CHAIRMAN of the parliamentary Information
committee Jamleck Kamau has accused the
media of misleading the public over the new
Kenya Information and Communication
Amendment Bill.
He said the bill was not unconstitutional and
that the government had no intention to gag
the media.
The bill allows the Tribunal to "recommend the
suspension or removal from the register of the
journalist involved." That would ban someone
from working as a journalist. Surely that
breaches the constitutional right to freedom of
information?
More importantly, the Information Cabinet
Secretary will appoint a selection panel to
choose the Tribunal members. No journalist
will sit on that five person selection panel.
The panel will advertise and interview for the
posts and forward three names for each
position to the Information secretary who will
then pick the members of the Tribunal.
The new complaints Tribunal will therefore be
directly appointed by the Information
secretary. There is no legal obligation to have
even one journalist on the Tribunal.
The Tribunal can levy crippling fines of up to
Sh20 million on a whim. It has no legal
obligation to justify its decisions.
A body with such powers directly appointed by
the Information secretary can easily be used to
gag the media.
Quote of the day: "People ask the difference
between a leader and a boss. The leader leads,
and the boss drives." - Franklin D. Roosevelt
was elected US president for the fourth time
on November 7, 1944