In a bid to avoid the crackdown on freedom of speech in their country, Zimbabwean journalists, lawyers and human rights activists have come up with an innovative plan to use the internet to get daily news to Zimbabweans.
They have created Zimonline — a website registered in South Africa and thus beyond the clutches of the Zimbabwean government and its restrictive media laws.
According to Zimonline spokesperson Daniel Molokela, a lawyer by profession, the team producing the site is based in both South Africa and Zimbabwe.
In an interview with the Mail & Guardian Online, Molokela said the objective of the Zimonline website is to provide Zimbabweans with information that he said “can’t be reported by state-owned media”.
Molokela said that the relaxed media laws in South Africa make it possible for Zimonline to operate, unlike in Zimbabwe. He noted that there are about two million Zimbabweans in South Africa — the largest Zimbabwean population in the world outside Zimbabwe.
“We believe South Africa is key to solving the situation in my country. We want to influence the thinking process of South Africans,” said Molokela.
He emphasised that Zimonline is not affiliated to any political party, but aims to play a role in the “democratisation of Zimbabwe”.
“We are determined to go beyond the Mugabe regime and MDC [the Movement for Democratic Change],” Molokela said.
The Harare-based The Standard last week reported that journalists for the site are “believed to be linked” to the banned Daily News and Daily News on Sunday. Molokela would not reveal the names of the journalists or the publications they previously worked for, saying Zimonline’s staff “is made up of former state and independent journalists”.
He said the majority of the publication’s journalists are based in Zimbabwe’s biggest cities — Bulawayo and the capital, Harare — but there is also an editorial team based in Johannesburg that edits the journalists’ stories.
Earlier this week, Allafrica.com reported that Sam Sipepa Nkomo, CEO of the company that publishes the Daily News, had distanced his company from Zimonline.
“I, as the chief executive officer of Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe [ANZ], wish to distance the ANZ or any of its staffers from the edition,” he said.
Molokela said Zimonline was very popular within the first week of its launch and that the traffic to the site has been “overwhelming”.
On Monday the website posted a message to its readers saying that its servers “could not cope” with the demand and that Zimonline will be increasing its capacity to ensure the site is faster.
As a result of the site’s high traffic, other website owners on the same internet service provider as Zimonline had “threatened to pull out” from the company that is serving them.
It is not the first time that a group of Zimbabwean journalists has registered an online paper in South Africa to avoid repressive media laws. After the Daily News was shut down it continued to publish for sometime via the web from South Africa.
Molokela also said that a group of Zimonline journalists is in the process of establishing the Zimbabwean News Service, a news agency that will work together with other publications to tell the real story of what is happening in Zimbabwe.
Zimonline