Back to Index

Media issues
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe
Extracted from Weekly Media Update 2003-38
Monday September 22nd- Sunday September 28th

While the public was still mourning the closure of The Daily News through the repressive Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act, it emerged that President Mugabe had given his assent to another controversial media law, The Broadcasting Services Amendment Bill (The Herald, 23/9 and Studio 7, 23/9).

In its report on the issue, The Herald merely highlighted some amendments to the principal Act without clearly stating what the original Act stipulated. The paper also didn’t subject the law to any scrutiny, as did Studio 7.

The private radio station viewed the signing of the Bill as part of government’s broader scheme to stifle alternative viewpoints, violating the constitutionally guaranteed right to freedom of expression. It quoted The Zimbabwe Independent editor, Iden Witherell, as saying, "laws passed by government were meant to suppress a free press."

In fact, such views were vindicated when the Supreme Court invalidated some sections of the broadcasting law saying they were unconstitutional. This followed a court application by Capital Radio challenging the refusal by the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe (BAZ) to grant it a licence. According to The Herald and The Weekend Tribune (27/9) the Supreme Court declared as unconstitutional Section 6 of the Act, which stipulated that the Information Minister be a licensing authority. The court ruled that the section undermined the independence of BAZ.

The Weekend Tribune also pointed out that the superior court had also invalidated the requirement that only one other additional national radio and television station, besides the public broadcaster could be licensed. The Herald report did not clearly highlight this save to confuse its readers by merely stating that Sections 6, 9(1), 2 and 9 (3) of the Act were struck down. There was no attempt to explain what those sections stipulated.

Further, the paper merely stated in passing that there were differences among the judges on some sections of the law. It did not clearly state what those differences were.
It was only The Weekend Tribune, which revealed that Justice Wilson Sandura had disagreed with the court’s view that Capital Radio had no legal basis to challenge the prohibition of foreign ownership since it had not indicated that it had foreign shareholders. Justice Sandura was quoted as saying, "even if all its shareholders were Zimbabwean citizens, it would still have locus standi to challenge the provisions on the basis that the provisions do not permit it to have foreign shareholding it desperately needs in order to operate a viable commercial broadcasting services… " However, it was unclear what the judgment meant to the amended Act.

Other media missed the story but continued to highlight government’s continued persecution of The Daily News. For example, SW Radio Africa (22/09) reported that the police had again seized The Daily News equipment it had returned the previous Saturday and that five directors of the paper had been arrested by the police.

ZTV (23/09, 7am) corroborated the report and quoted the police saying the directors would be charged under AIPPA and that, "police are considering charging some of the newspaper reporters for contravening the same Act." Two days later, ZTV (25/9, 8pm) revealed that the police had lived up to its word and had picked up nine journalists who were charged under AIPPA. The Herald and Chronicle (26/9) carried a similar report and stated that the journalists were being accused of "operating without accreditation."

However, The Zimbabwe Independent (26/9) quoted Daily News lawyer Gugulethu Moyo saying police had altered the charges and were now accusing the journalists of "aiding and abetting an illegal operation" after learning that the journalists had attempted to register but were denied the right to do so by Media and Information Commission (MIC) because ANZ (publishers of the paper) was not licensed. It also revealed that the police had listed 45 journalists, including some who had left ANZ, for questioning.

Meanwhile, the Zimbabwe Independent (and SW Radio Africa 25/9) reported that MISA had filed a court application challenging the legality of the MIC saying that according to AIPPA, three members of the commission were supposed to be appointed in consultation with media organisations. The paper pointed out that this was not done. It also noted that MIC has yet to draft a code of ethics for the media and set up a Media and Information Fund as required by AIPPA.

The Herald (26/9) ignored these details in its report on MISA’s application. It also largely ignored condemnation of The Daily News closure by members of civic society such as the Law Society of Zimbabwe (LSZ), who were quoted in The Zimbabwe Independent criticising the Supreme Court ruling on ANZ. The organisation said that, "recognition of and application of the ‘dirty hands’ doctrine as an obstacle or bar to the determination of the merits of a constitutional challenge imposes a limitation to the enjoyment of freedom of expression." The paper’s Editor’s Memo observed that the "dirty hands" principle the Supreme Court used against The Daily News had the potential of discouraging "future applicants from testing their rights in court."

While the government-controlled media avoided such analysis and gave the impression that the closure of the paper was lawful, The Standard (28/9) tried to expose how the State was selectively applying the law by failing to reprimand media practitioners working for the government-controlled media. It reported that Zimbabwe Union of Journalists had petitioned ZIMPAPERS to take action against its circulation manager Rukwata Ndoro, who plagiarised Mitchell’s book in his obituary of Muzenda. According to ZUJ, Ndoro " is neither trained nor registered and has been churning article after article, sometimes as a columnist and the latest as a reporter." Despite this, no arrest has been made so far.

Visit the MMPZ fact sheet

Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License unless stated otherwise.

TOP