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Food shortages and price increases
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
Extracted from Weekly Media Update 2005-12
Tuesday April 5th - Sunday April 10th 2005

THE government media carried 47 reports on the new wave of commodity price increases and shortages of basic commodities during the week but failed to logically explain to their audiences the reasons. Thirty-two of the reports were aired on ZBH. In its reports ZBH concocted conspiracy theories alleging that the shortages were as a result of political machinations by the country's enemies unhappy with a ZANU victory in the recent general election.

For example, three of the five stories ZTV carried on the subject projected this idea. Two of the stories quoted selected members of the public questioning the timing of the shortages and price increases of the basic commodities while the third attributed the stalemate on tobacco prices between farmers and buyers to a plot to punish the farmers who were suspected of having voted for ZANU PF. The contention by the Consumer Council of Zimbabwe (CCZ) that the shortage of mealie-meal, for example, was due to millers failing to receive "enough grain" from the Grain Marketing Board was suffocated by ZTV (6/4,8pm). Radio Zimbabwe (11 stories) and power FM (16 stories)'s carried similarly unenlightening stories.

Although the government Press tried to steer clear of conspiracy theories, it simply regurgitated official pronouncements on the price increases and commodity shortages. The government papers simply quoted government officials calling on retailers to revert to old prices without fully discussing the reasons for the increases. Neither did they discuss the likely effects of government's price freeze order on the availability of goods and the economy in general.

The Herald (7/4) was more hypocritical. While it carried a report calling on retailers and manufacturers to "exercise restraint on price hikes", it (9/4) defended the $1,7 trillion dollar-budget announced by the government-appointed commission running the Harare Council, which would see service charges and rates soar 40-fold. It argued that although the increases were massive for the ordinary ratepayer, they "do little more than cope with the effects of the high inflation that the country is experiencing at the moment".

It was left to the private Press to offer a critical and balanced analysis of the country's economic crisis and commodity shortages in its eight stories on the topic. But three of the Daily Mirror's four articles on the matter echoed the government's media's conspiracies by insinuating that price increases and commodity shortages were due to attempts by pro-opposition businesses to trigger food riots. Studio 7 inexplicably ignored reporting on all these matter in the monitored bulletins.

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