Media Blackout on Talks to Resolve Political Crisis

SW Radio Africa (London)

10 May 2011

The government continues to demand media black outs around important developments in Zimbabwe, leaving people in the dark about their future.

Andrew Moyse of the Media Monitoring Project Zimbabwe (MMPZ) said since Independence the government has selectively used media blackouts to deliberately withhold information and the advent of new independent newspapers has not changed this.

“The attitude is ‘what the eye doesn’t see, the mind doesn’t grieve over,’ as it were, ‘So we’ll just carry on and do what we know best – we’re in charge, and we’ll tell you if it has to happen.

“It’s very difficult this – to try to extract information when ministers and senior government officials tell us that it’s no business of ours when we have journalists who inquire about what is happening in the country, especially with the latest developments over SADC,” Moyse said.

Since the SADC talks began, journalists and the public have not been informed by government officials on developments. Very little information emerged from the meeting last week and on Tuesday a member of the SADC facilitation team on Zimbabwe, Mac Maharaj, arrived in the country, with criticism that once again the media and the public were not informed.

The team on Zimbabwe is made up of Maharaj, Charles Nqakula and Lindiwe Zulu. A member of the team told SW Radio Africa that it was unlikely the media would be informed about this latest visit as this was just ‘a follow-up to the talks in Cape Town.’

This is despite the fact that every step of the meetings is now critical, as the country heads for a full SADC summit on Zimbabwe, to be held on 20th May.

With difficulty journalists found out that one of the key disagreements at the latest talks in Cape Town was over the role of the partisan security forces, which have been blamed for unleashing terror on people opposed to ZANU PF.

It’s understood that talks with the security chiefs are expected to be held ahead of the 20th May summit, but as usual it will be unlikely that Zimbabweans will get to know anything about this meeting.

Moyse stressed that Zimbabweans have a right to be enlightened on national issues. “It’s about us, it’s not about a ruling elite. It’s about the people of Zimbabwe. So we do have a complete right to know what people are discussing about us,” he said.

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