The Standard is one of the leading newspapers in Kenya with a 20% market share. It is the oldest newspaper in the country owned by The Standard Group, which also runs the Kenya Television Network (KTN). The Standard Group is headquartered at the I&M Bank Tower in Nairobi.
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The newspaper was established as the African Standard in 1902 as a weekly. The Standard's founder, Alibhai Mulla Jeevanjee sold the paper to two British businessmen in 1905, who changed the name to the East African Standard. It became a daily paper and moved its headquarters from Mombasa to Nairobi in 1910. At the time the newspaper declared strongly colonialist viewpoints.[1] The British-based Lonrho Group bought the newspaper in 1963, only a few months before Kenya's independence. The paper changed its name to the Standard in 1977 but the name East African Standard was revived later. It was sold to Kenyan investors in 1995. In 2004 the name was changed back to The Standard. It is the main rival to Kenya's largest newspaper, the Daily Nation. In 1989,at a time when Kenya was going into multi-party era,the Standard Group acquired the KTN Television Channel.
In late February 2006 The Standard ran a story claiming that president Mwai Kibaki and senior opposition figure Kalonzo Musyoka had been holding secret meetings. At 1:00am local time (2200 UTC), on March 2, masked gunmen carrying AK-47s raided the editorial office of The Standard, and of its television station KTN. They kicked and beat staff members, forcibly took computers and transmission equipment, burned all the copies of the March 2nd edition of the newspaper, and damaged the presses. At KTN, they shut down its flow of electricity, putting the station off the air. Initially, the Kenyan information minister claimed no knowledge of the raid, but has since revealed that Kenyan police were responsible, and stated that the incident was to safeguard state security. "If you rattle a snake you must be prepared to be bitten by it," John Michuki said. Three journalists at The Standard, arrested after the critical story was printed, were released on March 2 on bail of 50,000 Kenyan shillings (US$692).[2][3][4]