By Roseleen Nzioka
Nairobi, Kenya: Freelance journalism has never been easy. Any freelancer can tell you that. I have been at it for nine years now and it has been one of the toughest things to do amid dwindling opportunities due to newspapers and other non-news organizations cutting down their communications budgets.
Yet, somehow, throughout the years, it was always possible to find some writing and editing work (I am a print and online writer/editor).
Then came March 2020 and the Kenya government announced the first case of Covid- 19 in the country. And kaboom! Everything shut down, we Kenyans were all advised to stay at home, work from home, keep social/physical distances from each other (as if a freelancer can effectively work from home).
When the Government announced the partial curfew plus all the other restrictive measures to curb the spread of the virus, I had just clinched an opportunity to collate a report for a research organization based here in Nairobi.
The content of the report was supposed to have emanated from a three-day conference. The conference like many others was abruptly canceled, and my gig died, just like that! I was to earn a tidy sum from this particular assignment that would have stabilized me financially for a couple of months.
That was my first hit from Covid-19. It felt like a financial TKO. By this time we as Kenyans had not understood the magnitude this virus was going to take. We thought that after the initial 21 days of partial lockdown, life would get back to normal.
Alas! It was not to be. Instead, it became worse. Other potential assignments I had begun negotiating for also disappeared without a trace.
Corona Virus with one swoop had turned freelancing into a near-impossible feat.
Every “door” I knocked asking if I could freelance was slammed in my face. One editor at a leading newspaper in Nairobi sympathetically told me they could not give freelancers assignments because they were planning mass layoffs of their fulltime journalists in order to cut down their wage budget.
With the massive layoffs of journalists from print, broadcast, and online media houses, the toll of the Coronavirus on our profession is huge. However, there are no solid figures for how many are now freelance journalists and more importantly how many of us are actually out of work as opportunities have dried up. Not only were assignments canceled, but pitches were not responded to, and following up on payments for published work became a job in itself.
Even without Covid-19, part of the hustle of being a freelance journalist is to develop a mind of steel when your pitches get rejected, like mine were by the BBC Africa Eye and the Persephone Miel Fellowship (2020).
Meanwhile, as freelancers we are limited in HOW we cover Covid-19 stories because most of us cannot afford the proper protective gear to go into public spaces, neither can we risk contracting the Coronavirus since we do not have proper medical insurance cover. Personally, I have been covering Covid-19 stories virtually and also heavily relying on press releases. Self-preservation right now is of necessity.
Following the Corona Virus outbreak globally, the Rory Peck Trust launched a survey to identify freelance journalists’ primary needs during this health crisis.
“The results helped us to understand that the needs of the journalists were mainly related to basic subsistence, health, and equipment,” said Johanna Pisco, the organization’s journalist assistance manager.
Rory Peck Trust issued awards of between EUR200 and EUR900 to freelance journalists who applied for assistance. The funds are to be used to support everyday living costs for the journalists and their dependents. As of early August, the organization has awarded a total of EUR26,500 to assist 53 freelance journalists around the world.
“The fund will remain open for as long as the budget allows it, though we continue to work to find more funding to help face the crisis,” said Pisco.
Other organizations have also set up relief funds for women and freelance journalists. I personally applied for the relief fund by the International Women Media Foundation (IWMF). I was not lucky. The response was that they were overwhelmed and had exhausted the funds for the first round. I am hoping that I will be lucky in the impending second round of funding!
Eight months down the road there’s no light at the end of the tunnel and there’s no telling when normalcy will resume or if it will. I know that I am not alone. I belong to a legally registered group of journalists calling ourselves the Association of Freelance Journalists- Kenya. And our numbers are growing by the day as staff layoffs in legacy media houses create new freelancers by the day.
We have formed a Whatapp group where we share our experiences as freelance journalists and media professionals. One thing is emerging from the communication. We are finding our profession untenable to pursue and there is no way to measure the toll on our mental health.
Just like other professions and industries like the hospitality industry, Journalism has been strongly impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic, with many local media houses losing massive advertising revenue, some newspapers folding, some TV stations shutting down and merging including the legacy outlets consequently shrinking opportunities for freelance journalists.
Roseleen Nzioka is a freelance journalist/editor.
