Wilf Mbanga on journalism in Zimbabwe

Wilf Mbanga, founder and publisher of The Zimbabwean, talks in The Guardian today about how Mugabe’s regime deal with independent journalists. And how they have started threatening their children. Wilf knows all too well the threats journalists face in Zimbabwe. A 14 tonne truck carrying 60,000 copies of his newspaper was attacked in May, 2008,

This year’s general and presidential election, which Mugabe lost to the MDC and Morgan Tsvangirai, made the previous decade’s media repression look like a grandmothers’ tea party. The state-controlled media went into overdrive – its ham-fisted spin and sickeningly blatant deception would have been laughable had it not been so tragic. link

Wilf is a regular at Frontline Club events with an Africa and Zimbabwe focus.