The Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ): Weekly Media Update 2010-1

1. General Comment

 

As Zimbabweans anxiously celebrated the beginning of a new decade, their hopes for comprehensive political, social and economic reforms remained clouded by uncertainty as none of the current developments appear to guarantee anything like the envisaged transformation that civil society has been demanding.

 

On the media front, news at the end of the year that members of the new Zimbabwe Media Commission (ZMC) had finally been named after almost a year of bickering among the coalition parties over the form and scope of media reforms marked a tentative step forward. But the politically compromised nature of its composition generated fresh concern over its capacity to deliver effective reform.

The Standard (10/1/10) aptly summed up this fear when it quoted media stakeholders querying the likely effectiveness of the ZMC on the grounds that its members would hold “diametrically opposed viewpoints” which was not only likely to cause “friction” within the commission, but also paralyse its operations and slow down reforms.

Similarly, revelations by Deputy Information Minister Jameson Timba in the same paper that the ZMC would “inherit the same secretariat” as its notorious predecessor, the Media and Information Commission headed by Tafataona Mahoso, also sent shivers down the spines of independently-minded media workers who have been asking how the ZMC will institute real media reforms under the provisions of the repressive enabling law, the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA). This was compounded by Timba’s disclosure that the commission would only start work after the appointment of a chief executive officer to head the secretariat.

The Zimbabwe Independent’s Muckraker column (15/10) dismissed the planned appointment of a CEO as “nonsense”, warning against sliding back to the old status quo of inefficiency and bias under which Mahoso “arrogated to himself all sorts of powers at the MIC”.

While Zimbabweans pray that the eventual commissioning of the ZMC will signal the arrival of a new crop of independent daily papers to expand their sources of news, the continuing paralysis in the reform of the country’s broadcasting sector remains a source of even greater concern. This has been characterized by unexplained delays in reconstituting the board of the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe (BAZ) following its blatantly irregular appointment by ZANU PF Information Minister Webster Shamu and the government’s singular failure to reform the repressive Broadcasting Services Act.

MMPZ believes that the board, tasked with regulating the country’s electronic media, should be speedily reappointed so that it can at least test the sincerity of the authorities’ pledge to finally free the airwaves after nearly thirty years of suffocating state control that has strangled the life out of professional public, private and community broadcasting in Zimbabwe.

 

 

2. Summary

The festive season proved to be both a blessing and curse for Zimbabwe. While it provided many weary Zimbabweans with a deserved break after a turbulent year, the holiday left the nation with virtually no easily accessible alternative sources of information from the state-controlled media after the few private weekly newspapers also closed shop for the holidays.

As a result, there was very little alternative to that of the dominant government-controlled media whose coverage of national issues has almost always been partisan and selective. This information gap was illustrated by the fact that of the 108 editions that the print media published during the 40 days between December 9^th and January 17^th, 82 (76%) were from the government-controlled publishers, Zimpapers, while the remaining 26 came from private publishers.

However, the official media’s dominance of the news market did not translate into informed coverage of contemporary national issues, highlighted in the period under review by continued differences among coalition partners over how to achieve political and economic reforms (See Fig 1).

 

 Fig 1: Topical stories in the print and electronic media

 

Publication	Power sharing dispute	Constitutional reforms	ZANU PF Congress	Human rights issues
ZTV	15	18	16	2
Radio Zimbabwe	14	13	21	0
Spot FM	4	8	23	1
The Herald	29	25	20	1
Chronicle	14	8	27	0
Manica Post	5	2	4	0
Sunday Mail	10	5	7	0
Sunday News	7	5	10	0
SW Radio Africa	21	2	4	30
Studio 7	6	0	1	3
ZimOnline	7	18	2	6
Zimdaily	2	1	0	1
Zimbabwe Times	6	0	0	3
New Zimbabwe.com	6	1	1	4
The Zimbabwe Independent	30	6	7	4
The Standard	13	13	2	5
The Zimbabwean On Sunday	10	6	3	17
Total	199	131	148	77

 

 

 

 

ZANU PF Congress

As the holiday season approached, ZANU PF held a delayed party congress in mid-December, which attracted 128 stories in the government-controlled media, none of which gave an independent analysis of the event and its outcome.

For instance, these media restricted themselves to marketing President Mugabe and his loyalists’ position in the party while papering over and censoring dissenting party voices.

The official media did not link the intense rivalry for senior party positions to ZANU PF’s unresolved succession issue, nor did they investigate the reasons why Mugabe failed to appoint Politburo members soon after congress as he usually does; or analyse the soundness of ZANU PF’s congress resolutions and their implications for the country’s reform agenda.

The Herald (12/12/09) provided a typical example of this professional ineptitude by failing to question Mugabe’s intemperate and racist comments against his MDC-T government partners, especially the party’s treasurer Roy Bennett, in his Congress address. It passively quoted him saying: “Ivo (MDC) vanoti chinjayi maitiro, isu tinoti chinjayi pfungwa. Svinurai, nyika ndeyedu, haisi yaBennett. Kwete. VanaBennett kana vakazvarirwa muno asika vana vevauyi”. [They say change your ways, but we say change your mind. Open your eyes, its our country, its not Bennett’s, No! Even if they were born here, they are the offspring of settlers.]

Neither did the paper reconcile this statement with a more conciliatory one he made at a joint Press conference with other coalition principals to update the country on the progress of the inclusive government, saying, “no one can claim to be more Zimbabwean than others” (24/12/09).

The private media reported the scramble for positions in ZANU PF, exemplified by the nomination of senior party officials Oppah Muchinguri and Didymus Mutasa to contest for positions in the Presidium, as an indication of fierce infighting in the party. They also analysed the implications of Jonathan Moyo’s return to ZANU PF, and speculated that President Mugabe had postponed announcing new Politburo members for fear of further dividing his party (The Zimbabwean & Zimbabwe Independent, 17 & 18/12/09).

  

Constitutional Reform

The public media only focused on the administrative modalities of the constitutional reform process, such as the provision of funding for the exercise and plans to train 500 people for outreach programmes without informing their audiences about the issues that were likely to be debated. Neither did they or the private media clarify the point of reference the constitutional teams would use in collecting people’s views.

Only the private Press, especially the Zimbabwe Independent (8 & 15/1/10) highlighted some of the issues that were likely to come under discussion, warning against political interference in the process. It (15/1/10) quoted Constitutional Minister Eric Matinenga saying: “We dare not dictate the outcome. History tells us that any interference with the will of the people is bound to fail. It happened in 2000. We should never ever tamper with the wishes of the people this time around.”

 

 

Power Sharing Dispute

The government media failed to give a holistic picture on the problems hindering the country’s smooth transition in their 98 reports on the outstanding issues that continue to hinder the government’s efforts to rehabilitate Zimbabwe. Only 19 of the reports were neutral while the majority (45) simplistically portrayed the MDC as an unfaithful partner and an obstacle to the resolution of the outstanding issues. None blamed ZANU PF. The remaining 34 depicted the parties as making significant headway in patching up their differences, citing the appointment of members to three constitutional commissions on the media, elections and human rights; and preparations for the start of constitutional outreach programmes. However, no effort was made to measure the sufficiency of the alleged progress in restoring Zimbabweans’ civil and political liberties, or to assess the suitability of the commissioners.

Although the private media also considered the composition of the Zimbabwe Media Commission (ZMC), the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission (ZHRC), and the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) as a sign of progress, they questioned the integrity of some of the commissioners. The Independent (8/1/10), for example, objected to the appointments to the ZHRC of perceived ZANU PF sympathisers such as Jacob Mudenda and UZ political science lecturer Joseph Kurebwa and former immigration chief Elasto Mugwadi, who defied a number of court rulings while in office.

The private media also highlighted growing regional disquiet over delays in resolving the deadlock, a development the official media either suffocated or censored.

 

Economy

Highlights included civil servants’ agitation for more pay; government’s cancellation of Mbada Diamonds’ proposed diamond auction in Chiadzwa; and the temporary closure of Nestle Zimbabwe due to government interference in its operations.

The government media only fairly covered ongoing wage negotiations between government and civil servants, but provided little insight into the Chiadzwa and Nestle sagas.

For example, they did not probe how Mbada won the Chiadzwa tender, identify the company’s directors or adequately explain why its planned auction was suspended. Neither did they highlight the repercussions of ZANU PF’s interference in Nestle Zimbabwe’s operations on the country’s economic revival quest.

Only the private media did an adequate job, though they never properly investigated the deal that the MDC-M’s Welshman Ncube was reported to have struck with Nestle.

 

Human Rights Issues

The government media carried four reports on human rights violations over the holiday, none of which were reported as such. They were mostly denials of the existence of the problem.

The private media featured 73 reports, 27 of which were incidents. Seventeen (63%) of them emanated from what appeared to be a fresh campaign to drive out the few remaining white farmers from their properties by the army, ZANU PF and war veterans, allegedly under the instructions of two senior ZANU PF officials Didymus Mutasa and Temba Mliswa.

The incidents included the seizure of nine white owned farms and attacks on eight white farmers in Mashonaland East, West and Central and Manicaland provinces.

The Zimbabwe Independent (15/1/10) reported war vets leader Joseph Chinotimba even resisting proposed reforms in the farming sector by the MDC arm of government: “…A land audit is not a priority at the moment. As a leader of war vets, I say no to the land audit. We should do the constitution first and even if they do it (land audit) after the constitution, I won’t be able to control the war vets and I just don’t know what will happen.”

 

The rest of the abuses were committed against the generality of Zimbabweans. These included:

• Alleged attacks on two MDC-T supporters, Sydney Rupiya and Daniel Makaranga, by suspected ZANU PF youths in Chakari and Uzumba (The Zimbabwean, 10/12/09)
• The harassment of WOZA leaders, Jenni Williams and Magodonga Mahlangu, and the alleged assault of a UZ student by state security agents (The Zimbabwean, 10/12/09 and The Standard, 13/12/10).
• Invasion of Nestle Zimbabwe’s premises by a gang of ZANU PF supporters allegedly threatening to force the company to buy milk from the First Family’s Gushungo Holdings (The Zimbabwean On Sunday, 20/12/10);
• Disruption of operations at Tinevimbo home-based care by ZANU PF youths who accused the organisation of having links with the MDC-T (The Zimbabwean On Sunday, 10/1/10); and
• The arrest of 25 Bindura University students for demonstrating against high tuition fees and an MDC-T councillor for holding an illegal rally in Makoni South (Studio 7 15/01/10).

 

The MEDIA UPDATE was produced and circulated by the Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe, 9 Knight Bruce Road, Milton Park, Harare, Tel: 263 4 741816 / 778115, E-mail: monitors@mmpz.org.zw

 

Feel free to write to MMPZ. We may not able to respond to everything but we will look at each message.  For previous MMPZ reports, and more information about the Project, please visit our website at www.mmpz.org

 

- January 22, 2010 by MMPZ Monday 9th, 2009 - January 17th, 2010

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Source: www.mmpz.org (received via email 22.01.2010)