Download - Media Institute of Southern Africa

ZIMBABWE
State of the media in Southern Africa 2002
an orchestrated move by the Zimbabwean
authorities to persist with
Thornycroft’s harassment. The allegation
that she is a “foreign” citizen is
likely to be trumped up in an effort to
silence the reporter.
The government of Zimbabwe
promulgated a controversial citizenship
law before the March presidential
elections that demands that all Zimbabweans
born of parents originally
not from Zimbabwe renounce their
“foreign citizenship”, in order for them
to be able to vote and become full citizens
of Zimbabwe.
This law was largely seen as targeting
the large farm workers’ community,
many of them originally
from Malawi, Zambia and Mozambique,
and the white community.
These groups are largely seen as
sympathetic to the opposition,
Movement for Democratic Change.
Thousands of people born in Zimbabwe
had their citizenship revoked
and many were unable to vote on the
basis of this law.
By bringing the question of
Thornycroft’s citizenship into this matter,
Zimbabwean authorities seem determined
to “find” a charge against the
reporter, after having failed to formally
charge her with any wrongdoing.
The intelligence services, in collaboration
with the police, arrested
Thornycroft in Chimanimani on
Wednesday March 27. She was released
on Sunday March 31, after a
high court judgement was sought for
her release.
The High Court ordered that she be
released as the police had failed to formally
charge her. The police can only
go by way of summons if they are still
interested in pursuing the matter.
ALERT
DATE: 2002-04-09
PERSON(S): Calvin Dondo,
Edwina Spicer, Newton Spicer
VIOLATION(S): Detained, censored,
beaten
Edwina and Newton Spicer, of Spicer
Productions, were arrested on Saturday
April 6, 2002, while covering the
National Constitutional Assembly
(NCA) organised demonstration.
They were released four hours after
being detained. Photographer Calvin
Dondo, of the Pan African News
Agency, was also beaten up and arrested
and had his camera seized by
the police.
Edwina Spicer told MISA-Zimbabwe
that the police arrested them while
they were in the process of video recording
the demonstration. “An officer
jumped out of the police vehicle, came
over to us and demanded to know why
we were taking pictures of the demonstration.
He further demanded that
we go to the Central Police Station and
deployed two officers to our car to accompany
us. I had been on the phone
to fellow journalists at the time, so the
news of our arrest spread fast,” said
Spicer.
At the Central Police Station, the
three journalists were grouped together
with arrested demonstrators. The police
questioned them about accreditation.
“We produced our Ministry of Information
accreditation cards, due to
expire on December 31, 2002. We
were told that these would be cancelled
by the Ministry on Monday morning
[April] 9 as we had been ‘caught filming
an illegal demonstration’ and that
this was not allowed,” continued
So This Is Democracy? 207