Back to Index

VOA confirms blocking of Medium Wave signal in Harare
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
Weekly Media Update 2006-26
Monday June 26th 2006 - Sunday July 2nd 2006

THIS week the Voice of America (VOA) finally confirmed that its Medium Wave news programmes on its Studio 7 broadcasting service was being "blocked" in Harare.

The station’s news broadcasts have increasingly become one of the few remaining sources of alternative information for many news-starved Zimbabweans.

VOA spokesman Joe O’Connell told the Committee to Protect Journalists (4/7) that although they could not verify reports of Studio 7 jamming in the past, they had now managed to "confirm them" and had "determined" that the interference was "intentional".

However, he noted that Studio 7’s Short Wave and AM frequencies outside the capital remained unaffected.

But the ZimOnline internet news agency quoted (26/6) an unnamed official in the Ministry of State Security saying the Central Intelligence Organisation and engineers from the Ministry of Information were "now working flat out" to find ways of "completely" jamming Studio 7 broadcasts into Zimbabwe.

Said the official: "There has been marked improvement on trying to block the US propaganda (Studio 7 broadcasts) from reaching us since the beginning of this month. The team is now aiming to look for ways to completely block the signal coming via a transmitter in Botswana."

The official further confirmed that the authorities were using the same Chinese equipment used last year to block SW Radio Africa, the other foreign-based radio station that targets Zimbabweans.

But as VOA was confirming the jamming of its Studio 7 broadcasts, SW Radio Africa (4/7) issued a statement announcing that the authorities had also started blocking its morning Medium Wave frequency.

According to the station, the interference "seems to follow the same pattern and began at the same time as the jamming of VOA’s Studio 7 broadcasts on medium wave" and "appears to be quite localised and focused on Harare".

MMPZ condemns this continued assault on citizens’ rights to access information of their choice. Such crudely undemocratic acts expose the authorities’ pathological fear of free expression and their determination to regiment public opinion through their tyrannical control of all sources of information accessible to Zimbabweans.

Visit the MMPZ fact sheet

Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License unless stated otherwise.

TOP