Zimbabwe

2009

  

Zimbabwe’s glimmer of hope for press freedom

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.

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Zimbabwe media lawyer free a day after arrest

We welcome good news from Zimbabwe today as authorities released Alec Muchadehama, one of many lawyers working in defense of persecuted journalists in that country.

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Reuters

Zimbabwe media defense lawyer arrested

New York, May 14, 2009–Police in Zimbabwe should immediately release Alec Muchadehama, left, a prominent human rights lawyer targeted for his work on behalf of journalist Anderson Shadreck Manyere and others, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

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IRIN

NABJ honors persecuted Zimbabwean journalist

On Thursday, the U.S.-based National Association of Black Journalists announced the winner of its 2009 Percy Qoboza Foreign Journalists Award: Zimbabwean journalist Anderson Shadreck Manyere. Half a world away, however, Manyere, left, lingered in a hospital in the capital, Harare, traumatized by nearly four months of imprisonment, according to his lawyer.

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Reuters

CPJ awardee Mtetwa faces possible arrest in Zimbabwe

New York, March 13, 2009–The Zimbabwean attorney general’s office should halt a baseless criminal investigation into human rights lawyer Beatrice Mtetwa, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

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Underground Zimbabwe: Interview with Robyn Kriel

Filmmaker Robyn Kriel, 25, from Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, spoke to PBS’ Wide Angle last week about the risks she took reporting from Zimbabwe in the lead-up to the country’s 2008 presidential election. Last April, CPJ closely followed the case of Kriel’s mother, Margaret Kriel, who was imprisoned for four days on accusations of “practicing journalism without accreditation.” You…

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CPJ urges Zimbabwe to improve media climate

Dear Prime Minister: The decision to form a unified government in Zimbabwe has created a welcome opportunity to address oppressive government decrees and media laws that have long stifled press freedom. Your party, the Movement for Democratic Change, has long made freedom of the press a central policy and you have repeatedly stated your aspirations to privatize the state-controlled media.

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In Text-Message Reporting, Opportunity and Risk

Using their cell phones, Africans are avid consumers of electronic information. For reporters, text messaging is an essential tool. It’s a brave (and risky) new world.  By Tom Rhodes

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Attacks on the Press in 2008: Zimbabwe

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…

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Q & A: Reporting in a ‘culture of fear’

Freelance journalist Frank Chikowore visited CPJ this week after receiving the Tully Center Free Speech Award at Syracuse University. Chikowore received the award for his brave, ongoing reporting on the crisis in Zimbabwe. He has worked for two newspapers in Zimbabwe, including The Nation and the Weekly Times, which was closed down in 2005.

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2009