25 May 2007

By Geoffrey Nyarota
 

TRADITIONALLY, Zimbabwe’s independent press has, as a matter of editorial policy, opposed the excesses of the government of President Robert Mugabe. Various independent newspapers have taken up the cudgels to fight for the restoration of full democracy to Zimbabwe.Privately owned newspapers have spearheaded the campaign against corruption, abuse of power, the breakdown in law and order, state-sponsored violence and the total lack of accountability and transparency in governance, particularly over the past decade or so. They have, by their very actions, therefore either overtly or covertly supported the political opposition movement.
 

The opposition parties, the Movement for Democratic Change mostly, and civil society organizations in ever increasing numbers have fought a similar campaign since relentless tyranny reared its ugly head, as the ruling elite abandoned its principled undertaking to achieve full freedom, peace and prosperity for the long-suffering citizens of Zimbabwe.

Up to the October 2005 split in the MDC most independent newspapers tacitly supported that opposition party. It is for that reason that President Mugabe and the then Minister of Information, Prof Jonathan Moyo mounted a vicious and ruthless campaign to silence The Daily News, The Financial Gazette, The Zimbabwe Independent and The Standard, which they publicly dismissed as mouthpieces of the opposition.

The deliberately orchestrated split within the MDC along essentially ethnic lines resulted in a somewhat polarised independent press, including on the Internet. It is arguable that the division was to some extent, along similar ethnic lines as well. While previously they were all aligned with the united MDC led by Morgan Tsvangirai, after the split some independent newspapers have clearly changed allegiance. Now while the majority of independent newspapers and websites campaign against the dictatorship of the Mugabe regime, some do so on the side of the mainstream Tsvangiari faction of the MDC, while others back the breakaway faction led by Prof Arthur Mutambara.

Mutambara was invited by Prof Welshman Ncube to assume leadership of that faction, but his leadership appears of late to be embroiled in prevarication. Some of those sections of the independent press that backed him have become openly hostile to him. When he was the flavour of the month they lashed out at anyone who dared to criticize Mutambara, however mildly. Now that he appears to have failed to satisfy whatever their expectations they now attack him viciously themselves.

The balance of newspapers and websites operating outside the control of government have tended to be either non-partisan or to align themselves with the mainstream Tsvangirai group. Both sides have been accused of political partisanship, as a result.
In the politics of the United States of America the endorsement of presidential candidates by major daily newspapers is a widely accepted political practice.

In the 2000 U.S. presidential election a total of 106 of the major daily newspapers endorsed Republican candidate George W. Bush, while only 52 backed Al Gore of the Democratic Party. Interestingly, among the newspapers that backed Gore were the nation’s leading and most influential dailies. They included the Baltimore Sun, Boston Globe, Detroit Free Press, New York Times, Philadelphia Inquirer and Washington Post.

The fact that Gore, the candidate endorsed by the most influential newspapers narrowly lost in a closely contested election added to the controversy of the poll, including allegations that extraneous factors might have determined the Bush victory. None of the 158 newspaper editors who endorsed a candidate or the hundreds of others who have done so thereafter in 2004 or since time immemorial in the Unites States was ever accused of promoting their own personal presidential ambitions through the mere act of adopting a politically partisan position in favour of one political party or another.

In the 2004 presidential election America’s most powerful newspapers again endorsed the losing candidate. The Washington Post, TheNew York Times, Boston Globe, The San Francisco Chronicle, and The Miami Herald all endorsed Democratic candidate John F. Kerry. In supporting Senator Kerry, The New York Times called him “a man with a strong moral core” and observed that the 2004 presidential election was mainly about President George W Bush's “disastrous tenure”.

Meanwhile, while endorsing President Bush The Chicago Tribune, the largest daily in America’s third-largest city, said President Bush had the ability and experience to deal with threats to the US security. Other papers that backed the incumbent president included the less influential Denver's Rocky Mountain News and The Dallas Morning News. Mr Bush secured a victory in another tightly run election.

The endorsement of Kerry by The Washington Post deserves closer scrutiny for evidence of how an important newspaper can seek to influence public opinion ahead of a presidential or other election. “Half the nation is passionately for George W. Bush and half passionately for John F. Kerry - or, at least, passionately against Mr Bush,” the Post said. “We find much to criticize in Mr Bush's term but also more than a few things to admire. We find much to admire in Mr Kerry's life of service, knowledge of the world and positions on a range of issues - but also some things that give us pause.

“On balance, though, we believe Mr Kerry, with his promise of resoluteness tempered by wisdom and open-mindedness, has staked a stronger claim on the nation's trust to lead for the next four years.”The Zimbabwe Times has often been accused of the crime of backing Tsvangirai. But the tacit endorsement of Tsvangirai by The Zimbabwe Times has been tempered by cautionary pragmatism. In my critique of Archbishop Pius Ncube two weeks ago I stated: “While Morgan Tsvangirai had certain shortcomings and was not as schooled or charismatic a politician as Mugabe, he was clearly the most popular opposition politician.”

In the past I have openly appealed to the MDC leader to indulge in realistic self-assessment and, should it occur to him that he has become the stumbling block or a liability to the progress or unity of Zimbabwe’s main opposition party, to place nation before self, while prescribing the most appropriate solution to the problem. When The Zimbabwe Times published an assessment of the potential of a generously long list of politicians with potential, however remote, to succeed Mugabe, Tsvangirai’s name did not appear at the top of that list.

In more open societies the role of the press in influencing political events, including the outcome of elections, is widely accepted. The role playing played by the independent press in nearly causing the downfall of Zanu-PF in 2000 cannot be overstated. Otherwise, how can the media campaign for an end to the dictatorship of a government in power without being somehow in support of the opposition as an alternative government?

Where several opposition parties vie for power individual media organizations should feel at liberty to promote the organisation they believe represents the best option as an alternative government. The Herald goes as far as to endorse a sitting government that has become unpopular and would lose any free and fair election, if it did not resort to violence and other unorthodox campaign strategies.

The crucial factor is that once an opposition party becomes the government of the day the press continues to play its watchdog role over the new ruling elite. The worst that can happen is that the opposition starts to believe that since they are campaigning to dislodge an authoritarian regime they should become sacred cows. That is part of the problem with Zanu-PF today. Mugabe believes since he dislodged our former oppressor Ian Smith we, as a nation, therefore, owe him a perpetual vote of gratitude.

The Zimbabwe Times will go out of its way to challenge any tell-tale signs of intolerance to criticism on the part of those who present themselves as our prospective leaders. Media organizations are normally expected to be non-partisan politically, for professional and ethical reasons. In the reality of present-day Zimbabwe, however, sections of the press are left with little option but to adopt strategies for survival against the machinations of a ruthless regime that maims and kills journalists while bombing printing presses for its own survival.

The government does this after building a massive media empire of its own, which the ruling party uses to influence public opinion and win general and presidential elections. The government has also enacted legislation such as the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) and the Public Order and Security Act (POSA), both of which render it difficult for the private press to operate professionally and effectively.

Since the split in the MDC an unhealthy tendency has crept into media practice, whereby certain forces have campaigned to build a halo around the persons of those very politicians who may have caused the split. A situation has now arisen whereby a section of the independent press will rise up in open condemnation of fellow journalists who criticize politicians such as Welshman Ncube and, surprisingly, even Jonathan Moyo, since his fallout with the Mugabe regime.

It is sad that while most media organizations challenge censorship by the Mugabe regime, journalists should now seek to censor each other. As I recently worked on an article on Archbishop Ncube I knew I was entering dangerous territory. But that did not deter me from raising what I genuinely believed were pertinent issues that Ncube, Zimbabwe and the foreign correspondents covering the country would in my humble opinion, benefit from.  

No journalist should subscribe to the notion that certain politicians or political activists are above criticism. -The Zimbabwe Times.

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