good job without fear or favour. Reporting on politics by Kenyan media has gone to the lowest level ever. 

I usually count the number of headlines referring to the two front runners in the presidential contest and look at the positiveness or negativeness of the headline. And it’s almost always biased, against one particular candidate in all the newspapers. Inevitably, I find myself checking on the author of the story before even reading it. 

There is a cartoonist in one of ‘the other’ dailies who has been allowed to disparage one of the contestants day in day out.

Absolutely no objectivity and no analysis any more. Where did our investigative journalists go? Why has no one told us what really caused the fallout in UhuRuto, for example, and forget the thief nonsense? Why do they continue to present the red herring of a contest between the President and his Deputy when the former is not a candidate?

And finally, why can’t someone update the photo gallery in the Online Nation more often? Surely pictures of Mashujaa Day and the Pakistanis are long outdated.

— Stanley Gichia, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa