Following the Dusit D2 Hotel building explosion, a New York Times article has created quite a controversy. The article titled ‘Shabaab Claim Responsibility for Deadly Assault on Nairobi Hotel office complex’ showed pictures that depicted dead bodies in a way that demeaned the Kenyan country whose citizens did not take well.
Kenyans on twitter and many other nationals joined to condemn the article even rallying for the deportation of the writer Kimiko De Freytas Tamura.
Foreign Correspondents’ Association of East Africa released a statement regarding threats toward the New York Times reporter from Kenya.
A statement from the FCAEA regarding threats toward member Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura and the debate over media coverage in #Kenya in the aftermath of the #DusitAttack pic.twitter.com/mNX0X9kcFP
— FCAEA (@FCAEA) January 16, 2019
FCAEA while praising social media said that the bad side of it is that it can be used as a channel of anger towards journalists working tirelessly and at personal risk just to tell a story in the country.
“The choice of images used in a time of tragedy is a difficult balance and something editors in newspapers, television and online media constantly battle to get it right. Different publications have different guideline,” added the statement.
“We ask that hate speech is not used against us through social media, that we do not become a punching bag for understandable anger and frustration, and ask that the citizens support us as we strive to truthfully and accurately report events in Kenya.”
In support of this was Kenyan blogger Robert Alai saying those who didn’t understand are incompetent.
I support FCAEA on this NYT issue. We have state censors target an innocent journalist for reasons which are best known to few incompetent individuals. @kimidefreytas should proudly do her work. #RiversideAttack pic.twitter.com/CiwkCRoavq
— Robert (@RobertAlai) January 16, 2019
Ms Tamura apologised on behalf of NYT for causing anger and anguish over the photos however after the apology it was only noted that New York Times are being hard headed and now campaigns are pushing for the publisher to pull down the photos which are still present in the article.
Do you think FCAEA is right or should they bow down to public demand?