Local media industry investors want President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga to intervene in the controversial award of the second digital TV signal distribution licence to a Chinese company.

Mayfox Ltd, a Kenyan firm that was among shortlisted bidders for the licence, said such intervention was necessary because national assets that should be protected in the public's interest and economic growth were at stake.

The consortium, which was knocked out on technical grounds without being given details of its specific shortcomings, said it had instructed its lawyers to challenge the decision in the High Court.

"We were surprised by the results because basically the government needs to empower its own people," said Mr Manga Mugwe, the chairman of Mayfox Ltd. "Where citizens have an interest and capacity to run a business of this nature, all governments throughout the world give them preference," he said.

"We hope that the principals will be able to give back the national assets to the Kenyan people."

Mr Mugwe said Mayfox had the technical capacity to transmit digital signals, having been involved in similar projects in Brazil, the United Kingdom and Italy. "We have rolled out 500 sites in Italy while Kenya is doing only 45 sites," he said. There is something amiss if someone is claiming that we have no capacity to do the job."

Award of the second digital TV signal transmission licence to Chinese firm Pan African Network Group Ltd has sparked uproar in the media industry with players expressing fear that the platform would be used to gag media freedom.

Apart from Mayfox and the eventual winners, other bidders were Africa Link Agencies, Signal Distributors Ltd, Globecast Africa, and National Signal Networks - a consortium of Nation Media Group and Royal Media Services.

Signal Distributors, another consortium of local content providers, withdrew in support of National Signal Networks' application that was rejected on grounds that the bid bond was valid for 60 days as opposed to the required period of 120 days.

"China is not transparent where the media is concerned and the fact that they were registered only four days before the process closed raises questions," said Mr Mugwe.

The tendering process has attracted the attention of the Parliamentary Committee on Energy, Communications and Information with committee chairman James Rege promising a thorough examination of the process with a view to finding out how local firms were knocked out of the bidding process.