(MISA/IFEX) – Geoff Nyarota, editor-in-chief of “The Daily News”, has been charged with criminal defamation for the second time in a month over reports of stories involving President Robert Mugabe’s case filed in the United States (USA), “The Daily News” reported on Thursday 10 May 2001. The charge arises from the publication of stories in […]
(MISA/IFEX) – Geoff Nyarota, editor-in-chief of “The Daily News”, has been charged with criminal defamation for the second time in a month over reports of stories involving President Robert Mugabe’s case filed in the United States (USA), “The Daily News” reported on Thursday 10 May 2001.
The charge arises from the publication of stories in which it was reported that Evelyn Masaiti, the opposition member of parliament for Mutasa, a rural constituency, and three relatives of victims of the violence-ridden June 2000 parliamentary elections, sued Mugabe in the USA for damages.
Nyarota was called to the Harare Central Police station and was charged under the Law and Order Maintenance Act for allegedly writing falsely about the legal suit. According to “The Daily News”, the lawyers representing the victims confirmed that they had filed the
lawsuit. In his statement, Nyarota denied that he defamed Mugabe.
In a statement on the case, reported in the 11 April issue of “The Herald”, Minister of Information and Publicity Jonathan Moyo said that what the government denied were “persistent false and malicious reports” carried by “The Daily News” and “The Zimbabwe Standard” that Mugabe had been lawfully served with a summons when that was not the case.
Moyo also said the two papers had falsely stated that a default judgement had been passed against Mugabe and that a process to identify and attach properties belonging to Mugabe had already begun.
Background Information
After the violence-ridden parliamentary elections in 2000, Masaiti, as well as Maria Stevens and Adella Chiminya, who both lost their husbands in the political violence, and Elliot Pfebve, who lost his brother, sued Mugabe in the USA for damages suffered and the loss of their relatives.
The high profile case was widely covered by “The Daily News” and “The Zimbabwe Standard”. The newspapers reported that Mugabe had lost the case. These reports were dismissed by the government as false. The government then threatened to file defamation charges against the two papers.
