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Political developments
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
Extracted from Weekly Media Update 2007-49
Monday December 10th - Sunday December 16th, 2007
December 20, 2007

THE official media acted like an extension of ZANU PF's propaganda arm in their coverage of the ruling party's extraordinary congress during the week. This was evident in their completely partisan coverage of the event, which they passively projected as a national event, resulting in the disruption of programming at the state broadcaster just to facilitate live coverage of the congress.

ZBC carried 43 reports on the topic while the official papers carried 40.

For example, during the first two days of congress (13 & 14/12), ZTV devoted 12 hours to broadcasting it live causing the suspension of the afternoon news bulletin (13/12) and delays in the presentation of the main bulletin (14/12, 8pm).

Spot FM and Radio Zimbabwe followed a similar pattern, carrying extensive excerpts of the congress live.

Government papers similarly flooded their audiences with superficial and favourable coverage of the congress. These included news articles, editorials, opinions, supplements and notices highlighting the congress programme and accreditation of delegates.

But such huge publicity did not translate into informative coverage of the occasion.

For example, they did not investigate the circumstances leading to President Mugabe's final confirmation as party candidate in next year's presidential elections.

Instead, they were preoccupied with projecting his candidacy as unanimous.

Neither did they explain how the delegates voted for Mugabe. Rather, The Herald (14/12) simply carried a table on its front page showing the ZANU PF organs and provinces as having "unanimously" voted for him, "hailing him for steering the party since the liberation struggle" and "tenaciously defending the country's hard-won independence".

They downplayed divisions within the party over expelled war veterans' leader Jabulani Sibanda's role. Reportedly, Mugabe had to "intervene and restore order" after disagreements on whether Sibanda should deliver a solidarity message on behalf of war veterans at the congress.

The official media failed to critically assess the adequacy of the party's resolutions to address important issues like the economic and agricultural crises. Similarly, the government media remained silent over ZANU PF's apparent abuse of state resources including public transport, tertiary institutions and the uniformed forces to provide services to delegates. For example, ZBC ran adverts announcing changes in public train schedules including cancellations, without stating that the move was a result of the need to facilitate the ferrying of ZANU PF delegates from around the country to the congress venue.

The government media's excessive coverage of the congress resulted in them barely paying attention to other political developments like the SADC-led talks between ZANU PF and the MDC and campaign activities of other parties.

However, The Sunday Mail (16/12) gave prominence to reports that the two parties were "on the verge of signing an agreement" on the constitution, the reform of media and security laws and the political climate.

Fig 5 and 6 show the lopsided manner in which the official media treated this topic as ruling party voices dominated.

Fig 5:Voice Distribution pattern for ZBC

Fig 6: Voice distribution in the government Press

Only the private media provided balanced coverage of the congress and related political developments.

They carried 70 reports on the topic. Of these 41 appeared in the private electronic media and 29 in the Press.

They questioned the logic of ZANU PF splashing about $3 trillion on the event at a time when most Zimbabweans were wallowing in poverty and asked where it got the money to purchase over 200 vehicles for its campaign activities. While The Financial Gazette (13/12) and the Zimbabwe Independent (14/12), for example, described as "clear abuse" ZANU-PF's use of state property for its congress, SW Radio Africa (13/12) pointed out that the ruling party had blurred the distinction between state and party resources.

Unlike the government Press, which sanitized the Jabulani Sibanda incident, The Standard (16/12), viewed it as a sign of division within the party.

Moreover, the Zimbabwe Independent (14/12) cited ZANU PF officials revealing that Mugabe's endorsement was through "manipulation" involving the "violation of the party's constitution, use of unprocedural means and coercions" such as Jabulani Sibanda's "one million-man march".

SW Radio Africa (13/12) and Zimdaily (15/12) made similar observations.

Almost all the private media carried updates on the ZANU-PF/MDC talks, which they reported as "facing collapse" after the two parties disagreed over the implementation of a new constitution and the timing of the elections, among others.

For example, SW Radio Africa (14/12) recorded National Constitutional Assembly chairman, Lovemore Madhuku, stating "it was obvious from the start that they (MDC) were not going to get anything from the talks . . . "

Figs 7 and 8 show the sourcing patterns of the private media.

Fig 7: Voice distribution in the private electronic media

Fig 8: Voice distribution of the private Press

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