A daily paper that was widely rumoured to have been taken over by Zimbabwe’s secret service has stopped publishing, it emerged on Friday.
The Daily Mirror, originally a semi-private paper that was owned by moderate ruling party member and intellectual Ibbo Mandaza has not published an edition since Tuesday.
Jonathan Kadzura, the board chairperson of the Zimbabwe Mirror Newspapers Group, told the official Herald newspaper that the company had temporarily suspended operations due to shortages of newsprint.
”Currently we are working on building up adequate stocks for newsprint. We will not rush to print until we have managed to secure enough paper,” Kadzura said.
But reports have suggested the group, which publishes both the Mirror and its sister paper, the Sunday Mirror, is in serious financial difficulty.
Some journalists at the paper are reported not to have received their salaries for January or February.
Control of the paper was wrested from Mandaza by the Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) in 2005, the private Zimbabwe Independent claims.
Since then it has been in serious financial difficulty.
Zimbabwe’s private press has been under serious threat since President Robert Mugabe’s government passed the contentious Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act in 2002.
Since then four newspapers have been closed down, including the popular Daily News.
The secretary general of the Zimbabwe Union of Journalists (ZUJ) has bemoaned the fate of journalists at the Daily Mirror.
It’s a result of government meddling in matters that should be entirely private, Foster Dongozi told the Zimbabwe Independent on Friday. — Sapa-dpa