‘Media catalyst to national development’

*H.E. Edward Kallon*

From the outset, I would like to thank my brother, Deketeke, for welcoming me and the United Nations team for a timely discussion with the Zimpapers Group.  I am grateful for this opportunity to share perspectives on how best the UN and Zimpapers Group could work together to ensure development and humanitarian issues get adequate media coverage.

Allow me to congratulate you and your team for the successful launch of Zimpapers TV Network on the DSTV platform. I believe this additional asset will play a key role in engaging the Zimbabwean diaspora on the opportunities available for them to invest and participate in national development.

The UN Development System in Zimbabwe supports the existence of a strong media that provides accurate, timely and objective reporting on development, recovery and humanitarian issues.

Last month, I attended the UN-Media Workshop in Mutare and a subsequent field visit with media personnel to UN-supported development and recovery projects in Manicaland Province.

The initiative, which brought together the UN, Government, Development Partners, and the Media provided a strong reminder on the role of freedom of information and the media as a platform and moderator of information can play in inspiring public discourse in nation building and sustainable development.

The UN appreciates the critical role that media, such as Zimpapers Group, have played in addressing public health crises like the Covid-19 pandemic, countering hate speech, misinformation, and providing critical information on climatic disasters like Cyclone Idai and its impact; and in advancing national development within the framework of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

My message is simple, the UN is keen to enhance its working relationship with the Zimpapers Group and other private and public media outlets to strengthening public dialogue on national development.

Factual, objective, and regular information is powerful to counter hate speech, disinformation, misinformation. It is also a critical tool to advance peace, democracy, and human rights (social, economic, political, and cultural rights).

In doing so, the media should also consider focusing on the poor and most vulnerable – those people and those places that are normally invisible, that would normally be left behind in the development discourse.

The right to information and freedom of the media are basic human rights that we sometimes take for granted. Only when these rights are interfered with or curtailed, do we realise the gaping hole left behind and one which eventually impedes progress.

An open yet responsible information sharing regime, guaranteed by law, is an essential characteristic of people-centered democracy, peace, and development.

The responsible two-way flow of information helps citizens to articulate and exercise their rights and to make informed political and economic choices, and for the State to reach out, dialogue, receive feedback and provide a response. When practiced in this way, it is a win-win.

What happens without such freedoms? Citizens are unable to participate in the broader economic, social, and democratic governance of their community and country. There is no check to certain quarters wielding excessive powers, or on the levels of efficiency and effectiveness of development policies and programmes.

Institutions of the State and of civil society do not course correct as they have no mirror on what is going right and what is not. Information as the “oxygen of democracy” is not only essential for citizens in a democracy but is also an essential part of a good government.

A vibrant and accessible media that articulates and sets a positive agenda in the public space on development issues is, therefore, critical to advancing peace, equity and access to basic social and public services including protection.

The lives of the poor, and particularly women and girls in poor households, can be transformed by ensuring their access to information that protects their rights, ensures redress when wronged, and opens doors to development resources such as land, markets, and credit, which were previously not accessed.

Potential abusers are put on notice, as those who suffer from violence now know how to report, who to go to and how to seek redress. The right information at the right time can help re-balance much in society that is unjust or unequal, if the capacities and commitment to also ensure change and to respond is there.

I believe the media, particularly public media such as Zimpapers Group can play as information sharing moderators between public and leaders and ensure follow-up actions with policy and decision makers.

Allow me to note that the UN in Zimbabwe, in partnership with the Government has begun implementing the 2022 –2026 Zimbabwe UN Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework.

Through the Cooperation Framework and engaging various stakeholders including the media, the UN supports four key pillars, namely peace, prosperity, planet, and people.

Before I request my colleagues to provide brief highlights on each pillar allow me to reiterate that the UN values the strong partnership with Zimpapers Group and the media in general in advancing peace, social cohesion, inclusive development within the framework of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in Zimbabwe.