By Qhubani Moyo
The attack on the Secretary General of the MDC-N Priscillar Misihairabwi-Mushonga by Conway Tutani, the NewsDay senior sub editor and columnist on November 4, 2011, is totally unacceptable and unjustified.
The attack arises from a newspaper article that falsely accuses Misihairabwi-Musonga of not being sensitive to the illness of Deputy Prime Minister Thokozani Khuphe, yet it is a matter of the public record that she has been genuinely sympathetic to Khuphe, with whom she has been in the trenches together for a long time both as a personal friend and political comrade.
The story that came out of the Chronicle has been proven to be a total fabrication. In their own words, the Chronicle have made an apology for their lie. In page two of the Thursday, Novemeber 2, edition the Chronicle, the newspaper says:
“In a story entitled ‘MP calls for bedroom sanctions’ published in the Chronicle of Tuesday, November 2, 2011, we quoted the MDC secretary general as having blasted people of Matabeleland as lacking political ambition. We erroneously quoted her as having said ‘something is wrong with the people from this region. Why do you always fight to become deputies to Shonas? Look at Khuphe the MDC deputy president has lost all her hair fighting to be Tsvangirai’s deputy.’ These words were never said by Mrs Misihairabwi Mushonga and we unreservedly apologise for the anguish and anxiety that might be caused by her.”
So even after the Chronicle has made such a retraction, Tutani of the NewsDay still wants to make a big issue out of a lie and thus promote alarm and despondency. It is common cause that Tutani, whose articles are limited in substance, wants to behave like a guerrilla columnist attacking everyone left right and centre and denying them the right to a response. Such kind of abuse of media space by people like Tutani flies in the face of the very struggles that Zimbabweans went to trenches for to ensure that we enjoy media freedom and plurality.
If people like Tutani would pound on other Zimbabweans on his columns every Friday and fail to give them the space to respond, where then is professionalism in their publications? Tutani should give himself time to think before putting pen to paper otherwise he is a big disgrace to the NewsDay. I am surprised that Brian Mangwende, an experienced editor, would allow the newspaper to have a one way engagement . I think it’s time that he makes a self-introspection and realises that it does not help his paper to grow if he makes it a conveyor belt of one section of ideas and shuts out all other ideas.
I find it strange that Tutani has found it relevant to fuel a discussion over an issue that has been closed, which was proved a lie the moment the first offending Chronicle publication flew off the printing press.
Tutani wants to incite women’s groups to do something about nothing. If people have nothing to write, they should not just fulfil a fixture. The writings that come to the public space should clearly be of value and based on facts and not this ranting by Tutani. People like Tutani who hate Misihairabwi-Mushonga for being resolute in her pronouncements that all regions should get equal share from the national cake thought they had for the first time caught her offside and thus wanted to use the allegations to crucify her.
Three weeks ago, I challenged Tutani to publish an article that responded to issues he raised in his column on regionalism and up to now he has not. All he could do was to send me an email trying to patronise me and playing a tribal card by telling me that he is of Nguni origin. If he is Nguni, so what?
The Voluntary Media Council, JOMIC and the Zimbabwe Media Commission are definitely going to receive a complaint from us about Tutani and NewsDay’s irresponsible behaviour.
Qhubani Moyo is the National Organising Secretary of the smaller faction of the MDC led by Professor Welshman Ncube
