Digital TV’s many channels creating conflict in homes

By FERDINAND MWONGELA

For a while now, this digital TV thing has been nagging my mind. Considering the powers that be insist that I have to migrate or else soon and very soon, December to be precise, I will have to start using my — very analogue — TV’s screen as a wall hanging.

A good number of us — I am sure I can’t be alone on this — do not believe in paying for anything when you can get something similar for free. And this, perhaps, explains why there are always long queues in malls around Christmas waiting for ‘free’ gifts.

The looming deadline saw me start shopping not every long ago for that decoder box thingy. The running consensus at the local drinking hole was to go for pay TV. The only thing I don’t get is why some Kenyans should pay a monthly fee — more than what they pay for rent — to watch TV!

My shift seems to weigh more in favour of those decoders that only give you the free to air channels, which have all the content I need. In between the news at 7pm and 9pm, and the usual soap operas that are aired around those times, honestly there is no time for those fancy channels.

Let’s face it, 7pm and 9pm news have become even more entertaining since the days we were growing up. I mean, back then, after news about Mtukufu Rais building a gabion or two here and there, there was very little. Which reminds me, do we still build gabions? I haven’t seen a picture of retired President Kibaki doing his bit to end soil erosion, and neither does his successor, the son of Jomo. Ok, as for Jomo’s son, he will probably get around to it — there is time — once he finishes this thing about title deeds and the ICC.

I even suspect students in the education system today would be hard pressed to say what a gabion is.

Anyway today, we have it all. From haki yetu circuses to politicians performing skits that would put thespians to shame, and the occasional romantic incidents between one or two grown men and chicken —keeps us going for days.

Hardly a week passes by without a proper rendition of some sort of skit on my screen. The most recent cast, I hear, had a cook and a messenger. I haven’t gotten around to watching it yet, and this has nothing to do with the lack of entry fee. Because unlike the Kenya National Theatre, such shows are free, they are brought to our TV screens.

And why bring in more conflict, honestly? Already the household can hardly agree on the few channels available, what would happen when there are 100 more channels to choose from? Think again.