Feb 24, 2000
HARARE, Zimbabwe — Renewing his assault on Zimbabwe's independent press, President Robert Mugabe has charged that the country's non-official news media are being used by racist whites and the British government to undermine his increasingly authoritarian 19-year rule.
Mugabe used the televised speech to members of the ruling party's women's league last week to assail the press, asserting that independent newspapers were "planning to topple his government."
Opposition has been growing to Mugabe's rule during the past 12 months, with newspapers, trade unionists and civic groups holding him responsible for uncontrolled inflation, corruption and government mismanagement. Mugabe also is criticized for sending Zimbabwean troops to Congo to support the regime of President Laurent Kabila.
"We thought the snake had given up but now it is lifting up its head again," Mugabe said in his speech Aug. 20. Whites, he said, "have been working outside the country with the help of the British government."
Early this year, two journalists for the non-official weekly newspaper, the Standard, were arrested and tortured for reports about a suspected coup attempt by army officers.
When they were released, journalists Mark Chavunduka and Ray Choto bore marks they said came from cigarette burns and electric shocks. Their lawyer said the journalists were subjected to shocks on their genitals, hands and feet, and that their heads were submerged in drums of water in a suffocation torture method known as "the submarine."
The case took an intriguing turn when three of the country's top judges demanded that Mugabe prosecute security officials responsible for the torture. Mugabe, in turn, suggested that the critical judges resign.
The Standard, as well as the weekly Independent, belong to private companies in which their black editors and white managers have a large stake.
Mugabe's government has threatened legislation to ban foreign investment in the media. Another independent newspaper, the Daily News, is owned by a consortium of British Commonwealth media organizations and has been looking for local partners since its launch earlier this year.
All but 70,000 of former Rhodesia's 300,000 whites have left since independence in 1980. Most of Zimbabwe's 11 million people are black.
Earlier this month, Mugabe drew criticism from the Paris-based international media advocacy organization Reporters sans Frontières, for vetoing a measure to better protect press freedom. It was the first time Mugabe had ever rejected a law.
The legislation proposed to overhaul a legal remnant from the era of white rule that allows the government to imprison reporters and editors for stories that "imperil state security." The law was used to curb the guerrilla war that led to Zimbabwe's independence.
"The president is resorting to penalties designed to punish his own generation of nationalists in the 1960s," wrote the Zimbabwe Independent in a commentary article last week.
Mugabe's veto could be overridden with 100 votes in the 150-member Parliament. The 52-member Cabinet earlier this week voted Parliament a 182% salary increase, a decision some critics saw as an attempt to ensure their votes against a veto override.
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