Radio Africa Group has announced intent to retrench a number of employees even as the going gets tough for the media industry.
Radio Africa, which owns six national radio stations, one TV station and a national newspaper, becomes the third mainstream media house in Kenya to announce retrenchments in the wake of a new government.
Other media houses which have announced retrenchments include The Standard Media Group and The Nation Media Group.
“As you may have observed in the recent past, there has been a shift in the media industry over time which forced us to make changes in our business model to maintain our competitive edge of the company. As Management, we have been faced with a situation that requires critical business decisions be made to ensure business continuity. We will therefore be reorganizing our internal operations, and in the process, we may declare numerous positions redundant based on the new structure,” said Group CEO Patrick Quarcoo in an internal memo.
On September 30, The Standard Group announced plans for mass sackings, but the implementation of the move which targeted over 200 employees stalled due to financial constraints.
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Recently, the Standard Group CEO Orlando Lyomu insisted that the media house would be forced to send home a number of employees, otherwise the “ship would sink”.
“We have done everything we can. Unfortunately, with the state of play, if we don’t take action, this ship will sink. During storms, the captains ask for all excesses to be thrown overboard to ensure the vessel can continue its voyage,” Lyomu said. He hinted that one of the radio stations, Vybes Radio, would be shut down in the process.
The Radio Africa Group runs Kiss 100, Classic 105, Radio Jambo, X FM, East FM, Smooth FM, The Star newspaper and Kiss Television.
