Radio VOP applies for a Zimbabwe broadcasting licence

One of Zimbabwe's unlicensed radio stations Radio VOP, has applied for an operating licence, the Executive Director, John Masuku, has confirmed.

Addressing Radio VOP website and radio Correspondents gathered in Harare for a one-day workshop, Masuku advised that they have applied for an operating licence and are waiting to see what will happen.

The Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe (BAZ), which falls directly under the Media and Information Commission (MIC) currently led by veteran broadcast journalist, Godfrey Majonga, has the final say before issuing out broadcasting licenses in Zimbabwe.

Radio VOP is among three independent but unlicensed Radio and Website stations currently operating in Zimbabwe today.

Only the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation Holdings Limited (ZBC) has the monopoly for the airwaves in Zimbabwe.

The two other unlicensed radio stations broadcasting into Zimbabwe are Studio Seven (7) from Washington DC in the United States of America (US) and SW Radio from South Africa.

Studio Seven is currently led by former Senior Reporter for The Standard newspaper, Ray Choto based in Washington DC, while SW Radio is currently led by Jerry Jackson a former journalist with the cash-strapped ZBC.

It could not be independently established whether or not SW Radio and Studio Seven had also applied for operating licenses to broadcast their programmes from inside Zimbabwe.

The other website radio station that is rumored to have applied for a license is the Eric Knight and Ezra Sibanda led which broke away from visionsfm.com. Rumor has it that Ezra Sibanda rushed to Zimbabwe to submit the application before the deadline.