Reflections on Zimbabwe's Press Freedom Day Celebrations: A case of the Daily News

The talk that characterised the recent, last minute cancellation of the Press Freedom Day commemoration for Harare and the subsequent decision by Government to intervene and have same held, at a later day, is a clear indication of Government's commitment to press freedom as enshrined in the new Constitution of the land.

Government's intervention at the highest level - Cabinet - is indeed a clear indication that it is committed to the creation of an enabling media space. The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Services, led by Professor Jonathan Moyo, has also taken active steps towards restoration of our heavily polarised media through Information Media Panel of Inquiry (IMPI). Commissioners in IMPI are representatives of the cross section of the Zimbabwean society that transcends the political divide.

It therefore remains the hope of many that other stakeholders in the media industry will reciprocate the goodwill by Government through responsible reportage and public statements.

In as much as Editorials differ depending on the interest of the shareholders of a given publication, one would want to see how the Daily News would fair in this new dispensation considering its obsession with everything that is pro-Tsvangirai.

Whereas, the Daily News is supposedly a national paper, which prides itself as Zimbabwean and, "proudly telling it like it is … without fear or favour," it is quite saddening to note that, this only goes in so far as the tenants of being an MDC-T Newsletter dictates.

In South Africa, the Sunday Times, which is widely read in the major cities of Zimbabwe, namely in Harare and Bulawayo, has over the years exposed some of the biggest corruption cases to rock the ANC led Government. Back home the Daily News has not faired that badly in that regard and to its credit is what has come to be known as NIEEB-gate. But there is one distinct feature that relegates Daily News from the league of the likes of Sunday Times in South Africa and News Day or new kid on the block The Zimbabwe Mail back in Zimbabwe.

In its 4th of May 2014 edition, a week before South Africa's elections, Sunday Times made a prediction of the elections results, which by the way were not far away from the mark. Sunday Times predicted that the ANC was not going to get two-thirds majority but was to fall back to the lower 60s, DA was to enjoy some growth while Julius Malema's Economic Freedom Fighters could send 19 MPS to parliament.

In contrast, the Daily News on the eve of the July 31, 2013 made no prediction on the outcome of the plebiscite, instead screamed with a headline on 89 reasons why the electorate was not supposed to vote for President Mugabe and his Zanu-PF party, something that could be expected of a newsletter not a national paper, the Daily News purports to be.

Under the new media dispensation, it would be quite informing and revealing to hear how the Daily News would explain why it has stuck to the name MDC, only to differentiate them as mainstream and smaller, even when official communication within the parties, be it internal or external, points otherwise. The MDC formations, led by Messrs Mr Morgan Tsvangirai and Welshman Ncube, came to be officially known as MDC-T and MDC, respectively. They gave themselves these names and no one christened them. Why the Daily News did not adopt these new names remains an interesting subject for exploration.

In the post July 31, 2013 elections, after the electorate totally rejected the 89 reason not to vote for Zanu-PF, the Daily News has been screaming on how Zanu-PF would fail the economy leading to Tsvangirai's party taking over.

If the Daily News is not reporting on its anticipated Zanu-PF economic failures, it is writing about the MDC so-called rebels being led by Tendai Biti. It is Daily News that has named and popularised the Biti camp as being rebels. It has not created a space for the rebel camp to tell their own side of the story and let the people be the judge, opting instead to be both the judge and jury that has already condemned the Biti camp as mutineers. This is evidenced by the paper's headlines some of which are as follows:

 • 04 MAY 2014    'MDC rebels project doomed'
 • 01 MAY 2014   Biti refuses to go
 • 30 APRIL 2014  Biti booted out
 • 30 APRIL 2014  Workers rally behind Tsvangirai
 • 29 APRIL 2014  Pro-Tsvangirai group seizes assets
 • 29 APRIL 2014  MDC supporters back Tsvangirai  

The headlines clearly show that the Daily News is viciously fighting in Tsvangirai's corner and has indeed reduced itself to Tsvangirai's mouthpiece. On the alleged support of the workers to Tsvangirai, the Daily News quotes only the Japhet Moyo led ZCTU, and nothing from the Lovemore Matombo faction despite stubborn facts to the effect that the latter enjoys more support than the former in some provinces as evidenced by the turn outs at the May 1, 2014 Workers Day Celebrations.

 As for the seizure of assets, it is clear that not supporters, but officials are from the MDC-T security department at the instruction of the highest office are seizing property. It's only a newsletter that can try to sugarcoat such kind of truth from the public.

What are we missing here? What link do the owners of Daily News have to the MDC and what do they owe Tsvangirai in particular? Or could it be a question of brown envelop ruling the roost beyond the dictates of the paper's editorial policy.

In which case it could be true, then that the Daily News stories are written at Tsvangirai's Highlands residence by Luke Tamborinyoka and transmitted to Trust Towers where they are reproduced and published unedited.

If the owners of the Daily News are in for money through this project, it is mind-boggling why have they remained quite as their boys continue to bet on a perpetually and perennially horse. Yes, the project is on a decline and this is evidenced by their reduction in pagination. The Daily News is now a 24 pager, slowly but surely moving towards the size of the former prime minister's newsletter.

If indeed, Daily News is not Tsvangirai's newsletter, then shareholders should be worrying at the prospect of the unexpected happening one day. The depolarisation of the media, a phenomenon the Government seeks to achieve, does not mean undue tolerance to the whims and idiosyncrasies such as the daily dosages that we continue to see in the paper. This can be understood on the same basis of the arguments surrounding the cancellation of the press freedom commemorations for Harare.

All media practitioners are agreed that press freedom is a constitutional matter, and rightly so. But what does the same constitution say about unseating a unconstitutionally elected Government? And what does the Daily News think of their headlines below and the gist of their stories in light of incitement of an uprising by members of the public with a view to unseating a constitutionally elected Government?

 • 05 MAY 2014: Mugabe must retire: Tsvangirai
 • 02 MAY 2014: Tsvangirai calls for mass action
 • 27 APRIL 2014:We won't wait for 2018 polls: Tsvangirai

Reporting on a story and being a willing vassal and active conduit to the message being peddled in a given story are two distinct things, something that even reporters at the Daily News should be privy to. A different message is being sent when Thelma Chikwana, the Daily News political editor, writes a political story about Zanu-PF taking a particular slant. In the same vein when all reporters in the newsrooms, as has become the case with the Daily News, are turned into political fanatics, then an agenda has been set. This agenda is clearly being seen in the thread of deceit being created by stories written by the following Daily News reporters in the last 30 days or so. These are Fungi Kwaramba, Llyod Mbiba, Jeffrey Muvundusi, Helen Kadirire, Mugove Tafirenyika, Tendai Kamhungira, Sydney Saize and Godfrey Mtimba.

What if those being wished away - through the machinations of the Daily News in cahoots with Tsvangirai - decide to respond politically? President Mugabe and Zanu-PF could only respond by giving a directive to all Government departments to stop advertising and subscribing to the daily as a cost cutting measure to the "failing economy" that the paper is so fond of reporting on daily. This can also be extended to private companies with links to Zanu-PF, and one wonders where this would leave the Daily News.

It would indeed be bad to the growth of our media industry. But let us make sober self-introspection on this and other media related issues as we await the delayed Press Freedom Day commemorations for Harare.
 
Press Freedom should not be corrupted to mean freedom of journalists and their practice but also to mean freedom of those that are written about as well.