Top 100 Kenyan Journalists 2019

by Denis Mwangi on Thursday, 25 July 2019 - 6:28 am

Kenyans.co.ke has unveiled the Top 100 Journalists in Kenya in 2019.

Over the last few months, the team undertook the task of ploughing through hundreds of profiles of Kenyan journalists to determine who among them had the biggest impact in the media industry in 2019.

A list that started out with more than 300 journalists, was combed through by an able team which narrowed them down by assessing several qualities.

Criteria

The first hurdle was to distinguish between media personalities and journalists as many Kenyans consider anyone who works at a media house, a scribe.

The Kenyan media industry has many talented radio, TV presenters and hosts who may not necessarily be journalists.

They include celebrities and comedians who keep their audiences hooked to the programs.

We defined journalism as the activity of gathering, assessing, creating, and presenting news and information which was the bare minimum filter to qualify for assessment.

We, therefore, used the said elements to determine the individuals who use these qualities to serve the public's interest.

When the team narrowed down the list, they assessed each one of them based on the quality of interviews, experience, diversity of talents and skills, as well as their ability to set the agenda for the nation.

We also looked at the roles they play in their different organisations such as seniority, oversight and management positions.

In this day and age of real-time borderless publishing and reporting, the team also considered how well journalists are able to leverage digital platforms to break glass ceilings in their careers.

Kenyans.co.ke also considered making honourable mentions to various individuals who made a comeback to media in 2019.

Janet Mbugua, who quit Citizen TV in 2017, returned to the screens mid-June to host Here and Now with Janet Mbugua on NTV.

Anne Kiguta recently made headlines when she announced that she was coming back to the screen, and on Sunday , she hosted Deputy President William Ruto on her debut at K24.

Terryanne Chebet also returned to the media with her new role at Metropol TV, heading the station as the general manager, as well as presenting news.

Also, worth mentioning are some journalist who would definitely have made it to the top 100 list owing to their contribution to the media industry but have already exited media houses for better positions like State House Spokesperson, Kanze Dena, who was a presenter at Citizen TV.

Former NTV business news anchor, Laban Onserio, also moved to the office of the president after he was appointed to the Presidential Delivery Unit, just to name a few.

The industry has also seen a new crop of scribes emerge as the digital revolution continues to manifest in the media. Among them is Kimani Mbugua and Zindzi Kibiku of Citizen TV, Shiksha Arora of K24 TV, Jesse Rogers of KTN News, Mukami Wambora of Citizen TV among others.

Note: Some journalists including Jacque Maribe, Rob N. Jillo and Njoki Chege quit their media houses after we had made this list.