Journos protest BAZ appointments

Journalists have addressed a letter to Speaker of House of Assembly, Lovemore Moyo, taking issue with the matter. BAZ will regulate the operations of the electronic, radio and television industry. Nominated to join the board are academic Vimbai Chivaura, publisher Benson Ntini, academic Vimbai Jirira, former ZBC executive Susan Makore, former publisher of the banned The Tribune newspaper, Kindness Paradza, and journalist Douglas Dhliwayo.

In his letter, MISA-Zimbabwes Chairperson Loughty Dube drew the Speakers attention to an advertisement placed in The Herald of 5 June 2009 by the Standing Rules and Orders Committee (SROC) inviting applicants for the ZMC and three other separate constitutional commissions, the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission, Zimbabwe Electoral Commission and the Anti-Corruption Commission. The advert never invited applications for the BAZ.

“Nothing in the wording of the advertisement suggested that this would in any way include interviews for prospective candidates to the Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe,” Dube’s letter stated. “Our reasonable assumption was that the call for applications was largely for constitutionally established Commissions and not necessarily statutory boards.

President of the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists, Matthew Takaona said there was a risk that Parliament did not get the right people for the highly technical broadcasting field.

“Broadcasting is a very technical field, you might find wrong people being put in the Broadcasting Authority Board. They risk getting people without the technical know-how,” he said.

The setting up of the media commission and the Broadcasting Authority board is touted as the long-awaited starting point in the planned democratisation of the media that has been under the fierce control of President Mugabe and Zanu (PF) for more than a decade.