Janet Mbugua is making a comeback on broadcast media after eight years as was announced by Nation Media Group’s Head of Broadcasting Simaloi Dajom.
“I am excited to inform you that renowned media personality, Janet Mbugua has joined Nation Media Group.
“Janet is highly skilled in engaging audiences on TV, Radio and Digital media,” she said in a statement.
The journalist is a highly acclaimed media personality, with an extensive career in television and radio with roles ranging from prime time news anchoring, news reporting, producing, hosting, voice over to moderating.
Education
Mbugua was born and raised in Mombasa, Kenya and attended the prestigious Brookhouse School in Mombasa for her high school education.
After she completed high school, she once revealed in an interview that she wanted to take a gap year before proceeding to college to which her parents agreed to on the condition that she utilized her time wisely.
Her friend disclosed that there was a new radio station opening in Mombasa in need of radio presenters and she decided to give it a shot. The radio station was known as Pulse FM and she worked there for three months marking the beginning of her career in media.
She then joined the United States International University and proceeded to the Limkokwing University of Creative Technology in Malaysia for her degree in Mass communication.
Mbugua is a holder of a Master’s Degree in Global Business Management from the Swiss Management Academy, Nairobi, Kenya.
Career
Having dabbled in radio after high school, her interest was picked after a radio presenter job she was eyeing at Capital FM became available. Before she left Pulse FM, she asked a friend to record her while she was live, and kept the cassette as her portfolio.
She then made her way to Capital FM’s offices armed with the recording, and handed it to the receptionist asking her to give it to her boss as her application for the job. Shortly after, she was contacted and told she had gotten the job with a salary of Kshs 50,000, a impressive boost from the Kshs 10,000 she made at Pulse. She worked at Capital for a year, presenting the mid-morning show, drive and other shows.
She would then proceed to Malaysia for her undergraduate studies, and came back to find Capital restructuring which rendered her redundant. She was encouraged to try TV after which she decided to give it a go, sending in a recording to Standard Media Group like she did at Capital. She was lucky that KTN was in need of a travel show host, and that was how she landed a six-month contractual role.
After her six months were up, and she returned to Mombasa. Before long, she got a call from SMG’s Managing Editor then Farida Karoney, asking her to do a screen test to assess her news anchoring skills. She was flawless and that saw her proceed to become an anchor on late night news, weekend and lunchtime news for a year and was then promoted to primetime news.
She moved to South Africa for greener pastures in 2009 and it was in Johannesburg that she landed an anchor role at ETV. During her two-year stay, she was a news anchor, reporter and producer of a pan–African content affairs show, Africa 360.
Mbugua returned to Kenya in 2011 and found out that her former boss Karoney was at Royal Media Services, producing news for Citizen TV. They reconnected and was offered a primetime anchor spot on the station, which led to her hosting two major news segments, Monday Special and The Big Question. She was paired with former Citizen TV anchor Hussein Mohammed and together, they were a dynamic duo who had Kenyans glued to their screens.
In 2017, she decided it was time for a career break, and left her job to focus on her family. Over time she took on short media projects while focusing on her foundation dubbed Inua Dada which she had started in 2014. The media personality is a vocal advocate of gender equality work uses her voice to champion for the rights of the Girl child, and to find sustainable solutions to improve their wellbeing.
The 38-year-old founded her media company JM Media Avenue in 2020, which provides people emceeing, public speaking and moderation services. She also provides guidance and mentorship to upcoming media practitioners.
In 2022, she was offered the Deputy Governor position by Moses Kuria who was vying for the Murang’a gubernatorial seat. She however declined and chose to focus on her personal projects.
