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Government uses sport to distract public's attention
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
Extracted from Weekly Media Update 2004-03
Monday January 19th - Sunday January 25th 2004

Despite persistent claims by South African President Thabo Mbeki and Nigeria's, Olusegun Obasanjo's that the country's two main rival political parties were on the verge of resuming formal talks to resolve the country's crises, the situation on the ground continues to deteriorate. For example, ZANU-PF is reportedly continuing with its violent campaign against supporters of the opposition, particularly in Gutu North where a parliamentary by-election is scheduled for February 1-2. Not only that, the ruling party is also being accused of using traditional leaders to frustrate the campaign activities of the MDC.

Only the private media revealed these barbaric tactics, which the ruling party has unashamedly employed in every election since the entrance into the political arena of the opposition MDC in late 1999. Recently, the police raided the MDC offices in search of what they described as "subversive" material, The Standard and The Sunday Mirror (25/1). Members of civic organisations have not been spared from this repression. Studio 7 (21/01) The Daily News and The Daily Mirror (23/01) reported that the police broke up a meeting of Harare residents organised by the Combined Harare Residents Association (CHRA) to discuss the increase in rates by Harare City Council by 600 percent.

The government-controlled media predictably ignored these incidents highlighting the extent of State-tolerated repression in the country. Instead, ZBC chose to drown its audiences with stories about the Zimbabwe national soccer team's journey to Tunisia for the African Nations Cup soccer tournament. For instance, ZTV devoted 30 minutes or 24 percent of its total news time (excluding business, weather and sport segments) allocated to 8pm bulletins in the week to soccer. Songs such as Go Warriors Go composed by Information Minister Jonathan Moyo accompanied some of the news items. In addition, the station's current affairs programmes such as the 30- minutes-long Behind the Camera and the-hour-long Face the Nation discussed soccer. Its Monday evening programming was also suspended to pave the way for live coverage of the team's departure to Tunisia. However, this overly generous devotion to soccer did not translate into a critical examination of Zimbabwe's preparations for the tournament but represented mere jingoistic puff pieces for the national team. The broadcaster ignored the chaos that surrounded the departure of the national team supporters to Tunisia and the shameful attempts by ZANU PF functionaries such as the war veterans' leader, Joseph Chinotimba, to hijack the event into a ZANU PF affair.

It was only the private media that revealed this. For example, The Daily News on Sunday (25/01) reported that Chinotimba distributed T-shirts inscribed Sendekera Mwana Wevhu, ZANU PF's latest slogan for the land reform programme, amongst supporters and announced that those intending to travel to Tunisia should wear the T-shirts. Perceived MDC supporters and some journalists working for the private media were reportedly barred from travelling to Tunisia. The government Press also turned a blind eye to this. Rather, The Sunday Mail (25/01) tried to give government mileage out of the national team's success. Said the paper: "We salute those in Government who put their heads on the block to pump a lot of resources into the Warriors' campaign, chartering a plane for the boys when everyone else was arguing that the money should be spent on food".

Such immoral attempts to politically hijack a popular sport clearly demonstrates the extent to which the authorities will go to try and win the support of Zimbabweans, who are becoming increasingly frustrated with the government's failure to restore some stability to Zimbabwe's social, political and economic existence.

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