Look Up TV Faces Bankruptcy, Gives Directive To Journalists

The future of journalists working at Look Up TV hangs in the balance after the station revealed that it has been hit by financial insolvency.

In an internal memo to its correspondents seen by Viral Tea dated Wednesday, November 30, the station is abandoning its pay-per-story format to the correspondents from Thursday, December 1 as a consequence.

The station's administration noted that the correspondents will be paid for the month of November before Thursday, December 15.

A presenter at Look-Up TV studios. /FILE

It has asked them not to file any story footage unless called upon to do so.

"Our wish has always been that we grow to a point where you will be paid per story, an idea and I have been pushing. Unfortunately, it is impossible to sustain this arrangement that we have been having due to financial insolvency.

"This being the case, November is the last month to pay, expect the November payment before 15/12/2022. Therefore from 1st of December kindly don't send any footage unless called to do so," read the notice in part.

The station in July had added veteran TV journalist Louis Otieno to its ranks as a senior English news anchor ahead of the intense coverage of the 2022 general elections.

A deal was agreed upon approaching Otieno for him to make a comeback on television screens, made easier by his previous stint at Royal Media Services (RMS) TV station, Citizen TV.

He started anchoring prime-time news at Look Up TV from 8:00 pm to 9:00 pm, which is a difference from the usual 9.00 pm to 10.00 pm timelines for prime-time news by other media houses.

Look-Up TV is a free-to-air television channel based in Nairobi County. It broadcasts news bulletins, current affairs programs, TV dramas, entertainment shows, talk shows, religious programs, and others and is also available via the Internet. 

The station's recent directive comes as scores of media houses across the country have been contemplating mass firings on the back of economic downturns.

The Nation Media Group (NMG) had hours ago announced its intention to retrench its employees enmasse in a bid to align itself with the current market environment, an exercise Viral Tea understands has already begun.

The media house which runs Daily Nation, NTV, Taifa Leo, Business Daily, Nation FM and online publishers such as Nairobi News had restructured itself to boost its business transformation agenda to assure success in the long term.

A photo of Nation Media Group. /BUSINESS TODAY