Parliament Thursday hastily voted to place the free media under a politically appointed tribunal and imposed harsh penalties against journalists under the most repressive press law in Kenya’s history.

The Bill gives the government power to kick journalists out of the media and to raid the accounts of media houses and journalists judged to be in breach of the code of conduct.

Effectively, the code is to be written by the government because the job is given to a team which is appointed by a panel picked by the Cabinet Secretary.

It creates perhaps the only body in Kenya with absolute power: The proposed media tribunal is expressly allowed by the Bill to do whatever it wants to ensure that its orders and directives are effected.

Parliament is allowed by the Constitution to write a law regulating the media by setting and monitoring compliance of rules. However, the Constitution prohibits the control of such a body by the government, political or commercial interests.

The Constitution also prohibits the state from controlling the media in any way whatsoever.

According to the Constitution, it is illegal for the government to “interfere with any person engaged in broadcasting, the production or circulation of any publication or the dissemination of information by any medium”.

It also bans the state from penalising anyone for any opinion or view.

Sixty MPs, or 17 per cent of the National Assembly, passed the Kenya Information and Communication Bill last evening, dealing a serious blow to efforts to create an open and progressive society.

MPs, without much debate, accepted a proposal by the Energy, Information and Communication Committee chaired by Mr Jamleck Kamau for the creation of the Communications and Multimedia Appeals Tribunal.

The tribunal will have the power to “impose a fine of not more than Sh20 million on any respondent media enterprise…adjudged to have violated either that law or the Code of Conduct for the Practice of Journalism.”

It will also have the power to fine individual journalists “not more than Sh1 million” for violating the same code.

In some interpretations, the fine is a debt and the offending person and organisation will have their back accounts raided or property auctioned.

The tribunal also has the power to recommend the suspension or removal of a journalist from the register of journalists.

This contradicts the Constitution which prohibits Parliament from passing any law limiting the freedom of the press.

Proposed by Mr Kamau, the creation of this tribunal was among amendments introduced with a mere 28 MPs in the chamber.

Only a handful shouted aye when the vote was called. But since no one shouted “nay”, the absence of opposition was assumed to mean that the members were unanimous.

As they were going through the amendments, Majority Leader Aden Dualle and Mr Kamau realised that the Bill was not going to be passed without the quorum of 50 MPs and they rushed out to get the rest.

“This is a controversial and good law but the members are not here. This House is more full when passing other Bills,” Mr Dualle said later.

After that, the 32 who hadn’t been in the House came in and helped bring the numbers up to 60 and then Speaker Justin Muturi called for the verbal vote, the ayes had it and the Bill was passed.

Among the tribunal’s powers would be to order the offending editor of broadcast, print or online material to publish the tribunal’s decision in any way it may specify.

The tribunal will have no more than seven members. The chairperson will be a nominee from the Judicial Service Commission and shall be a person qualified for appointment as a judge of the High Court with experience in communication policy and law.

There will be at least four more members, who will be people with knowledge and experience in media, telecommunication, postal courier systems, radio communications, information technology or business practice and finance.

These people should, however, not be employees of either the Media Council or the Communications Authority, the successor of the current Communications Commission of Kenya.