“We are going to clean up AIPPA in line with the constitution and findings of IMPI (the Information and Media Panel of Inquiry he set up last year). You will see major improvements to AIPPA which might even see a replacement thereof,” he said last week.
Addressing the Zimbabwe National Editors Forum (Zinef) annual general meeting he also contradicted a recent announcement by the justice ministry that it might bring back the defamation law nullified by the courts last year.
The law had been widely used by politicians and other influential people used to persecute media practitioners.
Moyo’s remarks were seen as a dig at Emmerson Mnangagwa who, despite being elevated to the position of vice president in December, still heads the justice ministry. “We are not going back on the defamation law and there is no need for journalists to be worried. I am in charge of the administration of the Act relating to defamation and I am telling you that we are moving forward. As for those that think we will go back, it’s their own problem,” said Moyo.
The IMPI was set up in 2014 at the behest of Moyo, who critics say wants to use the panel to further his own political ambitions by endearing himself with the media. Some observers from the ruling Zanu (PF), have also rapped the panel and at one time attempted to stop it.
AIPPA, Moyo’s brainchild, was promulgated in 2002, just before the presidential elections which President Robert Mugabe controversially won against Morgan Tsvangirai of the MDC.
Moyo urged journalists to question how the Zimbabwe Media Commission (ZMC) was using the funds it was receiving from journalists’ accreditation payments. While ZMC was created by AIPPA, Moyo is reported to have developed a dislike for the statutory body since independent commissioners were brought on board.
He said he feared that the newspaper industry would soon collapse and acknowledged that the media was facing acute viability problems.
Post published in: News