Three waves of media repression in Zimbabwe

ABSTRACT

This article seeks to highlight how the media – especially radio – have always been used in Zimbabwe to consolidate the power of the government. This invariably led to oppositional media emerging from outside the country, giving the populace access to alternative discourses from those churned out by state media. The response to the alternative media run by blacks led the Southern Rhodesian and Rhodesian regimes to come up with repressive legislation that criminalised these media. After independence the state media embarked on consolidating the status quo and eliminating some sectors of the community from coverage – a repeat of the past. Legislation inherited from Rhodesia continued to be used in independent Zimbabwe, where the criminalisation of alternative voices and limitations in access to alternative media are predominant. Such a scenario reveals that there have been three waves of media repression in Zimbabwe, from Southern Rhodesia to Rhodesia and then to independent Zimbabwe, to deny the media their independence.

Keywords:

• broadcasting
• clandestine
• diasporic
• dictatorial
• domination
• ideology
• indoctrinating
• repression

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Everette Ndlovu

EVERETTE NDLOVU is a media academic who draws on over 20 years’ experience as a media practitioner in radio, TV and print. He is an award-winning multi-documentary and feature producer, making films during his spare time under EN Media Productions. As a broadcaster, he is passionate about new media technologies and the impact of user-generated content, which forms part of alternative media. Dr Ndlovu has published journal articles on this topic. He presently lectures in new media and digital culture, alternative media, media institutions and ecologies, TV and film history and theory, media texts and audiences and global radio.