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Further economic decline
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
Extracted from Weekly Media Update 2006-15
Monday April 10th 2006 - Sunday April 16th 2006

THE government media’s reluctance to honestly discuss the real causes on the country’s myriad problems was also reflected by the way they tackled the continued economic decline, which this week was underpinned by disclosures that government planned drafting a supplementary budget.

But rather than interpret this development as an indictment of government’s failed policies, The Herald and Chronicle (13/4) unquestioningly reported on the development, which they even relegated to their business sections. They quoted an unnamed government official justifying the planned budget saying the hyperinflationary environment had "severely reduced the purchasing power of initial fiscal allocations".

There was no attempt by the papers to apprise their audiences on why the country was now frequently surviving on extra budgets since 2000. Instead, they simply cited analysts echoing government’s justifications.

The two stories generally mirrored the inadequacy of the other 47 economic stories the government papers carried. Although the reports highlighted symptoms of economic collapse, they reported them in isolation of the fundamental economic factors causing them.

ZBH ignored news on the supplementary budget in the 39 stories it aired on the economy.

Instead, like the official papers, most its reports were either hackneyed assurances by government and business officials that the authorities were taking measures to ease the economic distress the country was facing or simply highlighted the problems without linking them to government policies.

And though Spot FM (12 &13/4, 8am and 8pm) and ZTV (14/4 8pm) carried three reports that quoted economists noting that inflation was likely to maintain its upward trend due to persistent inflationary pressures and bemoaning government’s "appetite for expenditure", these issues were not fully explored.

Rather, the stations glossed over these observations by simplistically claiming that the economic situation would improve due to good rains the country received. It was hardly surprising therefore that there was preciously little balanced debate in the official media on Zimbabwe’s soaring cost of living, crumbling health delivery system and problems affecting industry.

The official Press’ pro-government sourcing pattern is shown in Fig 1.

Fig. 1 Voice distribution in the government Press

Although ZBH sought views from business, alternative sources and ordinary people, they were mainly quoted highlighting the country’s economic problems and not diagnosing them. See Fig 5.

Fig 5 Voice distribution on ZBH

Comparatively, the private media provided critical insight into the economic decline in the 37 stories they carried (private Press [26] and private stations [11]).

These media, except for the Mirror stable, generally linked the economic collapse to government’s economic mismanagement. They argued that besides the urgent need for foreign capital investment in the country, the authorities also needed to overhaul their economic policies.

This was particularly so, said The Financial Gazette (13/4), since "little" had accrued from government’s "much-vaunted Look East policy".

The Zimbabwe Independent comment (13/4) agreed, connecting the largely unproductive ‘Look East’ policy to admissions by the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA) that tourist arrivals from that quarter had declined by 70%, "the sharpest decline in any source market". The planes flying to the Far East were also reportedly making huge losses of up to US$980 000 every month, a development the paper quipped was the "cost of looking east".

The Standard equally viewed the decline in tourist arrivals from Asia as an indication of the failed government’s ‘Look East’ policy.

The private media also carried several stories exposing worsening economic decay, which Studio 7 (11/4) noted had forced urban dwellers to adopt rural lifestyles.

However, the Mirror stable remained largely characterless, seemingly afraid to categorically discuss the actual causes of the economic woes. For example, while The Daily Mirror (10/4) reported government’s gazetting of the new bread price from $44 000 to $85 000, its comment was careful not to criticise the authorities for the increase, saying: "…no one can be blamed for the new prices".

It then advised consumers to resort to substitutes such as rice, samp and pumpkins without even investigating whether the so-called alternatives were actually cheaper.

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