First on scene! Telling stories about the pain of others and living with the consequences

The Standard Group received 12 prizes at the 2023 Annual Journalism Excellence Accolades (AJEA). [David Gichuru, Standard]

The MCK, State of the Mental Health in Kenyan Media report published in November 2021 says that: "Journalists have been exposed to work-related trauma, the effects of covering traumatic events over a long period of time, can have negative effects on journalists themselves."

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) says that: "Before Covid, journalists were already dealing with a "perfect storm", of factors that challenged their mental health. They battled job insecurity, economic crisis of media and higher polarisation of media to growing attacks from elected officials against journalists."

Today, I share the plight of journalists through my story. I have never forgotten my initial journalism voyage in Garissa under the Kenya News Agency (KNA). It was baptism by fire. Surviving the dreaded Shifta attacks, covering frequent murders sparked by Somali family or clan feuds, telling tales of drought and at times floods, whenever the Tana River became furious in the neihbouring Madogo area and documenting the Kenya-Somalia cross-border skirmishes. Then one night it happened. Armed bandits raided the residence of the Provincial Commissioner (PC).

I was lying in my bed relaxing away the night when gunfire startled me. Some bullets tore through the door of my single room. Being a young, courageous and curious reporter, I quickly put on my shirt and crawled out to investigate the shootings. I came across two administration police officers who were my friends. They told me they were repulsing bandits who had attacked the residence of the provincial commissioner. I joined them in the battle.

After about five hours of gunfire, four policemen and six bandits lay dead. I went to bed shaken and in tears. Early morning, the District Commissioner summoned KNA reporters to his office.

"Last night one of our land rovers had mechanical problems and it backfired. It sounded like gunfire. I wish to assure Wananchi that Garissa is a very peaceful town." He said without batting an eye lid. I was angry. I sneaked out of the office to one of the three telephone booths in town and called the Nation Newspaper Newsroom. Editor Mutegi Njau received my call. After listening to my story pitch, he asked me to make a reverse call request through the post office. He gave me someone to take my story.

Military chopper

Gunfire rocks Garissa town; read the Daily Nation headline the following day. For the first time, the newspaper had reached Garissa on the same day. Normally, we would get the newspaper after two or three days depending on the state of the road. However, President Moi had seen the story which the administration in Garissa believed had died. On that Friday, papers were delivered in a military helicopter.

An angry PC ordered closure of all businesses. Citizens were herded to a forced public rally. The PC Amos Bore condemned the press for being unpatriotic and threatened them with fire. The following day Moi told a rally in Nanyuki that some journalists in Garissa had written lies to shame the government: "They are telling lies and exposing their mother's nakedness," he fumed.

That night, my door flew open from kicks by Special Branch officers. I was picked up from my bed in my birthday suit and thrown into a filthy police cell. I was incarcerated and tortured for weeks. The police demanded to know which policemen I was quoting in the article. For weeks I was beaten. My private parts were smashed. My hair was pulled out and fingers and toes squeezed with pliers. I couldn't sleep. I couldn't eat.

Mutegi Njau, who remains my great hero, risked his life to drive through bandit territory to Garissa to demand my release. He visited me in the cells. Emaciated and sickly, I met Mutegi for the first time. Two days after his visit, I was escorted at gunpoint to my house and allowed to pick up my academic certificates. I was then taken to court, declared persona non grata in northeastern province. Armed policemen drove me to Garissa express offices where I boarded a bus to Nairobi. Handcuffed, I stood all the way despite the fact that there were empty seats. I had just begun my journey in the journalism career.

A 2020 study by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism and the University of Toronto found that many journalists reporting on Covid19 pandemic showed symptoms of anxiety and depression. Around 11 per cent reported symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and around 70 per cent suffered from psychological distress. Journalists who cover natural disasters, war, violence, abuse and harassment, face anxiety, depression, sleep and eating disorders. They also survive burnout and trauma and PTSD.

An aerial view of Kisumu. [XN Iraki, Standard]

Then, violence broke out along the Kisumu and Kericho border. Politically-instigated violence turned ethnic with Luos suddenly fighting Kalenjin warriors. Kanu was trying to forestall the multiparty forces.

Between 1991 and 1992, when Kenya had its first multiparty elections, I lost count of the dead and the dying. A time came when the management of the Nation Newspaper demanded that we physically confirm the gender of each dead individual because the government had made it its custom to deny and challenge all our stories. I've never forgotten images of corpses with arrows stuck in their torsos, guts spilt open and many headless. The smell of death lingered in my nostrils for years.

The 1996 MV Bukoba Ferry disaster, almost knocked me out. MV Bukoba was a Lake Victoria passenger and cargo ferry. It operated between the ports of Bukoba and Mwanza City. Although designed for 430 passengers, it capsized on May 21 1996, killing more than 1,000 people. Families died. Some were coming from wedding ceremonies. Others were sportsmen and women from festivities. Many were school-going teenagers returning home at the end of the school term. Among the dead was Abu Ubaidah al Banshiri, al Qaeda's second in command at the time.

I interviewed survivors, many of them who couldn't swim. I talked to those who survived but lost entire families. They were broken and wished they had died. I learned interesting lessons, that in such accidents, ardent and expert swimmers die easily. They either confidently attempt to reach the shore and exhausted drown, or non-swimmers cling to them eventually killing them. Survivors clung on to jerricans, wooden planks and anything that could float until help came. At the end of the rescue mission, I tearfully covered the mass burial at the Mwanza stadium. The East African region went into mourning. President Benjamin Mkapa called for three days of grieving.

After the MV Bukoba assignment, I thought I was tough and hardened. Then the Group Managing Editor Wangethi Mwangi assigned me to conduct an undercover beat in 1999. With the help of the then Chief Government Pathologist Dr Kirasi Olumbe, I joined the Nairobi City Mortuary, as a trainee doctor. I watched closely as Olumbe cut through bodies while conducting postmortem. I observed mortuary attendants toying with death.

They causally placed their tea and mandazis besides corpses, some in state of decay. "This is how some of these fellows get deadly infections by failing to observe hygiene rules and work ethics," Olumbe told me. We ploughed through dozens of bodies and each day we would drive to Kenyatta Market for nyama choma lunch. "This meat looks just like that fat fellow we cut through," Olumbe would joke. I learned to cling to my appetite. Today, whenever I train journalists, I encourage them to make good use of trauma counselling services.