There is a particular kind of silence that descends on a country before its press is broken. You don’t hear it coming. You feel it \u2014 in the hesitation of an editor before publishing, in the self-censorship of a journalist who has learned what happens to colleagues who go too far. Rigathi Gachagua is saying Kenya is already living inside that silence, and he is not whispering about it.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Standing at his Wamunyoro home on Tuesday, the impeached former Deputy President delivered a blunt, wide-ranging accusation against President William Ruto’s administration: that it is running a deliberate, coordinated crackdown on journalists, bloggers, and independent media outlets \u2014 and that it is doing so with one eye fixed firmly on the 2027 General Election.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
This is not abstract politics. Gachagua named names and cited incidents. He alleged that on June 26, armed men believed to be police officers attempted to abduct Nixon Kiplimo, associate editor at the Standard Group, in Nakuru. The attempt, he said, failed. He accused President Ruto of directly undermining the editorial independence of Standard Media Group after the outlet published stories critical of his government. He alleged that journalist Muthoni Wakirumba received threats from political leaders \u2014 and he pointed the finger specifically at former Trade Cabinet Secretary and presidential adviser Moses Kuria. He claimed journalists linked to MediaMax have faced both physical harassment and coordinated online attacks. He said, with the kind of specificity that demands a response, that “top journalists and editors have been marked for crackdown.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Let that land for a moment. Marked for crackdown. In Kenya. In 2025.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Gachagua framed all of this within a pattern he says repeats itself with grim predictability: ahead of every general election, he argued, unpopular governments turn on the press because they fear what an informed electorate can do at the ballot. “We have had a bad pattern in Kenya that ahead of general elections, journalists and bloggers get targeted by unpopular regimes that fear the power of the people at the ballot,” he said. He warned that the government intends to strangle certain media houses financially by cutting off state advertising revenue \u2014 a quiet, bureaucratic weapon that leaves no bruises but can kill an outlet just as effectively as a raid.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
He invoked Articles 33 and 34 of the Constitution, which protect freedom of expression and media freedom. He called the alleged attack on Kiplimo “an open defiance to truth and total war on the freedom of the media.” He urged journalists and editors to stand in solidarity, describing them as “the last line of defense for Kenyans ahead of the 2027 General Election.” The rhetoric was heated, but the underlying argument \u2014 that a government approaching an election it fears losing has every incentive to silence the press \u2014 is not one you can dismiss with a shrug.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Then Gachagua widened the frame, and the picture became harder to look at. He drew a direct line between what he described as Kenya’s domestic press crackdown and the recent suspension of media operations in Uganda \u2014 the shutdown of NTV Uganda, Spark TV, and the Daily Monitor. He tied Uganda’s communications blackout to the tight alliance between President Ruto and Uganda’s Chief of Defence Forces, General Muhoozi Kainerugaba, son of President Yoweri Museveni. The implication was pointed: that the authoritarian instincts flowing through the region are not coincidental, that they travel along the same diplomatic corridors where these men shake hands and make deals.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
He called on the United Nations, international media freedom organizations, and regional bodies to monitor both Kenya and Uganda \u2014 and to actively support journalists facing intimidation. Whether those calls produce action is another matter entirely.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
It must be said plainly: Gachagua did not provide documentary evidence for several of his most serious claims. The government, the National Police Service, and other state agencies had not publicly responded to his specific allegations by the time this was published. Gachagua is a man with his own political survival at stake, his own grievances, his own agenda \u2014 and any reader with a functioning brain should hold all of that in mind. He is not a neutral observer. He never claimed to be.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
But here is the thing about power and the press: you do not have to like the messenger to take the message seriously. The question is not whether Gachagua is a saint. The question is whether journalists in Kenya are being watched, threatened, and financially squeezed into submission ahead of an election that could reshape this country’s future. That question deserves an answer \u2014 not from Gachagua, but from the government he is accusing. The silence from State House is, for now, its own kind of statement.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Gachagua closed with a warning aimed directly at Ruto: “If you think the media is your enemy, you are mistaken. Wait for August next year.” Whether that reads as a political threat or a democratic promise depends entirely on which side of power you are standing on. For young Kenyans who have watched this government’s relationship with accountability deteriorate in real time, it reads like something closer to the truth.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
There is a particular kind of silence that descends on a country before its press is broken. You don’t hear it coming. You feel it \u2014 in the hesitation of an editor before publishing, in the self-censorship of a journalist who has learned what happens to colleagues who go too far. Rigathi Gachagua is saying […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4010,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14,20,33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4011","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-kenya","category-sidebar-featured","category-trending"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"\n