MEDIA MONITORING PROJECT ZIMBABWE MEDIA UPDATE # 2001/22

SUMMARY

Ø First, it plagiarized the essence of a story about the army
commander campaigning against the MDC (29/5) from a
report first published by The Financial Gazette the previous
week. Given the gravity of the story, it is fair that the
daily’s editors may have considered this a sufficiently
important story to tell its own readers, even if it was four
days later. But despite the similarity in the wording of its
report, The Daily News was incapable of crediting what
was evidently the source for their story and provided no
evidence of their own research.
In the same issue the daily republished an entire page
from its Saturday issue, complete with dateline.
Then, in its Friday edition (1/6), The Daily News gave the
impression that its lead story about the investigation into
the activities of Information Minister, Jonathan Moyo, when
he was working for the Ford Foundation in Kenya, provided
new evidence. In fact, most of the story pertaining to its
headline, “Ford Audit Report Implicates Moyo”, had been
published by The Zimbabwe Independent in February.
In the same edition the daily carried a self-aggrandizing
article in its news columns that bore no relation to news.
The paper insulted the intelligence of its readers by
comparing the slavish prominence The Herald gave to
Mahachi’s funeral, with its own headlines of the week –
just in case readers were incapable of making their own
assessment. How such a story could be sanctioned for
inclusion in the paper, never mind a news page, suggests
extreme insecurity.
Ø Meanwhile, the missing story of the week was some
investigation into the identity of the Alfasud driver who
allegedly caused the accident that killed Mahachi.

Mahachi’s funeral

Indeed, the state media again swamped its audiences with the
funeral and follow-up stories about Defence Minister Mahachi. The
Herald carried 12 articles over four days (three of them as its lead),
while The Chronicle carried nine stories, six of them on one day
(28/5).
ZBC also provided wide coverage to events relating to Mahachi’s
death (39 minutes or 12% of the television bulletins monitored
(7am, Nhau/Indaba and 8pm) in the week. But notably, this
constituted less than half the time ZTV devoted to Border Gezi’s
death (27%). During the week of Gezi’s death, 90 minutes of the
330 minutes given to news concerned Gezi’s death.
The Daily News carried three stories referring to Mahachi’s funeral,
excluding its own propaganda story, while The Sunday Mail carried
a helpful diagram that clarified how the accident happened.

Mbeki and land

The private Press ignored comments from South African President,
Thabo Mbeki, reiterating his country’s support for the need for land
reform in Zimbabwe.
However, in its efforts to persuade viewers that Mbeki was
defending the Zimbabwe government’s fast track version of land
redistribution, ZTV devoted nine minutes and 30 seconds (49%) of
the news section in its 8pm bulletin (30/5) to footage of Mbeki’s
parliamentary response to MPs questions about events in
Zimbabwe.
Pointing out that a policy of correcting colonial injustices could not
be considered “an excuse” for gaining political support, Mbeki was
careful to confine his remarks to his government’s official policy of
support for the principle of land redistribution in Zimbabwe. But
despite ZTV’s lengthy footage (and another one the following
evening), nowhere did the South African President declare his
support for the way the Zimbabwe government was conducting the
land redistribution exercise as suggested by ZTV’s newsreader.
Describing the follow-up story in its business section the following
night (31/5) as “news just received”, ZTV screened another four
minutes and twenty five seconds of Mbeki’s comments from the
same parliamentary session – this time relating to sanctions.
Neither item was of much news value, since the South African
government’s official position on these issues is well known.
ZBC’s worst crime however, was the fact that it censored the most
important piece of news to emerge from the parliamentary session,
originally broadcast by SABC. This was Mbeki’s revelation that the
ANC and officials from his government had met senior MDC
officials in their efforts to find solutions to the crisis in Zimbabwe.
His statement followed an equally revealing comment by an ANC
MP who told the South African Parliament that officials from his
party regularly met senior officials from Zimbabwe’s opposition.
In the past, ZBC has reported denials that South African ruling
party officials have ever met the MDC.
Incidentally, the state broadcaster has never accorded so much
airtime in a single bulletin to Zimbabwe’s own parliamentary
sessions.
The Herald (31/5) also censored any reference to the South African
government’s meeting with Zimbabwe’s opposition in its story
headlined “Mbeki defends legitimacy of Zimbabwe’s land
reform”, thus also creating the impression that the South African
President had endorsed ZANU PF’s “fast track” land redistribution
exercise.
As a result, Zimbabwean consumers of the state owned media
remain unaware of the important fact that South Africa considers
the opposition MDC a legitimate stakeholder in Zimbabwe’s future
and regularly consults its officials – among others - in its efforts to
find solutions to the political, social and economic crises afflicting
the country.
Only The Zimbabwe Independent (1/6), quoting sources close to
Mbeki’s office, reported that the South African President and the
ANC’s secretary-general had met MDC secretary-general,
Welshman Ncube, on separate occasions during April. The news
was contained in the weekly’s story about Mbeki being expected to
meet President Mugabe during the G15 summit in Jakarta.

ZBC continued reporting Mbeki’s statement throughout the day
(31/5), on radio and television, (7am, 1.30 and Nhau/Indaba and
8pm). In follow-up stories, the state broadcaster sought to reinforce
its impression that Mbeki had endorsed ZANU PF’s land reforms
by seeking supportive comments from the War Veterans leadership
(1/6, Nhau/Indaba & 8pm TV), Zimbabwe’s High Commissioner to
South Africa, Simon Khaya Moyo and land expert, Prof Sam Moyo
of SARIPS (31/5, radio 1& 8pm and TV, 8pm). The 8pm television
bulletin even quoted Simon Moyo saying that Mbeki’s statements
clearly exhibited his understanding of the land issue in a report that
played the South African national anthem and showed file pictures
of Mugabe standing between Nelson Mandela and Mbeki to invoke
a sense of solidarity between the two countries. As if this was not
enough, the South African high commissioner, Jeremiah Ndou, was
also quoted (3/6, 8pm) backing Mbeki’s stance. He was quoted as
having said, “the demonstration by people in the region for land
is understandable because it is the reason they went to war”.
The reporter failed to ask Ndou whether his government specifically
supported ZANU PF’s land reforms.
During the week, 15 stories out of 136 monitored stories on ZBCTV
news bulletins (7am, Nhau/Indaba & 8pm) (11%) were related to
the land issue. Radio 2/4 had 18 (8.4%) stories on the same issue,
while Radio 1/3 had 32 (9%) including repeats.

Coup Plot Denial

Responding to reports in the British and South African media that
the South African authorities had been alerted to an alleged coup
plot in Zimbabwe’s armed forces, The Herald and The Chronicle
(30/5) carried prominent reports of the South Africans denying they
had such information. They also carried details of the original report
contained in the British-based Guardian newspaper and reported on
SABC.
But ZBC’s audiences would have been confused by the state
broadcaster’s version of the story.
ZTV introduced its footage of Zimbabwe’s armed forces
commander, Vitalis Zvinavashe, denying the possibility of a coup
plot (TV and radio 8pm 30/5), by referring to a garbled and
confused Herald feature accusing sections of the British Press of
being British government spies, as the basis for claiming the report
to be one of Britain’s conspiracies to destabilize Zimbabwe.
Thus ZTV simply introduced its story as: Enemies of Zimbabwe
have failed in their machinations to destroy the country, hence
they are now trying to put a wedge among the Zimbabwe
Defence Forces by alleging that a coup is planned.
And Zvinavashe was simply quoted as saying: “It is not true
because that type of thing should not be expected in this
country…”
Even his bland assurance that the defence forces were loyal to the
government of the day, reported by ZBC and The Herald (1/6) were
not questioned. It was especially important to clarify this
statement, given recent reports that the Army commander had
been campaigning for the ruling party in the barracks and that the
distinction between the ruling party and the government has
become so blurred by recent events.

Political Violence

The private press continued to cover incidents of political violence
in the week under review, while the state media continued to
suppress the stories or distort them in a way that implicated the
MDC as perpetrators of violence. The Herald Reports in the private
press, on the other hand, implicated supporters of the ruling party.
This week The Daily News had about ten articles while The Herald
had only two articles.

The Daily News (31/5) was first to carry a story on the resurgence
of political violence in Bindura, quoting MDC supporters who were
victims of the violence and other residents blaming war veterans
and ZANU-PF militias. But the story carried no comment from
either of these groups or from the police.
The following day, The Herald reported a second bout of violence in
the town, quoting the MDC’s parliamentary candidate in last year’s
election, whose car and shop were destroyed. Although the paper
did report that the clashes were between supporters of the two
parties as the constituency prepared for a by-election to replace its
previous MP, Border Gezi, it did not attempt to identify who was
responsible for destroying the MDC candidate’s property. It also
quoted a named individual “claiming” to be a senior member of the
ruling party and other unnamed ZANU PF members blaming the
MDC for the violence because its supporters were using “very
aggressive tactics” in their campaign since Gezi’s death. But the
state daily made no attempt to inquire what these tactics were.
The only hint ZBC’s audiences had of the Bindura violence came
when the state broadcaster aired police warnings that they would
deal with the perpetrators of violence in Mashonaland Central (1/6,
Radio 1pm, ZTV 7am & Nhau/Indaba).
Earlier reports in the private Press of the abduction of MDC officials
were totally ignored by ZBC.
In the only other story on political violence covered by the public
press, The Herald (28/5) carried an exclusive report on how riot
police fought running battles with war vets and illegal settlers
evicted from Glenara Estates outside Harare. 

The Daily News and The Herald (30/5) both carried ZBC’s story of
the previous evening (Radio 2 8pm) that Masvingo’s new mayor
Alois Chaimiti, was wanted by the police on allegations of
kidnapping and assaulting a ZANU-PF youth during the run-up to
his election. But neither paper – nor ZBC - questioned the police
allegations or sought comment from the alleged victim or those
accused of the kidnapping and assault.
Only The Daily News (28/5) reported that the High Court had
ordered the trial of alleged killers of MDC activists Tichaona
Chiminya and Talent Mabika in last year’s election campaign. And
only The Daily News (29/5) reported that the abducted MDC
candidate for a local council ward election had won the poll and
had been found alive after escaping from his kidnappers. In the
same issue, the daily reported that 33 MDC supporters in
Masvingo had been arrested for political violence, but that “not a
single ZANU PF supporter had been arrested on similar
charges”.
The same paper (28/5) reported MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai
predicting that ZANU PF would unleash an unprecedented wave of
violence in next year’s presidential election campaign. He was
quoted as saying: “There is going to be unprecedented
violence and many people will die.”
But the next day The Herald and ZBC allowed Information Minister
Jonathan Moyo the opportunity to distort the meaning of
Tsvangirai’s remarks. The Herald reported Moyo as saying that
Zimbabweans and the international community should note with
concern that through Tsvangirai, the MDC was promising to
unleash unprecedented violence and killing in the presidential
election.
MMPZ deplores such crude distortions, as it does ZBC’s continued
refusal to accord MDC members an opportunity to defend
themselves where they are accused of instigating violence.
For example, ZANU PF youth secretary Absolom Sikhosana was
quoted, (3/6, TV 8pm) during the Question and Answer segment,
saying that ZANU PF youths only reacted to attacks and that when
they do so they are accused of being violent so as to demonize the
ruling party. Sikhosana’s sentiments implied that the opposition
was to blame for the current wave of violence engulfing the country.
ZBC’s failure to balance ZANU PF’s accusations compromises its
impartiality as a news broadcaster.

Other
This week ZTV, through the NDA’s “Talk To The Nation”
programme, gave the opposition a rare platform to discuss the
country’s economic crisis and explain what policies it would adopt
to solve it. The programme featured ZANU PF’s MP David
Chapfika, who chairs the parliamentary budget and finance portfolio
committee and MDC’s MP Mashakada, a member of that
committee. And it was exceptional in that the two representatives
were able to express their views, while ordinary Zimbabweans were
afforded a rare opportunity to question the two men about their
parties’ policies. It made for interesting viewing, even if moderator
Mutumwa Mawere, was rather heavy-handed in giving preference to
callers without allowing the panellists adequate time to respond to
some questions.
It is therefore deplorable that ZBC has now been ordered to drop
this programme on the flimsy technical pretext that ZBC
technicians cannot work for a sponsored programme. Evidently,
those in control of the state broadcasting corporation cannot
tolerate fair and balanced political debate.

Ends.
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