Government addresses transmission challenges in Maphisa

GOVERNMENT has promised the people of Maphisa, Matobo District in Matabeleland South province that it is working on a quick solution to ensure they receive radio transmission before elections.

The people of Maphisa and other parts of the district rely on foreign  radio stations and television channels for broadcasting services as there is no transmission from local stations. Addressing artistes,  producers and other stakeholders  in Maphisa on Friday,  Media,  Information and Broadcasting Services permanent secretary  Mr George  Charamba said it was sad that the people of Maphisa and other areas could not access broadcasting services from their country but said soon a transmitter would be  installed.

"When we came here to inspect  the place where we intend to put the tower, it was clear to me that there was no transmission and today, I tested it again and the story remains the same. Once you go past Kezi, you lose your signal immediately. So I can imagine  how the situation is, right from that point to the border, it means essentially, there is no service, it means probably you are listening  to Studio 7 or you are probably listening to radio  stations from Botswana or South Africa. If you are not part of the national conversation then it essentially means we have denied you your citizenship. That's not proper at all, we are making you outsiders in a country that is in fact your own,'' he said.

Responding to a concern raised by Chief Malaba, Mr Charamba said transmission was likely to be available before July as they were working on the construction of the transmission tower. In his remarks at the meeting, Chief Malaba said they were always behind regarding news and current affairs and were worried that as the elections were coming, they would delay getting results.

"In the meantime mindful of the complaint raised by Chief Malaba, the elections are upon us, we want you to hear the results alongside the rest of the country. What it means is that as I go to Harare  I have to find a quick solution and a quick solution means getting a transmitter so that we are hosted by Econet. So, we will put a quick transmitter for you maybe before July.

We should be able to get some service and then you are able to be together with the rest of the country whilst your tower is being built," said Mr Charamba.

He said construction of the tower at Maphisa was set to begin in mid-July.

Mr Charamba said the construction of the 113- metre tower would create employment for locals.

"We will make sure that we use local labour,  that has always been our policy, we don't export labour from elsewhere. We don't bring foreigners from other countries to work here. So, be prepared citizens of Maphisa to please work with us as we prepare this site to install our transmission tower,'' he said.

Mr Charamba said the idea to meet artistes and content producers by the ZimDigital team was necessitated by the need to incorporate all 16 national languages and cultures.

"The instruction we have had from Government  is to say that the national television screen must express the cultures of the people of Zimbabwe  in their entirety. It also means that the languages through which all those programmes are presented to all of us must be languages that are spoken in our communities by our communities."

He said they began with provincial meetings and realised there are speech communities that must be addressed in their own special way.

"So went to our constitution and looked at how many languages we have and there are 16 national languages. We needed to get to some very specific language communities and we get to address them, share our vision with them and motivate them to be able to give us programmes which are in their languages  which express their own way of life and culture in their own languages so that the screen becomes the sum total of 16 languages in the Constitution. What we are  looking for are people who are interested in working with ZBC,  working with broadcasting association of Zimbabwe to create something that we will  show on the screen of our country."

Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) chief executive officer, Mr Patrick Mavhura encouraged artistes and content producers to produce local content to be beamed on national television as they would soon be launching six more channels.

He said the new channels include the security services channel, wildlife, history of the country, 24-hour movie channel, 24 religious and beginners channel.