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NewsDay

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Attack on journos intolerable

Opinion & Analysis
On Wednesday, Alpha Media Holdings (AMH) online reporter Tapiwa Zivira was detained by the police for four hours.

On Wednesday, Alpha Media Holdings (AMH) online reporter Tapiwa Zivira was detained by the police for four hours. He was being accused of recording video footage of their ongoing blitz against touts operating in Harare’s central business district.

Zivira sustained multiple body injuries, following the brutal attack and he was taken to Harare Central Police Station for interrogation. Police deleted his video recording and eventually released him without charge.

According to Zivira, police pounced on him as he was recording the raids and battered him with truncheons, accusing NewsDay of “writing negatively about their operations”.

This is the fourth incident involving harassment of journalists by law enforcement agents inside two months and this is worrisome.

In August, The Zimbabwe Mail photographer Angela Jimu was beaten up while photographing an MDC-T protest and last month, another The Zimbabwe Mail online editor Privilege Musvanhiri was harassed and assaulted by municipal police officers while filming the harassment of vendors in Harare.

A Zimpapers photojournalist, Justin Mutenda, was also recently stripped naked by State intelligence operatives at Harare International Airport while covering the departure of the Bangladesh national cricket team from Zimbabwe.

It is a fact that the police are mandated to enforce law and order in the country. But when they decide to attack and brutalise journalists performing their day-to-day duties, this raises a red flag. No doubt events of the last few months have left a lot of unanswered questions. One wonders what the police are trying to hide.

It is crucial for the police force to understand that journalists are mirrors of society that reflect what is happening in and around them.

The law enforcement agents must also note that they are part of that community and whatever they do in the public arena is bound to be exposed — good or bad.

Therefore, their heavy-handedness on journalists is in total violation of the media’s freedom to report; freedom of expression and freedom of information for the generality of the populace. This is not uncalled for in an independent Zimbabwe.

Journalists are concerned because the attack occurred hardly a week after First Lady Grace Mugabe threatened journalists for informing the country and the world at large about the goings-on in the ruling Zanu PF and her new role as the Women’s League-designate boss.

While the Press will acknowledge her views, Grace must, in the same breath, realise that it is inherent in journalists to interpret events as they unfold as long as they remain factual, ethical and professional and in the public interest. But her attacks could be interpreted to mean it is proper to attack journalists going about their day-to-day activities.

The attack on Zivira was absolutely overzealous and uncalled for, unprovoked and unwarranted. It is a bad reflection of the police as a law enforcement agency that is hard-handed and intolerant in its actions against journalists.

Any attack against journalists and media institutions — public or private — is intolerable and must be firmly punished because these people are out there to just report on what is happening.

Regrettably, the Committee to Project Journalists said that 40 journalist have been killed worldwide during the course of duty.