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Daily Media Update No.38
Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ)
April 26, 2008

Post-election focus
The government dailies maintained their propaganda blitz against those drawing attention to Zimbabwe's post-election crisis. They diverted attention away from the substance of their critical observations on the current hostile electoral stalemate with generalised conspiracies of alleged Western plots to 'illegally' remove President Mugabe from power.

Consequently, nothing was said about the official silence over the outcome of the presidential election, whose winner remains undeclared 28 days after the plebiscite. Neither was there any attempt to address the controversy over government's irregularly extended term of office. This is especially so in light of the authorities' apparent abuse of state agencies to engage in alleged post-election attacks against opposition supporters ahead of an anticipated run-off between Mugabe and MDC president, Morgan Tsvangirai.

The papers simply presented all government officials' dealings as normal, including their manipulation of otherwise national events to campaign for ZANU PF while railing against perceived opponents. For example, The Herald and Chronicle passively reported President Mugabe reducing international concerns over the disastrous effects of the delay in the release of the presidential election results to a land question standoff between Zimbabwe and Britain. Speaking at the official opening of the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair in Bulawayo, the papers quoted him saying: "When the West - led by the British - shamelessly continue to denounce our country, what is our crime? We are simply defending our birthright, defending our hard-worn national sovereignty." How the country's independence has any bearing on the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission's late release of the presidential poll result remained unexplained. They simply quoted him saying: "Better all those who shake and quiver at every word of our colonial masters please know Zimbabwe will never be for sale . . . and will never be a colony again."

In other reports, the dailies also passively reported Patrick Chinamasa, presented as Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Minister, describing as "patently false, inflammatory, irresponsible" claims by US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Fraser that Tsvangirai won "outright" in the March 29 harmonised polls. Without giving the full context in which Fraser made the statements, except that she claimed Mugabe was "trying to steal the election through a recount and should step down for Tsvangirai", the papers cited Chinamasa reiterating his previous claims that unofficial results pointed to a run-off.

Why the results remain off the record was not addressed. Neither was there any attempt to investigate the motive behind government's defence of the results delay. The papers reported Chinamasa criminalising Fraser's observations, saying she "has no moral or legal authority to make unfounded announcements on our domestic processes". Instead, they allowed Chinamasa to claim that Fraser's remarks exposed Tsvangirai and the MDC as an "Anglo-American project designed to defeat and reverse the gains of Zimbabwe's liberation struggle, to undermine the will of the Zimbabwean electorate and return the nation to the dark days of white domination."

Even SADC countries that dared express their disapproval of the unfolding crisis in the country were not spared. For example, Herald columnist, Nathaniel Manheru, ignored the context in which regional countries refused to facilitate the delivery of a Chinese arms consignment to Zimbabwe in a vituperative tirade that portrayed them as puppets of Western imperialism. The columnist, for example, accused these countries of being "dimwits - clearly emboldened by imaginary British and American support" for their "harebrained . . . contemptuous attempt to turn it (Zimbabwe) into the SADC village leper". Manheru presented the arms purchase as a normal activity and in isolation of the post-election tensions in the country, amid serious allegations that state security agents were heavily involved in the purge of opposition supporters in the countryside.

The Herald and Chronicle also reported as perfectly normal the police raids on the headquarters of the MDC and offices of the independent election watchdog, ZESN, resulting in the arrests and detention of around 215 opposition supporters. The papers highlighted police justification of the raids while relegating to the end of the report complaints by MDC spokesperson Nelson Chamisa that the police raided the premises with no search warrant and that most of those arrested were "victims" of ZANU PF's politically motivated violence in the rural areas, seeking sanctuary. The papers, for example, quoted police spokesperson Wayne Bvudzijena claiming that those arrested were responsible for post-election violence against ZANU PF supporters.

Drawing parallels with another police raid on the MDC offices last year, Bvudzijena claimed the MDC was harbouring fugitives from the law in the same way the opposition party had sheltered suspects in an outbreak of terror bombings in March last year. However, Bvudzijena omitted the fact that the so-called terror bomb suspects were absolved of any crime by the courts for lack of evidence. Neither did the papers remind him, nor question him about whether the police were investigating numerous reports of ZANU PF violence against the opposition.

In addition, the papers reported that that the police had searched ZESN offices seeking evidence showing that ZEC officials "were paid through ZESN to corruptly alter the outcome of the March 29 elections". No comment was sought from ZESN about this absurd claim, or even ZEC, especially in view of the fact that the results of the recounted constituencies substantially reflect the original figures returned.

Although the papers reported on the release of seven more House of Assembly results from the poll recounts, there was still no news on the fate of the presidential election or when the recounting exercise would be completed. Moreover, the papers did not question the logic behind the exercise given that so far - with 10 result declared - there has been no change in the original outcome, with the parties retaining their original seats.

Fig 1 illustrates the sourcing pattern in the government dailies.

Fig 1: Voice distribution in The Herald and Chronicle

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