Who Owns Kenya’s Media as the 2027 Election Nears?

Kenya’s largest newsroom now answers to a Tanzanian billionaire. Rostam Aziz’s Taarifa Ltd completed its takeover of Nation Media Group on Aug. 31, ending 66 years of Aga Khan ownership.

Nation’s sale is one piece of a wider reshuffle.

Across Nairobi, the families and founders who built Kenya’s private press are selling, stepping back or struggling to meet payroll.

All of it is happening less than a year before the August 2027 general election.

Whoever holds these newsrooms will shape how millions of Kenyans understand the 2027 race.

A Few Owners Still Control Most of What Kenyans Hear

Kenyan media looks crowded from a distance.

Reporters Without Borders counts more than 100 radio stations and nearly 50 TV channels in the country.

Yet a short list of owners leads the market.

Just 10 media owners dominate the landscape, according to a Media Council of Kenya study cited by the Reuters Institute.

Broadcast still carries most of the news. Afrobarometer found that 79% of Kenyans use radio for news at least a few times a week and 67% use television, while only 12% regularly turn to newspapers.

Nation Media Group Trades a Foundation for a Tanzanian Tycoon

Aga Khan ownership of Nation began in 1959. It started as a small Kiswahili newspaper, Taifa Leo, and grew into a regional group with more than 30 brands across four countries.

In March, the fund agreed to sell its stake in NPRT Holdings Africa to Taarifa. NPRT holds 92,618,177 Nation shares, a 54.08% stake.

Neither side disclosed the price.

Regulators in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda exempted Taarifa from making mandatory takeover offers to other shareholders, Kenyan Wall Street reported.

Six new directors joined the board in late August. Among them are veteran journalist Julie Gichuru and Jubilee Insurance Group CEO Julius Kipng’etich.

Nation’s new owner knows this business. Aziz co-founded Mwananchi Communications in Tanzania, whose newspapers Nation later acquired.

He is also a former lawmaker for Chama Cha Mapinduzi, Tanzania’s long-ruling party, and critics fear he may try to influence Nation’s editorial output, the BBC reported.

At a Nairobi news conference, Aziz said he backs “credible and independent journalism.”

Tanzanian journalist Neville Meena offered a mixed view in The Citizen. Meena said Aziz understands the commercial side of news, but independence will depend on strong governance and regulators.

Aziz’s Ties to State House Draw Scrutiny He Rejects

Aziz’s closest Kenyan tie runs through energy.

President William Ruto commissioned Aziz’s $130 million Taifa Gas plant in Mombasa in February 2023, praising him as a “resilient investor” who outlasted five years of official delays.

CNN correspondent Larry Madowo noted Aziz’s closeness to both Ruto and Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan. “He needs those relationships for his businesses to survive or thrive,” Madowo said.

Aziz rejects any political motive. He has said he was closer to former President Uhuru Kenyatta and the late Raila Odinga, and called those ties personal.

Nation’s board now also includes Georgia Mutagahywa, Aziz’s own chief of staff at Taifa Group.

Uganda Handed the New Owner His First Test

Pressure arrived within weeks, and it came from Kampala rather than Nairobi.

On June 28, Uganda’s army chief, Gen. Muhoozi Kainerugaba, ordered the shutdown of the Daily Monitor and NTV Uganda, both Nation properties. Kainerugaba, President Yoweri Museveni’s son, wrote on X, “In Uganda, I do not believe in a free press!”

Soldiers blocked Nation’s Kampala offices for a month.

Talks followed between Aziz, Museveni and Kainerugaba. Museveni then authorized the outlets to resume in late July.

Reporters Without Borders welcomed the reopening but said it would watch for continued interference. Terms of the talks have not been made public.

Nation’s regional reach also carries a logic that is easy to miss. Aziz framed the deal around the East African Community’s goal of letting ideas and capital move freely across borders.

East African money buying an East African newsroom is not the problem by itself.

What counts is whether any owner, from any country, stays out of the editor’s chair.

Standard Group’s Owners Are Caught Between Debt and State House

Founded more than a century ago, Standard Group publishes The Standard and runs KTN and Radio Maisha.

Ownership records as of Dec. 31, 2024, show the Moi family controls 69.03% of the listed company. A family linked to Joshua Kulei, a longtime aide to former President Daniel Arap Moi, holds another 10.90%.

Money is now the company’s most urgent problem.

Former KTN anchor Ken Mijungu said Standard owes him about 4 million shillings in unpaid salary and allowances.

Kenya Union of Journalists members and former staff have protested repeatedly over back pay and severance.

Creditors are pressing too. Auctioneers became a regular sight at the Mombasa Road headquarters, where incoming cash went first to creditors, Business Today reported.

In 2023, an auctioneer moved to sell company property over an unpaid 4.1 million-shilling defamation award. Standard had also gone years without paying rent for its regional bureaus, Business Today reported.

In February, the board suspended a planned 1.5 billion-shilling rights issue meant to recapitalize the company.

A tribunal later backed the Communications Authority’s move to revoke six Standard broadcast licenses over about 48.9 million shillings in unpaid fees and levies. CEO Chaacha Mwita said the company would take its challenge to the High Court.

Standard blames the government for part of its crisis. In a May editorial, the paper said the state owes it 1.2 billion shillings in unpaid advertising and called the withheld payments coercion.

Ruto answered on June 25. He accused KANU Chairman Gideon Moi of hiding behind debt while employees endured months of delayed pay, Capital FM reported.

Ruto called the situation “heartless to loyal workers.”

Both men have long competed for political dominance in the Rift Valley.

The Standard Group has not responded to written questions about its finances, sent on Sept 24. We will add any response to this report.

Each side holds part of the truth.

Owners who miss payroll weaken their own journalism.

A government that sits on ad money gains a quiet lever over editors.

Royal Media Services Remains Kenya’s Most Personal Media Empire

Samuel Kamau Macharia, widely known as S.K. Macharia, built Royal Media Services into Kenya’s largest privately owned broadcaster.

His network runs Citizen TV, Inooro TV and 14 radio stations in English, Kiswahili and several Kenyan languages.

Reporters Without Borders describes Royal Media as the dominant group in Kenyan broadcasting.

Macharia is also a former parliamentary candidate and longtime political commentator.

Unlike Nation and Standard, Royal Media does not trade on the Nairobi Securities Exchange, so its shareholder records are far harder for the public to see.

Macharia was born in 1942, and the network has not made a succession plan public.

Mediamax and Radio Africa Show Two Different Paths Through Hard Times

Mediamax Network owns K24 TV, People Daily and radio stations including Kameme FM and Milele FM.

According to Communiqué, the Kenyatta family is its most prominent shareholder.

In July 2025, Mediamax announced its sixth round of layoffs in four years. CEO Ken Ngaruiya blamed falling ad spend, digital disruption and unfavorable government policy.

Radio Africa Group, owner of The Star and Kiss 100, took shape differently.

Ghanaian-born Patrick Quarcoo co-founded it in 2000 with British journalist William Pike and Kenyan businessman Kiprono Kittony.

As of 2019, a South African media firm held a 49% stake, which later passed to Lebashe Investment Group.

Kittony stepped down as board chairman in June after 27 years. Martin Khafafa now leads the group as CEO.

Radio Africa’s founding is a pan-African record in itself: a Ghanaian journalist helped build one of Kenya’s biggest radio companies.

Capital FM Turns 30 Under Kirubi Family Control

Capital FM went on air in 1996 as Kenya’s first private FM station, founded by Lynda Holt. It turned 30 this month.

Holt later sold the station to industrialist Chris Kirubi, a friend she said had the resources to take it further.

Since Kirubi’s death in 2021, his daughter Mary-Ann Musangi has chaired Capital Group. She and her brother, Robert Kirubi, inherited much of their father’s fortune, including Capital Media Group.

Money has been tight here too. In a staff memo reported by The Africana Voice, Musangi said the company was in “huge financial difficulty” and would need restructuring.

Capital FM editor Kevin Rotich has said advertisers are shifting to social media because mainstream outlets cost more.

Regional Capital Is Rising, but Ownership Rules Lag Behind

Two shifts are now visible.

First, founding families and foundations are giving way to newer African capital.

Second, state advertising money has become a pressure point for struggling newsrooms.

Neither concern is new. Kenyan researcher Othieno Nyanjom wrote in a 2012 Internews study that owners seek either commercial returns or “likely political harvest.”

Data firm Odipo Dev found in 2018 that close to 37% of Kenyan newspaper, TV and radio outlets had owners exposed to political influence.

Kenyan scholars have also documented politicians registering outlets in the names of relatives, friends or spouses, which makes true ownership hard to trace.

Some signals point the other way. Kenya climbed to 106th of 180 countries in the 2026 World Press Freedom Index, up from 117th in 2025.

Kenyans will soon test these owners in the most public way possible.

By August 2027, every major newsroom will face an election that can reward caution over courage.

Readers will be watching which owners let their editors choose courage.