Prof Jonathan Moyo promises more engagement

GOVERNMENT will soon come up with an all-inclusive mechanism to deal with issues raised during consultations with various media players in the country, Information, Media and Broadcasting Services Minister Professor Jonathan Moyo has said.

"We have engaged the media, it is a continuous process but not an indefinite process," said the minister during a media workshop organised by Silveira House in Harare yesterday.

"It is a process we are about to conclude its first phase after which we will have to come up with a much more considered mechanism for one to further reflect on the issues that have come up, about the regulation of the media, the business interests of the media that is accessing newsprint, technologies, convergence technologies, welfare issues affecting the interests of journalists and the broader issues of how the media can participate in nation building," said Prof Moyo.

He said his ministry would employ a mechanism that will include all mainstream media players irrespective of ownership structure.

"The mechanism to probe these things will be driven by the media bringing the media together across the simplistic divide (public and privately owned media) that has not done us any good and we would like to be informed by that process and the two things that will be very instrumental in shaping our direction is what the media say to us and what the Constitution says to us and then the policy of Government in relation to those two things," he said.

The minister, however, said Government would also stand guided by past events on how to do things differently.