The use of jargon scares ordinary consumers from ‘Business Daily’

The paper’s editorial policy needs to be changed to ensure it connects with its audience. “I know—because I deal with people in high places, middle places and even low places—that this paper, sometimes, is bought for prestige (not for comprehension) so that people just see you’ve bought the BD.”

BD need not make its reporting so complex and difficult. “Let business reporting be simple and straight. Business is not rocket science.”

The “NMG Manual of Style and Usage”, which BD is required to follow, requires reporters to avoid using jargon because it only confuses the reader.

“When words or phrases used by experts are adopted into newspaper articles, they must be explained at first mention.”

But who is the audience for BD? “I still, even as a person who is interested in public affairs, struggle a lot to read and understand what BD is actually trying to say,” Mr Maliba said, holding up the paper.

“Even the average people walking around with this paper do not make much sense of this paper.... I think journalists write these things for themselves not for the people out there.”

Sparked criticism

The show, hosted by Olive Burrows, was discussing the top stories in BD. The story that sparked the criticism is headlined “42 percent of foreign investors flee NSE in nine months”.

Also Read: Over 6,000 foreign investors flee Nairobi Securities Exchange in 9 months

The front-page story, by Kepha Muiruri, says some 6,256 foreign investors have fled the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) between December 2022 and September 2023.

The story goes on to say that the flight of the foreign investors has been the primary driver of lower stock and market valuations this year, with the investors being critical to market performance as they dominate trading at NSE.

The writer then quotes unnamed “analysts” at Genghis Capital (without explaining what or who Genghis Capital is) as saying: “This is attributable in part to the value-agnostic capital outflows by foreigners from emerging and frontier markets, coupled with the protracted earnings recession by most corporates.

“The dynamics of demand and supply in our characteristically foreign-dominated market are imbalanced, thereby adversely affecting equity market valuations.”

This statement, the panelists said, is jargon-ridden and should have been broken down to make it more understandable. Mr Maliba said the story raised a serious issue and, had it been written in a more understandable manner, might have attracted the attention of Parliament for public discussion.

The other story that the panelists discussed was the main headline story, “Layoffs rise to Covid levels on higher taxes, fuel costs” by Constant Munda. The headline itself is a bit of a mouthful.

But the main problem was the use of unclear statements or unexplained acronyms and jargon—such as CMA, benchmark interest, equity market valuations, sell downs and sell-offs, dumped shares and net portfolio outflows.

BD is chock-full of examples of jargon that is unexplained, such as “amortisation”, “hot money”, “cryptocurrencies”, “game theory”, “nominal interest rates” and “foreign equity”.

However, BD is not as unreadable as Mr Maliba suggests. But it’s true the paper has a serious problem in how it communicates some of the messages in which jargon is used. Lack of clarity is apparent in some of the messages.

But there is no BD journalist who wakes up every morning to write for himself! The problem is that of explaining jargon, or substituting jargon for ordinary words, without losing the sophisticated and precise meaning intended.

This is not a problem peculiar to BD as it afflicts all writers who try to communication specialised knowledge to ordinary readers. No doubt, there is room for improvement on how BD handles jargon.

- The Public Editor is an independent news ombudsman who handles readers’ complaints on editorial matters including accuracy and journalistic standards. Email: [email protected]. Call or text 0721989264.