MEDEVA has made several seasons of four major television series for Kenyan broadcasters - Tazama! (a topical features magazine); Agenda Kenya (Kenya's pioneer political talk show); The Woman's Show (a talk show with light and serious video features); and the first series of Agenda Uganda.
Western donors have supported MEDEVA's Tazama! Agenda Kenya and Woman programmes because MEDEVA provides a number of services that positively influence Kenya's broadcasting industry, and more generally, support the spirit of inquiry and freedom of speech - training young people in ethical journalism; widening the democratic space in the very public forums of television and radio; and focusing on women's issues in an appealing, popular and male-friendly, way!
Although Kenyan broadcasters still run a lot of cheaply-priced American dramas and sitcoms, as well as Brazilian and Nigerian soaps and Nigerian reality competitions - they are beginning to recognise the potential and the popularity of locally-produced content, and do now occasionally commission it. Slowly, broadcasters are also giving independent production houses like MEDEVA, revenue-sharing deals, if and only if they - the broadcasters - manage to secure major commercial sponsorship for locally-made shows. Sometimes, however, radio and television broadcasters revert to their old ways, demanding large fees to cover the cost of airing programmes that have been made with donor money and offered to them free of charge!
MEDEVA though is still a Kenyan-registered, not-for-profit NGO and still donor-dependent, and the prospect of it being able to generate enough revenue (let alone profit) year in, year out, to sustain itself through revenue-sharing - or one day, through selling its programmes to broadcasters in Kenya - is still a long way off.
MEDEVA, The Godown Arts Centre, Dunga Rd, Nairobi, Kenya.
P.O. Box 59835 Nairobi 00200. Tel : +254 (0) 20 557569/70.
Mob: +254 (0) 734 696741, +254 (0) 722 696741
Fax +254 (0) 20 557585
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