Document detail

The performance of vernacular radio stations in Kenya: monitoring report

Nairobi: Media Council of Kenya; Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) (2012), viii, 33 pp., 15 figures, 17 tables
"The Media Council of Kenya (MCK), the statutory body established under the Media Act 2007 that regulates media and advances professionalism of the media in Kenya, monitored a set of ten vernacular radio stations in September/October 2011 in order to assess their current performance. The study looked at the adherence of the stations to the “Code of Conduct for the Practice of Journalism in Kenya” and the quality and diversity of their coverage. The monitoring was carried out during the confirmation of charges hearings at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague. A specific objective of the study was to analyze the ICC coverage in terms of accuracy, balance, fairness and conflict sensitivity. Key Findings: The radio stations scored highly on balance and fairness: 97% of the news reports showed no evidence of slanted reporting and 96% covered at least two viewpoints; only a few cases of hate speech were encountered. 99,5% of all radio items contained no hate speech; women were clearly underrepresented in the radio programmes. Women were central news subjects in less than 10% of the news items. Only a quarter of the presenters were female; the radio stations covered the ICC confirmation of charges hearings mainly in their news bulletins. Only a few talk-shows took up the topic. Several editors and managers described this editorial line as an attempt to avoid ethnic tension and incitement; the ICC coverage was predominantly perpetrator-centred. Only a few stories included the side of the victims of post-election violence. Most of the coverage focused on the immediate court procedures, only a few items provided in-depth background information about the cases." (Executive summary)
Contents
1 Executive Summary, 1
2 Introduction, 3
The Radio Landscape in Kenya -- Vernacular Radio Stations and the Post-Election Violence in 2007/2008
3 Project Description: Monitoring Vernacular Radio Stations, 6
4 Findings, 7
General Performance -- ICC Coverage -- Profiles of Radio Stations -- Conclusions and Recommendations