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Daily Media Update No. 22
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
April 10, 2008

MMPZ's daily media updates monitor the output of the domestic print and electronic media, particularly relating to coverage of election issues. Monitoring of the national public broadcaster, ZBC, is confined mostly to the main news bulletins on television and its two main radio stations, Spot FM and Radio Zimbabwe, although prime-time programmes containing political content or material relevant to the March 29th national elections is also monitored in a separate report. (This includes prime-time political advertising on ZBC). In addition, the main evening news bulletins of two privately owned radio stations broadcasting into Zimbabwe from abroad are monitored, Studio 7 and SW Radio Africa, together with the "news" pages of four web-based online news agencies specializing in news about Zimbabwe


Daily print media report - Thursday 10th , April 2008

Post-election focus
The official dailies, The Herald and Chronicle (10/4), failed to holistically report on the deepening crisis caused the by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission's puzzling delay in releasing the presidential poll results.
Neither did they expose the ruling party's complicity in the matter, nor probed the real motives behind the party's drive to have the results prolonged even further pending its demands for vote recounts in some constituencies.
Most of the 15 news reports that the dailies carried on the subject were mere official reactions to the crisis and lacked coherent background information.

For example, there was no informed analysis on whether the basis of ZANU PF's vote rigging allegations in 21 constituencies necessitated action under the country's electoral laws. This was especially so in the absence of information from the ruling party and the papers themselves whether the alleged vote miscounts were significant enough to compromise the result of the party and its presidential candidate, Robert Mugabe.
Rather, The Herald passively reported three of the eight ZEC officials accused of "tampering" with the ZANU PF vote at the Zvimba North constituency command centre as having appeared in a Chinhoyi court on "allegations of depriving ZANU PF of 51 senate votes".

Moreover, there was no explanation why ZEC had "agreed to recount ballots" in five of the constituencies and not in the other constituencies.

Notably, no clarification was sought from ZEC. The Herald and Chronicle only gave ZANU PF's own side of the story.
Similarly, there was no balanced presentation of government's assertion that cabinet was still functional until a new one has been appointed, despite the fact that President Mugabe had dissolved it just before the elections. Again, the issue was exclusively interpreted through the eyes of the authorities.

For example, the dailies quoted Acting Attorney General Justice Bharat Patel: "The 'dissolution' of Cabinet is not specifically provided for in the Constitution and, as such, it has no constitutional significance. It is therefore to be regarded as a purely administrative exercise not to be equated with the removal from office of ministers individually."
No attempt was made either to acknowledge or interpret the development as one of the negative ramifications of the unexplained late release of the presidential result on the administration of the country.

And though the official dailies updated their audiences on the MDC petition seeking the High Court's intervention in the release of the results, they also reported it in isolation of the negative implications of the results hold-up. Neither did they pursue ZEC lawyer George Chikumbirike's argument before High Court judge Tendai Uchena during hearing of the MDC application that "it would be dangerous to give an order that may not be complied with in view of outside exigencies they (ZEC) are not be able to control".

As a result, the nature of these outside pressures remained unclear.

The extent of the government dailies' professional passivity also manifested itself in the way they meekly allowed Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu to downplay the gravity of a decision by Southern African Development Community (SADC) to hold an extraordinary meeting on Zimbabwe's electoral crisis over the weekend.
The papers quoted Ndlovu saying "though it was normal procedure that a summit to discuss a member state should be held at the request of that country, Zimbabwe would appraise the regional bloc of political developments in the wake of the elections".

Otherwise as has become tradition, the government dailies devoted their opinion pages to attacking the opposition and their alleged Western masters of destabilising the country. Only the private weeklies, The Financial Gazette and Zimbabwean (10/4) gave more informed coverage of the subject. They interpreted the ruling party's poll petitions and its reappointment of cabinet as calculated plans to hold on to power while it worked on how to regain control following Mugabe's alleged defeat by MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai in the presidential poll.

The papers also pointed at the constitutional crisis being created by ZEC's late release of the results and highlighted growing international disquiet over the matter as exemplified by SADC's call for an extra-ordinary meeting on Zimbabwe.

Attention too was given to the alleged state of limbo in ZEC following ZANU PF's alleged interference in its duties.
The Zimbabwean, for example, quoted an alleged former CIO operative Liberty Mupakati alleging that members of the top echelons of ZEC were "more or less under arrest in their hotel, which doubles as the poll collation centre" because government feared they might leak information regarding the presidential poll.

ßHowever, the Gazette reported the ZEC's command centre as having been dismantled with police denying journalists access to the centre. In addition, it said its "repeated attempts to reach ZEC were unsuccessful".
Almost all the editorials in The Gazette on the matter criticised ZANU PF's contempt of the electorate by trying to subvert their self-determination by holding onto power.

In one of these, the paper's columnist Bornwell Chakaodza viewed it as ironic that ZANU PF, which in the past have "justified everything that they did on the basis that it was the wishes of the people" had shown "utter contempt" against the same people after the harmonised polls by "lashing at everyone including its spawn, the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission".

In another opinion, Mavis Makuni expressed surprise "at the lighting speed with which officials are acting" on ZANU PF electoral challenges "considering the foot-dragging . . . that has been resorted to in respect to the electoral challenges mounted by the opposition in the past". Added Makuni: " . . . but the bizarre fact (is) that all this commotion is taking place before the presidential poll results have been officially announced".

Figs 1and 2 illustrate the sourcing pattern in the official and private papers.

Fig 1: Voice distribution in the government-controlled press

Fig 2: Voice distribution in the private press

Daily electronic media report, Wednesday 9th April 2008

Post-election focus
ZBC (9/4) evaded critically reporting on Zimbabwe's post-election crisis, sparked by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission's withholding of the presidential poll results. Rather than highlight the impact of the delay and the anxiety it is causing, the national broadcaster restricted itself to reporting officials downplaying the crisis.

For example, ZTV (8pm) did not question Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa why ZEC continued to leave the nation in suspense by holding onto the results if they were "common knowledge" to "all contesting parties, the police, the Zimbabwe Election Support Network, and others.

And while it reported him saying ZANU PF was "disappointed" with the MDC-Tsvangirai's claims that they won the presidential ballot, it did not ask him who then had won it and by what margin if indeed "no single party has received the required 51 percent to be declared winners of the polls" Besides, the station not only gave Chinamasa generous airtime (six minutes 58 seconds) to criticize the MDC's conduct, it sought no confirmation of the matter.

It passively cited Chinamasa reiterating government's dismissal of the MDC calls for UN intervention in the crisis as "unwarranted", adding that it was Britain and the US who were behind the MDC's move and that the opposition party had "hoped for the Kenya-style mayhem" which did not happen.

There was equally no attempt to query the logic of ZANU PF's demands of a recount in 21 constituencies, particularly in light of its admission that it already knew of the election results; or the validity of Chinamasa's claims that the MDC "approached ZANU PF with a proposal for a government of national unity". Such professional docility was also evident in the manner in which they largely suffocated fresh farm invasions by war veterans and ruling party supporters.

While ZTV reported Chinamasa issuing more threats against the farmers, saying they should not "play with the lion's tail", Radio Zimbabwe (6am) and Spot FM (8pm) passively reported the eviction of "eleven white farmers" in Mashonaland Central without linking them to the authorities' threats.

The extent of the Zimbabwe post-election crisis was only depicted in the private electronic media, which devoted 27 reports to the matter. For example, not only did they highlight the post-election retribution of a cross section of Zimbabweans by state security agents and ZANU PF militias, they also reported on growing regional and international concern over the matter.

SW Radio Africa recorded the UN, US, Britain, Australia and South Africa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) president, Jacob Zuma, calling on the release of the presidential results while Studio 7 reported the Southern African Development Community (SADC) as having called for an extraordinary meeting to "discuss the post-election crisis in Zimbabwe".

It also emerged in the private electronic media that all was not well at ZEC's National Command Centre at Rainbow Towers in Harare. Zimdaily reported government as having "dismantled the National Collation Centre before the verification of presidential poll results". It quoted MDC's Tendai Biti saying that ZEC had "advised" two of their chief election agents that the verification of the results would be conducted in "private", adding that by so doing, ZEC could "cook" the presidential results to "fit the template of a run off".

The private electronic media also quoted losing presidential candidate Simba Makoni expressing similar sentiments.
SW Radio Africa reported on the new farm invasions, saying they were targeted at "white farmers and farm workers ZANU PF believe voted for the opposition". The station quoted the Commercial Farmers Union (CFU) president, Trevor Gifford, confirming this.

In addition, Zimbabwe Online reported soldiers in Gweru as having "raided bars and a public market and beat up people for not voting correctly".

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