Journalist accreditation helps to improve professionalism

The media industry in Kenya has grown by leaps and bounds over the last 20 years largely due to digital revolution. This has contributed to the expansion of the democratic space, ensuring more voices play the watchdog, agenda-setting and gate-keeping function and amplifying the citizens’ ability to call power to account. The positive impact of the expansion has, however, come with its fair share of challenges, key being regulation and ensuring all players in the industry adhere to set standards and professionalism.

One of the issues that bedevils the collective conscience of the industry are quacks operating in the media space, and who bring the media profession into disrepute. This calls for the need to define and licence persons operating as journalists and media practitioners.

The place of accreditation in journalism cannot be gainsaid. Accreditation has become increasingly important in an era where, by virtue of owning a smartphone and having access to social media, everyone can churn out content. The question that arises as result is where do the citizens turn to for the unadulterated truth? Accreditation is the remedy.

Accreditation identifies an individual as belonging to the journalism profession and authorises them to practice accordingly. Further, it enables them to enjoy the rights and privileges that come with being a member of the vocation. For all intents and purposes, most employers, not just in the media, ask potential employees for their accreditation details whenever they are looking for staff in different cadres.

This gives employers the comfort of ensuring that they hire the right personnel. In addition to ensuring that journalists adhere to stipulated tenets of their trade, accreditation opens doors for them through guaranteeing access to accurate and current information by allowing their participation in conferences, workshops, trainings and other gatherings.

Further, accreditation enhances the protection of journalists in the performance of their duties by hastening deployment of rapid response in cases where an accredited journalist is attacked. Those accredited can also apply for grants and placements in different media programmes.

As the media industry across the world battles waning public trust and misinformation, all players in the media space should operate in a professional manner, bound by the rules and regulations. Proper identification of journalists and media practitioners will contribute to addressing this.

This will strengthen the image of the media industry as a credible source of information in an ecosystem riddled with fake news. As the body mandated to set standards and ensure compliance, the Media Council of Kenya, through its accreditation function, has been working with stakeholders, including law enforcement agencies to improve professionalism in the media and lock out individuals masquerading as journalists.

One of the measures the council has currently undertaken to curb quacks is to provide a journalists verification number, 40314, which members of the public can use to confirm whether anyone presenting a Media Council of Kenya accreditation card is a genuine journalist. The cards have distinctive security features including a special number allocated to each journalist.

To widen the net and to ensure that everyone working in the industry is accredited, the council this year started the accreditation of media practitioners, who are not trained in the profession, but work in a newsroom environment.

This is being done on condition that they must first undergo the media practitioners training on the Code of Conduct for the Practice of Journalism in order to get accreditation.

The council is anticipating training of more media practitioners in 2022 to ensure that everyone operating in the media space is conversant with the Code of Conduct and always maintains professionalism. The council has also introduced a new category for public communication experts in the public and private sphere to ensure that all stakeholders with training in journalism and media studies are accredited.

The launch of online accreditation of journalists in responding to the realities of the Covid-19 pandemic in December last year has registered tremendous success. The council is working to improve the portal to offer journalists a better user-experience in the 2022 accreditation cycle and beyond.

As we head into a general election year, the council will roll out a series of trainings for journalists on election coverage. Accredited journalists will be given priority during the training. It is our social responsibility to ensure that the country remains united, even after the general election in the execution of our role as the watchdog.

There is need to tighten rules to ensure that only accredited media personnel are allowed to practice and within the confines of the law. This will go a long way in locking out unscrupulous individuals using media space to misinform and at times blackmail Kenyans.