President William Ruto has denied claims that the government has plans to shut down media stations ahead of the planned azimio rallies saying that the era of switching off media is behind us.
"Just for the record...take it from me, Kenya has come a long way, the era of swictching off this or that... that is way behind us," President Ruto said.
"I have said that we will support the right of the media to carry out its function.... you have our absolute support... irrespective of how biased you are against us, we will support you,"
At the same time, the head of state said that the media had placed him in a difficult situation but that no media blackout was planned.
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"If we exchange positions, if you stand where I'm standing you guys would have switched off the media... but us we will not," he added.
His response comes when the Kenya Editors Guild (KEG) president Churchill Otieno revealed that the government was planning to shut down media coverage.
"We have received reports of plans to shut down the broadcast media and the internet and throw the country into information darkness ahead of tomorrow's demonstrations. "This will be the most ill-advised assault on Kenyan democracy because it denies the public their right to information," said Mr Otieno.
The KEG boss said that the media has a constitutional mandate to provide information to the people and that attempting to prevent them from doing so would be illegal.
He also claimed that there are deliberate plans to harm media employees covering the demonstrations and that more will be targeted in the future. During his address, President Ruto also urged the opposition leader, Raila Odinga, to cancel the scheduled protests.
According to the President, most of the problems raised by the former Prime Minister can be addressed through a bipartisan parliamentary process.
Meanwhile, he emphasised that the recent protests nearly stopped the nation, killing three individuals, including a police officer, and wounding at least 400 others.
