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2 E. African J. Hum. Rts. & Democracy 91 (2004)
Media: A Pious Criticism of Government in Kenya

handle is hein.journals/eajhrd2 and id is 97 raw text is: EAJHRD Vol. 2 No.1 2004 pp 91-93 ISSN 1686-900X Copyright @ EAHRI, Printed in Kenya Commentary Media: A Pious Criticism of Government In Kenya WAMBUI KIMATHI ...Obviously, a man's judgment cannot be better than the information on which he has based it. Give him the truth and he may still go wrong when he has a chance to be right, but give him no news or present him with distorted and incomplete data.. .and you destroy his whole reasoning process... Arthur Hays Sulzberger, New York Times Publisher 1948 We live in a world where civic responsibility is being seen as a collective duty by individuals and corporate bodies alike in terms of nurturing a healthy culture of democracy no matter the private and short term interests and responsibilities. Watchdog institutions such as the media and human rights organizations are expected to conduct their business as part of society and not as detached actors whose only duty is to highlight the misdeeds of governments and or public officials. In journalism this is referred to as the principle of public journalism. This commentary wishes to look at the broad conduct of the media in Kenya during the current political transition with a view to assessing the extent to which the media can be said to have paid heed to the principle of public journalism. The commentary asks the question, is it ethical for the media to pursue reportage that has the effect of progressively undermining the faith that people should have in democratic system by relentlessly painting public officials as inept, corruptible, scandalous and irredeemably unreliable?

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