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Weekly
Times closed down just two months after launch
Reporters
Without Borders - Reporters sans frontières
February
28, 2005
Reporters Without
Borders today condemned the announcement by the Zimbabwean government's
Media and Information Commission (MIC) on 25 February that it is
closing the independent Weekly Times for a year for "violating
the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act."
"As usual, the Zimbabwean
authorities find any old pretext for gagging independent media that
might spoil things for them at the height of an election campaign,"
the press freedom organization said, calling it "the second
serious press freedom violation in two weeks," after three
foreign press correspondents were forced to flee the country.
"The government
does not hesitate to step up the repression one month before the
31 March legislative elections," the organization added, "although
it ratified the Southern African Development Community's protocol
on principles and rules for democratic elections which ought, in
theory, to guarantee press freedom."
MIC chairman
Tafataona Mahoso, who had threatened to close the Weekly Times
in January just a week after the first issue came out, said its
licence was being withdrawn because of a false statement and the
failure of its owners to reveal facts. The newspaper had tricked
him when it registered its licence by hiding certain aspects of
its editorial line, Mahoso alleged.
According to
its statutes, the Weekly Times is a privately-owned news
weekly focussing on development issues.
It is the fourth
privately-owned, independent newspaper to be closed in less than
two years, following the Daily News, the Daily News
On Sunday and The Tribune.
For more
information, contact:
Leonard
VINCENT
Bureau Afrique / Africa desk
Reporters
sans frontières / Reporters Without Borders
Email: africa@rsf.org
Website: www.rsf.org
Tel: 33 1 44 83 84 84
Fax: 33 1 45 23 11 51
5, rue Geoffroy-Marie
75009 Paris
FRANCE
Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website.
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