Wilf Mbanga

New York, November 11, 2010--Zimbabwean police should withdraw an arrest warrant issued last week against exiled editor Wilf Mbanga concerning a 2008 story about the murder of an election official, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

By Tom Rhodes

High numbers of local journalists have fled several African countries in recent years after being assaulted, threatened, or imprisoned, leaving a deep void in professional reporting. The starkest examples are in the Horn of Africa nations of Somalia, Ethiopia, and Eritrea, where dozens of journalists have been forced into exile. Zimbabwe, Rwanda, and the Gambia have also lost large segments of the local press corps in the face of intimidation and violence.

Top Developments
• Government fails to implement reforms allowing private media to operate.
• Two international broadcasters allowed to resume operation.

New York, January 20, 2010—Freelance journalist Stanley Kwenda, left, a contributor to the private weekly The Zimbabwean, fled the country on Friday after he said he received a telephone threat from a high-ranking police officer, according to the paper’s editor, Wilf Mbanga. 

Some Zimbabwean journalists say 2003 was the most repressive year for independent journalists. Others claim it was 2008. But no one is yet claiming it was 2009 after a recent series of positive developments for the country's media.

President Robert Mugabe and his ZANU-PF party, startled by balloting that threatened their 28-year rule, unleashed a brutal crackdown on opposition supporters and the press. Veteran journalist Geoff Hill described the weeks between the first round of voting in March and a runoff in June as “the worst time for journalists in Zimbabwe’s history,” a view expressed by numerous foreign and local reporters.

The Hong Kong police announced on Monday they would investigate the alleged assault on photographer Richard Jones by Zimbabwe's first lady, Grace Mugabe, while she was on vacation. On January 15, Jones claimed Mugabe ordered her bodyguard to hold the photographer down while she punched him repeatedly in the face near Hong Kong's exclusive Shangri-la Hotel, according to wire reports. 

Robert Mugabe's government has jailed reporters without basis, intimidated sources, and obstructed distribution of independent news.

New York, May 27, 2008--CPJ condemns the beating of distributors for private weekly The Zimbabwean on Sunday last week. Unknown assailants hijacked and burned down the distributors' truck, which was carrying 60,000 copies of the paper.  "Attacking these media workers and burning newspapers is nothing but brutal censorship of one of the country's last remaining independent news outlets," said CPJ's Africa Program Coordinator, Tom Rhodes. "We encourage the police, who have already opened an investigation into this attack, to find those responsible and bring them to justice as soon as possible in order to send a signal that violence against the press will not be tolerated."