Journalists swarm Zimbabwe

Chronice Reporter
THE country’s harmonised elections have generated a lot of interest in the global media, with at least 200 regional and international journalists having flown into the country to cover the polls.On Tuesday afternoon, most of the foreign journalists who came from the five continents of the world, including local scribes, had an opportunity to interact with President Mugabe at a no-holds-barred Press conference held at State House in Harare which was beamed live by the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation.

In a statement, the Ministry of Media, Information and Publicity said it cleared 82 percent of all the foreign journalists who had expressed their interest to cover the historic harmonised elections.

A long list of foreign journalists in the hundreds, cleared to cover the elections includes: Al Jazeera Network (Qatar), Arise Television (Nigeria), ARD German TV and Radio (Germany), Asahi Shimbum Newspaper (Japan), Australian Broadcasting Corporation (Australia), British Broadcasting Corporation (United Kingdom), Canada Broadcasting Corporation, Cable News Network (USA), China Central Television (China), TV Continental (South Africa), Der Spiegel (Germany), Die Presse (Austria), Die Welt (Germany), Deutschlandradio (Germany) and Economist Magazine (United Kingdom).

Also cleared are Diplomats Extra Magazine (Nigeria), European Broadcasting Union (Belgium), Mmegi (Botswana), Nation (Malawi), Namibia Broadcasting Coproration (Namibia), eNews Channel Africa (South Africa), People’s Daily (China), Radio France International (France), TV Mozambique (Mozambique), Neue Zurcher Zeitung (Switzerland), MISNA Catholic News Agency (Italy), La Libre (Belgium), Kydo News (Japan), ITV News (United Kingdom), NRC (Netherlands), The New York Times (USA), South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), Sveriges Radio (Sweden), The Hindu (India), Telegraph (United Kingdom), TV2 Danmak (Denmark) and VRT (Netherlands) among others.

Meanwhile, pirate radio stations such as Voice of America’s Studio 7 which continuously disrespect the country’s laws by broadcasting illegally into the country, promoting hate speech and fomenting violence among peace loving citizens do not appear on the list of foreign media cleared to cover the harmonised elections.

“About 250 foreign journalists representing 94 different media organisations had applied to cover Zimbabwe’s harmonised elections.
“The applicants included foreign media crews of media organisations with duly accredited bureaus in Harare but who wanted to augment staff in order to be able to cover the country,” said the ministry.

The cleared foreign crews joined local journalists and locally-based and foreign based foreign media to cover the harmonised elections after being accredited by the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission.