The Zimbabwe government has appointed former newscaster Godfrey Majonga to head the country’s newly formed media regulator.
President Robert Mugabe’s chief secretary Misheck Sibanda said Majonga will chair the Zimbabwe Media Commission (ZMC), a constitutional body to be responsible for regulating the media.
Majonga’s deputy will be Nqobile Nyathi, a journalism lecturer at the National University of Science and Technology and former news editor of the business weekly, the Financial Gazette.
Other members of the commission include veteran journalist Henry Muradzikwa, former diplomat Chris Mutsvangwa and Matthew Takaona, immediate past president of the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists.
The ZMC is the successor to the Media and Information Commission (MIC) which was abolished in 2008 and was accused of partisan application of the country’s tough media laws.
The MIC was responsible for the closure of at least four privately run newspapers since 2003 and the arrest of journalists working for the private media.
Sibanda also announced the names of members of the newly reconstituted Zimbabwe Electoral Commission and the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission.
Source African Press Agency
