AMH owner embarassed by NewsDay

Harare Bureau

ALPHA Media Holdings proprietor, Mr Trevor Ncube, on Tuesday felt embarrassed by a false report in one of his newspapers NewsDay and publicly apologised to Zimbabweans for the misinformation it published.

In its Tuesday edition, the NewsDay’s headline screamed, “RTGS$ to devalue further: RBZ”.

The story sensationally claimed the RBZ governor John Mangudya had told Parliament that the Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) dollar -Zimbabwe’s local electronic currency -was likely be devalued further by the time the tobacco auction floors open next week.

In a post on his Twitter handle, Mr Ncube wrote: “My heart breaks that @NewsDayZimbabwe got this story so wrong. This is an example of our blind spots/biases colouring our world view contributing to polarisation. While I maintain my newspapers are not me/I am not my newspapers – I am embarrassed. Sincere apologies to Zimbabwe.”

In his post, Mr Ncube posted two newspapers banners – that of The Chronicle and NewsDay.

The Chronicle, published by Zimpapers group and a sister paper to The Herald, had a banner reading, “RTGS Dollar to gain value” against the NewsDay’s “RTGS$ to Devalue further: RBZ”, generating controversy about reportage.

Some pseudo media analysts were quick to label The Chronicle story – which we also carried – as propaganda.

But Mr Ncube, in a moment of commedable candour – put the matter to bed when he chided his newspaper.

It has become tradition for privately owned newspapers in Zimbabwe to paint a gloomy picture on the country’s economic prospects and a taboo to publish anything deemed to be putting the ruling Zanu-PF Government and its programmes in good light.

In January and February, the private media were part of an ochestrated campaign of beaming bad coverage, some of it contrived, to attract sanctions on Zimbabwe by the West.