Prof J Moyo blast ZBC over mediocre programmes

INFORMATION, Media and Broadcasting Services Minister Professor Jonathan Moyo has blasted the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) for producing mediocre programmes "that are not being viewed by anyone" at a time when managers at the public broadcaster were receiving hefty salaries.

Speaking at the Bulawayo Press Club last week, Prof Moyo chided the ZBC management and workers for always asking for Government grants yet they were misusing money collected from licensing fees.

"The ZBC people have for too long been saying the Government does not give us grants and should give us money yet they are the only institution that has a dispensation from Zimra to collect a fee from every person who possesses a receiver. They squander that money and they don't collect it properly and they have all sorts of books including here at Montrose where they had fake licensing books," said Prof Moyo.

He revealed that Government discovered that there were some ZBC officials who were enriching themselves through corruption, a situation that had left the company in a precarious financial position.

"They are collecting money from the people and putting money in their pockets. On top of the fee they say Government must give them. Government is an institution that gets money from the tax payers and the tax payers are the generality of Zimbabweans and you want the Zimbabweans to pay you for doing nothing. What is it that is special about you to deserve that?" said Prof Moyo.

"If you look at the content that is coming out, they are producing things that nobody is watching. We are tired of people who do not want to take responsibility for their own actions. There are some people who think they must just be paid."

He said the situation at the ZBC was unsustainable as the broadcaster was only collecting $300 000 every month against a monthly bill of $2,3 million.

"When we came into office last year we found that ZBC was technically insolvent and it had a wage bill of $1,3 million per month and operational costs of $1 million per month while their monthly income was just $300 000. So how do you operate with such a scenario?" he said.

"The basic principle of any organisation is the ability to pay and when an organisation does not have the ability to pay its expenses, it must shut down."

He accused the ZBC of failing to discharge its mandate as expected by the public and in line with the national interest.

"Why are you not discharging your mandate? You want to be rewarded when people are not receiving a signal in places like Binga but you still want them to pay. We must be ashamed of ourselves when we are not discharging our mandate and ZBC has not been discharging its mandate but people had been lining up their pockets and fattening those pockets," said Prof Moyo.

"We have people who claim to have bought an OB van and want to pretend that they have bought it from Mars and they only know how much it costs when we know for a fact that it is just a kombi."

Last year Government suspended ZBC's chief executive officer Mr Happison Muchechetere after ZBC employees went for seven months without salaries while the CEO and top management received hefty salaries. A forensic audit has since been instituted to uncover the extent of the financial problems at the national broadcaster.