By Jacobs Odongo Seaman
Former Daily Monitor managing director Alex Asiimwe is former like yesterday was Saturday. All this because he was that amateur circus performer who took a live venomous snake to the stage instead of having its fangs clipped first. As he entertained his stomach with the snake in his hand, he forgot two things: One, that the snake can bend around and serve him a lethal bite, and two, that he was not immortal. So, like the Don in the Mafia world who was often betrayed by his ‘consiglieri’ (an advisor to the Mafia boss), Asiimwe got his dish served cold.
Alex Asiimwe assumed the reins at the Eighth Street Industrial Area-based Monitor Publications Limited after the state, frustrated by their own failure to hold Dr Gitahi Githingi to their whims, convinced Agha Khan to send the Kenyan medical doctor and his profession back to his homeland. Dr Githingi had always left the editorial to the editorial. His exit was a victory for the state.
This would be confirmed when a year ago, Monitor was closed down and Police asked Asiimwe to hand over two reporters. The MD wasted no time in asking that editors surrender the reporters to Police. But editors fought the MD off, leaving him smiling like a Butabika (mental hospital) patient would a fly whizzing past his food. However, Asiimwe would get his approval rating at State House shooting the ceiling when Sunday Monitor published a spread on First Son Muhoozi Kainerugaba. The early edition had already hit the newsstands when the MD received a call from Gen. Muhoozi. Shaking like a street vendor being harassed by KCCA goons, Asiimwe drove to Monitor and asked that the production be halted and all copies recalled from the stands. He then ordered editors to get alternative article for the cover and the two inside pages.
It was done. State had their man. But things would not end there; Asiimwe would become that managing director who summons a reporter to his office to explain why they covered NSSF the way they did. The same was with NWSC, Umeme, MTN and a host of other parastatals. One reporter was sacked for insisting on exposing MTN on a scandal that would later end up in court.
In December, last year, Nation Media Group reached the decision to sack Asiimwe ‘in installments’ (don’t ask me what that would mean). After we blogged, NMG found themselves in a spot of bother and tried to write a disclaimer presser, only to decide it would make the Frying Pun sound so real. With State House still enjoying the Asiimwe show, NMG would rescind their decision. It was a mistake, as many Monitor staff would say, but one editor saw a way to benefit.
The editor would tread in the MD’s shadow and do all his bidding. In Pun speak, we call it ‘sniffing the armpits.’ Whispers always suggested the two dipped their mandibles in sour honey everywhere they went. Matters came to a head when the Katosi road project spilled into the Namuwongo newsroom. With lawyers from UNRA pinning the bosses for taking bribes, the board was forced into launching investigations.
To make matters worse, Malcolm Gibson, the executive editor, read the riot act to NMG, and, like his predecessor Simon Freeman, demanded that the MD is fired as a condition for his stay on the job. When Gibson left for the US, NMG saw another embarrassment brewing and was forced to listen to the American editor. Gibson, who had already placed his RAV4 car on sale, reluctantly returned to Monitor and continued his duties. The writing was on the wall—Asiimwe would be sacked in due course.
However, it took the consiglieri’s brutal betrayal for the issue to be brought up. It was all about brown envelopes and sources say that before the editorial board investigating allegations of simmering corruption in the newsroom, the MD was made to look guiltier than guilty when the consiglieri saved his own skin and handed over evidence that were irrefutable. Samash Nuh, the chairman of the editorial committee of the board, was more than convinced when fingers pointed at the consiglieri, who, to save his skin, gave away his Don—I love the pun. Samash Nuh wrote the recommendation for the axe to fall with a thud.
Apparently, the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) money ghost is still stalking places. When the scandal broke out, many editors ate to their fill. From Monitor to Vision down to Red Pepper, it was all about ‘eat and let eat’, as John Ruganda would say. Even the usually silent Observer was not spared as an editor was forced to fire a reporter who had picked a fat envelope on his behalf and sat on it to himself. The reporter had done a lot of bungie jumping with the money, only for the editor to turn up at OPM and be told his dime had been couriered through the reporter.
The other reason the board had to say enough is enough is that two years ago, Asiimwe had blamed all Monitor’s woes on Daniel Kalinaki. In a board meeting for finance and marketing, he is alleged to have convinced the board that Kalinaki’s stance was hurting Monitor’s financial muscle since government was reluctant to advertise with the paper. He reportedly said Kalinaki had turned Monitor into an opposition paper and was stifling copy sales. The board was convinced that without Kalinaki, the paper would be turned around for the better as copy sales and ads would triple.
Fast-forward and all the MD was doing was taking staff to the streets to vend newspapers with threats that those who refused would not get Christmas bonus and shopping vouchers. The MD was himself a vendor and Monitor’s CSR image was outweighing its bank balance.
As investigations continued, it was discovered that there was a shortfall of more than Shs800 million. To the board’s dismay, the MD was angazi. These are monies mainly eaten by finance and marketing branch of the Mafia in Monitor. Two of the big guys in the department are rumoured to be bleeding from the wedge of the axe already. Sacked.
This explains one of the reasons NMG decided to send in its financial brain in Stephen Gitagama as caretaker MD at Monitor. The NMG director of finance, who is already in the country, will be tasked with straightening the financial abuse inside Monitor within the three months he will be caretaker. Asiimwe has until Friday to dust his cabinet for the new managing director.
Meanwhile, every Tom Dick and Banjo inside Monitor now goes around wearing huge headphones that make them look like pilots of junk military jets. All they do is play Pharell Williams’ ‘Happy’ song over and again. The mood is jovial but tense. They are happy but eager for more. Tense because word has been doing rounds that a reshuffle is imminent.
Don Wanyama, the ME for dailies, is being pitted for the overall ME, as Charles Odoobo Bichachi takes the back seat. Apparently, this is causing ripples in Namuwongo. Insiders say Bichachi is likely to quit after barely two years on the job, but some insiders say they won’t allow that to happen. See? Monitor is a weird bag of popcorn! If you doubt, ask for more. There are things like guys plotting to come together and demand that the chief sub editor is demoted on some peculiar grounds, including that mistakes in the paper now outnumber daily copy sales. These schools of thought are parading someone whose name sounds stranger than a Chinese viral infection as replacement for John Tugume. I am watching and loving the show now.
Someone in Nairobi said there is a whole lot of mess in Monitor now. I can’t agree more. But what next for the consiglieri turned traitor? At least this other one had already got, with the help of some former MTN big shot who used to deliver the brown envelopes, a stall in Kikubo market where Chinese products are sold now. That is a fall back. To be continued…
Editor’s Note: Seaman is a blogger at pigapanga.wordpress.com and an editor at New Times Rwanda