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The Zimbabwe Media Commission has admitted that it is partly to blame for the perceived drop in journalistic standards in the country, as it has not operationalised a media council that would regulate conduct of journalists. There has been growing concern about the standards of journalism in Zimbabwe and this week the chairman of the Information and Media Panel of Inquiry Geoff Nyarota pointed an accusing finger at regulatory bodies for what he perceived as ethical failures.
The Government has also expressed disquiet over unethical media practice, especially the private media’s abuse of the First Family. A member of the ZMC, Commissioner Matthew Takaona, who is also a seasoned journalist, yesterday said the ZMC had not taken off despite having members appointed.
“The law provides that the Zimbabwe Media Commission must appoint a Zimbabwe Media Council. The Zimbabwe Media Council is a board. That board must come up with a code of conduct that governs the way that journalists practice. So we must have a media council comprising of 11 people and those people must be drawn from across the board and must be representative of our society. They must be media representatives, labour and citizens,” said Mr Takaona.
“That council is there: it was appointed about three or four years back. But unfortunately I hope you understand the economic situation in our country. Because of that this media council never took off. Actually the council was under Commissioner Henry Muradzikwa who is a fellow journalist, he has worked as an editor for The Herald, he was an editor-in-chief for Ziana and also CEO for ZBC; he is a veteran journalist.
“He is the one in charge of that media council, but unfortunately there are officially no resources for us to operationalise that. Members are there, they have been appointed but they have not been able to do anything because of this financial difficulty.”
A voluntary media council is in place, but Mr Takaona noted that some of the organisations that subscribed to the ZMC were some of the worst flouters of ethical journalists. He noted that attempts to self-regulate in the media had not been successful, but believed that in time this would come around. The veteran journalist was wary of more legislation or regulation to the media saying such laws were liable to abuse.
“When we talk about the media we are dealing with a very delicate issue,” he said.
“When we want to control speech we don’t want to be careless about it, otherwise you really stifle people from expressing themselves. And you don’t want such laws where you stifle. We don’t want more laws and more laws and regulation, because today you have good governance that will use those laws in a responsible manner but tomorrow you will have a rogue government that can come out and abuse those laws to the detriment of media. So I think the best way forward is engagement and we can’t just run by laws, rules and so forth. “We are a responsible society, we have responsible journalists, we have educated journalists and I think there is a way to go without the promulgation of new laws,” he said.
Mr Takaona decried the overbearing influence of politicians and politically interested shareholders saying this, in the last 15 years, had militated against good journalistic practices.
Online Reporter