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Government media must stop insulting the intelligence of the nation
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
April 17, 2008

MMPZ is obliged to remind the government-controlled media that their dissemination of false stories and forged documents is a criminal offence under Zimbabwean law and represents an unprecedented level of contempt for the practice of journalism and the people of Zimbabwe.

Two stories published in The Herald today (one of them in the Chronicle) and broadcast in yesterday's ZTV news bulletins clearly illustrate the level to which these organizations have become slaves to the authorities' disinformation propaganda machine.

One story published in The Herald seeks to "expose" an attempt by MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai to summon "British military intervention" in Zimbabwe on the basis of a clearly fictitious "MDC Alliance memorandum of understanding signed between Tsvangirai and various rightwing groups in Zimbabwe and South Africa". The alleged document, published in full on the paper's inside pages, is undated and outlines a range of confused and hare-brained schemes to disenfranchise Zimbabweans and hand the country back to the whites and white commercial interests, in exchange for unspecified UK/USA support for "a military offensive to unseat the Government . . . " The front-page story and the document clearly represent a crude attempt to incite fear and confusion among the Zimbabwean population and to encourage disaffection and hatred against Tsvangirai and the opposition MDC.

The other story (in both papers) seeks to damage the reputation of SADC chairman, Zambian President, Levy Mwanawasa, and "expose" Tsvangirai as a "puppet" of the British on the basis of a letter allegedly written to the opposition leader by British Premier, Gordon Brown, which the British Embassy has already dismissed as a forgery.

The letter, allegedly a response to one written by Tsvangirai, is reproduced on The Herald's inside pages and included the crest of the office of the British Prime Minister and his alleged signature. It pledges Britain's support to "ensure . . . SADC is more directly involved in this crisis in Zimbabwe," and that Tsvangirai's "electoral success (is) respected".

On the strength of this forgery, the papers quote Zimbabwe's former Justice Minister, Patrick Chinamasa, identified as the chairman of ZANU PF's media sub-committee, saying, "It is evident that the extraordinary SADC summit was held at the behest of the British, and ZANU PF calls on President Mwanawasa not to be part of the regime-change agenda against Zimbabwe."

The story also quotes Chinamasa saying that Tsvangirai's collaboration with Britain in seeking "illegal regime change" is "treasonous".

No effort was made by the papers to establish the authenticity of the letter and it can only be assumed that the forgery was deliberately publicized in order to provide false grounds upon which to build a case against the MDC leader to portray him as a traitor to the nation.

There can be no worse abuse of the media than these shameful attempts to manipulate public sentiment against an obviously popular leader, especially at a time when the country faces its gravest political crisis since independence and that a run-off election for the unresolved post of national president now appears to be unavoidable.

The allegations contained in these stories, together with others recently publicized by the government-controlled media, also raises the real fear that the country will be plunged further into political turmoil if the state considers bringing charges of treason against Tsvangirai on the basis of fabricated evidence.

MMPZ implores the government media's executives to resist these efforts to use their institutions as tools to further destabilize Zimbabwe's faltering grip on democratic sanity - and to stop insulting the intelligence of the nation by lending credence to crude propaganda.

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