Joy Doreen Biira

Joy Doreen Biira (born 5 September 1986) is a Ugandan journalist and communications consultant. She describes herself as a "career journalist, communications and digital strategist, moderator, speaker, media trainer, brand influencer and mum".

Background and education Joy Doreen Biira was born on 5 September 1986 to John and Beatrice Baluku in the Western Ugandan town of Kasese, in the Rwenzururu sub-region, in the foothills of the Rwenzori Mountain Range.

In September 2005, Biira was admitted to Makerere University, Uganda's oldest and largest public university, to pursue a degree in Information Technology, her third preference. Her first choice had been Journalism and Mass Communication.

Biira joined Standard Media Group in January 2012 as a news anchor, reporter, and show host with Kenya Television Network (KTN Kenya). She hosted Business Today, a one-hour show that airs across 12 countries on the African continent. The show breaks down economic matters to its viewers while speaking to drivers of businesses, identifying the gaps businesses across Kenya and Africa might have and seeking solutions to these challenges. As Kenya is the economic hub of East Africa, business leaders, economists, and analysts make it their business to make an appearance on Business Today, which airs weekdays at 1400hrs East Africa Time on KTN News. She served in this role for nearly six years until October 2017.

In January 2017 she took on an additional role as host of the international news environmental show Eco@Africa, which she co-hosts with Nigeria's Nneota Egbe of Channels Television. She was selected as the East African Reporter for Deutsche Welle (DW) covering environmental issues and exciting solutions from Africa and Europe, serving in that role until October 2017.

She left KTN in October 2017. In January 2018, Biira was hired by the Kenya Ministry of Mining as the Advisor, Strategic Communications, serving there for one year. In January 2019 she rejoined Deutsche Welle as the African correspondent for their broadcast Business Africa, based in Nairobi, Kenya. She also continues to speak and consult professionally as the creatives director for Africa Speaks Limited, a role she has played since January 2010.

Family Biira is married to Newton Kung'u, since 2016. Together they are parents to two sons.

Controversies On 26 November 2016, armed government forces comprising Uganda People's Defence Forces (UPDF) and Uganda Police Force (UPF), attacked, ransacked and burnt down the palace of the King of the Rwenzururu, one Charles Wesley Mumbere. The number of fatalities are anywhere between 55 and over 100, depending on who is reporting. The next day, Biira, who was in her hometown of Kasese, for her wedding to fiancé (now husband), Newton Kung'u, a Kenyan citizen, was arrested by the Uganda Police, because she had posted photographs and a video of the inferno, after the attack, on some of her social media pages.

On 23 December 2016, Biira's personal automobile, a Mercedes-Benz E-220, a sedan with registration number: KBY 831K, was stolen from the company parking lot of Standard Media Kenya, her employer, where the owner had parked the vehicle. About a week later, the car was recovered in the western Kenyan city of Kisumu, approximately away. Arrested and charged for the theft was Aaron Obudho Ochieng, an editor at the television station where Biira worked. The editor's initial defence was that he and the owner of the vehicle had jointly planned the car theft. Six months later, he recanted those claims in court, publicly apologized to the car owner for the harm, pain and suffering caused by his lies to the court, and reached an out of court settlement with the car owner, for the civil liabilities related to his statements. He also lost his job as editor at KTN Television. In May 2018, Ochieng was again incarcerated for faiing to pay Biira.