When Kenya's opposition leader Raila Odinga held a mock inauguration last week declaring himself the 'people's president', he was out to discredit the results of an election held late last year that he eventually boycotted, saying the vote was rigged.

But Uhuru Kenyatta's government wants to put the election story behind it, get on with governing, and deny Odinga the oxygen of publicity, so it ordered media outlets to ignore the alternative inauguration.

When three privately-owned TV channels defied those orders and tried to broadcast the event, the authorities pulled the plug on them, setting off a debate on who gets to decide what constitutes news in Kenya, journalists or politicians. But however aggrieved they claim to be, Kenyan media have some of their own credibility issues to deal with.

Kenya's presidential election should have been settled five months ago when Kenyatta was declared the winner by 10 points over Odinga. Odinga challenged the result and was backed by the Supreme Court, which had ordered another vote for October.

The second round played out like a farce. Odinga pulled out, saying the fix was in. A key member of the electoral commission fled the country, citing political interference and death threats. Voter turnout was less than half of what it was in round one, and the electoral commission declared Kenyatta the winner, with more than 98 percent of the vote.

Most notably, after the election in late 2007. The results were disputed and the violence lasted for months. In the electoral aftermath, more than 1,000 were killed and more than half a million displaced.

While the causes of that violence were many and complex, the Kenyan media got much of the blame.

During the campaign, television stations had aired incendiary political ads - in breach of their regulations. Small, local radio stations incited post-election violence by broadcasting hate speech.

By year's end his government passed a new media law giving itself the power to fine news outlets - a law that the US-based Committee to Protect Journalists described as draconian.

Ultimately, this story comes down to questions of legitimacy.

The Kenyatta government had its legitimacy challenged by Raila Odinga in the most public of ways. The media tried to broadcast that ceremony, hoping to regain the legitimacy they squandered last year, falling short as election watchdogs and going soft on the Kenyatta government.

If the Kenyan media thought that would land them in the government's good graces, what happened last week proved they made a big mistake. And going to black, the way they did, will have come

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