The issue
of freedom of expression and a functioning free media are very important to a
free society and therefore all those organised
and took part in the march and other activities on World
Press Freedom Day have the nation’s gratitude. Still one has to serious
question whether these events are saving any real purpose or, worse still, have
become counterproductive. Did the marchers and the nation at large learn
anything, anything at all, from the keynote speaker?
Deputy
Minister of Information, Media and Broadcasting Services, Supa Mandiwanzira told
us that aligning laws that affect the media in Zimbabwe needs wide stakeholder
consultations. So 34 years after independence the same regime is still talking
of aligning laws and of wider stakeholder consultations before we, the people, can
finally enjoy freedom of expression and have a free media!
“Press
freedom comes with responsible journalism and that is what we expect from media
practitioners. What we want to emphasise is that press freedom should be
celebrated on a daily basis and it should not be restricted to May 3,” said
Mandiwanzira. How patronising!
Was this
march meant to advance the nation’s cry for press freedom and liberty or to
grant the Deputy Minister a chance to remind us of his new elevated position
and give the organisers the chance to hobnob and grovel before him? The very
fact that all the Deputy Minister said on the day runs against the grain of everything
the World Press Freedom Day was set to achieve is irrelevant! Indeed the regime
has used the occasion to express platitudes on the subject so it can get
brownie points for saying the right things whilst doing nothing to end the
repression.
Zimbabwe
had many opportunities to dismantle the Zanu PF dictatorship, especially during
the GNU years; it failed to do so because of the breath-taking incompetence of the
MDC leaders. Freedom of expression is still on the national agenda because we
have a very repressive regime, yes but that is not all; we also have
organisation like Zimbabwe Union of Journalist (ZUJ) who members are more keen on
impress the regime than to see an end to the repression!
2 comments:
@ Joseph Whande
When MDC leaders failed to implement even one democratic reform Mugabe must have thanked his demonic gods, to whom he has sacrificed the over 30 000 innocent Zimbabweans he has murdered in his 34 years in power, because he know nothing was going to stop him rigging the elections. And he did just that, blatantly rig the elections.
But to be absolutely certain he election victory in the bag; Mugabe spent millions sprucing his image in the UK and USA; paid NIKUV, the Israeli company, US$ 13 million to corrupt the voters roll (a shoddy con-job that the has in fact become the smoking gun to the vote rigging that the tyrant has decided to hide it at all cost); mil-lions bribing election officials; millions to pay the hired rally crowds; millions on the bussed multiple voters; etc. He must have spent billions of dollars; money the nation did not have!
Indeed in his reckless spending to finance his vote rigging operations to get out of the political hole Mugabe was unwittingly digging an even deeper hole economic hole for himself. Since his re-election ten months ago Mugabe has since learnt that rigging the economic recovery is IMPOSSIBLE.
Zimbabwe is in this economic mess because of the 34 years of gross mismanage-ment, rampant corruption and the lawless looting that has scarred all would be investors away. The regime has stubbornly refused to address any of these issues which is why any money given the regime is bound to be wasted.
Mugabe's economic recovery plan in geared on getting the $27 billion for his ZimAsset plan but says nothing about addressing the mismanagement, corruption and looting. For ten months the begging bowl has remained mockingly empty; not even his old ally the Chinese were willing to contribute even one Yuan with which to rattle the bowl!
The EU's US$318 million will be the first significant pledge raising the regime's hopes that it can after all rig the economic recovery too! I say rig because without the reforms to end the mismanagement, corruption and looting there will be no recovery. The EU is aware of this too but they do not care; they want to re-engage with the Mugabe regime to get at Zimbabwe’s resources, especially the diamonds.
“Europe listens to the jingle of money, not to the cries of distress (of the millions of ordinary Zimbabweans who are the victims of this corrupt and murderous Mugabe regime),” as Joseph has so aptly put it!
What is so hypocritical in this is the EU is forcing member states like Greece and Spain to carryout economic reforms to end the mismanagement and waste that had crept up in their economies but is turning a blind eye to Mugabe’s mismanagement and corruption which are infinitely worse than that in Greece! Of course Zimbabwe can also have a competent and democratic government and the nation prosper; the EU is not giving us a chance to do so, period!
@ Maya Angelou
----------------
You, created only a little lower than
The angels, have crouched too long in
The bruising darkness,
Have lain too long
Face down in ignorance
………………..
History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, and if faced
With courage, need not be lived again
………………….
Do not be wedded forever
To fear, yoked eternally
To brutishness.
The horizon leans forward,
Offering you space to place new steps of change.
……………………….
Here on the pulse of this new day
You may have the grace to look up and out
And into your sister's eyes, into
Your brother's face, your country
And say simply
Very simply
With hope
Good morning.
She wrote in her epic poem the Pulse of Morning
RIP Sister Maya Angelou!
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