(RSF/IFEX) – After years of hounding the independent press, President Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe is establishing itself as one of the African countries that places the most curbs on its population’s right to information. RSF is particularly alarmed by Information Minister Jonathan Moyo’s warning, during a provincial tour on 3 October 2004, that the opposition Movement […]
(RSF/IFEX) – After years of hounding the independent press, President Robert Mugabe’s Zimbabwe is establishing itself as one of the African countries that places the most curbs on its population’s right to information. RSF is particularly alarmed by Information Minister Jonathan Moyo’s warning, during a provincial tour on 3 October 2004, that the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) will be denied access to the state media even though general elections are scheduled for next year. “Unless and until we have a loyal opposition, it will not be possible for them to access the public media,” Moyo said.
“A leading member of the government, who has gone as far as describing foreign journalists as ‘terrorists’, has shown yet again that Zimbabwe is now in a phase of all-out censorship,” said RSF.
“By banning the MDC from accessing the public media, the information minister has demonstrated that the official press has been reduced to the role of government mouthpiece,” the organisation continued. “As for the few Zimbabwean journalists bold enough to show signs of independence, they are systematically hounded by the police or judicial system even if, by peacefully resisting a dictatorial government, they achieve some victories which we salute.”
RSF has called on South Africa, one of the last countries still able to talk to the Zimbabwean government, to ask Harare to at least respect its international commitments.
Zimbabwe has ratified the Protocol on the “Principles and Guidelines Governing Democratic Elections” in the Southern African Development Community (SADC). Yet the minister’s announcement violates Article 2.1.5 of the Protocol, which guarantees “equal opportunity for all political parties to access the public media.”
“It goes without saying that banishing the opposition from the public media, threatening remarks and judicial harassment of the independent press constitute serious violations of Zimbabwe’s public commitments to its partners in southern Africa”, RSF said.
Moyo, President Mugabe’s right-hand man, was responsible for drafting a draconian press law in 2002. In May 2004, he described foreign correspondents as “terrorists” (see IFEX alert of 7 May 2004). He then got “The Herald” daily to dismiss three of its journalists, who also worked for Voice of America (VOA), on the grounds that they posed a “national security threat.”
On 1 October, Moyo made threatening remarks about journalists who contribute to foreign news media and who, in his words, were “ready to be used by colonial forces to destroy the country by reporting lies.”
Meanwhile, Zimbabwe’s independent press struggles to continue publishing even though the authorities do everything possible to silence it.
After interminable legal proceedings forced “The Daily News” to stop publishing, the newspaper fought back with a judicial guerrilla war it seems close to winning (see alerts of 22 September, 14 June, 11 and 6 February, 23, 22, 16, 13 and 12 January 2004, 22 December, 19 and 14 November 2003, and others). More recently, Moyo has attacked the privately-owned “Zimbabwe Independent”. Three of its journalists, editor Vincent Kahiya, reporter Augustine Mukaro and publishing group director Raphael Kumalo, were detained on 23 September and accused of “abusing press privileges” (see alerts of 30 and 23 September 2004). They were held for a day after the newspaper ran a story on 30 July saying the two court assessors in the trial of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai had asked for the verdict to be delayed so that they could give their opinion on Judge Paddington Garwe’s decision. Tsvangirai, the MDC leader, is accused of plotting to assassinate President Mugabe. The verdict has been postponed until 15 October.
On 10 January, Kahiya, along with reporters Dumisani Muleya and Itai Dzamara and former managing editor Iden Wetherell, were arrested and held for several days on Moyo’s orders after running a story about President Mugabe’s “grabbing” of an Air Zimbabwe jet for a holiday and business trip to Asia (see alerts of 14 and 12 January 2004).
On 1 October, eminent Zimbabwean lawyer Edith Mushore publicly criticised Moyo, telling a magistrate’s court that he had been “overzealous” in his reaction to the Air Zimbabwe report and could have caused “embarrassment to the president.” Moyo effectively confirmed that the report was true, but insisted that, if not “defamatory”, it was at the very least “blasphemous”.
