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Photo: Derk Segaar/IRIN

A special edition of The Standard newspaper published after the raid.

NAIROBI, 2 March 2006 (IRIN) - Dozens of armed men raided a leading Kenyan media house on Thursday morning and shut down its operations, three days after police arrested several reporters from the same organisation. Tom Mshindi, chief executive of the Standard Group, told reporters in the capital, Nairobi, that the raid targeted The Standard newspaper's editorial offices, printing plant and the transmission centre of its affiliate company, the Kenya Television Network. The men, who stormed the media house at 1.00 a.m. local time [10.00 GMT], took away computers and transmission equipment, damaged the presses and set fire to Thursday's editions of the country's oldest newspaper. "We have very strong evidence to suggest that these acts were carried out by the police," Mshindi said. Kenya's information minister, Mutahi Kagwe, told journalists that he did not order the raid and knew nothing about it. He promised to hold a news conference later in the day. Media owners and practitioners, civil society leaders and opposition politicians strongly condemned the attack. On 28 February, three reporters were summoned by the police following the publication of a story alleging that President Mwai Kibaki met secretly with a key opposition figure and former foreign minister, Kalonzo Musyoka. The newspaper's managing editor Chacha Mwita, news editor Dennis Onyango and journalist Ayub Savula were in custody and waiting to be charged in a court of law at the time of the attack. The purported secret meeting between Kibaki and Musyoka was seen as a ploy by the government to compromise its opponents at a time when it is embroiled in allegations of graft that have forced several key ministers to resign. The government has denied that the meeting took place. Among those who have resigned are former finance minister David Mwiraria, education minister George Saitoti and energy minister Kiraitu Murungi. The three were named in the so-called Anglo-Leasing and Goldenberg scandals, amidst public and donor pressure for Kibaki to deal with the misuse of public funds. Those piling on the pressure include opposition figures like Musyoka. Goldenberg involved the loss of public funds through a bogus gold and diamond export scheme. The Anglo-Leasing scandal followed the commissioning of an allegedly non-existent company to print new passports and build a modern forensic laboratory for the police. The ongoing scandals come at a time when the government and its partners are struggling to feed some 3.5 million Kenyans facing severe food shortages due to a prolonged drought. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemned the detention of the three reporters. "The volatility of political life in Kenya, since the defeat of the presidential camp in the constitutional referendum is leading to more and more damaging consequences for the press," RSF said in a statement. "We call for the release of the detained journalists and for an end to methods that are unworthy of a great democracy," it added. "It is high time that the Nairobi authorities understand that imprisoning a journalist solves nothing and does not put right any wrong."