Vernacular radio in Kenya began in the pre-independence period in 1953 when the African Broadcasting Services was established to carry inclusive broadcast content to serve local Kenyan communities. However, it was not until the second wave occurred after independence in 1963 that vernacular radio began to show some promise, although radio broadcasting remained in tight government control. For instance, the first privately owned radio on the African continent Homa Bay Community Radio which was started in 1982 was shut down by the Moi regime only two years after its inception. The significance of the establishment of this radio station, however, was that it illustrated the considerable autonomy possible through community media. The Moi government retained close control over radio under the guise of national unity after it suffered an attempted coup in 1982 and limited broadcasting to Kiswahili rather than vernacular languages. The fear that vernacular media might be used for political purposes by the opposition and the loss of control of a key means of influencing opinion made the Moi regime remain opposed to granting FM licenses to the private media (Okoth, 2015). The third wave in radio broadcasting was ushered in by the liberalization of the airwaves in the 1990s. Media liberalization in Kenya was an initially gradual process, with the first private (English language) FM station, Capital FM, being licensed in 1996, followed by the steady growth of other English and then Kiswahili language stations. In 2000, Kameme FM, a Kikuyu language station, became the first to break the state monopoly on local language broadcasting.