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The
rule of law
Media
Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
Extracted of the Weekly Media Update 2004-20
Monday May 17th – Sunday May 23rd 2004
The government-controlled
media’s collusion with the authorities in undermining the rule of
law and presenting ZANU PF’s philosophy as representative of public
opinion was evident in their unbalanced, inflammatory and racist
coverage of the assault in Parliament on Cabinet ministers Patrick
Chinamasa and Didymus Mutasa by opposition MDC MP for Chimanimani
Roy Bennett.
They allowed
ZANU PF officials and ruling party activists to use racist and blatantly
threatening language to attack Bennett without identifying this
as being inflammatory and constituting dangerous incitement to violence.
Chinamasa’s
crudely racial and offensive provocation of the MDC legislator was
also conveniently omitted.
With their news
angle based on this perspective of the fracas, the government media
used the incident as a springboard to launch a vitriolic attack
on the MDC, perpetuating ZANU PF’s claims that the opposition was
inherently violent.
This uncritical
and biased coverage of the issue simply magnified the incitement
and hatred expressed by ruling party officials and its supporters,
and coupled with the state security agencies’ selective application
of the law tended to corroborate widely held concerns by local and
international observers about the breakdown of the rule of law in
the country.
ZTV (18/5, 8pm)
was at the forefront of the government media’s unprofessional and
xenophobic coverage. It claimed that Bennett’s attack on the two
ministers demonstrated the violent nature of the MDC, without clearly
explaining the circumstances leading to the incident.
The Herald
and Chronicle (19/5) followed suit.
The Herald
story, Bennett’s behaviour riles Zimbabweans, appeared calculated
to give the impression that his behaviour had so incensed all Zimbabweans
they wanted revenge.
The paper quoted
"scores of Zimbabweans" threatening retribution
against Bennett. However, only four people were quoted and half
of them were unnamed.
One of these
unnamed sources accused Bennett of suffering from a "colonial
mentality and hangover" while the other one, a Harare
woman, claimed that if the ministers did not retaliate "we,
as women, will organise ourselves and descend on Parliament to deal
with Bennett."
Similar views
from unnamed selected members of the public appeared on ZTV (19/5,
8pm) that evening. One of them was quoted saying, "If
we were there (in Parliament) we would have crushed him. In fact,
I don’t think things will be fine for him if we meet him".
Instead of subjecting
such incitement to scrutiny, the newsreader stated: "…The
MDC has always resorted to violence whenever democratic means such
as the ballot box have failed to achieve their goals".
As proof, the
reporter then chronicled incidents, which he claimed were a testimony
of the MDC’s violent nature. Several MDC MPs were named as facing
charges of violence.
However, the
reporter omitted to say that none of the implicated opposition legislators
have been convicted on such charges.
Rather, the
station featured government’s Media and Information Commission chairman,
Tafataona Mahoso, and ZANU PF activist William Nhara, masquerading
as "political analysts and social commentators",
invoking an unwarranted racist perspective and smearing the opposition.
Nhara was quoted
as saying Bennett’s actions "reflects the remnants of
a legacy which believed that the only way to talk to an African
is through beating them".
Mahoso called
for the "severest punishment", saying Bennett
was "representing a party that contains racists"
which "for the last three years has been fomenting violence
among our people".
However, the
private media presented sober and balanced coverage of the issue.
While condemning Bennett’s actions, they also challenged Chinamasa’s
spiteful and gratuitous attack on the MP.
For example,
they revealed that Chinamasa had abused parliamentary privilege
by digressing from his response to a parliamentary legal committee’s
adverse report on the Stock Theft Amendment Bill to focus on alleged
"cattle thefts" by Bennett’s British ancestors
(The Daily Mirror, 19/5; Studio 7, 19/5; and The Standard,
23/5).
The Daily
Mirror quoted Chinamasa referring to Bennett as an "inheritor
of looted wealth…land and cattle…and (one) who owns the whole of
Chimanimani", language criticized by The Standard
as "intemperate, uncouth, vituperative"
and "unbecoming of a government minister and one (who
is) supposed to preside over the country’s justice system".
It was only
the private media that accessed the MDC’s perspective of the parliamentary
scuffle. SW Radio Africa (19/5) and the Zimbabwe Independent
(21/5) quoted MDC spokesman Paul Themba Nyathi echoing The
Standard’s viewpoint. He told the Independent that
while the MDC did not condone Bennett’s actions, neither did it
condone "the demeaning, hurtful, wicked, barbaric and
provocative racial and personal slurs and insults hurled at Bennett"
by Chinamasa.
Studio 7 (19/5)
and The Standard quoted Bennett himself attributing his flare-up
to the failure by parliamentary authorities to protect him from
Chinamasa’s personal insults.
Studio 7 (20/5)
also revealed that Mutasa had kicked Bennett during the melee. Mutasa
was quoted confirming this: "You don’t just wait there
when a mad man is charging at you. It’s true. I kicked
him very hard. What’s wrong with that?"
But the government
media ignored this, preferring to push ZANU PF’s neurotic racist
rhetoric as a mirror of national opinion.
As a result,
the government media presented the ZANU PF-organised demonstrations
to protest Bennett’s behaviour as a spontaneous response by angry
Zimbabweans against the dehumanizing treatment of blacks by unrepentant
whites as personified by "former Rhodesian police officer"
Bennett.
It was in this
light that ZBC (20/5, 8pm) and The Herald (21/5) reported
ZANU PF’s information secretary for Harare, Winston Dzawo, misinforming
the nation when he claimed that Bennett’s action was not only an
"assault" on the two cabinet ministers "but
also on the people of Zimbabwe who elected the ministers and the
President who appointed them to their posts". But neither
The Herald nor ZBC pointed out that Chinamasa had been elected.
The government
media passively reported on the inflammatory language used by ZANU
PF officials and demonstrators in clear breach of the Public Order
and Security Act (POSA).
For example,
Harare governor Witness Mangwende was reported in The Herald
as banning Bennett from the province, warning, "…If we
see him walking in the streets of Harare we will revenge."
A similarly violent threat was issued by ZANU PF’s Manicaland
provincial chairman Mark Madiro, quoted by SW Radio Africa (20/5)
"banning" Bennett from entering Manicaland, where his
constituency is located, adding that he would be killed if he did
so.
The private
station also reported that Mangwende had called for "Bennett’s
head" and told protestors "to do
a thorough job if they find him."
Mines Minister
Amos Midzi was reported as having threatened that, "all
MDC MPs will not walk the streets of Harare".
In fact, the
dangerous effects of this appalling incitement by ZANU PF officials
were fully exposed by the private media. SW Radio Africa & Studio
7 (20/5), The Daily Mirror, The Tribune and the Zimbabwe
Independent (21/5) reported that following the officials’ address
to the demonstrators, a mob marched to the MDC’s headquaters, Harvest
House, under police escort and inflicted extensive damage to its
offices.
However, instead
of arresting those responsible for the violence, the private media
noted that the police arrested four MDC officials inside the building.
While these
media condemned the inaction of the police in preventing the violence
and the cynically selective application of law, the government media
ignored these incidents and presented the demonstration as having
been peaceful.
At the same
time it became clear from a report on Studio 7 (20/5) that ZANU
PF would allow unruly individuals to take the law into their own
hands. The station quoted Mutasa as saying he would not guarantee
Bennett’s safety because he was the "most undesirable
element in Zimbabwe" adding that the authorities would
let "the events unfold in the country, and if the people
go violent against Bennett, and if he gets hurt in the process,
it is his own lookout. That is what he has been inviting and he
is going to have it."
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