News continue to flow in Kenya, June 2009. Photo: Lena Bjørnsen

Following the violent events in Kenya after the elections in December 2007, IMS actively engaged in a number  of activities to help the media sector tackle the traumas and make up for professional shortcomings revealed during the crisis. 17 months on, Lena Bjørnsen, a student of the University of Århus, visits Kenya. IMS asked her to share her accounts of the media situation

Chapter 1

By Lena Bjørnsen

I arrive early in the morning on June 4 greeted to Kenya by a beautiful sunrise painting the sky bright orange. It's a Thursday meaning heavy traffic on the streets heading to Nairobi, but this doesn't seem to bother the taxi driver who is incredibly relaxed and cheerful. And very talkative. So it doesn't take long before he is telling me stories of Kenya and his family and also about the violence that broke out following the parliament election in December 2007.

- A conflict between tribes will never happen again, he says optimistically; I think that in twenty years from now we are all one tribe.

I listen closely because the conflict is exactly what brought me to Nairobi, and I'm pleased to hear his optimism.

Thesis-writing in Kenya

Writing my thesis on the theory of conflict sensitive journalism I have gone to Kenya to see how the idea works when put into action. After the eruption of violence following the elections in 2007 IMS initiated a workshop focusing on teaching journalists and editors the importance of how conflicts are portrayed by the media.

During my stay in Kenya I will talk to some of the participants in the workshop to find out how they see the usefulness of conflict sensitive journalism almost a year and a half after the violence.

Last year's conflict still present today

While the taxi is idling because of a traffic jam, I roll down the window to buy a newspaper from one of the many guys running around between the cars standing bumper to bumper. On the front page is the story of the Kenyan police force being on trial at the Geneva Human Rights Court of Justice accused of killing protesters demonstrating against the results of the election.

This is the first indication of how the violence of last year is still an issue in Kenya today. And of how last year's events have made the Kenyans even less trusting of either the police or government officials. According to Frank Ojiambo, who has been a news editor at both the Standard and the Daily Nation (Kenyas biggest news papers), the media is the most trusted institution of Kenya.

Frank Ojiambo is the first person I talk to during my stay, and he gives me insight into the role of the media in Kenya.

- People look for direction in the media, so when the media gets it wrong, millions of Kenyans get it wrong too, he says.

This also goes for when the media let important events go unreported. And according to him this was a contributing factor to why people picked up pangas (resembling a sword) and machetes and fought neighbors and friends of other tribes killing over a thousand and forcing about half a million to flee their homes.

Journalists play a vital role

Frank Ojiambo explains that after people had cast in their votes, the election results were not published by the media. The results came only from the polling committee which he believes made people find them untrustworthy causing suspicion and frustration.

- We betrayed the Kenyans - if the results had been published then they wouldn't have resorted to violence, Frank Ojiambo states.

That is why he finds it very important that Kenyan journalists are aware of the role they play in a society as diverse as the Kenyan.

- Journalists must look for a way to publish in a way that does not incite one community against another, he says.

Conflict is taboo

But to Frank Ojiambo the situation has not improved, and tensions caused by diversity between tribes, unemployment, corruption and poverty are still present under the surface but go unreported.

- The biggest problem is that very few people will talk about it - they just hope it goes away. The underlying factors that got Kenyans to hack each other haven't been addressed. If nothing happens before the next election it could happen again, he anticipates.

Leaving the house of Frank Ojiambo, I wonder if the picture he is painting is too dark. But driving out of Nairobi and into the countryside the following day I see a camp of hundreds of white tents. The driver tells me that it is a camp for countless of families who had to flee because of the violence and still live there today. A lot of them have not returned either because they are afraid to do so or because there is nothing to return to since many homes were burned down.

Seeing the huge camp serves to me as an indication that to this day, underlying conflicts still exist in Kenya. Just because the Kenyans have laid down their weapons for now does not mean that a repetition of last year's violence couldn't erupt again, making it vital that the media is prepared and will react more proactively next time.