DENY the media regular updates and access to the ongoing talks in Zimbabwe and live with the consequences.
The parties to the negotiations in Harare will have to swallow whatever media speculation that comes with the talks, without any qualms. It is their fault.
Expecting the media to remain tight-lipped at such a crucial juncture is a no-brainer.
The media has been at the receiving end of abuse and criticism because of its speculation – speculation promoted by blackouts on the same media. Incomprehensible indeed!
With the speed culture of the digital age an insatiable appetite of the media has to be recognized, those who ignore or black out the media will have to live with the consequences. The world has moved on and traditional media outlets do not satisfy people’s desire for quick paced news. Our negotiators should know this.
Cyber reporting is no longer work in progress. It is here, it is alive and it will destroy those who try to run away from it, those who do not manage it responsibly.
Media is part of the political, social and economic ideological realm and it will exert pressures and pangs on policy makers and politicians, especially those who try to evade the qualms and concerns of that media, and its client - the people.
Ideology, policy making and political strategy have become more and more identical with the media and emerging media technologies and can no longer be ignored.
A media professional at one lecture said: “We (do) not just want a piece of the cake, but the whole bloody bakery.” True indeed.
When you make decisions that affect people’s lives and their only recourse in the democratic movement is involvement through the media, then expect the media to exert some kind of pressure.
No more patchwork, “no zvigamba”, but the full monty is what the media demands.
The public’s mentality, consciousness, attitudes, semiotic processes that will ultimately bring about social and political change, now all find expression in the media, especially in the post-modern era. The media will not compromise or self-marginalize in the democratic movement, but engage as a formidable social force.
To expect the Zimbabwean media to shut up until the big announcement is ill-advised. To then blame the media for speculation is myopic; especially with no regular official updates on the progress being made.
In line with civic journalistic values, the media will play a role in overcoming current social fragmentation and political polarization. And if politicians are, as they claim, bent on bridging the political, social and economic divide, then they should recognize the significance of, and respect the concerns and musings, an ever-inquisitive media.
Politicians who ignore the advances made in the media will have themselves to blame if they are destroyed by those advances.
People love the news, but pay extra and particular attention to bad, gloomy and disastrous news (e.g. news on wars, famine, etc. as opposed to news on someone winning the lottery).
Politicians should circumvent media provision of gloomy news, by providing the alternative news, in a timely fashion.
They should also not under-estimate the public’s insatiable appetite for gloomy, disastrous news, and the capacity of modern (post-modern) media to provide that news.
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