Youth Forum comments on Bashir visit

The Youth Forum supports the initiative by four journalists Stanley Gama, Stanley Kwenda Valentine Maponga and Jealous Mawarire to challenge the legality of Media and Information Commission.

This does not only go a long way in advocating for democracy and good governance but also to enlighten the citizenry on these critical issues. We also condemn the denial of access of these journalists to the just ended COMESA Summit at Victoria Falls which was generally described as a gathering of dictators and criminals.

Al-Beshir the president of Sudan under International Criminal Court warrant of arrest felt at home in the midst of fellow dictators.

We are also against the way this whole event was covered by the state media since it emphasized on the assumption of chairmanship by President Mugabe at the expense of critical issues such as the overview of the body, achievements, failures and the significance of the body.

As Youth Forum we urge the state media to be more informative and educative rather than being a mere propaganda conveyer belt of ZANU PF and the government. We are shocked by the continued bias of the state media and hate speech contrary to the dictates of the Global Political Agreement.

As Youth we expect to be allocated time to also air our views as we have always been advocating for to the relevant authorities to no avail. We strongly feel that the government must put its house in order in terms of restoring human rights and good governance so as to bring about donor and investor confidence.

Glob trotting with a begging bowl and calling for the removal of sanctions before addressing the pertinent issues as envisaged by the Global Political Agreement will only help to humiliate the government of Zimbabwe and the nation as a whole.

It also goes a step further to legitimize ZANU PF argument that it is the MDC which called for sanctions hence the need for it to take charge in calling them off.

Youth Forum strongly feels that there is a great need to make great Reserve Bank reforms before acquiring funds to resuscitate the economy. Issues to do with the constitution, national healing, media reforms and information regarding the inclusive government should not remain a preserve of those in government as what is currently prevailing.

Such issues must be community driven in the exact meaning of the word.
YOUTH FORUM INFORMATION AND PUBLICITY