Financial Gazette (Harare)
Bornwell Chakaodza
2 May 2007
column
Harare — Countries with a free press don't have famines: Nobel Laureate
TODAY, May 3 is World Press Freedom Day. The day before yesterday, May 1, was Workers Day. The theme this year in Zimbabwe was: Workers Time to Fight.
What a time indeed to reflect and fight on so many fronts in this country. Times are hard in Zimbabwe at the moment. Not of course for the tiny fraction enjoying the trappings of power but for more than 95 percent who are clearly at the bottom of the pile, it is a very tough environment indeed.
Zimbabweans now look like Mozambican peasants when that country's civil war ended in 1992. They look much thinner and emotionally drained. Statistics paint a very grim picture indeed. Unemployment stands at more than 80 percent. More than three million Zimbabweans including journalists have fled the country to eke out a precarious existence in foreign lands.
Annual inflation is officially hovering around 2 220 percent but is believed by independent experts to be around 5 000 percent and continuing to gallop. In 1992, at the time of the worst drought in living memory in Southern Africa, the Zimbabwean dollar was eight to one US dollar. Now it is a staggering Z$ 25 000 to one US dollar at the parallel market. Much worse, Zimbabwe is now a fractured society.
Democratic countries with a free press do not have famines said Amartya Sen, the Nobel Prize winner in economics. What the good professor meant was that a free press warns political authorities about the threat of famine and droughts and nations are thus better prepared to act swiftly to avert starvation.
For example, the manner in which the Zimbabwean government and other SADC governments (with the assistance of the international community) rose to meet the immense challenge of the 1992/93 drought that struck the Southern African region is a famous case in point. The relief operation was carefully planned and brilliantly and transparently executed precisely because a free press acted as an early warning system among other factors. Back then, we were not such an impoverished pariah state as we are now.
And it is precisely the power of a free press and the sacrifices that are made by the media, private individuals and various organisations to pressure governments that continue to deny their citizens freedom of the media that I want to talk about in this article. By this I mean the freedom of journalists to gather information without hindrance and the freedom of the people to read, see or hear this information unfettered.
The question that immediately comes to mind is: Should a day be set aside for this kind of activity? Absolutely. Consider the perils that are faced by journalists around the world in general and Zimbabwe in particular. Worldwide, more than 20 journalists have been killed in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere in the course of performing their professional duties.
Many others are currently imprisoned in a number of countries. Yet others are trailed or kidnapped in trouble spots or conflict areas around the world. Our country, Zimbabwe, continues to be one of the worst places to work as a journalist. It is an act of enormous bravery, defiance and resilience to work as an independent journalist and human rights activist in this country.
The wave of repression and police brutality in the last two months in which journalists legitimately covering national events were detained, assaulted and harassed testify to the above fact. All these developments are taking place against the background of a media environment which is extremely embarrassing for a fairly developed country like ours and with such an educated and discerning population -- thanks to the continuing terrible legacy of Rasputin Jonathan Moyo, President Robert Mugabe's former propaganda chief and Minister of Information and Publicity between the year 2000 and end of 2004.
How this man can sleep easily at night and continue to live with himself boggles the mind. Consider his record. First, the repressive media laws. Jonathan Moyo will be remembered for all time as the man who presided over the enactment of the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) in 2002 which resulted in the closure of four private newspapers thereby severely limiting democratic space in the country.
Jonathan Moyo will be remembered for all time as the man who presided over the passing of the Broadcasting Services Act (BSA) which has effectively prevented the establishment of private radio and television stations in the country thereby leaving the government-controlled Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) the only broadcasting station in Zimbabwe.
Lesser countries in terms of infrastructural development and levels of education and sophistication such as Mozambique, Zambia and Tanzania -- impoverished as they are -- opened up their airwaves many years ago. Zimbabwe is the only country in the region whose population is at the mercy of full-blown propaganda churned out on a daily basis by the only daily newspapers, the government-controlled Herald and Chronicle in Harare and in Bulawayo respectively as well as the government-run ZBC.
The privately-owned and independent weeklies, The Financial Gazette, Zimbabwe Independent, The Standard and the UK- based Zimbabwean as well as the private radio stations based outside Zimbabwe and online .coms are no match for the dominant state media as they are very limited in terms of reach and frequency. So it is indeed bad news all round as far as alternative sources of information for Zimbabweans are concerned.
Jonathan Moyo will also be remembered for many other things including his echoes in the draconian Public Order and Security Act (POSA) as well as rendering former state media workers destitute through his insensitive and on-the-spot dismissals. I meet these guys who were fired from ZBC and elsewhere from time to time and the years out of employment have taken their toll both physically and emotionally.
The media sector has shrunk terribly, leaving the Zimbabwean public in the dark on many happenings affecting their lives -- all this as a result of his wickedness and lack of tolerance. Unfortunately, nothing to date has changed. His terrible legacy lives on. If anything, repression of media and other freedoms has intensified in this country.
This is a media age we live in. Thus as we join the rest of the world in celebrating World Press Freedom Day, I dream of the day when we will no longer have words such as repressive media environment and draconian media laws on our lips. This nation is in need of healing as has been said repeatedly by many organisations and eminent individuals across the political spectrum including the churches, Archbishop Pius Ncube, the Save Zimbabwe Campaign, the Centre for Peace Initiatives in Africa (CPIA), men and women of goodwill in ZANU PF, the central bank governor Gideon Gono, to mention but a few.
President Mugabe himself struck a healing and conciliatory tone when opening the just-ended Zimbabwe International Trade Fair 2007 when he talked about a partnership between government and the private sector and I quote him "that is synergetic and collaborative and not adversarial and confrontational". Unfortunately, his words are seldom matched by action. This is the tragedy that we have lived with for a long time now.
Among many other confidence-building measures that ZANU PF can introduce as a matter of urgency, repealing AIPPA and POSA as well as genuinely opening up the airwaves to allow more players in the broadcasting field will be an enormous investment in political goodwill to all Zimbabweans.
Look at the state of the media and the country today Mr President. Things are just not working despite the brave faces that you and your lieutenants put on everyday. Last week's Zimbabwe International Trade Fair said it all regardless of the positive notes you incessantly strike on this and many other things. Surely it cannot just be business as usual anymore -- because there is no business to talk about really.
There is no need to deny that reality. Besides, there are too many declarations on the part of your ministers and too little action. What we need is action. Equally important, we must have a free press. Without that, Zimbabwe will remain incoherent, isolated, ostracised, bleeding and lost in the long grass.
Email: boncha@mweb.co.zw
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