Nkaissery urges CNN to apologize for ‘hotbed’ statement
Kenya’s interior cabinet secretary Joseph Nkaissery on Thursday urged American television CNN to apologise for portraying the country as a “terror hotbed” during a live discussion.
Nkaissery stated that Kenya has experienced terror threats but is not a hotbed as depicted by the media house.
He assured Kenyans that the country was secured and ready to host world leaders among them US President Barack Obama in the upcoming Global Entrepreneurship Summit.
Speaking during a press briefing at Harambee House on Thursday, Nkaissery said that this was not the first time CNN was misreporting on Kenya.
“Despite the terror attacks recently experienced by the country, it does not in any way turn Kenya into a hotbed of terrorism as alleged by CNN,” Nkaissery said.
Asked if he was demanding for an apology from the international broadcaster, Nkaissery said, “If they are civilised enough they should apologise.”
He lauded Kenyans for speaking up on the misreporting and asked them to treat it with the contempt it deserves.
NOT UNIQUE TO KENYA
The broadcaster has since edited the out the terror hotbed from the title of its web story but retains it in the intro of the article authored by its Pentagon Correspondent, Barbara Starr.
An insert of an editor’s note added to the story also reads, “The headline and lead of this article has been recast to indicate the terror threat is a regional one.”
Foreign affairs cabinet secretary Amina Mohammed during an earlier press conference stated that terror was not unique to Kenya.
She later tweeted through her official account, “Yes it (terror) happens across the globe! Which continent has not experienced it?”
CNN has a dubious reputation of inaccurate reporting of events in Africa.
In its coverage of the terrorist attack at Garissa University College, the broadcaster aired a live telephone conversation with Arnolda Shiundu of Kenya Red Cross from “Nairobi, Nigeria”.
Before the 2013 general election, CNN reporter Nima Elbagir paid actors in a forest, armed them with crude weapons and shot a story on how “Kenyans had armed themselves” in anticipation of post – election violence.
The broadcaster later pulled down the story after day-long basing by Kenyans on Twitter.