Women on the wayside
By Miriam Madziwa Posted Jul 1 2007
Tabitha Khumalo might be every Zimbabwean journalist’s dream interview. As vice president of the country’s main labor movement, she has information on labor issues and trends at her fingertips. The gender activist has initiated ways to solve basic problems for women, such as a fundraising campaign to get sanitary pads to Zimbabwean women who cannot afford to buy them due to biting economic hardship.
But despite all these credentials, very few Zimbabweans have read about her work in the local media. As a trade unionist and gender activist, she says she is perceived as an enemy of the state.
“Most of the coverage I have had during the past year has been in regional and international media,” Khumalo says. “The only time I was covered by the local media was when the government was accusing trade unionists of mismanagement.”
Poor coverage of Khumalo and other Zimbabwean women is a result of the country’s skewed media environment and editorial policies, which tend to ignore women as potential news sources. Zimbabwean feminist activist Everjoice Win sums up the scenario by saying: “Women hardly make the news, and the issues that concern them are not deemed newsworthy.”
Zimbabwe’s legislative and political environment has made practicing as a professional and ethical journalist difficult for all, especially women. In addition to battling each day to find interesting story ideas and sources brave enough to speak, journalists have the task of finding ways to circumvent repressive laws such as the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act and the Public Order and Security Act.
The AIPPA requires that both journalists and newspaper publishers register annually with the Media and Information Commission whose commissioners are handpicked by the government. Journalists can be imprisoned for up to two years if caught working without an MIC license, and even after meeting the set criteria and paying the mandatory registration fees, accreditation is not guaranteed. More frustrating still, a valid license does not guarantee journalists freedom from harassment as media organizations deemed critical of governmental policies are threatened, harassed and their employees arrested and assaulted. Such was the case with The Daily News, which was bombed, had its newspapers seized and copies destroyed before being shut down for failing to meet registration requirements under the AIPPA.
The country’s tense political and harsh economic environment has relegated stories that include the experiences of Khumalo and hundreds of other Zimbabwean women to the spike in most newsrooms.
Sibusisiwe Ndlovu, a freelance journalist in Bulawayo, says the argument of many male editors whose views hold sway is “why bother?”
“At a time when political tensions are high, who cares about the difficulties that women are facing?” she says of editors’ rationale. “Surely, it’s the bigger picture of the lives of Zimbabweans in general that sells?”
The country’s political situation has also made it hard for women to feel secure being quoted in news reports or to engage in activities that gain media attention. Women politicians Sekai Holland and Grace Kwinjeh were among a group beaten on March 11 while on their way to a national prayer meeting.
“We were assaulted, humiliated and demeaned in a way that was different from the way they demeaned the men,” Kwinjeh says.
Such experiences force many Zimbabwean women into silence.
Zimbabweans are not free to openly vent their frustrations at the economic and political situation. Jenni Williams is the leader of the group Women of Zimbabwe Arise. WOZA frequently stages protests against poor governance. She says WOZA women are routinely arrested, detained and harassed for taking to the streets.
Many Zimbabwean women fear that being quoted in the media will bring this kind of trouble to their doorstep. Trade unionist Khumalo says each time police find articles on the Internet in which she is quoted, she is taken in and questioned.
Often, journalists miss deadlines while desperately trying to get enough women to talk about mundane issues such as shortages and the high cost of contraceptives and sanitary products. Opposing government views is considered unpatriotic, and among poor rural women, such comments often lead to denial of food aid by government and ruling party ZANU PF officials.
Sylvia Moyo is a 53-year-old woman living in Nkayi, a rural district in the southern half of Zimbabwe. She supports the opposition party, Movement for Democratic Change. She says her political affiliation makes it difficult for her to feed her family with the staple food, sadza, which is made from ground corn.
“I cannot buy maize from the local Grain Marketing Board depot because there is a lot of favoritism, which is all political,” explains Moyo. “The GMB officials want to know which party you support, and they tell us openly that they won’t sell maize to opposition party supporters.”
This reluctance of sources to talk and the lack of sufficient interest in stories about women collude to keep their voices out of the Zimbabwean media. The stories are considered “soft topics” that do not stimulate reader interest and advertisers’ attention.
Other factors contributing to the muting of women’s voices are poor remuneration and dangerous working conditions for Zimbabwean journalists.
News organizations cannot afford to pay reporters salaries that cover their basic needs. They often fail to cover transport and accommodation costs that encourage reporters to travel extensively to find stories that feature women equally. Instead, journalists hitchhike or request rides from sources with government departments and non-government organizations, for example, who often expect favorable coverage in return. Such arrangements often leave journalists in a quandary over sources.
Kholiwe Nyoni is a trained journalist who now works as a program officer for a civic organization.
She concedes that financial considerations greatly influenced her decision not to work for mainstream media outlets. Salaries in both state- and privately owned media are low. On average, those working in state media institutions earn 250,000 Zimbabwe dollars [USD $8] a month. The amount is not even enough to cover transport to and from work. Although men and women with similar qualifications and experience earn the same, male reporters tend to take home more money. The additional cash is earned from out-of-station allowances that men receive because they are frequently assigned to travel before their female colleagues.
Additionally, the prevailing atmosphere of fear and apprehension makes it worse for women to practice journalism. How do reporters leave the house to cover a breaking story when they fear they might end up in a filthy police cell after being arrested for reporting without a license? And what’s more, the money they earn is not even enough to pay their rent or bail. In April, freelance reporter Gift Phiri was picked up by police while shopping during a weekend. He was detained and tortured before being brought to court. He is being charged with practicing without accreditation.
Given such a scenario, women are not staying in mainstream media. Many are opting instead for jobs in public relations, where conditions are safer and salaries are better. As a result, few women are left in the media to give their colleagues a voice except a few young reporters who lack the experience to argue for their stories featuring women to be published or aired.
“I cannot practice as a journalist,” says Kholiwe Nyoni. “It will get me nowhere. As a woman, I saw I would remain at the bottom of the newsroom hierarchy because there is not much room for promotion of women.”
A baseline survey conducted by a regional media organization, Genderlinks, found that both state- and privately-owned media houses are not hiring equal numbers of women and men. The survey found that in most newsrooms, there are four men for every woman hired.
Consequently, there are few seasoned women journalists who have the experience, connections and aspirations to be publishers or broadcasters in their own right and change the media landscape from the top down. The provisions of AIPPA make it nearly impossible for even men to establish media houses, with restrictions such as blocking foreigners from investing in media houses. This leaves women with fewer resources at an even greater disadvantage when taken into account the odds already stacked against them socially, politically and economically. And until the situation changes, the concerns and aspirations of Zimbabwean women will remain underreported.