The ManicaPost
Muchadura Dube
That wise old adage that the pen is mightier than the sword has significance to modern-day liberated Zimbabwe in multiple ways.
In one of the critical ways, the adage, which has withstood the test of time, has the sole and solid purpose of initiating and consolidating the nation’s socio-economic growth.
The fourth estate is a key pillar that should espouse values congruent to Zimbabwe’s unique developmental trajectory, which is anchored on firm local mass participation.
The media has a responsibility to tell a true and objective Zimbabwe story that inspires multitudes across the globe.
Zimbabweans are a resilient lot, judging by the depths from which they have arisen to claim their stake in the league of sovereign states. That is the Zimbabwe story. Therefore, the journalistic fraternity shoulders an enormous responsibility to explicitly support the people’s agenda.
Some sceptics might want to ask what the people’s agenda is. Simply put, it is the embodiment of the people’s aspirations, their values and expectations and the means by which these are articulated towards fruition.
The fourth estate has the onerous task to project this agenda in the simplest of terms for it to be a shared vision where the populace will consciously play their role.
Given the sensitivity of its critical role, the media has to be part of the greater community discourse by partnering Government through relaying messages that are pro-people.
In the Zimbabwean context, there is the State media and the private media. The dichotomy is a reflection of the diverse interest that the media represent. Whilst the State media has always identified with the interest of the populace, thus the poor and the marginalized, the private media has been rabidly critical and insolent of the values that bind Zimbabweans together.
In the case of these private media houses, theirs has been the case of the one bankrolling the piper picking the tune. Instead of being the ears and eyes of the people’s agenda, the private media has tended to major on trivialities that engender the narrow sectional interest of Zimbabwe’s erstwhile colonisers.
Mind you, these still bear ambition of monopolising the abundant resources that Zimbabwe is endowed with. In these parochial-minded social misfits masquerading as journalists, the imperialist has found willing stooges who are ready to discard the virtues of patriotic journalism for the mucky lucre in the form of the greenback.
A cursory glance of headlines of some private dailies will reveal mercenary tendencies, which have become the order of the day in the newsrooms.
The private media has the arduous task of assuming a Zimbabwe outlook, which has eluded it since the dawn of the country’s independence. Taking such a moral stance and route will only harness the hitherto untapped potential of indigenous Zimbabweans, which is necessary to initiate development.
For the nation to enter the critical economic take-off stage in its developmental endeavours, it requires the nation’s collective intellectual, social, economic and political acumen to extricate the nation from the economic quagmire.
At more than 90 percent literacy rate, the highest on the African continent, Zimbabweans have to rid themselves of the perennial African tag of being the white man’s Trojan horse.
World acclaimed reggae legend Robert Nesta Marley reasoned that “none but ourselves can free our minds.” As such, a robust and patriotic media, whose thrust is to ameliorate and proffer remedies to the people’s plight, can only drive this kind of enduring message home. It would be suicidal to have such a pivotal sector such as the media in alien control with no Zimbabwean values, as this would be a perfect recipe for disaster.
Lessons should be learnt from the Rwandan experience on how destructive the media could be if left in irresponsible hands.
In a heart-rending Rwandan experience, one of the broadcasters had the temerity to call for the total annihilation of one of the tribes.
I believe that the hidden foreign hand, whose destabilisation role in the Great Lakes region continues to haunt Africa to this day, was pervasive in the atrocities that rocked Rwanda. It only reminds Africans to be on guard against retrogressive elements who celebrate the misery of Africans
Suffice only to suggest that a journalist worth his salt, one with his country at heart, does not need to be schooled in the virtues of nationalism. The ruling party has the concept of the Herbert Chitepo School of Ideology, which will help in grounding citizens in firm national concepts that are sacred.
It is one thing to proffer constructive criticism to those who hold the levers of power, but quite another if this is steeped in utter disregard of the basic tenets of journalism. A purveyor of falsehood couched in the mantra of freedom of speech is unacceptable and whoever is found in breach has to be accountable.
Recently the Constitutional Court made a landmark ruling that removed from the nation’s legal landscape the law of criminal defamation.
There is consensus among all and sundry that this piece of legislation was draconian insofar as it restricted media function.
Such commitment by the various arms of the State should only breed confidence within the media sector and the society at large, given the permissible and robust debate that will be beneficial to the nation.
The clarion call for the fourth estate, whose pervasive influence can be the catalyst for economic growth, is to take on board the principles of objectivity and fairness when informing the nation.
A polarised media, devoid of constructive criticism, can only be an engine for destruction of gains achieved this far. The same applies to a partisan media that blinds itself to the diversity, which is inherent in a democratic country such as Zimbabwe.
One hopes that the media will turn over a new leaf to become a vital cog in the national discourse of economic growth with a human face.
Muchadura Dube is a Nyanga based farmer and political analyst.
