NDIMA

(NDIMA/IFEX) – The proprietor of Citizen Radio and TV, Samuel Kamau Macharia, pitched his transmitters without authority of the Communication Commission of Kenya (CCK), the Kenyan parliament was told on 26 April 2001. In a 26 April ministerial statement, Information, Transport and Communication Minister Musalia Mudavadi also explained why the government seized equipment belonging to […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – On 25 April 2001, Citizen radio and television station proprietor Samuel Kamau Macharia was arrested and charged with setting up and using radio communication equipment without a licence. The transmission equipment in question was placed along Forest Road in Karen and AMBank House along University Way in Nairobi. Police further accused the businessman […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – A journalist was arrested on the weekend of 21 to 22 April 2001 in the Garissa District of Kenya’s North Eastern Province after he engaged a police officer in an argument that arose after he was denied a chance to record a statement. Milton Omondi, a journalist working for the Kenya News Agency […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – A correspondent for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Alfrad Taban was arrested on 11 April 2001 and detained by Sudanese authorities. Taban was arrested as he went to cover an Easter function at the invitation of a local church group. He is being held in a military camp under Sudanese emergency laws. For […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – The following is a 6 March 2001 NDIMA press release: Nairobi, 6 March 2001 ‘Monitor’ editors acquitted – state fails to prove paper’s malice Three editors of Uganda’s independent daily ‘The Monitor’ were acquitted of sedition charges on March 6, 2001, after a Kampala court found them innocent. The two and a half […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – Following the 12 December 2000 NDIMA alert circulated by IFEX regarding the closure of the Internet exchange point by the Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK), the Telecommunications Service Providers of Kenya (TESPOK) provided NDIMA with a statement giving their side of the story. It is of interest to know that before NDIMA issued […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – On 20 December 2000, Kenyan Cabinet Minister Nicholas Biwott was awarded a record KES 30 million (approx. US$383,000) for libel in a book about the murder of the late Foreign Minister Robert Ouko. The judgement against the British authors of “Dr lain West’s Casebook”, which implicated the cabinet minister in a 1990 murder […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – Four journalists from the rural bi-weekly newspaper “The Sharpener” have been arrested by police in the Nyeri District of Central Kenya following the alleged disappearance of computer equipment. The reporters, including the publisher of “The Sharpener”, Kinyua Mutahi, were rounded up between Monday 18 December and Tuesday 19 December 2000. They are being […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – On 13 December 2000, Kenyan Police Commissioner Philemon Abong’o directed police bosses from the Western and Rift Valley provinces of Kenya to institute immediate investigations into recent attacks against journalists. The incidents occurred while the journalists were covering two separate meetings called by the lobby group Muungano wa Mageuzi in Busia town (in […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – On Friday 8 December 2000, the Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK) ordered the immediate closure of a recently-launched Kenya Internet Exchange Point (KIXP) and also ordered the disconnection of all Internet Service Providers (ISPs) linked to the new exchange. CCK’s move prompted angry reaction from local ISPs, who said they would now be […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – On 10 December 2000, police beat up a photo journalist working for “The People Daily” newspaper in Naivasha town, (about eighty kilometres west of Nairobi), in the Nakuru District, in the Rift Valley Province. The incident occurred moments before a meeting by the lobby group Mageuzi (Change Over) was due to start. Collins […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – On 9 December 2000, at least four journalists working for different media houses were injured after police violently dispersed a meeting called by a lobby group, Muungano wa Mageuzi. The meeting was held in Busia town, in the Western Province, near the Kenya-Uganda border. Police in full riot gear beat the journalists, who […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – On the evening of 27 November 2000, Johan Wandetto, a correspondent for “People Daily”, was released on a KES 10,000 (approx. US$127) police bond. Wandetto was arrested on 26 November, together with three other journalists working for the “Nation”, “East African Standard” and “Kenya Times”. The three other journalists were also released on […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – Kenyan police arrested a correspondent for “The People Daily”, based in Kitale, in the North Rift Province, on 26 November 2000. Johann Wandetto was arrested over a story he wrote which claimed that the body of a recently deceased cabinet minister had been secretly exhumed. The controversial minister, Francis Polisi Lotodo, died on […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – An “East African Standard” photographer, Malachi Owino, together with other newsmen, was attacked by a suspected hired gang on 26 November 2000 in the lakeside town of Kisumu, in Nyanza Province, about 450 kilometres north-west of Nairobi. A meeting had been convened by the Initiative’s People’s Commission of Kenya (PCK), a body appointed […]

(NDIMA/IFEX) – On Friday 13 October 2000, a photographer working with the “Nation” newspaper was ejected from a function at Kenyatta University, on the outskirts of Nairobi, where President Moi was conferring doctorate degrees to graduates. Presidential guards also tried to snatch a camera from the journalist. Govedi Asutsa was attempting to take a picture […]