Interior CS Fred Matiang'i on Wednesday maintained that NTV, KTN and Citizen TV which were shut down on Tuesday will remain off air until investigations into subversion claims against them are concluded.
This did not go down well with Kenyans who complained of being taken back to the dark days and Winnie Odinga, daughter of NASA leader Raila Odinga expressed her dissatisfaction at the move.
Winnie took to Facebook to aim a dig at CS Matiang'i by posting a photo of The Prince of Wales and The Duchess of Cornwall visited the ITV Studios in London today to mark 90 years of the Royal Television Society, sarcastically asking whether we should go back to the pre-colonial days.
[caption caption="Winnie Odinga's Post on Facebook"]
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"Our former colonial masters are celebrating media freedom - here in our ‘democracy’ it’s media blackout.
"Maybe we should go back?" she asked.
NTV, KTN and Citizen TV have been off air since Tuesday after they were shut down by the Communications Authority of Kenya as they aired the 'swearing-in' of Odinga at Uhuru Park.
CS Matiang’i added that police were looking into the “role of some elements in the media fraternity who participated in the furtherance of an attempt to subvert or overthrow the government”.
Later on Wednesday evening, reports emerged that police were also seeking to arrest Nation Media Managing Editor Linus Kaikai, Larry Madowo and Ken Mijungu.
A tweet posted on NTV Newsroom official page stated: "Plainclothes officers reportedly outside Nation Center, allegedly to arrest NTV's Linus Kaikai, Larry Madowo and Ken Mijungu for unclear reasons".
Earlier this week, Kaikai revealed that President Uhuru Kenyatta summoned a few editors to State House and threatened to close and revoke the licenses of any media house that would air the NASA swearing-in event.
He (Kaikai) stated that he was alarmed over a developing trend by the government to gag or threaten the media over coverage of the current political events in the country.
[caption caption="NMG Managing Editor Linus Kaikai"]
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