[kictanet] [ke-internetusers] Kenya communications (amendment) Bill: Is media overacting?

[Crystal Watley]

Brian,

The meeting was not made public knowledge. If it had been then possibly more
would have attended. Myself included.

The Communications Bill contains many well thought out policies that will
benefit Kenya in its quest to become an leader in information and
communications technology in the region. I read the bill when it came out in
its first draft form and twice more during the consultation and amendment
period. The bill is still not ready to be passed into law. As it is a
serious piece of legislature it needs more discussion especially in open
public forums. Once the general public and the media take an issue with a
piece of legislation it should be tabled and discussed until necessary
revisions are made. I would like to reiterate this bill is not ready to be
passed into law. If it is I would encourage the media institutions to
challenge its legality in court. It has already been rejected in the court
of public opinion.

If what Dr. Ndemo and others say about the ability of the president to amend
the act, although Kibaki is in a catch 22, he should see that the media
stays free. What Kenyans should be afraid of is giving the government the
power to decide on what dictates a "state of emergency". This has been used
in other countries to suppress the masses and give all control to a few
powerful individuals. The control of the many by the few is something we
already see in Kenya. Information and communications technologies are to
improve INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATIONS. The proliferation of Kenyan content
cannot be stilfed by the law or many will shy away from their use due to
fear.

Crystal

On Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 6:36 PM, Brian Longwe <blongwe at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> I too, feel that this is overreaction and misrepresentation by the media.
> How many of the very vocal media personalities who appeared protesting have
> even read the proposed legislation? If they did, they would see that the
> powers granted are only applicable during a state of emergency. Other laws
> set out the process and conditions by which a state of emergency can be
> called.
>
> Our experiences with the post-election crisis this year exposed how
> partisan and instrumental media can be to fuel discontent and in many cases,
> media related information was used to take lives.
>
> Have the more responsible media houses forgotten so quickly the regret and
> guilt they expressed, when they started crying out for peace - after they
> realised how seriously wrong their transmissions were taken by the public?
>
> It is true that when Govt invited stakeholders to make representations
> regarding the bill, the media houses that bothered to send personnel sent
> only very junior officials - there's no knowing what kind of
> feedback/representations these underlings took back to their bosses.
>
> How many media houses sent representations to the house committee that was
> responsible for the bill when they were invited to do so? To what extent did
> they engage with informed contributions, proposed modifications or even
> proposed text to replace the offending sections?
>
> People need to realise that things like this don't happen overnight,
> law-making is a process that provides any citizen with the right and the
> opportunity to make their views felt and known. The masses that have been
> mobilised by the media houses should have been in Mombasa when govt, the
> house committee and stakeholders were meeting to among other things look at
> sections of the Kenya communications amendment act - not now, when their
> elected representatives have yielded to the due process and submitted the
> bill to the President.
>
> my two-pence,
>
> Brian
>
>
> On 12/13/08, Grace Bomu <nmutungu at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I had signed up for the mars group protest yesterday on the
>> representation that it was a protest on food prices and MP'S refusal
>> to pay taxes.
>> I am disgusted that the media have used our voices for their causes
>> exclusively, disregarding ours.
>> As a Kenyan, i think there should be a review on cross-ownership of
>> media if democracy is to thrive. Also, considering the role of the
>> media in fueling ethnic/ regional backlash since 2003,  isn't there
>> need for a check on them?
>> There may be misgivings on the arbitraly powers conferred to the
>> Minister in charge of security but media has to be checked.
>> The media should give suggestions on alternative ways to check them
>> instead of using all their airtime and acres of newspapers to win
>> public sympathy.
>> Finally, they should stop branding it ' media bill' as the bill is not
>> a conspiracy against media but a bill to amend the communications act.
>>
>> --
>> Sent from Gmail for mobile | mobile.google.com
>>
>> Grace L.N. Mutung'u
>> +254721898732
>> +254736091242
>>   Kenya
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>>
>
>
>
> --
> Brian Munyao Longwe
> e-mail: blongwe at gmail.com
> cell:  + 254 722 518 744
> blog : http://zinjlog.blogspot.com
> meta-blog: http://mashilingi.blogspot.com
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-- 
Crystal "Naliaka" Watley
Voices of Africa
crystal at voicesofafrica.org
http://www.voicesofafrica.org/

"You must be the change you wish to see" - Gandhi
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